Hindsight's 2020

This episode was recorded on May 17, 2021. Little did I know -- 3 weeks later -- my dad would pass away suddenly and unexpectedly. If I'm being honest, I have not listened to this episode in its entirety. Nor have I listened to any of the last five episodes I taped from late April through May; however, I'm dropping all of them (S1 Episodes 15-19) now for my listeners to hear. Their stories deserve to be told and listened to...

Hey, Kim! thanks for being here today. I'll let you go ahead and introduce yourself. 

Hi, Andrea. I am so glad to be here with you also. My name is Kim. I live in New York. I am a mom of three amazing humans who are making their way in the world. They've mostly flown the coop. But I think I've done something right because they're doing pretty good out there in life. I've been married for 20 plus years and for a c...

[00:03:30]No, not for one day. I did not work from home. One moment of it. We got an email the night before saying that we were an essential business and that all of our stores will be operating to the best that we could under the new circumstances with all the safety protocol in place. And we briefed our staff immediately the next day and we've been open ever since.

[00:06:31]I'm a cancer survivor, so for me personally, I t...

If you're interested in following Julie's story check out her website & Caringbridge sites.

The AirBnB event Julie refers to is "Sangria & Secrets with Drag Taste". 

For more information on her local support group and Stage 4 resources:
BAYS (Bay Area Young Survivors)
BCA (Breast Cancer Action)
METAvivor

Episode Notes:
[00:01:08] I remember feeling so kind of envious that they were entering this New Year with such ...

Laika is the Founder of Hygrid Health, a digital health company that she launched in February 2021. She's a mother of two energetic and sweet kids and has been married to her husband for over 12 years. Laika was born in Karachi, Pakistan and moved to the US at the age of 7. She grew up just outside of Atlanta, GA and has lived in San Francisco since 2011.

Details on Hygrid Health:
Hygrid Health is enabling a platform where consum...

2:13 Parenting-wise, I have row, row, row'd that boat!

3:35 When our (customers) works were getting shut down, they definitely were very interested in our work remaining open  - understandably - so they could get their work done at home and we could take care of their kids.

4:01 We went with the commercial insurance guideline and we shut 'er down, and I think our daycare parents we're like "Really? You're not gonn...

Mental Health Resources:

HHS

NIH

Dr Chung of Kaiser Permanente

AAPI Resources:

Stop AAPI Hate

Show Notes:

2:14 The most difficult thing during that time was the fact there were so many unknowns with the pandemic

2:49 That definitely put me in a spiral in terms of my mental health

3:08 We all know our limitations when it comes to anxiety and stress

4:07 I knew it was nothing like something as intense as a heart attack, but it was an attack of...

2:33 That’s when it started to hit me and I was getting a little bit nervous about things.

4:57 I was really just in survival mode at that point.

5:11 Are we at a point in our relationship where we’re really gonna hunker down together and there’s no end date? Are we going to do this?

5:48 We’re gonna be in this for awhile

6:05 I hired a moving company, they Facetimed me and they went in and packed up my entire apartment and put it in b...

4:04 My parents told me right then and there “You cannot talk to the police. You cannot get in trouble”.

4:24 I was afraid to do any kind of mistakes because I immediately equated that with possibly going back to place that I didn’t know anybody or anything about.

4:45 I think that made me work very, very hard bc I knew I needed to be excellent to do anything.

4:57 I had to walk a very fine line and that there was no room for mistakes...

1:47 Having a pre-k’r, doing zoom school is impossible, so he literally just watched tv all day.

8:08 it was nice because for those three days we got to pretend that he didn’t have cancer.

8:41 Pancreatic cancer is just awful and terrible and you need the most awful drugs to try to penetrate those cells.

9:06 He was NED for almost a year  - which was awesome - and then it came back, it had metastasized, but in very small not life thre...

3:34 I felt like I hit my limit in terms of caregiving to an extent.

10:31 Smart companies, from my perspective, know that it's so much more expensive to replace someone than to make room for them to get better and take care of themselves.

11:30 I took 6 weeks off toward the end of the year - to me the leave is more of a symptom of the fact that I didn't put myself first for a long, long time. Then I got to the point where I ...

This episode, during which I share bits of my story, is just the beginning. In future episodes, I’ll speak with guests who bravely share their personal ups and downs from last year. I hope you’ll tune in to hear their stories and be part of the conversation about cultivating our own resilience and empathy in order to move forward with hope and joy.

The first few episodes will feature guests who have really diverse experiences and pe...