For years, Kim Moy cared for her kids and husband, while helping to care for her parents – an experience she describes as being in a “pressure cooker.” Being a caregiver to any loved one can be emotionally draining, but caring for a spouse can be a whole new level of lonely. In our final conversation of the season, Kim talks about the tradeoffs of being a spousal caregiver, grieving the loss of someone who’s still there, and how she’s learned to let go of the way things used to be.
How can a family caregiver look after her loved ones and herself while navigating a broken healthcare system? Renee Hanania has been advocating for her son Branden to receive care for his disability under Medicaid, piecing together a “care village” for him and his complex needs. All the while, she’s also been battling her own health concern: stage four breast cancer.
One in six Americans is over age 65, and that number is only going to climb in the next few decades. So how can we collectively prepare for this elder boom? Ai-jen Poo is president of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, and she thinks this is our golden opportunity to finally give caregivers their due. We hear about why we need to expand Medicaid access, improve job conditions for care workers, and see aging as a gift, not a crisis. We also talk to professional home care worker Katrina Mouzon about the challenges facing care workers today.
A big chunk of family caregivers in this country are part of the “sandwich generation” – people caring for young children and aging parents at the same time. Robert Ingenito was one of them. After caring for his dad and raising his young daughter while working, Robert came to a breaking point. He decided to move his dad to an assisted living facility. It wasn’t an easy decision, and it’s one he still grapples with today.
As someone living with HIV, Vince Crisostomo couldn’t imagine aging past thirty, let alone getting old enough to care for his parents. But when the time came to look after them, Vince embraced it, especially after years of caregiving for...
When Jessica Guthrie became a caregiver at age 26, her life turned upside down. Her career, friendships, and love life went on the back burner as she prioritized caring for her mom, who has Alzheimer’s disease. Over nine years of caregiving, she’s faced burnout, medical racism, and the isolation of doing it all alone. But despite the challenges, Jessica finds power in the small moments she still has with her mom, and the community of Black caregivers she’s found on social media.
Poet and artist Yosimar Reyes moved home to take care of his grandmother during the pandemic. Sometimes he cries in his car from the stress and pressure of caregiving. But he also knows how lost he’d be without her. In this beautiful and honest conversation, Yosimar shares how he supports his 90-year-old grandmother – financially, mentally, and emotionally.
When you’re caring for an aging parent, you want the best care possible. But what does that care cost? And who pays for it? AARP’s caregiving expert Amy Goyer struggled financially to give her parents the best care possible and even ended up filing for bankruptcy. Despite this, Amy looks back on the joy of caregiving and celebrating the wins.
Why are millions of us – kids included – losing Medicaid coverage, oftentimes by accident? And how can we get it back? We’ll answer these questions with Medicaid expert Joan Alker, and hear Litha’s story – an Arkansas resident who lost coverage for five months, all while coping with life-threatening kidney failure.
One year after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, we sit down with two women working in the reproductive rights space to talk about what has changed, and what’s still to come.