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Chapter 1: What is the main topic of the 'Burnout Sandwich' episode?
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I do have aging parents, and that's a whole conversation over two beers and three pizzas.
There's a uniquely American burnout crisis in families.
I can't control the diseases my loved ones have, but I can control my own mindset.
More than 63 million people in America are caregivers. Of kids, of parents, and other loved ones. And nearly half of caregivers under the age of 50 are taking care of a parent and a child at the same time. Maybe you're one of them. Maybe you're also trying to hold down a job and handle everything else life throws your way. And maybe it's got you feeling spent.
So how do you handle burnout when the call is coming from inside the house, when you just can't walk away? I'm Jacqueline Hill, and this week on Explained to Me from Vox, we talk to people who've been there and who have made it through. Alyssa Quart runs the Economic Hardship Reporting Project. She's also a member of what's known as the Sandwich Generation.
You've probably heard the phrase. It was coined in the 80s to describe people in their 40s through their 60s caring for their parents while raising kids. But a growing number of people like me, Gen Xers and millennials, are now joining in this generation. A few years ago, Alyssa's mother was diagnosed with cancer. So we were getting infusions daily and radiation after that.
And meanwhile, I have this 14-year-old daughter who kept calling, you know, would I be able to go to her volleyball game? Would I make dinner? Would I go over her homework? And at a certain point, she too got sick. And at one point, she was even hospitalized. And so I was like caring for both of these people that I loved so immensely at the same time.
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Chapter 2: How many people are part of the sandwich generation?
And it was something that when I wrote this piece for The Guardian about this, in a way it was cathartic to interview whatever, 10, 15 people who were dealing with their parents and their children in that level. You know, one of them said to me, it's a multi-layered sandwich of shit.
The Guardian
I had the burden of, you know, applying for medical leave and, you know, calling MetLife and this kind of stuff. But that's not that bad. But when I talked to people whose parents had Alzheimer's or in other ways, unable to do it, were first generation and didn't speak English. And so they were being told to do things that they didn't understand. It could take such a toll.
One of my friends who was also caring for an elderly parent who wound up passing away was struggling to secure adequate care for him, and he was first generation. And she created a QR code of his medical history to force doctors to pay attention, and she'd put it on her cell phone and wave it around when they came in the room. And that sort of, to me, that was a metaphor for how
much work it takes and energy and innovation caregivers have to, of parents and children, have to do to get their needs met.
You wrote this piece and in it you called yourself one of the lucky ones. You know, your mom had good insurance, so you were able to handle a lot of what came at you. You also have sort of like institutional knowledge. You know how to navigate the system. What are some of the factors that are making it hard for most people to handle sandwiching?
So some of these things that make things hard are the cost of care. It is the absence of long-term care. There's also literally, if you're taking $1 trillion out of Medicaid, it's going to be really hard for people who are dependent on Medicaid, which... is different from Medicare.
Medicaid is what people who had lower-income work now rely on, and this is what the current administration is trying to kind of strip bare.
Last week's show was about burnout at work, and we had the writer Jonathan Malesik on, and he had this really interesting definition of it.
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Chapter 3: What challenges do caregivers face when balancing family responsibilities?
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The key is remembering there's always a path forward to feeling renewed and re-energized. Try the all new energy refreshers at Starbucks. I'm Jonquan Hill. This is Explain It To Me. So the sandwich generation is when you care for your kids and your parents. But we're living longer, which means grandparents are getting added to the sandwich, too. Basically, it's becoming a club sandwich.
A lot of people are now taking care of their aging parents, their adult kids and their grandkids.
Faith Hill covered this phenomenon over at The Atlantic, where she's a staff writer.
And in qualitative research studies and their interviews with grandparents, and they really say, like, I'm aging, I'm tired, and I'm needed by everyone at the same time. Like, I don't even know who to prioritize. So people are, you know, they want to be involved with family and they want to help, but they're just being stretched to their limits.
Researchers talk about this beanpole effect where family trees are kind of getting longer and skinnier. And this is because people are living longer on average. So more generations are alive at one time. But they're also getting thinner because people are having fewer children on average. So that means fewer siblings, fewer cousins. And now family bonds are kind of being defined by these things.
up and down bonds between grandparents, parents, children, great-grandparents. And those are absolutely beautiful in their own way, but they tend to be sort of more formal. You know, there's more of a hierarchy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And with families needing so much help, you know, they also are really a lot about care these days.
How have the expectations for what parents are supposed to be doing for their children changed? And how does that factor into all of this?
The expectations kind of keep rising. You know, there's this term intensive parenting, which sort of refers to a parenting style that is very expensive and very time consuming. And I think it's also just becoming more common to kind of surveil kids all the time. We're very worried about children's safety.
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Chapter 4: What does a typical day look like for a caregiver?
A lot of adults, they work their whole lives for so many decades. They raise kids. They put so much into that. And then this is kind of the time that they've been waiting for to focus on themselves again.
But that time is really getting delayed and in some cases, you know, just sort of pushed back until it's not going to happen at all because a lot of grandparents, you know, are being involved in child care until the point at which they wouldn't be healthy enough to travel or they are kind of losing some of those opportunities they might have had.
Yeah, you know, on one hand, this does sound new. But I also know a ton of people who are, like, raised by their grandmas. Who is this new for, you know?
Yeah, certainly it's not the first time that, you know, grandparents have been involved at all. But I think it's just becoming sort of more and more common and to a more extreme degree. And, you know, that's partly because there are now more working parents. There are more single parents. You know, those numbers are rising.
So I think it's just becoming sort of more common for people to assume that they will lean on their own parents for help.
In a lot of ways, it sounds like a lot of these older caregivers are experiencing the same kind of burnout younger caregivers are. But I wonder, like, is there a difference in the way these two groups of people are coping and handling this?
I actually started looking into this story because I kept hearing about the idea that, like, grandparents today aren't doing anything. Oh.
Yeah.
There was a lot of, you know, kind of like complaining going on on social media and articles about this, even, you know, that people feel like boomer grandparents are very self-involved and they just want to kind of go and enjoy their retirement and drink on the beach.
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Chapter 5: How does secondhand stress affect caregivers?
What question do you have for me today? Okay, talk to me about energy levels. Why is it that it's sometimes I feel total waves of exhaustion? So like, you can't focus, you're falling asleep, that kind of thing? Exactly. And then at some points, I'm just totally fine. Why is that happening? And is there anything I can do to help it?
Yeah. So the peaks and slumps throughout the day, we have all been there. So that's mostly because of our circadian rhythm. It's basically the cycle our body goes through in a 24 hour time period. And it controls things like metabolism, hormones and energy.
So that's like the reason I feel tired before bed and well rested in the morning. It's our circadian rhythm. It's a totally natural biological response. So when I want to just close my eyes and put my head down on my desk, what can I do about that?
According to my research, one of the best things you can do is get up and walk around. Get your blood flowing. Maybe call up a friend and grab a coffee or a tea.
That sounds really nice right now.
You want to go do it?
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It's Explaining to Me. I'm JQ. One of the things that can make caring for our loved ones in a crisis so hard is managing something called secondhand stress. That's when you absorb the anxiety or sadness or frustration of the person you're caring for, sometimes without even realizing it.
My name is Amy Goyer, and I serve as AARP's National Family and Caregiving Expert.
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Chapter 6: What resources are available for caregivers to manage stress?
During those years when I was caring for so many people at once. I was driving my car. And again, you know, I'm so busy. I'm working. Everybody's going to the doctors and the hospitals and everything. And I realized I was on fumes. I had no gas. So I went straight to the gas station. And I was so, you know, that feeling like I'm not going to make it. I'm not going to make it. And, you know.
Yeah. Like, oh, my gosh, I should have listened to my mom and not let it go below half. And look at me now.
Yes, exactly. That's what my dad always told me. So I made it to the gas station and I was so relieved that I didn't break down and fill the car up. And as I pulled out of the station and started driving, I thought, wow, you know, it makes the car runs better on a full tank of gas. Like I could feel a difference in how the car was driving. But that was my aha moment.
I was like, oh my gosh, I expect myself to run on empty all the time and be just as efficient. That doesn't make sense. So I thought, what fills my tank? What fuels me so that I can keep going? It's little quick fill-ups. Like you may not have, what is it now, $60 to fill your tank, but you got 10 bucks.
So maybe I have 10 minutes and I'm going to, you know, do some stretches or jumping jacks or walk around the block or I'm going to get a good cup of coffee or tea. I'm going to call a friend. I'm going to text with someone. I'm going to go in an online caregiving group. I kept fresh flowers in the house. That filled me up.
So there's things I have to do. to keep my sanity as a caregiver. And one of them is to eat privately alone. I make them their plate and dinner, and then I make mine.
Keep a running list on your phone of small, specific things that someone can actually help you with. That way, when someone offers, you're like, oh yeah, actually.
I am going to call my family members and say, hey, I am planning on going such and such place and such and such date for such and such time. Someone needs to take over.
I had Pilates once a week. That was kind of my deal breaker. I only cancel for a true emergency. And so you know what those premium fills are for you. The other big thing that I learned as a caregiver is that I can do anything, but I can't do everything. Yeah.
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Chapter 7: How do finances impact caregiving responsibilities?
What are the things that have to be me?
Yeah, you know ā There are so many solutions and it's great when it's like, OK, let's get the caretakers going. What can I offload? What can I not? But, you know, the cost of care is just so expensive and, you know, that can be stressful and it gets harder over time. I wonder, can you get into the finances of caregiving and sort of the role that plays?
And for me, the finances were one of the most stressful things. You know, my parents planned. They had a financial advisor. They did the best they could. Their budget paid for caregivers while I was working. And I started absorbing the costs above their budget. And when they moved in with me, you know, I paid the mortgage. I paid for all the food. I paid for their clothing.
And it added up as their needs increased. And after more than about a decade of this very intensive caregiving, my mom passed away in 2013. My sister passed away the following year, and I had to empty her house and manage her estate and ended up... Oh, that's so much, Amy. And still caring for dad at the same time. And the upshot is by the time he passed away, I had...
so much credit card debt that I was using to try and catch up with things. And I kept thinking, I can handle this. I'll dig out. And I ended up in bankruptcy. And I can tell you that's one of the most difficult, humiliating, terrible experiences. But I talk about it openly because I know I'm not the only one.
And I know many, many caregivers are struggling financially, and nobody talks about money. You try to look at any benefits they may be eligible for. I eventually got my dad enrolled in veterans benefits, which was a huge help. See if your loved ones have long-term care insurance that might help pay for some things.
Find out if, you know, for some people they may qualify for help just paying their heating and cooling bill, their energy bills. You can contact your area agency on aging and ask about any type of help with benefits and case management and care management. They will connect you with who can help you with those kinds of applications.
This can be a lot to process. Are there resources and tools that people can turn to when this part of life becomes emotionally overwhelming?
Yes, emotionally overwhelming is kind of the biggest piece of it. Lots of great resources. I just wrote a Care for the Caregiver Guide for AARP this past year, and it's free. You can get counseling. I think counseling and some type of one-to-one therapeutic environment could be really, really helpful. Even if it's not ongoing, it's for periods of time that you need it.
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Chapter 8: What mindset shifts can help caregivers cope better?
Oh, that's such a good question. So many things. I think I would say chill out a little bit. You know, I can't control the diseases my loved ones have or what happens to them health-wise, but I can control my own mindset. And I think that's the most important thing.
I've seen thousands and thousands of caregivers across my career, and people will have very similar situations, but they have very different attitudes and they come through it differently. You know, it's not even the resources they have. It's their mindset about it and how supported and at peace they feel with it. And the biggest difference is their mindset.
That's it for us this week. You can find a link to that guide Amy mentioned in our show notes. Have you ever learned that lesson the hard way? Call 1-800-618-8545 or send an email to askvox at vox.com. And consider becoming a Vox member. Vox members get special newsletters, and you get to listen to this and other Vox podcasts ad-free. Go to vox.com slash members to find out more.
This episode was produced by Danielle Hewitt and Peter Balanon-Rosen. It was edited by Jenny Lawton, fact-checked by Melissa Hirsch, and engineered by Brandon McFarland. Our executive producer is Miranda Kennedy, and I'm your host, Jonquilin Hill. Thank you so much for listening. I'll talk to you soon. Also, congrats, Patrick. Bye! Support for Explain It To Me comes from Starbucks.
Burnout can happen to anyone, but there's always a way to get your flow back. Take your afternoon slump, for instance. It's a phenomenon we all know too well. Sometimes all it takes is a reassuring word from a friend or a sip of a refreshing drink. So the next time you're looking to refocus and re-energize, you can hit up a friend and grab a Starbucks new energy refresher together.
Try the all-new energy refreshers at Starbucks.
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