Ellen McGirt on Supporting Caregivers at Work

Roula Amiri:
Welcome to Better by Great Place to Work, the global authority on workplace culture. I'm your host, Roula Amire, Content Director at Great Place to Work.
We have the incredible journalist, speaker, and podcast host, Ellen McGirt, on today. This is a personal episode where Ellen and I talk about caretaking, the challenges of being part of the sandwich generation, and what employers can do to help caregivers, who are the fastest growing employee identity group in the US. I'm very thankful to Ellen for her vulnerability in sharing her experience.
I hope that we normalize conversations like this so we can better help each other. For anyone charged with policies and programs or can influence someone who is in charge, please listen in and consider some of our ideas around what can be done for caregivers at your organization. And of course for any caregivers who listen in, we hope this episode is of some comfort.
Ellen McGirt, welcome to the podcast.

Ellen McGirt:
I'm so happy to be here with you. Thank you for having me.

Roula Amiri:
I'm so happy to have you on. You've been a journalist for 20-plus years.

Ellen McGirt:
Yes, my gosh.

Roula Amiri:
A podcast host, author, speaker, you've written for Time. You've written for Fast Company, most recently Fortune. And now you're Editor-in-Chief of Design Observer, an independent media company. That's an extremely impressive bio.

Ellen McGirt:
Ah, thank you.

Roula Amiri:
But something we can't learn from your bio is you're a former caregiver and member of the sandwich generation, meaning you took care of an older parent while taking care of children of your own. And that's what I want to talk with you about today because I don't think we talk about caregiving enough in general, and definitely not enough in the context of the workplace. So let's change that today.

Ellen McGirt:
Let's. And bless you for taking this on. And I just want to begin by sending a heartfelt message to anyone who's listening to us today, whether you're on your commute, whether you're doing a self-care walk, wherever you're hearing our voices, if you're in the middle of this journey or beginning this journey or ending this journey, we love you and we're here for you.

Roula Amiri:
To begin, I'd love for you to describe the type of caretaking you were doing, for how many family members, what type of care did they require, were you going back and forth between homes, are you working full-time? Just kind of set the stage for us.

Ellen McGirt:
The work began in earnest for three vulnerable adults. My elderly mother was living with her husband, Chad, who had Parkinson's, and my older half-sister, who just needed to be part of a family home. She was struggling with addiction, she was struggling with mental health disorders, and for a while that arrangement made sense.
And then my mother slipped and fell and broke her hip. And I moved down to Florida, working full-time. Shaky Wi-Fi at the retirement village, I was really sweating that out. And she managed to get through it relatively well and managed to get back home in about six weeks, where she could walk with a walker and be in command of her home, which was important to her, and we did have a housekeeper that we relied on. And I went back to my life.
And then the following year, just as the pandemic began, she slipped and fell again and broke the other hip and that's when everything fell apart.

Roula Amiri:
Yeah, I'm a former caretaker myself.

Ellen McGirt:
Tell me.

Roula Amiri:
And you can't fully understand what it's like until you become one. Just like anything in life, it's not easy. I mean, it's grueling. It can be grueling. You are managing the care of someone else. If it's a parent, you're parenting your parent. It can be emotional and difficult. You're usually managing other caretakers or extra help because it's not enough if it's just you. You have doctor's appointments, transportation to and from, which is not easy. Insurance, Medicare, billing. Usually then on top of a job and on top of caring for children of your own.
You've described it as feeling like the loneliest place in the world, and being a person of color makes it even more complicated. Tell me a bit about that.

Ellen McGirt:
From my situation was unique, as all situations are unique, but I am the Black child in a white family. My mother is white, my father was Black, so this part of my family was entirely white.
So I show up with the daughter's voice and the checklist and the trying to be efficient about it, and every single person when they first meet us, whether it's a doctor or a priest, my mother was at a Catholic rehab facility, every single person mistook me for the help. And I mean the help-help, like the aid or the housekeeper or something. And I'll tell you, I was mistaken for a bedside aid so often at my mother's rehab facility when I was allowed to go, they gave me a parking spot in the employee parking lot, which was [inaudible 00:05:20].

Roula Amiri:
Because you were staff.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. And because I would just start to help out ... These were all immigrant women. I'm in South Florida, they're all immigrant women. They speak a variety of languages, they're working lots of jobs. And they're trying to educate themselves to get to the next thing and suddenly I'm joining them as the other. It was exhausting, but also illuminating.

Roula Amiri:
I remember, when you are a caretaker, don't you feel like you become an expert? Like, "Oh, I could be a physical therapist. I've done exercises. I could be a nurse's aid." You jump in and do other jobs because they need to be done.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. You do. I'm a medical billing expert. I'm a logistics expert. I can work Medicaid like any ... But the other thing is, I don't know if you found this was true for you, I felt I was adopting an expert's voice just to cover up the fact that I was terrified that the next thing that came up I wasn't going to be able to manage.

Roula Amiri:
Oh, I can completely relate to that. I was in Chicago, so I live in Chicago, and my dad lived in Ohio, so I was going back and forth-

Ellen McGirt:
Oh, my goodness.

Roula Amiri:
... just constantly for a period of about three years. And I was in Ohio so much, I mean, they just assumed I lived there. That I was a local. Because I'm always in the medical equipment place, the rehab facilities, because I was there, I mean, I really was, I was there more than I was in Chicago. It's like you feel like you're living ... You are living a double life, a parallel life. It's a lot and you feel isolated. You do feel lonely.
Even though this country's in a caregiving crisis. There's a shortage of caregivers. One in five Americans are unpaid caregivers, one in three have to leave their jobs to take care of an ailing family member. And the people who can't leave most have to leave their jobs early, can't take on additional projects, so their careers, are up for promotions, visibility, that's harmed. Of course that impacts businesses, productivity, revenue, no one wins, so we all need to do better.
What are some ways workplaces can better support caregivers today?

Ellen McGirt:
What would've made a difference for me, and I think I'm guessing would make a difference for other employees as well, is normalizing caregiving conversations to include older relatives, to include vulnerable adults. It gets into very tender territory quickly, and I appreciate that people don't like talking about it, but the amount of dignity management you have to take on as a caregiver of a vulnerable adult is something that no one prepares you for. And it's classes, seminars, information support groups, a pop-up ERG style of gatherings that can help people manage the emotional side of it.
Because the tactical tips ... I started as a service journalist, Money Magazine, the world's most boring but useful magazine, just helping people get from here to there in their financial lives. I can give you a checklist. I can tell you the things to ask a medical provider. But without the emotional piece, especially for vulnerable adults, you're preparing them to lose capacity in the world. It changes your relationship with them. And if you have nowhere to go with that, particularly when we're working from remote locations so much.
I lived in just fear, for a while my mother was still mobile and she was really losing her capacity to think and her personality was greatly changed, she had two falls and hit her head twice, that she was going to show up behind me on a scooter while I'm talking to one of the senior leaders that I routinely interview for my work. And I tell you, if they're not a Great Place to Work company, they're going to be like, "Who is that lady behind you?" You want to be able to know that you're plugging into a workplace ecosystem that is prepared to support you, in at least talking through the human side of caregiving.

Roula Amiri:
Most workplaces are not.

Ellen McGirt:
They're not. They're not. And if not that, then flexible time off, no questions asked. A flexible schedule can change everything for people. Coworking. Some leader, manager, assigner, who is going to help you cobble together a schedule that doesn't derail your colleagues, which of course is a burden, but gives you the flexibility to think, to schedule, to understand what your vulnerable adult needs, and of course, just pull yourself together.

Roula Amiri:
Right. You mentioned dignity management. What do you mean by that?

Ellen McGirt:
My mother was a difficult person, which is why she got so much done in life. She was really spicy and sort of that disappointed ... She was 93 when she died, one of those disappointed generations of women. It's like, "If only I'd had the things that later generations had, I would've been the President of the United States," kind of thing. And that spicy spirit was amplified as she got older and more confused. And she was deeply embarrassed by aging, and deeply embarrassed by not being able to get to the bathroom by herself, and deeply embarrassed by her teeth and the way her toenails looked. Those really basic things she couldn't ... She loved to entertain, she couldn't do that anymore. She didn't want people to see her.
So finding ways to talk about that with her to make her comfortable so she would accept the medical care she needed was a full-time job. And then also finding the providers who could help her with all of those things and maintain her dignity is tough.

Roula Amiri:
Very. And you're becoming emotional support for your parent. You feel that it's so hard that they're struggling, just accepting what's happening.

Ellen McGirt:
It feels out of order somehow.

Roula Amiri:
Exactly.

Ellen McGirt:
She was never prepared to give up being a grandma.

Roula Amiri:
Yeah, yeah. Oh my goodness.

Ellen McGirt:
And may I ask how your father's doing?

Roula Amiri:
He passed away.

Ellen McGirt:
I'm so sorry. My mom died last year.

Roula Amiri:
And that's another ... And we'll talk about that. The grief is another topic. Grieving in the workplace that also, these are things everyone ... Caretakers are the fastest growing employee identity group in the country today. So that means someone's going to know someone who is a caretaker, and also someone's going to know someone, if they haven't experienced it already, who's passed away.
And these are topics that are part of life, the one guarantee of life that go unspoken and unsaid in the workplace and outside of the workplace. And as you've mentioned, if you're in a great culture, at least you have the opportunity for there to be space to talk about those things.

Ellen McGirt:
Right, right. To bring that part of yourself to work. It's interesting. As you were talking, I'd never really thought about this before, but it's progress that we're even calling it caretaking, like it even has a name.

Roula Amiri:
Absolutely.

Ellen McGirt:
Because it used to be just like family. Family just did family things, and this is one of the things that families did, except they didn't. And they didn't always do it well and they didn't have the resources. And family units, which are emotional systems, economic systems, we're always struggling with this, but giving it a name gives it a shape, gives it a life.

Roula Amiri:
That is progress and that is good to point out. I think also in terms of workplaces' leave policies for caretakers, these are long ... They can be short journeys, there can be long journeys. The understanding that if you have to take care of a family member, it's usually not a two weeks and I'll be back. It's a back and forth, it's ongoing. And it can affect your physical health, with travel, and your mental health. And so I think employee resource groups are great.
Also, legal help. Navigating legal system, becoming someone's power of attorney. All those things you don't know until you're in it and it's a learning, it's a constant education of things you never knew. No one ever told you. There's also that checklist that would be helpful.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. That's right. You can't get everything on LegalZoom. So really doing an audit of whatever your employee assistance program packages are, have very senior leaders do a check-in, do an audit. "Are we providing the proper support with the proper tone that reflects our spirit in this organization?" That would be a wonderful way to get ahead of this.

Roula Amiri:
Yep. We also talked about ... You mentioned flexibility. I felt lucky that I had a flexible work situation where I could keep my job and be a caretaker. Being a writer I can work from anywhere, I mean, which I did. Most often my office was the car because it was the only quiet place. In a facility there's dings-

Ellen McGirt:
Yes. Girl, I'm with you. Yeah.

Roula Amiri:
... there are noises. There are.

Ellen McGirt:
I'm out there in the employee parking lot trying to get a column out.

Roula Amiri:
Regularly. Yes. You work from anywhere and everywhere. And I just was in to see my doctor recently and she's had a limited schedule. And everyone loves this woman so she has a fan club, and I said, "Ah, are you retiring early? What's going on? You have a limited schedule." And she did not have any color in her face. She just looked at me and said, "I'm going back and forth to California. My mom is declining and I am ..." She's in the middle of caretaking. And she said to me, "I know you know this." And she just said, "It's brutal. No one told me. I am a physician and I feel completely unprepared." But she only lit up in that conversation saying, "But thank goodness I have a workplace where I can keep my job and go back and forth."
So you can't underscore the importance of flexibility in the workplace when it comes to caregivers. I mean, I would've had to leave my job.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. That's right. And you're hanging onto it for dear life. Because you need it so badly, for the stability of, for the income, for the benefits, for all those things, if you have a problem with your manager or if you're in a mismatched situation, you lose your wiggle room. You lose your ability to advocate for yourself.
I think something that would be really good to flag for managers is to make sure that anybody who feels really tethered to their job because they need the benefits and they need the flexibility, that they're still growing and progressing. Because it makes them vulnerable. They're going to sit on their hands a lot of times, not draw attention to themselves. If they would like to progress, if they would like a different manager, if they'd like to move up, it's a hard time because you're vulnerable.

Roula Amiri:
One thing I wanted to ask you about, we mentioned how caregivers are the fastest growing employee identity group. What would you say to someone who isn't a caretaker, hasn't been through that experience but has a colleague who has, how can they better support them? Was there anything that helped you or wasn't helpful from colleagues, family, or friends?

Ellen McGirt:
That's such a great question, and I really wish I had a better answer at the time I was going through it to ask for help more effectively. Kindness and compassion goes a long way, assuming good intent for me. If I was scrambling on something or if I was late to something, just that kind of emotional flexibility that I just was not going to be able to stick to the kinds of structures that I did before.

Roula Amiri:
Your deadlines.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. And so much of it is showing up in public. I actually have to be on stage and interview people. My mother won't take her diaper off is not a good excuse, although it would've been a mood-changer if I'd mentioned that.
But I do think that being willing to revisit in one-on-ones or in regular meetings, how everybody is doing and if there's anything going in their lives that they need a little extra flexibility. So the question then becomes one for the team and not just for the individual. I would've been much more likely to say, "I need a little support here," if it was a characteristic of the entire team, that we are all caring about each other. That probably would've helped.

Roula Amiri:
Did you share with your workplace what was going on? Did everyone know? Did you feel you could tell people? Or was it just your immediate team or your manager?

Ellen McGirt:
I told my immediate team. We were pretty tight. It was in the height of the pandemic, there wasn't a lot of opportunity for a chit-chat. But it's a generic thing, "I'm just taking care of my mom." Like, oh, everyone has a mom, "And you're so lucky you get to spend time with her and this is such a precious time." And I was like, what these three adults needed were completely different. They were vulnerable in different ways. It was three different health insurances. My sister, who was always in trouble, sometimes it was the court system. I had to take her to court to compel her into treatment because she was going to kill herself or somebody else. She was in her 70s.
All this level of complexities, I couldn't imagine talking to anybody about that every day because it was a new disaster. It was a new twist.

Roula Amiri:
A new fire to put out.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. I wouldn't even know where to begin.

Roula Amiri:
Yeah. Yeah. It's a different language.

Ellen McGirt:
It is. It's a completely different language. You apply the skillset that you know from getting from here to there to it, but it just rips you apart.

Roula Amiri:
I would hear, which wasn't helpful, "We never see you. You're so busy." I'm not -

Ellen McGirt:
Fighting for my life, man.

Roula Amiri:
Exactly, yeah. I'm not busy on vacation. I'm not kicking back in Ohio.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. That's right. I'm not baking cookies and going through the family album here.

Roula Amiri:
And there's that implied, "You're so busy, we never see you. Make some time for us." And for me, when I was back in Chicago, I would just collapse, like physically collapse. That's what kept me going. So I'm not interested in making plans.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. That's right. You know what would've helped, now that we're talking about it, like a decision partner, that the decision ... I was done by 8:00 AM. And there was this new thing, and that was my husband's great skill and burden and he kept them in touch, it's like, "Here's a situation," blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. "Every decision is bad and I'm afraid and it's expensive. And also, suddenly the air conditioning doesn't work." It's like, "So help me make this decision."
That made all the difference in the world because you could just get it off your plate. No decision was guaranteed.

Roula Amiri:
Right, for sure.

Ellen McGirt:
There was no right decision, but you just needed to make one.

Roula Amiri:
That's an excellent point. In this situation, there is no right decision. Answers aren't clear. They're muddied and you're spent and it's emotional, and you could go down the line. Someone that can step in and help, and even take off ... You're running their household. After a while things are broken, things need to be fixed. The car, something needs to be done with the car, and all those things. If you have a partner in crime or someone that you can just lean on or say, "This is so hard." And having that space to say that.
You mentioned your mom passed away a year ago, May of 2023. And in typical workplaces, you get a few days off of work and you come back and people don't know what to say.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. Yeah. That's [inaudible 00:20:33].

Roula Amiri:
It's difficult. Other than time off, how can workplaces support employees who are going through grief and who are grieving?

Ellen McGirt:
Listeners, I'm staring into space right now. I am taking through the list of things that people said to me, acknowledging what had happened, it goes such a long way.

Roula Amiri:
Agreed.

Ellen McGirt:
Such a long way. And if you don't have a good relationship with someone, a card is probably better. This is not the time for a person that you've had conflict with or you're not aligned with or you've had some sort of issue with to try to establish rapport. A card is good. Love that person from a distance. I think you just have to be clear about what has happened in the workplace in the past. But acknowledging what's happened, asking if they can contribute to a fund or something, if you need more time.
I always found that the simplest things ... It ended up being about five years between the pandemic and caregiving, that I had exited my life the way I had planned it and thought about it and lived it, and which meant ... I'm a stepmom for kids for a very, very long time, which meant I was struggling to stay in touch with their lives and struggling to support their dad and their mom to ... Their navigating high school. They're going into college, We dropped off Rachel at college, it was like dropping her off into prison because it was like you couldn't leave your dorm. She's just graduating this year and I'm so very proud.
So I'm struggling with all of that, but a simple thing that just made me feel normal again, invite me to that. I would've loved that. I just want to feel normal again.

Roula Amiri:
Yes.
Ellen McGirt:
And you're taking inventory. You mentioned that you went to your doctor, and I applaud you for doing that. I stopped all appointments. I was just frantic. So I'm coming back into my life, and so all of them. I'm getting my mammogram. I'm like, it's been three years.

Roula Amiri:
That's my space. Yeah, that's ... Exactly.

Ellen McGirt:
Right. It's like, "Ah. Oh my goodness." Going to the dentist. Once I got through that gauntlet, it's like, "Okay, I'm back at health baseline again. I don't have to enter into caregiving for myself." I sort of said, "Okay, I can walk back into life, older and different." I'm different. I'm going to be different.

Roula Amiri:
You're fundamentally changed. I think that's the other part.

Ellen McGirt:
You can't get back to normal. You can't get back to normal.

Roula Amiri:
No, no.

Ellen McGirt:
It's over now. That's different. I'm new.

Roula Amiri:
You're new, you're new. Seeing someone exit life, how can you not be fundamentally changed to your core? And on top of that, the experience of caretaking.

Ellen McGirt:
I'm emotional, and I know I have your permission, so if you're listening, I'm okay. But I'll tell you, my mom died two days after my birthday last year. And she was a funny, feisty woman, and she was clearly declining and confused for the first few days of May. But she did wake up on May third, my birthday. I just didn't want her to die on my birthday. I just didn't. It's like the silliest thing.

Roula Amiri:
Of all days.

Ellen McGirt:
Of all days. And she did wake up and she's, "Oh, hello, hello." She was a little peppier than usual. And I said, "Mom, today is the anniversary, the first day we ever met." And she said, "It is?" I said, "Yes, it's my birthday." She said, "Oh, happy birthday." And so we were chatted for a little bit and I said, "I was worried, I didn't want you to die on my birthday because that would be the last chance you had to upstage me." And she burst out laughing.

Roula Amiri:
Wow.

Ellen McGirt:
That was really her. That was her sense of humor.

Roula Amiri:
True guttural.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah, she really got it. And she looked at me, she had these piercing blue eyes, and she said, "Well, it's only because I didn't know what day it was."

Roula Amiri:
Damn.

Ellen McGirt:
She got the last laugh.

Roula Amiri:
She did.

Ellen McGirt:
She really did.

Roula Amiri:
Wow.

Ellen McGirt:
I know. I loved that little exchange. And then she drifted off and then died two days later.

Roula Amiri:
Oh my goodness.

Ellen McGirt:
I know. She was a feisty one. She was a feisty one.

Roula Amiri:
Yeah. I think also checking in with someone around holiday markers can be hard. I found out of all days and occasions, my birthday is the hardest.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah.

Roula Amiri:
It's the hardest, because I think you feel the call's going to come.

Ellen McGirt:
I know.

Roula Amiri:
And you know better, and it doesn't.

Ellen McGirt:
I know.

Roula Amiri:
Then it's hard.

Ellen McGirt:
Were you with your dad?

Roula Amiri:
Yes.

Ellen McGirt:
Were you worried about that?

Roula Amiri:
Yes.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. Yeah. They always say the person chooses. Sometimes they choose to go on their own, sometimes they choose to go with the person. All this mysticism about the way we talk about this is really tough. I was there too, and I thought it was going to ruin me, but it didn't. I was okay.

Roula Amiri:
I agree. And I think speaking on both our behalves, there's no other place we would've rather been.

Ellen McGirt:
Right, right. I was terrified to miss it, because she was so frightened. My mother was terrified. She was terrified. She hung on longer than any human being I could imagine. My husband and I talked about it. I don't know how your dad felt. My husband said it wasn't that she wanted to stay because she was in so much discomfort, but she definitely didn't want to go.
And there was nothing I could do to ... or any of the hospice care workers or anybody around us, to help her feel more comfortable around that. I couldn't imagine not being there, specifically because I knew how frightened she was.

Roula Amiri:
And I think that's another emotion that you only experience as a caretaker, that feeling of helplessness. True helplessness. You can't do anything to change the situation and you just have to sit in it and just sit with them and sit beside them.
And these are conversations if I could have had with someone in the workplace, a colleague, who had been through it, who would just say, "That's normal," it would've been a lifeline. It would've helped save me from feeling like you're drowning. You don't know that emotion until you're in it.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. That's exactly right. And so I'm wondering, since we're inventing the perfect workplace here, you and I together-

Roula Amiri:
Yes, we are.

Ellen McGirt:
... this beautiful morning, if hospice-style training would be useful for certain types of managers. You put your hand up for it and you can identify yourself as someone who has that wisdom, because they've had the kind of training and preparation that a hospice volunteer would have. If you could self-identify, "I'm hospice-trained. I'm a volunteer. If this is happening for you, let me be part of your support team." That would be really nice.
Roula Amiri:
That would be beyond.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. That's something people can put their hands up for.

Roula Amiri:
Yes. I have a friend going through this with her dad. She lives in the Twin Cities, her dad is in Ohio. And she was saying she feels very isolated and alone in the workplace. And by happenstance, she was talking with a colleague who was asking her why she's going back and forth so much, she said, "Oh, my dad's sick." And her colleague had been through a caretaking journey, she had no idea. And it just never came up. How would she have known?
And so that's become her kind of de facto hospice care support, that she has someone. And she said, "Nothing's gotten any easier. And a matter of fact, things are more complicated." But she said, "I have someone who understands this world, who can ... It's just something who can navigate it."

Ellen McGirt:
Right, that's right. It can help you pre-mortem certain stages, certain activities. Here's how you advocate. I welcome the opportunity to do that for others. And I know that anybody who's been through same, anything, anything that's hard, we welcome the opportunity to show, "Here's how you apply for a mortgage. Here's how you pick your specialty healthcare plan." We welcome the opportunity to do that. And I think finding ways for people to self-identify and make them available.
You know what else would make a really big difference, now that we're chatting about it. Remember a couple of years ago when Chuck Robbins at Cisco was moved by the news of the death by suicide of Anthony Bourdain and Kate Spade in a row. And he asked the senior team, "Is a thing that could possibly be happening? Could people be suffering and I not know it?|" And he wrote a letter to the organization flagging this and asking people to reach out if they needed help. And he got flooded, and it changed the way the organization dealt with mental health amidst their completely changed ecosystem.
It's a great story. If a very senior person, respected senior person makes the same disclosure about caregiving, about hospice, I think-

Roula Amiri:
Grief.

Ellen McGirt:
Grief, mourning, because it's so much going on in the world, grief and mourning are different things. They live in different parts of your body and they're triggered by different things. They're triggered by things in the news, conflict and death. It's terrible.
I think a very senior person triggers this conversation in the workplace with a disclosure, with a concern, and see what pops up. And I think you're going to see new training, new conversations, new talking points, and new volunteers, and maybe even new staff positions around it.

Roula Amiri:
That's an excellent point. If nothing else, being vulnerable and sharing from a leader, because that is being vulnerable, that is vulnerability. And also in terms of manager training, even in the check-ins. If you know someone who's lost someone, on those holiday ... We know their heart, their changed. Just acknowledging that.
And people think, "I want to give someone their space. I don't want to be intrusive." It's just care. It's saying, "I hope you're doing okay. I'm here if you ever want to talk or not, but I'm acknowledging your life has changed. This Thanksgiving is going to be different for you and your family."

Ellen McGirt:
Yes. Yeah. The hospice care. I got a hand-signed note from the hospice team two days before the anniversary of my mom's passing, which was last week, just a few days ago. I was so moved by it because I was a coiled spring. I don't even come from a particular religious tradition, but a year just seems like a magical moment. You've spent the year-

Roula Amiri:
I know.

Ellen McGirt:
... this is the year without them. The first year of the first everything. And I don't feel released. It meant so much to get that acknowledgement. And that's-

Roula Amiri:
And that's what a colleague, a friend, they can do just that gesture.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. Because it doesn't end there. You're cleaning out their house, you're finding objects, you're packing up things, and it hits you at different times. And we're not wired to wind things down. And the business impulse to scale and grow doesn't help that. Chronic illness is tough because you just get moments. You don't get closure, you don't get better. And aging and death and dying is ...
Same with my sister who died unexpectedly a few weeks ago. She was not taking care of herself and she was badly impaired and she fell, which was like the nightmare. Years and years and years of trying to help her get care and keep her safe, and then suddenly it was all over. And then it was back into that sudden, "What do we do with her house? What do we do with her things? What do we do? What do we do?"
I joined the reality that lots of people face that chronic illnesses and death and decline just run counter to my instincts, which is to fix and improve, prop back up, celebrate, and move on.

Roula Amiri:
That's how we're all wired.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah.

Roula Amiri:
This changes that.

Ellen McGirt:
Yeah. Yeah.

Roula Amiri:
It's the exact opposite of that.

Ellen McGirt:
It is the exact opposite of that. And that we are part of a conversation about our own mortality too.

Roula Amiri:
That's another layer.

Ellen McGirt:
It is.

Roula Amiri:
That's another layer.

Ellen McGirt:
It is, it is. No wonder everybody wants robots and AI. Having human beings around is complicated.

Roula Amiri:
Yes. I'm going to close by coming back to your bio, which said to ask you about fly-fishing. And if you can believe it, this is the second time fly-fishing has come up on this podcast.

Ellen McGirt:
Are you serious?

Roula Amiri:
Yes. I had Brittany Howard, on the Grammy Award-winning musician.

Ellen McGirt:
I missed that one.

Roula Amiri:
I'll send it to you.

Ellen McGirt:
I will [inaudible 00:33:06].

Roula Amiri:
And when I asked her how she creates a sense of wellbeing for herself, she said fly-fishing.

Ellen McGirt:
Fly-fishing is absolutely amazing. It's absolutely-

Roula Amiri:
What am I missing? When did you pick it up? Why?

Ellen McGirt:
It's about 10 or 15 years ago, and I had seen somebody do it. I was working on a project in a former life in Colorado, and I saw somebody do it. It looks impossible. This ribbon in the sky and it's just sort of this dance, and you can't possibly catch anything like this.
I grew up in New York City. I grew up in a complicated household. I didn't know anybody who fished of any kind, so it just was something so far away from me. And from that moment I saw it it's like, "Well, I want to try that." And it was years and years and years afterwards until I finally found someone who was willing to take me. It's a tough thing, it was my husband.
And this story becomes the central story in most of my keynotes, because I write about race. And particularly before, during, after George Floyd incident, most audiences are nervous that, "Here comes the race lady. How long is it going to take before she she's talking about Civil War, here it comes." So I begin with a story about fly-fishing and how transformational it was for me. You're standing in a river. You're standing in an ecosystem already in progress. Your job is to trick the fish by giving it something that looks like something it wants to eat. And that's the game. It's not a volume game, you're not going to feed your family. I'm certainly not. But you're just part of something. And then when that fish interacts with you, it just feels like you've joined nature.
But as I was fly-fishing, and I was very lucky to go to some beautiful places, I noticed I was always the only person of color, ever. Not even a park ranger, not even a guide, not even someone driving by. And the joke I make is that once I was at a tiny little brew pub in a very small town in Montana, and I saw a Black man behind the bar. We met eyes and we both thought the other one was in witness protection. That's the only reason you could possibly be there.
And so the big reveal is that the National Park system was created by a very prominent, very public, very avowed white supremacist named Madison Grant. And his view was that the park system needed to be a respite for white men who were being challenged by the onslaught of ... I think this was like 1917, 1918. The Great Migration was beginning, the post-Reconstruction, all of this stuff was going on. And he wrote a book called The Passing of the Great Race. I think I don't have that quite right. And of course, you know what race he was talking about, and it was filled with eugenics and all kinds of justifications for workplace violence and actual race violence. Teddy Roosevelt loved the book so much he wrote a blurb for it. These were prominent people.
And so that's the legacy. That's the legacy of the great outdoors. And by the time I get to that punchline, people are picturing themselves out in nature like, "Oh, I can do something about that." The toxic nature of race relations in America, and lots of other places too, is so built into the groundwater that you don't even get to see it. It's in our history. So your job is to notice wherever you are, who's not there and ask why. And the why comes a story, and that story becomes the work. And we can all do that.

Roula Amiri:
We can all do that. Well, Ellen, thank you so much for sharing and opening up. I hope our conversation has been helpful to anyone listening. And if you are a caretaker and if you're having a hard day, we hope you feel seen and heard and less alone.

Ellen McGirt:
Yes, we certainly do. We got emotional talking, and that was wonderful. Thank you for opening up and sharing your story. I know that your dad must have been so very, very proud of you.
And I'm hoping that anyone who's listening, in addition to feeling heard and supported, sends this podcast conversation to anybody who's in charge and ask them to listen to it. And reach out for ideas about how we can transform your workplace into a place that's good for all, all who mourn, all who grieve, and all who care.

Roula Amiri:
Thank you, Ellen.
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed today's podcast, please leave a five-star rating, write a review, and subscribe so you don't miss an episode. You can stream this and previous episodes wherever podcasts are available.