November 12, 2025 • 46 mins
Summary
In this episode, Christina Keys shares her transformative journey from being an unaware caregiver to becoming a leading advocate for family caregivers. She discusses the challenges faced by caregivers, including financial burdens, emotional tolls, and the lack of resources available. Christina emphasizes the importance of community support and the need for better systems to assist caregivers. She also highlights the role of technology in improving caregiving experiences and the necessity of self-care and recovery for caregivers after their journey ends.
Learn More
Connect with Christina Keys on LinkedIn
Learn more about Keys for Caregiving
Takeaways
Many caregivers don't identify as such until much later.
Financial burdens can devastate caregivers long after care ends.
Caregiving often leads to an identity crisis for caregivers.
Community support is crucial for caregiver recovery.
Technology can help bridge gaps in caregiver resources.
Caregivers need to redefine their normal after caregiving ends.
Grief doesn't go away; it changes form over time.
Building community can enhance caregiver experiences.
Caregivers often feel invisible in their roles.
There are many resources available that caregivers may not know about.
(00:00:00) From Leads to Leases - A Senior LIving Business Podcast (00:01:34) Welcome Christina Keys - Founder of Keys for Caregiving (00:02:39) The Journey of a Caregiver: A Personal Story (00:04:36) Why Caregivers Struggle to Self-Identify as Such (00:08:46) Understanding the Financial Burden of Caregiving (00:12:58) Resources and Support for Caregivers (00:17:03) The Importance of Financial Planning and Community Support (00:18:20) Navigating Post-ICU Support for Families (00:22:28) The Recovery Journey After Caregiving (00:27:38) How to Cope with Grief (00:31:08) Marketing to Caregivers in Senior Living (00:34:49) Senior Living Sales & Nurture Cycle is Longer Than You Think (00:36:19) Building Community Over Competition (00:39:41) Can Tech Solve the Caregiver Shortage? (00:43:15) Keys for Caregiving: A New Path Forward
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
And it took me a while to realize that I also made myself
invisible. I Mom came first.
When I showered, when I ate, when I worked, when I did
anything, Mom came first. You know, I was just as guilty
as the outside world of making myself invisible.
And then here I am, Mom is gone.I don't know how to make me a
(00:20):
priority. What if you were a caregiver for
years before you even knew that word applied to you?
For today's guest, that realization came after losing
everything, and it changed the course of her life.
Welcome to From Leeds to Leases ACCR Growth podcast that helps
senior living providers transform their complex
(00:41):
challenges into opportunities. Listen in for stories from
industry leaders, innovative strategies and insights, and
with our expertise, learn how toincrease occupancy faster,
Guaranteed. Welcome back to another episode
of From Lease to Lease is the podcast that dives deep into the
senior living and senior care industries, bringing you
(01:01):
insights, strategies, and stories from the experts of the
forefront of innovation, leadership, and care.
I'm your host, Jerry Vinci, CEO of CCR Growth, the full service
marketing and growth agency that's exclusive to the senior
living industry. And through this podcast, I'm
here to guide you through the evolving landscape of senior
care, exploring the innovations,strategies, and leadership
(01:23):
insights that are shaping the future of the industry.
So whether you're a provider, a caregiver, or industry leader,
this show is here to help you make informed decisions and
create meaningful impact. All right.
Today's guest is Christina Keys,a nationally recognized family
caregiving advocate, speaker, and business strategist who
turned personal crisis into powerful purpose after her
(01:45):
mother suffered A devastating stroke.
Christina spent a decade as a full time caregiver, losing her
career, her savings, and nearly her life in the process.
Today, she's the founder of Keysfor Caregiving and a leading
voice on the front lines of caregiver recovery systems
change, and support for the often invisible individuals
(02:05):
driving care decisions across the country.
So Christina, welcome to the show.
I'm so glad to. Have you here?
Thank you. I'm excited to be here today.
Thank you. This is such an important topic.
And like you said, I mean invisible individuals, I think
is such a, such a powerful way to describe caregiving.
Sometimes. I think they're, they're
definitely the unseen heroes across America right now.
(02:28):
So I'm, I'm really glad you're here to share with us your
insights and, and help some people who might be in a similar
situation to you and, and looking for some, some ways out.
And so thank you. I want to talk first about the
caregiver. You didn't know you were, you
didn't call yourself a caregiveruntil you spent years in the
role. Why do so many caregivers not
realize they're caregivers untilyears?
(02:49):
In. Well, I think a lot of times
we're thrown into it and even ifwe get that diagnosis that hey,
your mom or your loved one is got diagmentia, dementia and
it's going to progress. We're still like, we think we
have time, right? And for me, you know, everything
was fine that morning. You know, that morning, I talked
(03:10):
to my mom. We were talking about, you know,
her going out with her friends, my car, whatever.
And, and then by 3:00 that afternoon, I got a call saying
she had a massive stroke. And I walked into the ICU and I
didn't know if I was going to walk out with a mother or having
to make Funeral arrangements. You know, when you walk in and
see that, when everything changes in an instant, you know,
(03:31):
for you, you're like, I just want this person to be alive,
you know? So for me, I was doing all of
this stuff. I brought her home after about 5
months and there I was being APTand OT, you know, a nurse and
EMT, you know, case manager and Med manager, all of these things
and didn't even realize I was a caregiver, right?
(03:52):
I had no idea I was caregiver because I wasn't, I was in tech,
you know, all my life, you know,I didn't know that about the
caregiving world. And so for me, it took a while
for me to understand I was a caregiver.
And I think for myself and a lotof other people, once we admit
we're a caregiver, you know, that grief really sets in that,
(04:12):
yes, I'm still a daughter for mymother, but we understand the
relationship has changed. You know, and I think it's hard
for people to, you know, especially like a parent with a
child, you know, a husband with a wife, a wife with a husband,
you know, if we use that term for a minute, we think it's
going to take away from that relationship.
(04:33):
So it's hard for us to actually say that sometimes.
Why do you think it's hard to self identify as a caregiver
though? I mean, I'm is it a loss of your
sense of self or is it somethingalong the lines of you grieving?
For that relationship of what itused to be and now it's kind of
shifted. I hadn't been in that industry,
(04:55):
so I didn't even know the term. Honestly.
When I remember, some of my Facebook memories came up and
here I was taking care of my mom, managing her care, doing
all of this stuff. And one of my first Facebook
posts was, Hey, does anybody know if they have babysitters?
But like for adults, I, I literally didn't even know the
term caregiver. You know, I, I was talking about
hardware and software, you know what I mean?
(05:16):
You asked me how to build, you know, data center.
I'm good. You know, you asked me what?
Because I have no idea, right? And so I, I didn't know that
term and caregiver, you know, I'm thinking of somebody in the
hospital or I'm thinking of somebody who is paid.
I'm not understanding what a caregiver is.
It took me a long time to realize that I was a caregiver.
(05:37):
And it was from other people talking about being a caregiver
and, and hearing some of those similar situations when they are
caring for a loved one that I realize, oh, I'm a caregiver.
And there are some people that never really want to admit that
they're a caregiver, you know, and they use different terms
like care partner, which like for Terry, my ex-boyfriend who I
cared for, that was pretty much what I was for him, right?
(05:59):
But the luxury of finally realizing you're a caregiver is
you know where to go to find resources now, you know what to
search on Google, you know who to talk to about saying, hey, I
need some caregiver resources orI need some caregiver support.
It's just, you know, when you'regoing to a Medical Center,
you're going to a Medical Center.
You might be seeing the endocrinologist, right?
(06:22):
But you have to go to the Medical Center first.
You got to walk through those doors, right?
So there's a luxury and, and finally identifying as that
caregiver. But yeah, there there's AI.
Remember, the hardest part for me was I remember when I was
leaving my career, I gave like amonth's notice because I didn't
want to leave, you know, and butyou know, I was working 9:00 to
5:00 Monday through Friday, B toB, and that is just not
(06:44):
conducive to full time care. And by February, I'd used all my
vacation time and all my sick days that I got awarded in
January. And I remember that last day,
you know, I was supposed to leave at 5.
Everybody left at 5:00 and it's 6 O clock.
I'm the only one in the building.
I'm still like, you know, putting stuff into Salesforce.
It was suddenly super important that everybody knew Larry wore
(07:05):
green socks and Salesforce, right?
He's like CEO and the managementteam.
You're like, Christina, what thehell are you doing here?
And I'm like, well, I just want to make sure everything's
wrapped up and, and they're like, it's OK to go, you know,
And I remember that was like thelongest elevator ride of my life
because, you know, I got into that elevator and I was still
Christina, the career woman. And and once those doors opened,
(07:27):
like I was just Christina the caregiver, and I was completely
lost and I was scared. It was scary, you know, it was
scary to know, like, you know, when I went to work, things were
so simple, you know what I mean?It was I was managing
multimillion dollar accounts. That was simple.
Managing a constant crisis, you know, and watching my mother,
you know, go through that. It's different when it's not
(07:48):
somebody you love, you know. So yeah, it's, it's tough for us
to admit that sometimes we don'tbecause we don't know what we're
doing necessarily. And we're also, it changes our
role. So it makes us very aware that
we don't have the same exact type of relationship we used to
have with that person. Could see that for sure.
(08:11):
I see a lot of similarities too on the senior living side of
things, just in terms of people not knowing the terminology
until they're actually in it. You know most people when they
do a search for senior living, they still put in nursing home.
Absolutely. That's such an outdated term.
Right. Yeah.
They're like, I don't want to send my mom to a nursing home.
And they think it's something. I mean, senior living is so
(08:33):
different than what a nursing home is, you know what I mean?
I would love to go to senior living now.
I mean, these places are beautiful, you know, gardening,
movie theaters, you know, restaurants, all of this stuff.
Like we don't know until we know.
How do financial sacrifices for caregiving show up in people's
lives long after the journey ends?
Well, I don't think people understand that for me.
(08:58):
And my mother was a, you know, aerospace engineer.
She was an executive at Boeing. You know, she retired from
Boeing. She had great insurance.
She had a great pension, you know, I was in tech, I was
making six figures. You know, I'm Wheeling her out
of the hospital thinking we're great.
She's got great insurance. She's got a supplement on top of
that. We're great.
And then come to find out her insurance does not cover in home
(09:21):
care. And then you don't understand
that, you know, there's other things that you need on top of
that, you know, adult briefs, all the extra medication
co-pays, you know, all the cleaning supplies, all the, you
know, gloves, all the bed sheet,all the hospital beds, all the
equipment. And you get them home.
And, you know, you find out Medicare only covers one piece
(09:42):
of equipment every five years. And even if you're on Medicaid,
it takes like an act of God to get something finally approved,
you know, and so we went through, we had, we both had a
very, you know, good robust 4 O1KS.
And, you know, between everything that the hospital
wasn't paying, not the hospital,but her insurance wasn't paying
for. And we had to remodel the
(10:02):
bathroom so she could actually go to the bathroom, get her
wheelchair in, you know, and, and, and make sure the
downstairs was suitable for her hospital bed.
All of these things, build a ramp, you know, all of these
things you don't think about, you know, within a year and a
half, almost close to two years,that's all it took for us to go
through our life savings, you know, and I was, I was in my
early 40s then, you know, I'd, I'd done everything.
(10:23):
I chased that American dream. I got a job, I turn it into a
career. I put my money in my 4 O 1K and
and it all went to my mother's care.
And then you're I was paying between 3000 and $1500 a month
for my mother's care. And when I had to leave my 6
figure job, you know, I'm takingpart time jobs and piercing them
(10:44):
together making $15.00 an hour, which I hadn't made since I was
like 16 years old. You know, I have been food bank
lines and you know, having to get, you know, resources from
the community and I had, I didn't know how to do that
either right. And so all of these things went
away, all of my cushions went away.
You know, the vacations and everything went away.
(11:04):
And, and then after my mom passed, even like on Hospice, I
thought, OK, finally Hospice is going to come in.
I'm going to get some relief. Well, Hospice was a little
different, right? And so my expenses went from
3000 to $6000 a month. And then my mom had her stroke
at 62, so she didn't have life insurance, right?
(11:24):
So, you know, I'm having to sell, you know, her doll
collection to pay to bury her, you know, and I don't think
people understand that, you know, when we're thrown into a
lot of that, sometimes we're notprepared for any of it, right?
And so, and I don't think peopleunderstand until they go through
it too, that the death is very expensive, you know, and then on
top of that, you're trying to rebuild your life because it's
(11:47):
not just about the grief, you know, it's about the caregiver
recovery also. And you're trying to rebuild
your life. And you are completely, you're,
you're going through grief. You're also going through an
identity crisis, right? And you're also going through,
you know, for 24 hours a day, I've been on call, you know, and
trying to calm down your nervoussystem.
And then you've got to learn to plan financially and you're
(12:09):
having to reach out to like, youknow, financial planners and all
of these people. And you still, it takes a minute
also to get past that crisis mindset because the second you
get some money put aside, you still shortly after, within that
first year or two, you're still thinking, well, there might be
an emergency, you know, so it's,it's tough to recover
(12:32):
financially. It's not just about the money.
It's about what we have walked through as caregivers constantly
being in fight or flight mode. It's about, you know, the cost
that we didn't expect of caring.It's about the cost of death
that we didn't expect. It's a cost of rebuilding our
life and rebuilding our credit and everything that changed a
(12:54):
lot of times when we are caring for someone.
I've heard that so many times about people depleting their
their funds, their savings, their retirement accounts.
And how do families cope with that?
I mean, how do they pay for careif if they've tapped all their
resources, what's left? How?
How did they get around that? Well, so sometimes they're able
(13:15):
to do like with Terry, we were able to do Medicaid spend down
right and I was able to get him.We were not married.
We were partners for like 20 years or whatever.
I was able to get him the care he needed and the insurance he
needed and that way, but it alsomeant, you know, he was an
electrician all of his life. He had, you know, some money and
(13:36):
and a house and all those thingswent to the state also, right?
Places that they can go, caregivers can go to places like
area agency on aging and see what kind of programs they have
to see what kind of programs that they qualify for.
Also check with some of the local senior centers and see
what type of programs they have.Even something as simple as
(13:57):
Meals on Wheels, which is a great program, right?
I mean that's going to help you right there.
Every time after a while you equate things to, oh, that $20
equates to one hour of care, right.
So if I'm struggling and I'm having to sell all my stuff,
which I had to do, I had to sella lot of my nice stuff.
There is constant garage sales and you know, things like that.
(14:18):
And so if I'm having to do that,if I can go somewhere and get a
little bit of help like Meals onWheels or go to a local
nonprofit and get some of the like adult briefs or the, you
know, medical equipment instead of paying for the hospital bed
or the other four pieces of equipment you need that Medicare
isn't paying for. So there there are certain
(14:39):
things that you can look for, but I think one of the reasons
why we spent so much money in the beginning is because like
many caregivers, we were our families.
We were thrown into it. We were not prepared, we didn't
understand. I think about if I would have
had like a care coach, I think our money would have lasted a
lot longer because they would have told me about the local
resources. They would have told me about,
(14:59):
you know, check with area agencyon aging.
They would have told me about, you know, the things that you
can get covered, things that youneed, things that you don't
need, you know, And so I didn't know those things.
And I was asking the hospitals, I was asking the doctors and
that they're there to do something completely different
than be your community guide. I found an interesting statistic
(15:20):
and I want to get your opinion on it.
It's it's from 2021 from AARP, but they said over 75% of family
caregivers report out of pocket expenses and one in three spend
more than 20% of their income oncaregiving.
I'm kind of calling bullshit on that because everybody I know
who who is in a caregiving role,it's way more than 20%.
(15:41):
Yeah. I mean, I think AARP is
wonderful, the research they do and the statistics they do, but
that was not my experience and that is is not the experience of
I think the caregivers that I know would rejoice in it only
being 20% what's our birthday, you know.
But I think it's important that they do that research is that's
(16:03):
just not been my experience. There is a lot of expenses that
we don't think about and and maybe perhaps they didn't put
that into that research. You know, like I said, said, the
outside medical equipment you need, the, you know, remodeling
of the bathroom that you need, the ramp that you need to be
built. The extra co-pays that you're
spending because your medications are more now, the
(16:23):
extra doctor's visit co-pays, you know, the, the bathroom
remodeled all the stuff, right, The extra cleaning supplies,
right? So the extra gas that you need
because you're running around. I mean, all of those things are
not, I don't think they're equated into that.
I think they're looking at how much they're out, out of pocket
is, you know, my out of pocket for care.
(16:43):
What I was writing checks for tothe private caregivers and the
agencies were between 1500 and 3000 a month.
And I wish that would have been when I was working 6 figures
that might have been 20%, but not after I had to leave my
career. Yeah.
And and many caregivers do have to leave their career.
(17:03):
You mentioned financial planningtoo.
What kind of tools or strategieshave you found that help people
now that you wish you would haveknown about at the time?
The care coaches would have beenwonderful, right?
A care coach, wonderful. And if anybody's listening, you
don't know what a care coach is.It's somebody who's been through
it, right? Somebody who's been through it,
(17:23):
who knows how to find local resources, who knows about some
of the programs that are out there, who knows about some of
the tools that will help you manage your care journey and
also that will be there to, you know, listen to what you're
going through and understand. Local nonprofits would have
really helped. I didn't know about those.
I didn't find out about, you know, nonprofit here that helped
(17:44):
with the extra medical equipmentand the adult briefs until, I
don't know, four years into my care journey, right.
And you know, again, checking with the area agency on aging
and see what kind of programs they have would have helped a
lot too. All of these things I would have
known, but I didn't even know what to look for.
I didn't know what to look for. It's kind of like once I use
(18:05):
that caregiver word, I started to find out what to look for.
And once I started connecting with other caregivers and
building community and finding support and learning some of
these things to ask for is when things started to change for me.
And from the medical side, what do you think hospitals and
discharge planners still get wrong about supporting families
(18:26):
post ICU? Well, it's not necessarily their
job to give people resources. You know, when I left that
hospital, I, my mother was in a wonderful hospital, one of the
best hospitals in Seattle, I think Harborview Hospital.
And we were there for God, like almost three or four months.
We, I lived in the hospital withher.
So I'm talking to these doctors,these nurses, these, you know,
(18:48):
social workers discharged like all of these people all the
time, chaplains, everybody who walks in.
I'm trying to be educated. You know, they let me wheel her
out of there knowing I had no training, knowing I didn't know
anything other than, again, how to build a data center, you
know, and they gave me a list ofsenior living locations and in
home care. And I didn't.
(19:09):
And what they had told me, it seemed like if I got in home
care, it had to be 24 hours, right?
And I didn't want somebody there24 hours.
I thought that might be expensive, you know, So there is
a hospital system on the East Coast.
I can't remember the name of it right now, but they have gotten
it right. They have gotten it right.
And it is something that I dreamed about so many times.
(19:33):
And they actually have caregiverresource centers right in the
hospital. If they have somebody who, you
know, their family members had astroke, they know that person's
going home, there's a caregiver,you know, somebody comes in and
says, hey, by the way, we have this caregiver Resource Center.
It's a whole area in the hospital, whole section of the
hospital that has all these resources, that has people you
(19:53):
can talk to. They've got like massage chairs,
you know, and I, I believe there's fourteen of them, right?
And then if hospitals had something like that and medical
centers had something like that,it doesn't even need to be a
large place. Listen there, I'm sure the
doctors and nurses and and medical teams, they have had
(20:15):
their fill of angry caregivers. Angry, confused, and scared
givers, right? The way I communicated with
hospital teams and medical teamswhen I was first caregiving was
way different after a while, right?
I learned the difference betweenadvocating and being scared out
of my mind and trying to communicate that right.
(20:35):
And if they were to implement that, not only would they have
people who are not having as many hospital visits because
when they're at home, they're getting the care they need.
The caregivers are not as burnedout.
They're able to provide better care.
They're able to find the resources so they're not having
repeat hospital visits. It would really help them to,
you know, have a better flow of how things go when they're
(20:58):
dealing with families, when they're dealing with people who
have, you know, terminal issues or medical issues where they
need family caregivers. So I, I think they need more
than just a list of, you know, senior living and, you know, in
home care, because not everybodyis gets to my mother would have
not, she would need to go to skilled nursing.
(21:18):
She wouldn't have been able to live in one of the fancy senior
living places, right. But that's what they gave me a
list of, you know. Yeah, and that's just such a
scary thought that I'm just like, sending you on your way,
you know, with little to no experience in doing this.
I mean, that had to be terrifying.
Can only. Imagine.
Yeah. And you know, the as a new
caregiver, I didn't know either.You know, they said take her
(21:41):
home in and even with Terry, like you got to take him home
and I'm not trained for that. And it took me a while to learn
to say there is no safe place for them right now.
We need to find a safe place forthem, you know, and so, and
sometimes that meant them going from the hospital to the skilled
nursing, right? So they can get the rehab they
(22:03):
need so they could be safe when they got home, right?
Or even just something as simpleas scheduling that home health
and all the home health, you know, folks that are going to
come into the house before you leave that hospital so they're
safe. I didn't know you.
She's got to go home with you. Used to be OK and just figure it
out, right? We learn along the way how to
(22:24):
advocate for our loved ones, howto advocate for ourself.
So everybody's safe. And when the caregiving ends,
what does the recovery process look like?
Well, you know, caregiving for many, many of the caregivers, it
affects our life, you know, financially, physically,
spiritually, mentally, emotionally, socially.
And so we have to recover all those areas of our life, you
(22:47):
know, and we've been in fight orflight mode for so long.
You know, I was constantly goinginto an emergency, coming out of
an emergency, preparing for an emergency or recovering from an
emergency, right? And I had a very strange
blessing, a very strange blessing.
My father, who I love dearly andI was not a caregiver for, died
(23:08):
unexpectedly about six months before my mother.
And so I went through all the grief counseling, one-on-one
grief counseling, and I learned a lot about grief.
And so I thought when mom was passing that I would be all
prepared for that. I didn't realize there were
certain things like, you know, Ididn't when my dad passed, I
(23:29):
didn't have to worry about, you know, everything shooting in my
system. Like it used to be adrenaline
going crazy in my system whenever the phone rang, right?
Or when it was 5:00 or when it was 2:00 or when it was 10:00.
Because those were certain timesthat, you know, I had to check
in on mom or do something for mom.
You know, there are so many things like going out, the
social isolation that I had losta bunch of friends and now I
(23:52):
have to like make a bunch of friends, right?
And even my relationship with, you know, how I saw things
spiritually changed as well. So having to recover all of
those things and they're, you know, I was always super
optimistic. I was always, I was always the
fun one. I was always the funny one.
Well, I wasn't like that after, you know, mom had the stroke and
(24:13):
being able to find out who we are again and regain some of
that, right? Because we've become so full of,
you know, fear and depression and anxiety at times, depending
on how our support system is. I can tell you that if we're
practicing self-care, sorry caregivers, if you're listening,
I'm sorry, I mentioned the bad word, self-care.
(24:35):
But if you're practicing self-care and you have
community, then it's going to beeasier for us, right?
Your recovery is going to be a little bit easier, but there are
are these different aspects of our life that we have to recover
and the financial we have to recover.
I mean, all of these things, something as simple as I
remember after my mom passed andI, I went out on a date.
(24:56):
I went out on this lovely date with this gentleman.
He took me to this very nice restaurant and he's having a
conversation with me and I'm having a whole different
experience because all I can think is, Oh my God, I got to
ride in somebody else's car here.
I didn't have to drive my own car in case I had to leave it.
Oh my God, my, my phone's in my purse.
Like like I always used to have it on the table.
Like, Oh my God, I don't have tobe home at a certain time.
(25:18):
Like my God, I'm not having to pay for care while I'm here.
Like, I don't know what happenedfor him on that date, but for
me, I was having a whole different experience.
So something even as simple as that, you know, we have to well,
and then and then we have to deal with, you know, some of the
things, all the grief on top of that, right.
So we're processing the grief and we're also processing how do
(25:38):
we recover these parts of our life.
And, and The Who am I now if I'mnot a caregiver?
I've always and we talk about the caregivers being invisible.
And I used to get so angry aboutthat.
I used to get so angry about it.And it took me a while to
realize that I also made myself invisible.
Mom came first. When I showered, when I ate,
(26:00):
when I worked, when I did anything, mom came first.
You know, I was just as guilty as the outside world of making
myself invisible. And then here I am, mom is gone.
I don't know how to make me a priority.
Like even just sitting down to eat a meal and not project
managed during that meal was uncomfortable for me.
(26:20):
So learning how to watch TV without it, just trying to block
everything out, I mean uncomfortable for me.
And I started a caregiver recovery program.
You know, I have many years in recovery, 31 years in actual
recovery. And when I was coming out of
being a caregiver reminded me ofwhen I first started my recovery
(26:41):
from drugs and alcohol back 31 years ago.
So, you know, the caregiver recovery term came from that.
And when I first started it, youknow, it's baby steps.
It's baby steps for all of that.And so I started a caregiver
recovery support group. And what's been so great about
that is all of the people that are in that group, we are
(27:01):
experiencing the same thing. They're recovering all of these
different areas of our life and being confused by, you know, the
different steps along the way and who we are and what our life
can be because our all of our lives are way different than we
thought they were going to be. You know, we think we're going
to help mom pass or dad pass or whoever.
(27:21):
We're going to grieve and then we're going to have all this
freedom. And it's, it's not like that
because a lot of our life was run on adrenaline before, right?
And now we're just running on being a human being, which is a
little bit different level, you know, so.
I'm sure it's different for everyone, but in your
experience, what are the best ways to to cope with that grief
(27:45):
and cause allowing yourself to to come back to center?
I mean, is it just a time thing?Is IT support groups?
Is it being self aware that you're experiencing these things
and and recognizing where your life is impacted and how you
need to work on those responses and and subconscious right Some
of it. Well, I, I definitely recommend
(28:05):
anybody, whether you have been acaregiver or not, if you lose
someone very important, you know, in your life, even if you
lose a, a pet that was, you know, very important in your
life to, I found that grief counseling was very helpful for
me. And if group grief counseling is
not your jam, that's not comfortable for you.
(28:26):
There's individual grief counseling, there's also grief
rake, there's art therapy, there's even grief raves.
Now there's a million ways to dogrief for you.
So whatever way you process that, it's out there for you,
right? And I found that it was life
changing for me. But the biggest thing I, I
realized is just like in caregiving, because in
(28:47):
caregiving, the reason why I, you know, that first few years,
you know, and after I left my career, I went to my last
doctor's appointment and they told me like, Hey, by the way,
your body's shutting down. You have six months left to
live, you know, and I had to like, I had to learn self-care
really quick. The first thing I had to do was
redefine my normal, right? So when I'm going through this
(29:07):
new change in my life with the grief, not being a caregiver, I
have to read define my normal, right?
And so that means I have to fit in what I can do for my grief
recovery, what I can do for my, you know, my calming down my,
you know, nervous system, right?My cortisone levels, bringing
those down. And it's not just about going to
(29:28):
the doctors and getting a pill. It's, it's very important to go
to the doctors, right? That's one thing that we did not
do a lot of times when we were caring for, you know, someone
else. So that's something that I
always encourage people to do isgo to the doctor and see, you
know, how you're doing, right? And but we have to, you know,
seek out whatever works for us. If that's, if that's yoga, if
(29:49):
that's Tai chi, if that's, you know, you know, somatic therapy,
whatever it may be, whatever works for you because you're
also like for me. And what I've heard from the
other people is nothing feels right at first.
Nothing feels right at first. So that's OK.
Just keep trying. Just keep trying until something
clicks, until it feels. Nothing's going to be
(30:12):
comfortable at first, right? Nothing's going to be
comfortable for a while until itfeels a little less
uncomfortable, right? And, and the biggest thing with
grief is and caregiver recovery,you know, there is no graduation
day, you know, and, and people talk about those five stages of
grief, right? The five stages of grief were
written for people who are dying.
They were not written for the people who are living, right?
(30:34):
Because we can experience those five stages of grief in like 10
minutes, you know, and, and on repeat and we can be fine for
six months and then something happens and that grief comes up.
So there's the normal is there is no normal that you have to
fit into if you're not hurting yourself and you're not hurting
somebody else. However, it helps you to feel
(30:55):
better and learn to walk with that grief because it's
somebody. If it's somebody really close to
you, grief doesn't go away. You just learn to walk with it
differently. I.
Love that. I love that.
That's great advice. Thank you for sharing that.
Shifting gears to look at thingsthrough the senior living lens a
little bit, a lot of the marketing and focus for senior
living providers is really on the older adults or the family,
(31:19):
but not necessarily the family caregivers.
So how are providers missing themark?
By marketing only to older adults or to the family but not
to the caregivers? Yeah, You know, it's interesting
because one of the things I did when I changed my career was I
started going out and gathering resources and talking to people.
And I'd say, hey, in the senior industry you work with family
(31:40):
caregivers, right? Oh, no, I worked with with a
senior or something who's signing all those contracts and
who's like making the calls and well, it's usually family
member. I'm like, OK, well, so you work
with family caregivers. No, I just work with seniors,
OK, just because you know, just because they're they're bringing
the senior in, that's who's going to get the service.
So that's not necessarily who's making the decision, right?
(32:01):
The family caregiver making the decision.
The family caregivers are not only going to make the decision
on the service you provide, but they're also going to make the
decision on sometimes, you know,the ease of it, you know, and
how much you understand that they are part of it.
Like for senior living, they're going to be calling, they're
going to be, you know, going andvisiting.
They want to work with the location that's going to be open
(32:22):
to seeing them as part of the team, right.
So I think that it's really important that they start
looking at when they can not only, you know, the times that
you're posting on social media, the different social media
platforms that you're on it. I would talk to people and
they'd be like, oh, I hate TikTok or I hate Facebook or I
hate this. It's like, you know, I really
don't care what you hate your clients like that and that's
(32:44):
where they're at. You're talking to isolated
caregivers who aren't going out anywhere and they're on social
media many of the times. And so you might not like it.
You don't have to post dance videos, but you should maybe for
your business, right? This is how this is how you
market to them. And another thing that, you
know, I, I did a lot of classes at the senior living locations
(33:05):
and one of the things that they like, I did a lot of downsizing
classes, you know, before, during and after the funeral
classes like resource fairs all out there.
And then what would happen is wewould work with the community
and they would give tours of these beautiful places, right?
So people knew where and they had people who moved in after,
if they weren't ready, then theyknew where to go afterwards,
(33:27):
right? And I don't understand, there's
always room somewhere, you know,once a week or once a month
where they could have a caregiver support group for
those family members who are in that location, right?
Because again, it's if a, if a caregiver is, is happier and
calmer and they're having support and they're having
community, they're less likely to come to your staff and say,
(33:50):
Hey, you're doing all of this wrong because I'm frustrated
with my life, right? So you having things like, you
know, a carrier support group that you host at your place,
having community resources there, having a caregiver area
there where there are resources where they can look at just
acknowledging that they're there, right.
And when you're, when you are a company and you provide a
(34:13):
service for a senior, think about some of the other services
or products that might be helpful to them also that you
don't have necessarily, but you could recommend to them because
they're going to remember that. Hey, I went to Jerry.
He helped my mom get into this senior living place, but he also
told me about, you know, this caregiver support group.
(34:34):
He also told me about this financial planner or this care
coach and you know, I would recommend Jerry all day long
because it what you know, I feellike he really valued me and
took care of me and helped me not only my mother but me,
right? One of the things that I know
just from the marketing side andlooking at all the the move in
data that I come across on a regular basis is that the sales
(34:57):
cycle is way longer in senior living than people think it is.
So exactly what you're saying, Imean, there was a, a data point
from 2023, Asha found that family members are the primary
decision makers and 73% of senior living placements.
So they're way more involved than people might think.
And, and that first impression, second impression, or if you're
(35:18):
just providing resources and maybe down the road they
remember that and then they comeback.
I mean, that's so vital to that whole process of just building
rapport, you know? Right, And if you're in that, I
mean, there's a great community here that does like events where
they invite outside people and you know, the caregivers can
come, they do lunch events or you know, anything like that
where they're able to see that. I remember I did a downsizing
(35:41):
event and this this lady came, wonderful lady.
She was just wanting to, you know, downsize her house little
bit. Her husband was with her at the
time and she came to a couple more of my events and they were
always in the senior living locations.
Well, when it was when her husband passed, she had this
house that was too big for her. Guess where she went to like
(36:02):
find a place to have to live? It was a place that she had
visited like 3 years prior. You know it in those events that
they said, hey, you want to do atour and she was thinking she
would never live there, right? That that's one that I just know
personally because I was with her on that whole journey,
right? So.
Exactly. Exactly 1 of the the core
(36:23):
messages that that I've heard you say before is talking about
building community and not competition, right?
Tell me more about that. Yeah, I I feel like there are so
many people who are worried about.
I have to get all these customers.
I can't have my competition in there.
We, there was enough seniors, you know, if you like my town
(36:45):
alone, I live in a town where there's 500,000 residents,
right? There are 49,500 family
caregivers. So there's obviously a lot of
seniors that they're caring for.There is not one community.
There is not one senior placement person.
There is not one any type of senior service that can handle
49,000 customers right now, right?
(37:06):
And so if you're building that community, again, if I'm a
senior placement person and I goto you and I talk to you about
my services, but I say, hey, by the way, while we're getting
this worked out, here's this information from the support
group. Here's this information for
Meals on Wheels, here's this information for the downside.
I'm full service, right? I become full service without
(37:27):
having to do all that stuff myself.
And families appreciate that. Families appreciate that a lot.
And building that community, I remember I went to Indianapolis
to build community. I was there for like 2 months
and I found in two months of being there, I, I found and
produced a 43,000 square foot Expo, right?
And I found 154 resources in that town for seniors and
(37:49):
caregivers. And I'm at this event and, and
there are a lot of people there who have marketing people who
their whole job is to be in the community.
You know, their whole job is to connect.
And they're coming up to me and saying, I didn't even know these
resources were in this town, should know these resources are
in this town. And from that I built a
networking group so they can continue to network.
(38:11):
And we're at this first meeting and, and one of the nonprofits
that we invited was a nonprofit that built free ramps for people
with mobility issues. You'd think that's a very
important nonprofit. They had been around for 15
years. There was like 30 people in that
first meeting. There was only two people who
knew about that nonprofit. And there were a lot of heavy
(38:33):
hitters that were, you know, in that community that, you know,
were people who had, you know, people who were paid to go out
and find resources. They should have known about
that resource. They should share about that
resource. So because you think about the
Karen closet that's here, that gives away the durable medical
equipment and medical supplies to people they don't have.
(38:55):
These nonprofits don't have a huge marketing budget.
They don't have people that theycan pay.
They're run by volunteers that it's going to all the networking
meetings, right? So we have to network together
to get that information out there.
So we have to build community. And what happens is when I was
building community all over the United States, I would go into
these towns and there's these little silos of like, you know,
(39:16):
the small group that works together here and they refer
small group over here, small group.
Look, there's enough business for for you guys to all work
together, right? And you, and you have to do more
than just be the guy who shows up at that networking meeting
and hands out your business cardand, you know, participates in
community. You got to be more than just
that guy, right? You got to participate in the
community. And, and it helps build your
(39:37):
business too. If you're there to build your
business, building community is going to build your business.
And in addition to lack of collaboration, how do you think
there's obviously a lacking in caregivers?
I mean, there's a shortage in that space for sure.
How can tech platforms solve that problem?
Well, there's tech platforms outthere that you know, like Go
(39:59):
Instacare is one, right? Go Instacare is a great tech
platform that has caregivers that are on it, that people can
hire professional agencies can hire professional caregivers,
People can hire private caregivers.
The care carers on there can take, you know, short term jobs,
part term jobs. So what happens in the care
industry with these agencies? Sometimes these caregivers get.
(40:21):
Full time work, sometimes they do based on how many clients
they have, and then sometimes they get part time work and it
ebbs and flows and so they lose people.
These people go out and get parttime jobs and sometimes they're
making more at McDonald's than they are as ACNA, right?
And so platforms like Go Instacare, they're able to go in
there and have jobs that are still in that field, right?
(40:44):
So we're keeping them in that field.
So they're not necessarily goingout and door dashing or, you
know, eats or, you know, drivingaround doing stuff.
We're keeping them in that fieldand that's what we want to do.
That's great. That's great.
And then for families that are looking to navigate online care
marketplaces, I mean, what should they be looking for?
(41:04):
The first thing that you want todo is you want to try to get a
tool that's going to help you with your care journey, right?
There are tools out there like inner Hive that there's Hero
Gen. there's all kinds of, there's the pink book.
I mean, there's all kinds of tools out there that are going
to help you not only manage yourtime, manage your tasks, manage
your documents, but they're alsogoing to connect you with
(41:27):
community, right? They're going to connect you
with community. I would also say, you know, go
to places like Caregiver Action Network, they've got a hotline
that you can call and on that hotline, they'll give you some
of the resources you need. If you have a loved one who's
had a stroke, go to, you know, look up the stroke foundation.
If you have somebody who has cancer, look up that foundation.
(41:48):
They have all the resources theyneed.
Dementia, like Dementia Society of America, Alzheimer's, you
know, association, those folks right there are going to have be
your starting place, right? You have to start somewhere and
when you're talking to somebody,what I would say, if you're a
caregiver or you're somebody in the industry, when you're
talking to somebody, the end of your conversation should always
be, do you know anybody else I should check with or you would
(42:11):
recommend? Because you don't.
If you're looking for medical equipment, that's great.
You got that resource, but you've got somebody on the phone
who's probably connected to another resource, right?
Your last question should be, doyou know anybody else that I
should talk to that might help on my care journey or help me
care for my mother better? Or if you're a business person
that might help me help my clients better that because 1 +
(42:33):
1 + 1, you just build your community out that way.
You know, if I'm able to step into a town that I don't know
anybody and within two months have 154 resources, it's because
I asked that question continually.
Do you know a few was the question I would ask right.
And we can all do that so. Yeah, no, that's such a simple
(42:53):
solution and and a great way to network and and build that out
so quickly. We do that all the time and some
of the networking events that wego to.
I always ask that even with the podcast, I I reach out to people
all the time and ask is there anyone else that you would you
think would be a good fit for the show or multiple people?
I would love to connect with them.
So that's a great way to do it. Tell me about keys for
(43:14):
caregiving. How did that come about and and
what it is that you're doing now?
So keys for caregiving, you know, I left my tech career and
I wound up having to get a job part time in the senior care
industry. And my job was to be a sales and
marketing manager and find all these resources in town.
And I did a bunch of stuff, built, put a bunch of classes
(43:36):
out, put together an annual senior and caregiver resource
fair. And from there I had quite a few
resources built a nonprofit, A hyperlocal nonprofit that got
national coverage. People started asking me to
speak. I worked for a company who I was
able to build community all overthe United States.
While I was doing that, I was doing some consulting jobs with
companies who needed to be able to reach out to caregivers
(43:58):
because they knew how to reach out to seniors, but not
caregivers. I was helping people with
events. Something led to another and you
know, that's what I do now is mythe main bulk of my business is
consulting with businesses who are trying to reach family
caregivers, trying to create events for family caregivers.
Also, you know, I speak all overthe United States, you know, the
caregiver journey during it and after it.
(44:21):
I teach classes on caregiver recovery as well.
So that's what keys for caregiving is.
It just got to a place to where I was continually being asked to
do these things and I needed thetime to do that.
So here. We are.
That's great. That's amazing that you built
that out. And where can our audience go to
learn more about Keys for Caregiving or connect with you
(44:41):
directly? Christinakeys.com, right?
And then also you can find me onany of the social media
platforms, keys for caregiving. I also have a national text line
that you can text me and that's 360-230-7736.
Awesome. That's so great.
Well, Christina, thank you so much for hopping on the show
(45:03):
today. I really appreciate it.
I know that everything you shared is going to be really
valuable to anyone who's starting or in the midst of
their caregiving journey. Thank you.
Thank you so much. It's an honor to be here.
Thank you so much, Jerry. All right, so as we wrap up
today's episode, I want to thankChristina Keys for sharing such
an honest and important story. From the realities of full time
(45:26):
caregiving to the overlooked stage of recovery and the
systems that need to change. Christina, your voice is helping
so many others feel seen, supported, and prepared.
So thank you. If you want to connect with
Christina, hire her as a speaker, or learn more about her
work through Keys for Caregiving.
You'll find her links in the show notes.
And as always, we hope you foundthis episode insightful and
(45:48):
inspiring. Don't forget to subscribe to our
podcast on your favorite platform and stay tuned for more
episodes where we continue to explore the evolving world of
senior care, covering everythingfrom innovative care models and
leadership strategies to family support technology in the future
of aging. Also, remember that From Leads
to Leases isn't just an audio experience.
We're also a video podcast. You can subscribe to our YouTube
(46:08):
or Spotify channels if you want to see the full episodes like
the one here with Christina. I'm Jerry Vincey, CEO of CCR
growth. Thank you for joining us on From
Leads to Leases and please like,subscribe and share this episode
with anyone who might find it useful.
Until next time, leave a strategy and with heart chat
with you again soon. Thanks, Christina.
Thank you. Thanks for listening to From
(46:30):
Leads to Leases. Are you ready to fill your rooms
faster and increase occupancy? Visit ccrgrowth.com to learn
about our Senior Growth Innovation Suite, a proven
system to generate highly qualified tour ready leads,
accelerate sales and reduce acquisition costs.
Let's connect and turn your challenges into opportunities.
See you next time.
And it took me a while to realize that I also made myself
invisible. I Mom came first.
When I showered, when I ate, when I worked, when I did
anything, Mom came first. You know, I was just as guilty
as the outside world of making myself invisible.
And then here I am, Mom is gone.I don't know how to make me a
(00:20):
priority. What if you were a caregiver for
years before you even knew that word applied to you?
For today's guest, that realization came after losing
everything, and it changed the course of her life.
Welcome to From Leeds to Leases ACCR Growth podcast that helps
senior living providers transform their complex
(00:41):
challenges into opportunities. Listen in for stories from
industry leaders, innovative strategies and insights, and
with our expertise, learn how toincrease occupancy faster,
Guaranteed. Welcome back to another episode
of From Lease to Lease is the podcast that dives deep into the
senior living and senior care industries, bringing you
(01:01):
insights, strategies, and stories from the experts of the
forefront of innovation, leadership, and care.
I'm your host, Jerry Vinci, CEO of CCR Growth, the full service
marketing and growth agency that's exclusive to the senior
living industry. And through this podcast, I'm
here to guide you through the evolving landscape of senior
care, exploring the innovations,strategies, and leadership
(01:23):
insights that are shaping the future of the industry.
So whether you're a provider, a caregiver, or industry leader,
this show is here to help you make informed decisions and
create meaningful impact. All right.
Today's guest is Christina Keys,a nationally recognized family
caregiving advocate, speaker, and business strategist who
turned personal crisis into powerful purpose after her
(01:45):
mother suffered A devastating stroke.
Christina spent a decade as a full time caregiver, losing her
career, her savings, and nearly her life in the process.
Today, she's the founder of Keysfor Caregiving and a leading
voice on the front lines of caregiver recovery systems
change, and support for the often invisible individuals
(02:05):
driving care decisions across the country.
So Christina, welcome to the show.
I'm so glad to. Have you here?
Thank you. I'm excited to be here today.
Thank you. This is such an important topic.
And like you said, I mean invisible individuals, I think
is such a, such a powerful way to describe caregiving.
Sometimes. I think they're, they're
definitely the unseen heroes across America right now.
(02:28):
So I'm, I'm really glad you're here to share with us your
insights and, and help some people who might be in a similar
situation to you and, and looking for some, some ways out.
And so thank you. I want to talk first about the
caregiver. You didn't know you were, you
didn't call yourself a caregiveruntil you spent years in the
role. Why do so many caregivers not
realize they're caregivers untilyears?
(02:49):
In. Well, I think a lot of times
we're thrown into it and even ifwe get that diagnosis that hey,
your mom or your loved one is got diagmentia, dementia and
it's going to progress. We're still like, we think we
have time, right? And for me, you know, everything
was fine that morning. You know, that morning, I talked
(03:10):
to my mom. We were talking about, you know,
her going out with her friends, my car, whatever.
And, and then by 3:00 that afternoon, I got a call saying
she had a massive stroke. And I walked into the ICU and I
didn't know if I was going to walk out with a mother or having
to make Funeral arrangements. You know, when you walk in and
see that, when everything changes in an instant, you know,
(03:31):
for you, you're like, I just want this person to be alive,
you know? So for me, I was doing all of
this stuff. I brought her home after about 5
months and there I was being APTand OT, you know, a nurse and
EMT, you know, case manager and Med manager, all of these things
and didn't even realize I was a caregiver, right?
(03:52):
I had no idea I was caregiver because I wasn't, I was in tech,
you know, all my life, you know,I didn't know that about the
caregiving world. And so for me, it took a while
for me to understand I was a caregiver.
And I think for myself and a lotof other people, once we admit
we're a caregiver, you know, that grief really sets in that,
(04:12):
yes, I'm still a daughter for mymother, but we understand the
relationship has changed. You know, and I think it's hard
for people to, you know, especially like a parent with a
child, you know, a husband with a wife, a wife with a husband,
you know, if we use that term for a minute, we think it's
going to take away from that relationship.
(04:33):
So it's hard for us to actually say that sometimes.
Why do you think it's hard to self identify as a caregiver
though? I mean, I'm is it a loss of your
sense of self or is it somethingalong the lines of you grieving?
For that relationship of what itused to be and now it's kind of
shifted. I hadn't been in that industry,
(04:55):
so I didn't even know the term. Honestly.
When I remember, some of my Facebook memories came up and
here I was taking care of my mom, managing her care, doing
all of this stuff. And one of my first Facebook
posts was, Hey, does anybody know if they have babysitters?
But like for adults, I, I literally didn't even know the
term caregiver. You know, I, I was talking about
hardware and software, you know what I mean?
(05:16):
You asked me how to build, you know, data center.
I'm good. You know, you asked me what?
Because I have no idea, right? And so I, I didn't know that
term and caregiver, you know, I'm thinking of somebody in the
hospital or I'm thinking of somebody who is paid.
I'm not understanding what a caregiver is.
It took me a long time to realize that I was a caregiver.
(05:37):
And it was from other people talking about being a caregiver
and, and hearing some of those similar situations when they are
caring for a loved one that I realize, oh, I'm a caregiver.
And there are some people that never really want to admit that
they're a caregiver, you know, and they use different terms
like care partner, which like for Terry, my ex-boyfriend who I
cared for, that was pretty much what I was for him, right?
(05:59):
But the luxury of finally realizing you're a caregiver is
you know where to go to find resources now, you know what to
search on Google, you know who to talk to about saying, hey, I
need some caregiver resources orI need some caregiver support.
It's just, you know, when you'regoing to a Medical Center,
you're going to a Medical Center.
You might be seeing the endocrinologist, right?
(06:22):
But you have to go to the Medical Center first.
You got to walk through those doors, right?
So there's a luxury and, and finally identifying as that
caregiver. But yeah, there there's AI.
Remember, the hardest part for me was I remember when I was
leaving my career, I gave like amonth's notice because I didn't
want to leave, you know, and butyou know, I was working 9:00 to
5:00 Monday through Friday, B toB, and that is just not
(06:44):
conducive to full time care. And by February, I'd used all my
vacation time and all my sick days that I got awarded in
January. And I remember that last day,
you know, I was supposed to leave at 5.
Everybody left at 5:00 and it's 6 O clock.
I'm the only one in the building.
I'm still like, you know, putting stuff into Salesforce.
It was suddenly super important that everybody knew Larry wore
(07:05):
green socks and Salesforce, right?
He's like CEO and the managementteam.
You're like, Christina, what thehell are you doing here?
And I'm like, well, I just want to make sure everything's
wrapped up and, and they're like, it's OK to go, you know,
And I remember that was like thelongest elevator ride of my life
because, you know, I got into that elevator and I was still
Christina, the career woman. And and once those doors opened,
(07:27):
like I was just Christina the caregiver, and I was completely
lost and I was scared. It was scary, you know, it was
scary to know, like, you know, when I went to work, things were
so simple, you know what I mean?It was I was managing
multimillion dollar accounts. That was simple.
Managing a constant crisis, you know, and watching my mother,
you know, go through that. It's different when it's not
(07:48):
somebody you love, you know. So yeah, it's, it's tough for us
to admit that sometimes we don'tbecause we don't know what we're
doing necessarily. And we're also, it changes our
role. So it makes us very aware that
we don't have the same exact type of relationship we used to
have with that person. Could see that for sure.
(08:11):
I see a lot of similarities too on the senior living side of
things, just in terms of people not knowing the terminology
until they're actually in it. You know most people when they
do a search for senior living, they still put in nursing home.
Absolutely. That's such an outdated term.
Right. Yeah.
They're like, I don't want to send my mom to a nursing home.
And they think it's something. I mean, senior living is so
(08:33):
different than what a nursing home is, you know what I mean?
I would love to go to senior living now.
I mean, these places are beautiful, you know, gardening,
movie theaters, you know, restaurants, all of this stuff.
Like we don't know until we know.
How do financial sacrifices for caregiving show up in people's
lives long after the journey ends?
Well, I don't think people understand that for me.
(08:58):
And my mother was a, you know, aerospace engineer.
She was an executive at Boeing. You know, she retired from
Boeing. She had great insurance.
She had a great pension, you know, I was in tech, I was
making six figures. You know, I'm Wheeling her out
of the hospital thinking we're great.
She's got great insurance. She's got a supplement on top of
that. We're great.
And then come to find out her insurance does not cover in home
(09:21):
care. And then you don't understand
that, you know, there's other things that you need on top of
that, you know, adult briefs, all the extra medication
co-pays, you know, all the cleaning supplies, all the, you
know, gloves, all the bed sheet,all the hospital beds, all the
equipment. And you get them home.
And, you know, you find out Medicare only covers one piece
(09:42):
of equipment every five years. And even if you're on Medicaid,
it takes like an act of God to get something finally approved,
you know, and so we went through, we had, we both had a
very, you know, good robust 4 O1KS.
And, you know, between everything that the hospital
wasn't paying, not the hospital,but her insurance wasn't paying
for. And we had to remodel the
(10:02):
bathroom so she could actually go to the bathroom, get her
wheelchair in, you know, and, and, and make sure the
downstairs was suitable for her hospital bed.
All of these things, build a ramp, you know, all of these
things you don't think about, you know, within a year and a
half, almost close to two years,that's all it took for us to go
through our life savings, you know, and I was, I was in my
early 40s then, you know, I'd, I'd done everything.
(10:23):
I chased that American dream. I got a job, I turn it into a
career. I put my money in my 4 O 1K and
and it all went to my mother's care.
And then you're I was paying between 3000 and $1500 a month
for my mother's care. And when I had to leave my 6
figure job, you know, I'm takingpart time jobs and piercing them
(10:44):
together making $15.00 an hour, which I hadn't made since I was
like 16 years old. You know, I have been food bank
lines and you know, having to get, you know, resources from
the community and I had, I didn't know how to do that
either right. And so all of these things went
away, all of my cushions went away.
You know, the vacations and everything went away.
(11:04):
And, and then after my mom passed, even like on Hospice, I
thought, OK, finally Hospice is going to come in.
I'm going to get some relief. Well, Hospice was a little
different, right? And so my expenses went from
3000 to $6000 a month. And then my mom had her stroke
at 62, so she didn't have life insurance, right?
(11:24):
So, you know, I'm having to sell, you know, her doll
collection to pay to bury her, you know, and I don't think
people understand that, you know, when we're thrown into a
lot of that, sometimes we're notprepared for any of it, right?
And so, and I don't think peopleunderstand until they go through
it too, that the death is very expensive, you know, and then on
top of that, you're trying to rebuild your life because it's
(11:47):
not just about the grief, you know, it's about the caregiver
recovery also. And you're trying to rebuild
your life. And you are completely, you're,
you're going through grief. You're also going through an
identity crisis, right? And you're also going through,
you know, for 24 hours a day, I've been on call, you know, and
trying to calm down your nervoussystem.
And then you've got to learn to plan financially and you're
(12:09):
having to reach out to like, youknow, financial planners and all
of these people. And you still, it takes a minute
also to get past that crisis mindset because the second you
get some money put aside, you still shortly after, within that
first year or two, you're still thinking, well, there might be
an emergency, you know, so it's,it's tough to recover
(12:32):
financially. It's not just about the money.
It's about what we have walked through as caregivers constantly
being in fight or flight mode. It's about, you know, the cost
that we didn't expect of caring.It's about the cost of death
that we didn't expect. It's a cost of rebuilding our
life and rebuilding our credit and everything that changed a
(12:54):
lot of times when we are caring for someone.
I've heard that so many times about people depleting their
their funds, their savings, their retirement accounts.
And how do families cope with that?
I mean, how do they pay for careif if they've tapped all their
resources, what's left? How?
How did they get around that? Well, so sometimes they're able
(13:15):
to do like with Terry, we were able to do Medicaid spend down
right and I was able to get him.We were not married.
We were partners for like 20 years or whatever.
I was able to get him the care he needed and the insurance he
needed and that way, but it alsomeant, you know, he was an
electrician all of his life. He had, you know, some money and
(13:36):
and a house and all those thingswent to the state also, right?
Places that they can go, caregivers can go to places like
area agency on aging and see what kind of programs they have
to see what kind of programs that they qualify for.
Also check with some of the local senior centers and see
what type of programs they have.Even something as simple as
(13:57):
Meals on Wheels, which is a great program, right?
I mean that's going to help you right there.
Every time after a while you equate things to, oh, that $20
equates to one hour of care, right.
So if I'm struggling and I'm having to sell all my stuff,
which I had to do, I had to sella lot of my nice stuff.
There is constant garage sales and you know, things like that.
(14:18):
And so if I'm having to do that,if I can go somewhere and get a
little bit of help like Meals onWheels or go to a local
nonprofit and get some of the like adult briefs or the, you
know, medical equipment instead of paying for the hospital bed
or the other four pieces of equipment you need that Medicare
isn't paying for. So there there are certain
(14:39):
things that you can look for, but I think one of the reasons
why we spent so much money in the beginning is because like
many caregivers, we were our families.
We were thrown into it. We were not prepared, we didn't
understand. I think about if I would have
had like a care coach, I think our money would have lasted a
lot longer because they would have told me about the local
resources. They would have told me about,
(14:59):
you know, check with area agencyon aging.
They would have told me about, you know, the things that you
can get covered, things that youneed, things that you don't
need, you know, And so I didn't know those things.
And I was asking the hospitals, I was asking the doctors and
that they're there to do something completely different
than be your community guide. I found an interesting statistic
(15:20):
and I want to get your opinion on it.
It's it's from 2021 from AARP, but they said over 75% of family
caregivers report out of pocket expenses and one in three spend
more than 20% of their income oncaregiving.
I'm kind of calling bullshit on that because everybody I know
who who is in a caregiving role,it's way more than 20%.
(15:41):
Yeah. I mean, I think AARP is
wonderful, the research they do and the statistics they do, but
that was not my experience and that is is not the experience of
I think the caregivers that I know would rejoice in it only
being 20% what's our birthday, you know.
But I think it's important that they do that research is that's
(16:03):
just not been my experience. There is a lot of expenses that
we don't think about and and maybe perhaps they didn't put
that into that research. You know, like I said, said, the
outside medical equipment you need, the, you know, remodeling
of the bathroom that you need, the ramp that you need to be
built. The extra co-pays that you're
spending because your medications are more now, the
(16:23):
extra doctor's visit co-pays, you know, the, the bathroom
remodeled all the stuff, right, The extra cleaning supplies,
right? So the extra gas that you need
because you're running around. I mean, all of those things are
not, I don't think they're equated into that.
I think they're looking at how much they're out, out of pocket
is, you know, my out of pocket for care.
(16:43):
What I was writing checks for tothe private caregivers and the
agencies were between 1500 and 3000 a month.
And I wish that would have been when I was working 6 figures
that might have been 20%, but not after I had to leave my
career. Yeah.
And and many caregivers do have to leave their career.
(17:03):
You mentioned financial planningtoo.
What kind of tools or strategieshave you found that help people
now that you wish you would haveknown about at the time?
The care coaches would have beenwonderful, right?
A care coach, wonderful. And if anybody's listening, you
don't know what a care coach is.It's somebody who's been through
it, right? Somebody who's been through it,
(17:23):
who knows how to find local resources, who knows about some
of the programs that are out there, who knows about some of
the tools that will help you manage your care journey and
also that will be there to, you know, listen to what you're
going through and understand. Local nonprofits would have
really helped. I didn't know about those.
I didn't find out about, you know, nonprofit here that helped
(17:44):
with the extra medical equipmentand the adult briefs until, I
don't know, four years into my care journey, right.
And you know, again, checking with the area agency on aging
and see what kind of programs they have would have helped a
lot too. All of these things I would have
known, but I didn't even know what to look for.
I didn't know what to look for. It's kind of like once I use
(18:05):
that caregiver word, I started to find out what to look for.
And once I started connecting with other caregivers and
building community and finding support and learning some of
these things to ask for is when things started to change for me.
And from the medical side, what do you think hospitals and
discharge planners still get wrong about supporting families
(18:26):
post ICU? Well, it's not necessarily their
job to give people resources. You know, when I left that
hospital, I, my mother was in a wonderful hospital, one of the
best hospitals in Seattle, I think Harborview Hospital.
And we were there for God, like almost three or four months.
We, I lived in the hospital withher.
So I'm talking to these doctors,these nurses, these, you know,
(18:48):
social workers discharged like all of these people all the
time, chaplains, everybody who walks in.
I'm trying to be educated. You know, they let me wheel her
out of there knowing I had no training, knowing I didn't know
anything other than, again, how to build a data center, you
know, and they gave me a list ofsenior living locations and in
home care. And I didn't.
(19:09):
And what they had told me, it seemed like if I got in home
care, it had to be 24 hours, right?
And I didn't want somebody there24 hours.
I thought that might be expensive, you know, So there is
a hospital system on the East Coast.
I can't remember the name of it right now, but they have gotten
it right. They have gotten it right.
And it is something that I dreamed about so many times.
(19:33):
And they actually have caregiverresource centers right in the
hospital. If they have somebody who, you
know, their family members had astroke, they know that person's
going home, there's a caregiver,you know, somebody comes in and
says, hey, by the way, we have this caregiver Resource Center.
It's a whole area in the hospital, whole section of the
hospital that has all these resources, that has people you
(19:53):
can talk to. They've got like massage chairs,
you know, and I, I believe there's fourteen of them, right?
And then if hospitals had something like that and medical
centers had something like that,it doesn't even need to be a
large place. Listen there, I'm sure the
doctors and nurses and and medical teams, they have had
(20:15):
their fill of angry caregivers. Angry, confused, and scared
givers, right? The way I communicated with
hospital teams and medical teamswhen I was first caregiving was
way different after a while, right?
I learned the difference betweenadvocating and being scared out
of my mind and trying to communicate that right.
(20:35):
And if they were to implement that, not only would they have
people who are not having as many hospital visits because
when they're at home, they're getting the care they need.
The caregivers are not as burnedout.
They're able to provide better care.
They're able to find the resources so they're not having
repeat hospital visits. It would really help them to,
you know, have a better flow of how things go when they're
(20:58):
dealing with families, when they're dealing with people who
have, you know, terminal issues or medical issues where they
need family caregivers. So I, I think they need more
than just a list of, you know, senior living and, you know, in
home care, because not everybodyis gets to my mother would have
not, she would need to go to skilled nursing.
(21:18):
She wouldn't have been able to live in one of the fancy senior
living places, right. But that's what they gave me a
list of, you know. Yeah, and that's just such a
scary thought that I'm just like, sending you on your way,
you know, with little to no experience in doing this.
I mean, that had to be terrifying.
Can only. Imagine.
Yeah. And you know, the as a new
caregiver, I didn't know either.You know, they said take her
(21:41):
home in and even with Terry, like you got to take him home
and I'm not trained for that. And it took me a while to learn
to say there is no safe place for them right now.
We need to find a safe place forthem, you know, and so, and
sometimes that meant them going from the hospital to the skilled
nursing, right? So they can get the rehab they
(22:03):
need so they could be safe when they got home, right?
Or even just something as simpleas scheduling that home health
and all the home health, you know, folks that are going to
come into the house before you leave that hospital so they're
safe. I didn't know you.
She's got to go home with you. Used to be OK and just figure it
out, right? We learn along the way how to
(22:24):
advocate for our loved ones, howto advocate for ourself.
So everybody's safe. And when the caregiving ends,
what does the recovery process look like?
Well, you know, caregiving for many, many of the caregivers, it
affects our life, you know, financially, physically,
spiritually, mentally, emotionally, socially.
And so we have to recover all those areas of our life, you
(22:47):
know, and we've been in fight orflight mode for so long.
You know, I was constantly goinginto an emergency, coming out of
an emergency, preparing for an emergency or recovering from an
emergency, right? And I had a very strange
blessing, a very strange blessing.
My father, who I love dearly andI was not a caregiver for, died
(23:08):
unexpectedly about six months before my mother.
And so I went through all the grief counseling, one-on-one
grief counseling, and I learned a lot about grief.
And so I thought when mom was passing that I would be all
prepared for that. I didn't realize there were
certain things like, you know, Ididn't when my dad passed, I
(23:29):
didn't have to worry about, you know, everything shooting in my
system. Like it used to be adrenaline
going crazy in my system whenever the phone rang, right?
Or when it was 5:00 or when it was 2:00 or when it was 10:00.
Because those were certain timesthat, you know, I had to check
in on mom or do something for mom.
You know, there are so many things like going out, the
social isolation that I had losta bunch of friends and now I
(23:52):
have to like make a bunch of friends, right?
And even my relationship with, you know, how I saw things
spiritually changed as well. So having to recover all of
those things and they're, you know, I was always super
optimistic. I was always, I was always the
fun one. I was always the funny one.
Well, I wasn't like that after, you know, mom had the stroke and
(24:13):
being able to find out who we are again and regain some of
that, right? Because we've become so full of,
you know, fear and depression and anxiety at times, depending
on how our support system is. I can tell you that if we're
practicing self-care, sorry caregivers, if you're listening,
I'm sorry, I mentioned the bad word, self-care.
(24:35):
But if you're practicing self-care and you have
community, then it's going to beeasier for us, right?
Your recovery is going to be a little bit easier, but there are
are these different aspects of our life that we have to recover
and the financial we have to recover.
I mean, all of these things, something as simple as I
remember after my mom passed andI, I went out on a date.
(24:56):
I went out on this lovely date with this gentleman.
He took me to this very nice restaurant and he's having a
conversation with me and I'm having a whole different
experience because all I can think is, Oh my God, I got to
ride in somebody else's car here.
I didn't have to drive my own car in case I had to leave it.
Oh my God, my, my phone's in my purse.
Like like I always used to have it on the table.
Like, Oh my God, I don't have tobe home at a certain time.
(25:18):
Like my God, I'm not having to pay for care while I'm here.
Like, I don't know what happenedfor him on that date, but for
me, I was having a whole different experience.
So something even as simple as that, you know, we have to well,
and then and then we have to deal with, you know, some of the
things, all the grief on top of that, right.
So we're processing the grief and we're also processing how do
(25:38):
we recover these parts of our life.
And, and The Who am I now if I'mnot a caregiver?
I've always and we talk about the caregivers being invisible.
And I used to get so angry aboutthat.
I used to get so angry about it.And it took me a while to
realize that I also made myself invisible.
Mom came first. When I showered, when I ate,
(26:00):
when I worked, when I did anything, mom came first.
You know, I was just as guilty as the outside world of making
myself invisible. And then here I am, mom is gone.
I don't know how to make me a priority.
Like even just sitting down to eat a meal and not project
managed during that meal was uncomfortable for me.
(26:20):
So learning how to watch TV without it, just trying to block
everything out, I mean uncomfortable for me.
And I started a caregiver recovery program.
You know, I have many years in recovery, 31 years in actual
recovery. And when I was coming out of
being a caregiver reminded me ofwhen I first started my recovery
(26:41):
from drugs and alcohol back 31 years ago.
So, you know, the caregiver recovery term came from that.
And when I first started it, youknow, it's baby steps.
It's baby steps for all of that.And so I started a caregiver
recovery support group. And what's been so great about
that is all of the people that are in that group, we are
(27:01):
experiencing the same thing. They're recovering all of these
different areas of our life and being confused by, you know, the
different steps along the way and who we are and what our life
can be because our all of our lives are way different than we
thought they were going to be. You know, we think we're going
to help mom pass or dad pass or whoever.
(27:21):
We're going to grieve and then we're going to have all this
freedom. And it's, it's not like that
because a lot of our life was run on adrenaline before, right?
And now we're just running on being a human being, which is a
little bit different level, you know, so.
I'm sure it's different for everyone, but in your
experience, what are the best ways to to cope with that grief
(27:45):
and cause allowing yourself to to come back to center?
I mean, is it just a time thing?Is IT support groups?
Is it being self aware that you're experiencing these things
and and recognizing where your life is impacted and how you
need to work on those responses and and subconscious right Some
of it. Well, I, I definitely recommend
(28:05):
anybody, whether you have been acaregiver or not, if you lose
someone very important, you know, in your life, even if you
lose a, a pet that was, you know, very important in your
life to, I found that grief counseling was very helpful for
me. And if group grief counseling is
not your jam, that's not comfortable for you.
(28:26):
There's individual grief counseling, there's also grief
rake, there's art therapy, there's even grief raves.
Now there's a million ways to dogrief for you.
So whatever way you process that, it's out there for you,
right? And I found that it was life
changing for me. But the biggest thing I, I
realized is just like in caregiving, because in
(28:47):
caregiving, the reason why I, you know, that first few years,
you know, and after I left my career, I went to my last
doctor's appointment and they told me like, Hey, by the way,
your body's shutting down. You have six months left to
live, you know, and I had to like, I had to learn self-care
really quick. The first thing I had to do was
redefine my normal, right? So when I'm going through this
(29:07):
new change in my life with the grief, not being a caregiver, I
have to read define my normal, right?
And so that means I have to fit in what I can do for my grief
recovery, what I can do for my, you know, my calming down my,
you know, nervous system, right?My cortisone levels, bringing
those down. And it's not just about going to
(29:28):
the doctors and getting a pill. It's, it's very important to go
to the doctors, right? That's one thing that we did not
do a lot of times when we were caring for, you know, someone
else. So that's something that I
always encourage people to do isgo to the doctor and see, you
know, how you're doing, right? And but we have to, you know,
seek out whatever works for us. If that's, if that's yoga, if
(29:49):
that's Tai chi, if that's, you know, you know, somatic therapy,
whatever it may be, whatever works for you because you're
also like for me. And what I've heard from the
other people is nothing feels right at first.
Nothing feels right at first. So that's OK.
Just keep trying. Just keep trying until something
clicks, until it feels. Nothing's going to be
(30:12):
comfortable at first, right? Nothing's going to be
comfortable for a while until itfeels a little less
uncomfortable, right? And, and the biggest thing with
grief is and caregiver recovery,you know, there is no graduation
day, you know, and, and people talk about those five stages of
grief, right? The five stages of grief were
written for people who are dying.
They were not written for the people who are living, right?
(30:34):
Because we can experience those five stages of grief in like 10
minutes, you know, and, and on repeat and we can be fine for
six months and then something happens and that grief comes up.
So there's the normal is there is no normal that you have to
fit into if you're not hurting yourself and you're not hurting
somebody else. However, it helps you to feel
(30:55):
better and learn to walk with that grief because it's
somebody. If it's somebody really close to
you, grief doesn't go away. You just learn to walk with it
differently. I.
Love that. I love that.
That's great advice. Thank you for sharing that.
Shifting gears to look at thingsthrough the senior living lens a
little bit, a lot of the marketing and focus for senior
living providers is really on the older adults or the family,
(31:19):
but not necessarily the family caregivers.
So how are providers missing themark?
By marketing only to older adults or to the family but not
to the caregivers? Yeah, You know, it's interesting
because one of the things I did when I changed my career was I
started going out and gathering resources and talking to people.
And I'd say, hey, in the senior industry you work with family
(31:40):
caregivers, right? Oh, no, I worked with with a
senior or something who's signing all those contracts and
who's like making the calls and well, it's usually family
member. I'm like, OK, well, so you work
with family caregivers. No, I just work with seniors,
OK, just because you know, just because they're they're bringing
the senior in, that's who's going to get the service.
So that's not necessarily who's making the decision, right?
(32:01):
The family caregiver making the decision.
The family caregivers are not only going to make the decision
on the service you provide, but they're also going to make the
decision on sometimes, you know,the ease of it, you know, and
how much you understand that they are part of it.
Like for senior living, they're going to be calling, they're
going to be, you know, going andvisiting.
They want to work with the location that's going to be open
(32:22):
to seeing them as part of the team, right.
So I think that it's really important that they start
looking at when they can not only, you know, the times that
you're posting on social media, the different social media
platforms that you're on it. I would talk to people and
they'd be like, oh, I hate TikTok or I hate Facebook or I
hate this. It's like, you know, I really
don't care what you hate your clients like that and that's
(32:44):
where they're at. You're talking to isolated
caregivers who aren't going out anywhere and they're on social
media many of the times. And so you might not like it.
You don't have to post dance videos, but you should maybe for
your business, right? This is how this is how you
market to them. And another thing that, you
know, I, I did a lot of classes at the senior living locations
(33:05):
and one of the things that they like, I did a lot of downsizing
classes, you know, before, during and after the funeral
classes like resource fairs all out there.
And then what would happen is wewould work with the community
and they would give tours of these beautiful places, right?
So people knew where and they had people who moved in after,
if they weren't ready, then theyknew where to go afterwards,
(33:27):
right? And I don't understand, there's
always room somewhere, you know,once a week or once a month
where they could have a caregiver support group for
those family members who are in that location, right?
Because again, it's if a, if a caregiver is, is happier and
calmer and they're having support and they're having
community, they're less likely to come to your staff and say,
(33:50):
Hey, you're doing all of this wrong because I'm frustrated
with my life, right? So you having things like, you
know, a carrier support group that you host at your place,
having community resources there, having a caregiver area
there where there are resources where they can look at just
acknowledging that they're there, right.
And when you're, when you are a company and you provide a
(34:13):
service for a senior, think about some of the other services
or products that might be helpful to them also that you
don't have necessarily, but you could recommend to them because
they're going to remember that. Hey, I went to Jerry.
He helped my mom get into this senior living place, but he also
told me about, you know, this caregiver support group.
(34:34):
He also told me about this financial planner or this care
coach and you know, I would recommend Jerry all day long
because it what you know, I feellike he really valued me and
took care of me and helped me not only my mother but me,
right? One of the things that I know
just from the marketing side andlooking at all the the move in
data that I come across on a regular basis is that the sales
(34:57):
cycle is way longer in senior living than people think it is.
So exactly what you're saying, Imean, there was a, a data point
from 2023, Asha found that family members are the primary
decision makers and 73% of senior living placements.
So they're way more involved than people might think.
And, and that first impression, second impression, or if you're
(35:18):
just providing resources and maybe down the road they
remember that and then they comeback.
I mean, that's so vital to that whole process of just building
rapport, you know? Right, And if you're in that, I
mean, there's a great community here that does like events where
they invite outside people and you know, the caregivers can
come, they do lunch events or you know, anything like that
where they're able to see that. I remember I did a downsizing
(35:41):
event and this this lady came, wonderful lady.
She was just wanting to, you know, downsize her house little
bit. Her husband was with her at the
time and she came to a couple more of my events and they were
always in the senior living locations.
Well, when it was when her husband passed, she had this
house that was too big for her. Guess where she went to like
(36:02):
find a place to have to live? It was a place that she had
visited like 3 years prior. You know it in those events that
they said, hey, you want to do atour and she was thinking she
would never live there, right? That that's one that I just know
personally because I was with her on that whole journey,
right? So.
Exactly. Exactly 1 of the the core
(36:23):
messages that that I've heard you say before is talking about
building community and not competition, right?
Tell me more about that. Yeah, I I feel like there are so
many people who are worried about.
I have to get all these customers.
I can't have my competition in there.
We, there was enough seniors, you know, if you like my town
(36:45):
alone, I live in a town where there's 500,000 residents,
right? There are 49,500 family
caregivers. So there's obviously a lot of
seniors that they're caring for.There is not one community.
There is not one senior placement person.
There is not one any type of senior service that can handle
49,000 customers right now, right?
(37:06):
And so if you're building that community, again, if I'm a
senior placement person and I goto you and I talk to you about
my services, but I say, hey, by the way, while we're getting
this worked out, here's this information from the support
group. Here's this information for
Meals on Wheels, here's this information for the downside.
I'm full service, right? I become full service without
(37:27):
having to do all that stuff myself.
And families appreciate that. Families appreciate that a lot.
And building that community, I remember I went to Indianapolis
to build community. I was there for like 2 months
and I found in two months of being there, I, I found and
produced a 43,000 square foot Expo, right?
And I found 154 resources in that town for seniors and
(37:49):
caregivers. And I'm at this event and, and
there are a lot of people there who have marketing people who
their whole job is to be in the community.
You know, their whole job is to connect.
And they're coming up to me and saying, I didn't even know these
resources were in this town, should know these resources are
in this town. And from that I built a
networking group so they can continue to network.
(38:11):
And we're at this first meeting and, and one of the nonprofits
that we invited was a nonprofit that built free ramps for people
with mobility issues. You'd think that's a very
important nonprofit. They had been around for 15
years. There was like 30 people in that
first meeting. There was only two people who
knew about that nonprofit. And there were a lot of heavy
(38:33):
hitters that were, you know, in that community that, you know,
were people who had, you know, people who were paid to go out
and find resources. They should have known about
that resource. They should share about that
resource. So because you think about the
Karen closet that's here, that gives away the durable medical
equipment and medical supplies to people they don't have.
(38:55):
These nonprofits don't have a huge marketing budget.
They don't have people that theycan pay.
They're run by volunteers that it's going to all the networking
meetings, right? So we have to network together
to get that information out there.
So we have to build community. And what happens is when I was
building community all over the United States, I would go into
these towns and there's these little silos of like, you know,
(39:16):
the small group that works together here and they refer
small group over here, small group.
Look, there's enough business for for you guys to all work
together, right? And you, and you have to do more
than just be the guy who shows up at that networking meeting
and hands out your business cardand, you know, participates in
community. You got to be more than just
that guy, right? You got to participate in the
community. And, and it helps build your
(39:37):
business too. If you're there to build your
business, building community is going to build your business.
And in addition to lack of collaboration, how do you think
there's obviously a lacking in caregivers?
I mean, there's a shortage in that space for sure.
How can tech platforms solve that problem?
Well, there's tech platforms outthere that you know, like Go
(39:59):
Instacare is one, right? Go Instacare is a great tech
platform that has caregivers that are on it, that people can
hire professional agencies can hire professional caregivers,
People can hire private caregivers.
The care carers on there can take, you know, short term jobs,
part term jobs. So what happens in the care
industry with these agencies? Sometimes these caregivers get.
(40:21):
Full time work, sometimes they do based on how many clients
they have, and then sometimes they get part time work and it
ebbs and flows and so they lose people.
These people go out and get parttime jobs and sometimes they're
making more at McDonald's than they are as ACNA, right?
And so platforms like Go Instacare, they're able to go in
there and have jobs that are still in that field, right?
(40:44):
So we're keeping them in that field.
So they're not necessarily goingout and door dashing or, you
know, eats or, you know, drivingaround doing stuff.
We're keeping them in that fieldand that's what we want to do.
That's great. That's great.
And then for families that are looking to navigate online care
marketplaces, I mean, what should they be looking for?
(41:04):
The first thing that you want todo is you want to try to get a
tool that's going to help you with your care journey, right?
There are tools out there like inner Hive that there's Hero
Gen. there's all kinds of, there's the pink book.
I mean, there's all kinds of tools out there that are going
to help you not only manage yourtime, manage your tasks, manage
your documents, but they're alsogoing to connect you with
(41:27):
community, right? They're going to connect you
with community. I would also say, you know, go
to places like Caregiver Action Network, they've got a hotline
that you can call and on that hotline, they'll give you some
of the resources you need. If you have a loved one who's
had a stroke, go to, you know, look up the stroke foundation.
If you have somebody who has cancer, look up that foundation.
(41:48):
They have all the resources theyneed.
Dementia, like Dementia Society of America, Alzheimer's, you
know, association, those folks right there are going to have be
your starting place, right? You have to start somewhere and
when you're talking to somebody,what I would say, if you're a
caregiver or you're somebody in the industry, when you're
talking to somebody, the end of your conversation should always
be, do you know anybody else I should check with or you would
(42:11):
recommend? Because you don't.
If you're looking for medical equipment, that's great.
You got that resource, but you've got somebody on the phone
who's probably connected to another resource, right?
Your last question should be, doyou know anybody else that I
should talk to that might help on my care journey or help me
care for my mother better? Or if you're a business person
that might help me help my clients better that because 1 +
(42:33):
1 + 1, you just build your community out that way.
You know, if I'm able to step into a town that I don't know
anybody and within two months have 154 resources, it's because
I asked that question continually.
Do you know a few was the question I would ask right.
And we can all do that so. Yeah, no, that's such a simple
(42:53):
solution and and a great way to network and and build that out
so quickly. We do that all the time and some
of the networking events that wego to.
I always ask that even with the podcast, I I reach out to people
all the time and ask is there anyone else that you would you
think would be a good fit for the show or multiple people?
I would love to connect with them.
So that's a great way to do it. Tell me about keys for
(43:14):
caregiving. How did that come about and and
what it is that you're doing now?
So keys for caregiving, you know, I left my tech career and
I wound up having to get a job part time in the senior care
industry. And my job was to be a sales and
marketing manager and find all these resources in town.
And I did a bunch of stuff, built, put a bunch of classes
(43:36):
out, put together an annual senior and caregiver resource
fair. And from there I had quite a few
resources built a nonprofit, A hyperlocal nonprofit that got
national coverage. People started asking me to
speak. I worked for a company who I was
able to build community all overthe United States.
While I was doing that, I was doing some consulting jobs with
companies who needed to be able to reach out to caregivers
(43:58):
because they knew how to reach out to seniors, but not
caregivers. I was helping people with
events. Something led to another and you
know, that's what I do now is mythe main bulk of my business is
consulting with businesses who are trying to reach family
caregivers, trying to create events for family caregivers.
Also, you know, I speak all overthe United States, you know, the
caregiver journey during it and after it.
(44:21):
I teach classes on caregiver recovery as well.
So that's what keys for caregiving is.
It just got to a place to where I was continually being asked to
do these things and I needed thetime to do that.
So here. We are.
That's great. That's amazing that you built
that out. And where can our audience go to
learn more about Keys for Caregiving or connect with you
(44:41):
directly? Christinakeys.com, right?
And then also you can find me onany of the social media
platforms, keys for caregiving. I also have a national text line
that you can text me and that's 360-230-7736.
Awesome. That's so great.
Well, Christina, thank you so much for hopping on the show
(45:03):
today. I really appreciate it.
I know that everything you shared is going to be really
valuable to anyone who's starting or in the midst of
their caregiving journey. Thank you.
Thank you so much. It's an honor to be here.
Thank you so much, Jerry. All right, so as we wrap up
today's episode, I want to thankChristina Keys for sharing such
an honest and important story. From the realities of full time
(45:26):
caregiving to the overlooked stage of recovery and the
systems that need to change. Christina, your voice is helping
so many others feel seen, supported, and prepared.
So thank you. If you want to connect with
Christina, hire her as a speaker, or learn more about her
work through Keys for Caregiving.
You'll find her links in the show notes.
And as always, we hope you foundthis episode insightful and
(45:48):
inspiring. Don't forget to subscribe to our
podcast on your favorite platform and stay tuned for more
episodes where we continue to explore the evolving world of
senior care, covering everythingfrom innovative care models and
leadership strategies to family support technology in the future
of aging. Also, remember that From Leads
to Leases isn't just an audio experience.
We're also a video podcast. You can subscribe to our YouTube
(46:08):
or Spotify channels if you want to see the full episodes like
the one here with Christina. I'm Jerry Vincey, CEO of CCR
growth. Thank you for joining us on From
Leads to Leases and please like,subscribe and share this episode
with anyone who might find it useful.
Until next time, leave a strategy and with heart chat
with you again soon. Thanks, Christina.
Thank you. Thanks for listening to From
(46:30):
Leads to Leases. Are you ready to fill your rooms
faster and increase occupancy? Visit ccrgrowth.com to learn
about our Senior Growth Innovation Suite, a proven
system to generate highly qualified tour ready leads,
accelerate sales and reduce acquisition costs.
Let's connect and turn your challenges into opportunities.
See you next time.
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