← Before We Go
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- [00:02]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
So I want to take you back to a very specific time.
- [00:05]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Okay.
- [00:06]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
It's 2009. You're living in LA, working on a hit show.
- [00:10]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Am I?
- [00:11]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Weren't you?
- [00:12]
AI Jen Poo
Was it a hit?
- [00:13]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yvette Nicole Brown is an Emmy nominated actress known for her work as Shirley Bennett on the NBC sitcom Community.
- [00:20]
Yvette Nicole Brown
This isn't even the only study group I've had this year. You see those ladies over there used to be in their group till they kicked me out. They called me Tatalina. Okay. No, I'm kidding. I always joke like that because Community, we had to fight for every viewer we got. But, okay, yes, I'm working on. Let's go. Okay, I'm sorry.
- [00:33]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Every Sunday before her long week of shooting the show, Yvette would call her dad back in Ohio. And when did you first feel like something wasn't quite right with him?
- [00:45]
Yvette Nicole Brown
You know, it actually wasn't the calls for me, because what I've learned about dementia is especially in the early stages of dementia, they can hold it together really well. They know that they're going to talk to you and the calls are, what, maybe an hour? So in an hour, if you repeat yourself a couple of times, it doesn't really resonate as much. Right.
- [01:04]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yvette's first clue that there was something wrong with her dad happened when Community was on hiatus and she flew to Cleveland to visit him.
- [01:12]
Yvette Nicole Brown
We were going to be meeting at my Aunt Mickey's house, may she rest in peace. And my dad got lost coming to my auntie's house. And he had been coming to my auntie's house for 40 years. And when I tell you it was a straight shot from his house to her house. It was like one street, make a right and then a left. I had never known my dad not to know what to do, what to say, where to be. And so for him to call me and go, yvette, I don't know where I am. I don't know how I got on this street. And I don't. You know, that was like, what is happening? After that experience, you know, there were times when he would call and say that something had happened at his job and he would look on the. He worked at a school, at a middle school. He would look on the cameras and find out that he was the one that put something somewhere that no one could find. He'd see himself rolling the trash can somewhere or see himself doing something in the boiler room or whatever and not realize that he had done it. Like he was losing time. And so that was When I was like, oh, God, something's going on with my father. So by the time he was gearing up to retire, I was like, well, Daddy, you know, you're gonna retire. You should just come out here. I don't know, Yvette. And then one day, when we started talking more about the issues he was having, I said to him one day, well, daddy, why don't you just move out to LA and let me take care of you? And he said, you know, Yvette, that don't sound like a bad idea. I said, okay, dad, Bye. And I hung up. Because my thought was, he said, yes, I got it, you got it. He said it. And then I just mentally started figuring out, when can I get him? How can I get him? What will it take?
- [02:40]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yvette was wrapping up filming the fifth season of Community, and producers had told the cast that NBC was canceling the show. But Yvette wasn't really thinking about that. Her biggest worry was her father.
- [02:52]
Yvette Nicole Brown
We finished the season on a Friday, and by Sunday, I was in Cleveland getting him.
- [03:01]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
What did you find when you got there? What was the state of things?
- [03:04]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Oh, it was bad. So my dad, he was retired, so he was just in his house, and it was just hoarded. Not hoarded like hoarders, but hoarded in. In a way that I had never seen my dad's house. So, like, stacks of books. He would go to Barnes and Noble and buy a whole bunch of books, but he wouldn't read them, so they'd be stacked up or. He was a Chipotle guy. He loved that Chipotle bowl. So there was, like, all of these Chipotle containers that he had washed and cleaned, but then he stacked them. So instead of throwing them out, they were clean, but they were just stacked high, or a lot of paper bags neatly folded, stacked high. It was weird how it manifested for him. And he looked like Rip Van Winkle. Like, he had this long white beard and long hair because he hadn't been going to the barbershop. So it was literally like finding Father time. Thankfully, my cousins had been there, so they had been, you know, bringing him food and checking on him. And he had a wonderful neighbor, Ms. Pearl, who would bring him over for dinner every so often or bring food to him. So he was healthy, he was eating, and he had shelter and he was okay, but he just looked like he wasn't taking care of himself. You know, nails were long, hair was long, he was clean, but he just didn't know that he needed to get his hair Cut. It was weird. It was so weird seeing him. Like, I'd never seen him like that in my life. Oh, I bet that was scary. It was really scary. But then again, it was also. It was also comforting in a way because I was like, this is the worst you will ever look. This is the worst your house will ever look. This is the longest your nails will ever be. Like, we about to get this together. I'm coming in at the right time. We're gonna get you home and get you together. So I saw it as a confirmation that he really did need me.
- [04:47]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Was there ever a part of you, like, deep down that thought, you know, I'm overwhelmed, I'm busy, maybe I'd just be easier to find a care facility for him. What helped you to choose that harder path?
- [05:01]
Yvette Nicole Brown
You know, one. I never saw it as a harder path. I really felt like the harder thing for me would be for my dad to be in someone else's care in some God awful nursing home where he was just a number. I knew that he would not thrive in Ohio in a nursing home where I would only be able to go see him once a year or twice a year when they would be on their best behavior, you know. So for me, it was not a difficult decision. And I realize now, 12 years later, that every big decision I've made in my life, I've made it without thinking of the cost. Like, well, where could I be now? Or maybe my career could have been. I've never thought about roles I missed out on or opportunities I missed out on or I've never thought about it. Family comes first. People comes first. I think what's happening in this world right now, and especially in this nation, is happening because people prioritize money and power and things over people. People are important whether they are born here or not, whether they love the way you love or not, whether they look the way you look or not. People are important. And so letting go of a financial opportunity or career opportunity with the takeaway being that I get to be there for my father or for a friend or for my now husband, or even for my dog. Easy decision.
- [06:35]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Instead of putting her father in the care of strangers, Yvette became her father's caregiver. Depending on how you count, there are between 63 and 105 million family caregivers in the United States. It's a lonely job and often a thankless one. But Yvette and others are trying to Change that. I'm Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter, and this is before we go. This season we're in conversation with people from all walks of life, exploring how we live alongside mortality. Today's episode Yvette Nicole Brown from community to caregiver as the weather cools down, I find myself reaching for layers that are timeless, comfortable and easy. And Quince has become my go to. Their pieces feel elevated, they last and they don't come with the big price tag that you'd expect. We're talking $50 Mongolian cashmere denim that actually fits and outerwear that looks designer but costs a fraction of the price. The quality really is that good. What I love is how Quince works directly with ethical factories and cuts out the middlemen so you get that same luxury feel and craftsmanship at about half the price. It makes upgrading your wardrobe feel both practical and stylish. One piece I've been living in is their organic cotton blazer with a sleek lapel, patch pockets and cropped sleeves. It's modern, effortless and instantly pulls an outfit together. It's professional, but not too serious. Quince has become my one stop shop for timeless pieces that I'll wear again and again. Find your fall staples at quince. Go to quince.combeforewego for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com beforewego to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com beforewego as expected, NBC canceled Community. But that didn't actually mean that Yvette was unemployed.
- [08:44]
Yvette Nicole Brown
We had done five years of the show, but when you sign up, you sign up for six years of a show. So I had one more year left on my contract and Yahoo's Crash picked up that contract.
- [08:53]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yvette knew she couldn't take care of her father and keep up with Community's shooting schedule, which would have required her to be away from home for 16 hours a day for five months. So she went to the producers and told them that her circumstances had changed.
- [09:07]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Could they please release me from my contract? And they kindly said yes. So they released me from the contract. And then thankfully they were recasting a role on the Odd Couple on cbs. And I got a call saying, would you want to come and work on the Odd Couple? And it was like the difference between an 80 hour week of work and a 25 hour week of work. Odd couple shot like 7 minutes from my house, I'm not kidding, from driveway to parking spot on the lot. It was seven Minutes. Like, it was a perfect. I could go home to see my dad at lunch. Like, it was just a perfect, perfect gig. So I was able to segue from one job into another and still be able to take care of my dad.
- [09:44]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Those first few months. There was a lot to do. Yvette's parents had divorced when she was young, but her mom helped get her dad settled.
- [09:52]
Yvette Nicole Brown
My mom was helping me at the time, May she rest in peace. She's passed on. But we got him to the doctor, got his physicals, took him to a neurologist, and that's when we found out what the diagnosis was. And my dad, before he got on medication, was pretty much catatonic. A lot of the times he would just sit and just stare. And I thought at the time, this is as good as it's going to be. But once we got him diagnosed and he got his medication, he. He came back from that.
- [10:16]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
And did getting that diagnosis, like, finally having a name for it bring you any clarity? Did it help in any way? Or did it just deepen kind of the grief since you knew what was gonna happen?
- [10:27]
Yvette Nicole Brown
It kind of deepened the grief for me a little bit. Because my granddad, paternal granddad, died of Alzheimer's. Alzheimer's is a horrible way to go. And I remember my Aunt Shirley, May she also rest in peace. I feel like everybody's gone on to glory. She was me in her family. So she took care of my granddad. And. And from what she described, it sounded to me like it's just a person forgetting how to be a human. You forget how to breathe, how to eat, how to talk, like how to walk. It all just goes away. It's like you're becoming a baby again. And so that part was very daunting. And for the longest time, I didn't say it was Alzheimer's. I would say my dad has dementia. And I was. For the longest time, I was hoping that he had been misdiagnosed. But it's Alzheimer's, and I know it now. And it's genetic, and he has it, and it is what it is.
- [11:16]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
So you used to leave him little notes when you left the house?
- [11:19]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Yeah.
- [11:20]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
What kinds of things would you write? And what did those notes mean to him and to you?
- [11:25]
Yvette Nicole Brown
First I got a really big chalkboard, and I left it in the kitchen. Cause he was still mobile and still getting his. Going to the bathroom himself and going to get his drinks out of the refrigerator and stuff. And I would say, dad, today is, you know, Tuesday, January, whatever. I'm at Work. This is my cell number. If you need me, you can call me. And so that was the way we did it. And then as we got. As he got further along, then I would leave notes like, hi, dad, you're in California, you're okay. I've gone to the grocery store. I left at 12 o', clock, I'll be back at 2. You're totally safe. Please don't go outside or your dinner's in the refrigerator. You just put it in the microwave for three minutes. Please don't go outside. The police. Don't go outside was always a part of it as it. As we got further along, but thankfully he never was one to. He wasn't that kind of. I believe Alzheimer's intensifies like alcohol. This is what I tell people. I believe, like alcohol and fame, Alzheimer's intensifies the person you are. So if you are a homebody who doesn't cook, you're not gonna go outside, you're not gonna turn on the stove. And thankfully, the greatest gift of this, of his version of Alzheimer's, is that my dad was a homebody that didn't cook. So I never had to worry about him turning on the. I never had to worry about him being a wanderer. He was going to be home in house. So my notes were more, let me get you acclimated to the day and you're going to be looking for me and let me tell you where I am and when I'll be back.
- [12:51]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Over the past decade, Yvette has learned a lot about living with someone who has Alzheimer's. And the biggest lesson, at least in her father's case, was that the progression of the disease is not always linear.
- [13:02]
Yvette Nicole Brown
There were seasons of time when he was very angry. And that's him knowing that something's wrong with him and he's somewhere he doesn't want to be and somebody's telling him when to eat and what to do and he doesn't like it. And when he first entered into that angry phase, I was like, oh, God, I can't do years and years of him at this level of anger every day. It was like a month of anger or two weeks of anger or sometimes a day or an hour of anger. It always would cycle back into him being agreeable and kind and wonderful because that's the man that he was. Some of those first versions of him that I met broke my heart because sometimes Alzheimer's patients can be very cruel. Sometimes they can say some things and you're doing everything you can. So besides Just not. I haven't done anything to harm you. I'm literally breaking my back to make every day joyous.
- [13:55]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
But there's one piece of advice that Yvette most wishes she could go back and give herself. And I'm just gonna say it's a lesson she still hasn't exactly taken to heart.
- [14:05]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Find a way to. Find a way to care for yourself. There's been different days. I was like, dad, I didn't eat today, you know, or I forgot I'm not drinking my water like I'm supposed to. Or I haven't. My feet haven't touched grass. I still have not learned how to take care of myself. This many years later. I'm still. I joke. I have a. I have a full box of Burke Williams spa certificates.
- [14:32]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
I'll take one of those.
- [14:33]
Yvette Nicole Brown
That's what every friend I have is then that response when I say it. But I literally have gotten gifted with, you know, facials and go get a massage. I never could find the time to do it. I still have not been able to find the time to do it. So I would tell myself to find the time to do it. Yeah.
- [14:49]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Well, I'm going to tell you right now, find a time to do it.
- [14:52]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Find the time to do it. Yeah. I just don't know how. I just don't.
- [14:57]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Speaking with Yvette really reminded me of how little support there is for caregivers. So I reached out to my friend AI Jen Poo. She hears this kind of thing all the time.
- [15:06]
AI Jen Poo
All the time, everywhere I go.
- [15:08]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
AI Jen is an organizer and advocate, and she works to improve support for professional caregivers like nursing home workers and family caregivers like Yvette.
- [15:18]
AI Jen Poo
It's so interesting. I don't even know how we got here. We're such a fundamental and important part of our lives. How are we going to care for the people that we love? Has become almost an invisible afterthought to the design of our society. The entire structure of our workforce is designed in such a way that assumes that people never have families and never have any caregiving responsibilities. We are a country that has no paid family medical leave policies so that one out of every four moms returns to work within two weeks of giving birth. And we don't have support for family caregivers. It doesn't have to be that way. We could, as a society, as a country, actually make a different set of choices.
- [16:13]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Much of AI Jen's work is inspired by her grandfather and the struggle her family experienced near the end of his Life.
- [16:19]
AI Jen Poo
My grandfather was a hero, a giant in my life. After he retired, he actually moved in with us, and he was a retired Air Force educator, and he was a tai chi instructor. And I grew up watching him practice tai chi in the driveway. And he would drive me and my sister to school almost every day, and we would do these regular trips to Burger King together after school. And he would tell us all the things that he thought we should be thinking about as elementary school students and middle school students.
- [16:58]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
But as AI Jen's grandfather got older, his health started to fail, got to.
- [17:03]
AI Jen Poo
A point where he lost his vision. And then that catalyzed a whole other host of other health issues where he needed, around the clock, very intensive assistance. And we just couldn't find the care workers to be able to support him in that way. And he always made us promise that we wouldn't put him in a nursing home. And we ended up in a position where we just didn't have options. And so we had to place him in a nursing home against his wishes. I will never forget going to visit him at that nursing home. It is permanently seared in my memory. The smells, the sights, the sounds. You could feel it in the air, this feeling of dehumanization, I would say. And he passed away after just a couple of months in that facility. And I remember thinking, gosh, how could it be that the people who spend their entire lives caring for us and giving us so much weight, we can't give them better options for care and dignity when they need it the most?
- [18:17]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
You know, I imagine what you saw and experienced was heartbreaking, but your response wasn't anger at individuals. You saw these maybe less than optimal conditions at your grandfather's care facility. But you didn't blame the workers who were supposed to be taking care of him. Why not?
- [18:39]
AI Jen Poo
Well, I also tuned into the workers and noticed that so many of them were stretched so thin. Most of the workers who supported my grandfather were responsible for between 20 and 30 people, which is just impossible to be present, truly present for that number of people who need assistance. And so I just felt like they were in a completely impossible position and that there was something bigger at play here. It was, in some ways an undervaluing of everyone's humanity in that context.
- [19:15]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
And AI Jen says we're not only undervaluing the work of caregivers in facilities like the one her grandfather was in. We're also undervaluing the work of family caregivers like Yvette.
- [19:27]
AI Jen Poo
We don't have a culture where we care out Loud, where we talk about what we need as caregivers, where we support each other as caregivers, where we make visible the experience of caregiving. And that's one of the reasons why culture change is so important to me.
- [19:44]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
And so there's this cultural invisibility of caregiving, and then there's the daily grinding reality of it, the weight so many people carry just quietly. And I think for so many especially unpaid caregivers, that squeeze can feel endless. What would it take for those caregivers to not just get by, but to actually thrive?
- [20:06]
AI Jen Poo
If we had a culture and a set of policies that really valued caregiving, it would be supported from birth to death. So from the time that you're born, your parents would have access to paid leave and you would have a network of childcare resources. And then as you go through life, all of us at any point could develop a disability or become ill and need more assistance. And there should be paid family medical leave. There should be options to have home care assistance, and we should have long term care in this country. A lot of people assume Medicare covers long term care and then they reach out to try to get access to it and realize that it really doesn't. And so your only option is to pay out of pocket, which is out of reach for the vast majority of Americans because it's an average of $100,000 a year for a room in a nursing home, or you can totally deplete your assets to be eligible for Medicaid.
- [21:18]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
And for iGen, this isn't just about politics and policies, it's about culture.
- [21:23]
AI Jen Poo
We have this kind of dichotomy where it's like, if I'm a caregiver, you're a care recipient. And the truth of it is, every time I'm in the role of a caregiver, I receive as much as I give my mother in law. Right now I'm actually a caregiver for her. And she's 84 and she was a therapist her whole life and she has dementia. But she also is literally my therapy right now. She's offering me so much wisdom. She's so present for me and giving me so much love and care. And the fact that that is always at our disposal is such a powerful thing.
- [22:14]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
You know, AI Jen, I think caregivers carry wisdom. They carry strength and a kind of love that holds the world together. You've met so many caregivers through your organizing. What have they taught you about strength, about love, and what it means to build a meaningful life even in the midst of hardship.
- [22:34]
AI Jen Poo
I have learned so much about what it means to show up. No matter how hard it is, no matter what the situation is, caregivers show up. They are present. They deliver and give of their energy, their wisdom, their attention. We live in a time when nothing is more valuable than time and attention. And that is what caregivers give in abundance every single day. And it is a reminder to me that that is always a choice that we have. We can always choose to put our attention towards caring, towards enhancing and support, supporting other people's dignity, other people's opportunity, other people's agency. And it's like a virtuous cycle where it supports our own.
- [23:32]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
You're listening to before we Go. We'll be right back. Yvette's father lived in her home for 11 years. And then last April, he had a fall. At the time, Yvette and her then fiance Tony weren't home.
- [24:00]
Yvette Nicole Brown
I'd gone to New York to do Sesame street, which was a dream of mine that I'd wanted to do my entire life. And I was doing some specials with Cookie Monster on Sesame Street. So it was just a dream, dream come true. And me and Tony were in on the plane flying home and I got a text message from my, my assistant that had a video attachment, but I couldn't download it because I was, I was in the air. It's probably a video with daddy saying, can't wait to see you or something. But it wasn't that. When I got home, it was a video of her and daddy telling me that dad had fallen, but he was fine. So when I got home, dad appeared to be fine. You know, she explained what had happened and I checked him out, kicked the tires. He was great until he stood up to walk to the bathroom and couldn't walk. And I was like, what is happening? Ambulance came and we found out that he had broken. When he fell, he had actually broken his hip. So then it was surgery, repair the hip. He's in the hospital, but he can walk. He did it. He started physical therapy. He was walking. I'm like, this is great. We're going to be good. He's going to walk. What I did not know until then and what someone told me, but I didn't understand fully. Anesthesia is a problem on any 80, 80 plus year old person, right? Coming back from the anesthesia is a problem, but anesthesia with dementia is a whole nother level. When I tell you that my dad was psychotic and that's the best word I can use, he was Hallucinating. He was combative. He was trying to take his catheter out. He kept trying to get out the bed, and he literally. It took him probably a month and a half for the anesthesia to completely leave his body. But in that month and a half, he went to a nursing rehab facility. So for the month that they were assessing whether he should be able to continue physical therapy, he was not well enough to do physical therapy. So by the end of the month and a half, they just booted him out. So by the time he was released, he could no longer walk. So if he could no longer walk, he's now bedbound and in a diaper, and I can't care for him anymore. And. But I wasn't a deterrent. I was like, well, shoot, I'm gonna get busy. I'm gonna learn. I'm gonna get certified. I'm gonna get certified and flipping him in the bed and getting him out to bed. I'm gonna learn how to do the little twist thing they do with the. With the. They did this really great thing they do when they have to change him. You know, I was gonna learn all of that, and I was going to get the thing that lifts him. I was going to turn my house into a hospital. And I was busy doing that because I was like, dad's going to be with me in my house until one or both of us go on to glory. And I was talking to a caregiver, and he said, eyvette, can I just. Can I get a second with you? And he said, I'm going to say this first. There is. There's nobody on this planet that can love your dad better than you. Nobody. But is there a chance that there's somebody on this planet that can care for him better? And I was like, dang. I was like, yeah, there's. There's. There's people that have studied everything my dad's going to need physically. There are people who are certified, they have degrees, and they can 100% do it better than I will ever be able to do it. He says, so do you think that the better thing would be for you to let them? And then he also said, and I got to ask you one more question. Would your father want you to be his daughter or his nurse? And I said, if my dad could tell me, he would want me just to be his daughter. He said, okay, so we know that there's someone that can care for him better than you can not love, but care. And we know that your dad, if he was in his. In his right mind, he would want to tell you to live your life and not be here flipping him up and turning. He wouldn't want that for you. And that was the first time I was even open to the idea.
- [27:54]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yvette already knew she didn't want to put her father in a nursing home where he would be one of dozens of patients. But she'd learned about another option called board and care. These are smaller residential care facilities. They're usually in homes in neighborhoods. Yvette's social worker had one in mind. One where Yvette's father would have his own room and would be just one of three or four patients in the entire facility. But when Yvette tried to call the woman who runs the facility, she didn't answer the phone.
- [28:24]
Yvette Nicole Brown
And so he said, oh, no, no, you need to call again, because I think that's where your dad should be. I think that her facilities are great. And I called, and she's so amazing. She said, come tonight. Come by right now. And what I had learned in my Finding a Place for dad journey is that you will know when you cross the threshold if your family member should be there. Because if you cross the threshold and smell bodily fluids, if it smells like a bathroom or vomit.
- [28:51]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Mm. Mm.
- [28:52]
Yvette Nicole Brown
I went to one facility. There was a patient there. This poor woman was, like, in her 30s. And I don't know what her diagnosis was, but she was nonverbal and just kind of rocking. And she had stuff on her shirt, which means she had spilled. Either she had thrown up on herself or she had eaten and spilled. She looked unkept. And that was bad enough. But the thing that made it really bad is the woman that was giving me the tour. The owner of this facility said to me, oh, don't worry about her. That is someone's child. That is someone's mother or daughter, sister. And this woman who is being paid to care for her, told me, don't pay attention to that, because that's. That's not what I want to show you about this place. And I thought to myself, I'm going to look over there, because that's going to be my father.
- [29:49]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yeah.
- [29:50]
Yvette Nicole Brown
My father is going to be someone on a couch that you haven't fed or cleaned up or haven't washed or who you don't spend time with. So I'm going to pay attention to this dear woman. So things like that will make it very easy for you to know where your loved one should be. I walked across the threshold of the place where my dad is. And I smelled cookies. Another time I went back to check again because they say go different times. I smelled lasagna. My dad has always been clean. He's always been fed. He's always been happy. He's always been comfortable. No matter what time I go to visit, and I go all times of the day and night. I want to. I want to catch him.
- [30:31]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Yeah, yeah.
- [30:32]
Yvette Nicole Brown
And you can't catch them because they're not that. You know, they love him and they care for him and they care for the other men that are there, and it's a wonderful, wonderful place. And now when I go to visit him, I go to visit him as his daughter. I don't have to wipe his nose. I don't have to feed him. I do feed him. I enjoy that. When I'm there and it's dinner time, I want the caregiver to have a break. So you go on and sit and relax and paint your nails or something. I'm going to feed them and I'm going to sit with them for these three hours or whatever. So I. It was the right decision. Do I feel guilt? Absolutely. Do I feel guilt right now that I'm sitting here talking to you on a podcast instead of sitting with him? Absolutely. Because the difference is when he was in the house with me, even if I was in my booth doing a podcast, he was here. And if he needed me, I could get to him in two seconds. And there have been times when I would be in here and he'd be like, yvette. I'd be like, listen, I gotta go. My dad needs me. So I feel guilty that I'm not in arm's reach for him like that anymore if he gets scared or he has a bad dream. But I do know that who is there, they love him and care for him as well.
- [31:35]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
These days, Yvette spends a lot of time advocating for caregivers and taking care of caregivers and convincing other people that they can be caregivers too. In 2024, Yvette launched a seven part podcast series about caregiving called Squeezed.
- [31:51]
Yvette Nicole Brown
What I love about Squeezed is it's the kind of podcast you can turn on while you're caregiving for someone or while you're decompressing from caregiving for someone. And hopefully it feels like you're listening to two friends or three friends having a conversation, and you can just go, let me check in with Yvette and see who she's having coffee with today. So people just feel a little less alone. I think There's a lot of sadness and loneliness that can be a part of the caregiving journey. One, because, you know, especially if your caregiver has Alzheimer's, you're mourning them every day you see them, you're saying goodbye to another part of them that's. That's passed away. And that can be very sad and lonely. And it helps to know that you're not alone, that there's someone else going through that exact thing and they found a way to laugh their way through it or cry their way through it. And there's nothing wrong with either of those choices.
- [32:45]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Caregiving often asks more of us than we think we can give. But as Yvette so beautifully puts it, it's really just love in its most committed form. A quiet, everyday kind of bravery that connects us all whether we're ready for it or not.
- [33:01]
Yvette Nicole Brown
You know, whenever I would talk about being a caregiver and I would hear people say, oh, I could never do that. And I'm like, why would you say that? Well, it's so hard. I said, it's not hard, though. Caregiving is just loving someone else sacrificially. That's all it is. And anybody can do that. Everybody can do that. Parents are caregivers. Yes, that's your child. But parents are caregivers, teachers are caregivers, so everybody really is caring for other people. You add the extra layer of choosing to do it sacrificially that really gives you, like the title. But we all are doing it, or we all will have to do it, or we all will have it done for us. So it's smarter for us to all make peace with it before our time comes. I always said, I've said this from the beginning about caregiving. It is the best, tough thing I've ever done, or the toughest, best thing I've ever done. But it has always been the thing that I knew that I was supposed to do. I mean, 12 years, 12 years of my life, I've been a caregiver. I wouldn't change it for anything. I know for sure that had I not gone to my dad, he would not be here. I know for sure. And that if that can't make you feel good about your decision, I don't know what can.
- [34:13]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
What a gift you are.
- [34:15]
Yvette Nicole Brown
Oh, back at you, kiddo.
- [34:31]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Before we Go is a production of Podcast Nation and Me. Our production team includes Karen Given, James Brown and Madison Britt. Original music by Edward Ayton. I'm Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter and If you like what you've heard, I'd be so grateful if you tell a friend about us. And please leave us a review on your favorite podcast app. It helps other people who need us find us a little easier. If you'd like to see photos and videos of these conversations and connect with other Before We Go listeners, visit us on Instagram Before We Go podcast next time on the show. In 2020, Barry Blackman was diagnosed with cancer for the second time. After surgery and chemotherapy. His physical prognosis was was good, but he was still struggling with anxiety and depression. That's when he decided to fly to Oregon to undergo psychedelic assisted therapy.
- [35:26]
Yvette Nicole Brown
My overall being, my bearing just changed very substantially.
- [35:33]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
Experts say that a single session of psilocybin assisted therapy can result in lasting improvements for many people who try it.
- [35:40]
AI Jen Poo
It changes how you are with your sense of self. So the part of your brain that is responsible for I'm Tony. I like coffee in the morning. I am a doctor who cares about that. All that stuff kind of gets dissolved.
- [35:55]
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleiter
That's next week on Before We Go.