One Piece Episode 154 REPACK

Diedrich Jong:Whether you are a new listener or one of our regulars, the statistics show that you've cared for someone at some point or will or have been on the receiving end of the caregiver experience. In our previous episode, we spoke with a young millennial who gave up her career ambitions to care for her grandmother. That experience however, led her to start company called Carewell, which is now thriving. Elizabeth Miller is our guest today and she describes herself in the sandwich generation of caregivers. On one hand, taking care of both ailing parents, and on the other hand, her own children, while also working full time. The challenges of this sandwich experience led her to some dark places. So much time spent on other people that the neglect of her own health reached critical levels.

One Piece Episode 154

Diedrich Jong:Since then, she's dedicated her life to improving the health of people in similar situations, through her business and podcast called Happy Healthy Caregivers. In this conversation, Elizabeth shares ideas like 100 days of healthy, the realities of the balancing act and why she felt she regularly left her mom on top of Mount Everest. And much more. This episode is especially personal to Eric. Have a listen and you'll learn why, okay, let's get into it. I'm producer Dietrich Jong, and this is the No Barriers podcast,

Elizabeth Miller:Now it's even younger, as people wait to have children older, there's so many more young caregivers out there, but yes, I did feel like I was young in my circle. So much vocabulary, new vocabulary, new terms. It was a learning, a huge learning curve. I felt frustrated by the healthcare system was very fragmented, and you are trying to piece together the information. And I wanted somebody to just validate, like this, hello, it's me, I'm wheeling in mom to appointments or taking copious notes in the hospital. And people were very quick to give me advice and my husband advice about how we should better manage their diabetes and you know, wound care and whatever other handouts they could give us, basically adding to my task list. And I just thought-

Elizabeth Miller:Similar kind of guilt, lots of guilt. I mean, I would go over at night and she would say, "Can we watch a movie together?" She lived nearby in an assisted living community and I'd say, "I can't do a movie. Let's watch an episode of Frankie and Grace. I got to get home to the kids." I got to get up at 5:00 AM and start this hamster wheel all over again.

Erik Weihenmayer:So you learned to navigate the system pretty well, of course. But then even for you though, like you would leave your mom. And I think you wrote somewhere that you felt really guilty. Right? Because you want to be there 24/7, but you can't, you're getting pulled in a million directions. Right? So how do you emotionally cope with that feeling like, oh my God, I'm not doing as good a job as I should be. I'm abandoning this person who took care of my every need when I was growing up. And you know what I mean? Like, there's that whole emotional piece as a daughter.

Elizabeth Miller:I wrote in my journal, that's where writing became very therapeutic and a way to process that for me. And one of the early blog posts I wrote was it feels like you're feeding a nest of hungry birds, when you're that person squeezed in the sandwich generation and a working caregiver on top of that. You're the mother robin rushing out to get the worms for everybody. And you come back and this nest of birds is all like screaming at you for a piece of the worm. And you're like, I'm going through this whole decision tree in my head. Who is the most needier? Who did I give it to last? And you know, you miss things. I remember feeling guilty too about my kids were in school and I would be with other moms and they would say, "Oh, does Jacob or Natalie have this teacher or that teacher or what?"

Elizabeth Miller:The COVID pandemic, I think was very clear that if one of us got six, someone else had to pick up the pieces and we've got to have backup plans and several of them. And then I think too, like the people who struggle with prioritizing their own self-care, and self-care's not just about eating right and working out, but all of that mental, practical and so forth, but it's what would happen first of all, if something happened to you, to the person that you greatly care for? That sometimes will get people to move in that direction. And, and what if that person is tired of you? We think about we're doing all of this for our care recipient, but they need, variety's the spice of life. They need other people too, for companionship and activities and yeah.

Jane: I'm Jane Perrone and this is On The Ledge and this episode is served rare and a little bit salty. In this week's show I will be giving you my very personal opinions about houseplant prices, rare houseplants and what it all means for us houseplant growers. I'll also be bringing you a new listener in Meet the Listener and I'm answering a question about marks on a Moon Cactus.

Jane: Thank you to all the fine people who have been leaving reviews for On The Ledge; JamieJ527, ClayXO43 from the US, Parkan8 from the UK and bathtubwitch from Ireland and I particularly liked aggressivescritches from the US, who likes to brush their cats while listening. Shoutouts to new Patreons, Shaun, who became a Crazy Plant Person, Louise, Alison, Steve, Erica, Mosie, and Mel, who all became Ledge-Ends, and Stephanie who became an On The Ledge Superfan. Thanks to all of you and for all of you who are already subscribers via Patreon who have decided to switch your membership to annual. I'm glad that you have been able to do that. I've sent through instructions to everyone who is currently paying monthly on how to switch. If you run into any problems, do give me a shout because I know these things can often involve a lot of confusion and ticking different boxes, so do get in touch if you're having problems switching from monthly to annual, or any other issues with your Patreon membership, I'll be happy to help. If you don't know what on earth I'm talking about, then you can find out more about Patreon in the show notes for every episode. Scroll down the page and you'll find all the info that you need.

A reminder that we have a Q&A special coming up very shortly, so do drop your questions to me - - and I will endeavour to fit as many of your questions into that episode as poss. People do fire lots of plant questions at me on social media and I do try and answer as many of them as I possibly can, but I don't always get to everybody. If you really want your question to be answered, then do drop a line to and I will do my damnedest to get to you in the upcoming Q&A special.

Do remember, also, that people who are members of the Houseplant Fans of On The Ledge Facebook group can also share any plant problems in that group and there is a whole array of people with expertise who can help you out. If you want a quick answer and you don't want to wait for me to get back to you, then do join Houseplant Fans of On The Ledge. There are just three questions to answer. You have to identify your favourite episode - tricky, I know! Do you want to know what my favourite episode of On The Ledge is? I haven't actually prepared an answer to this question. I think I would probably say that the 100th episode was very important to me and I loved going to James Wong's flat, so those two James Wong episodes would be up there. I also love the Lithops episode which, funnily enough, I'm entering in the Radio Broadcast and Podcast Category at the Garden Media Guild Awards. I won that category for my previous podcast, Sow, Grow, Repeat, back in 2016 but have not yet won it for On The Ledge, so maybe it's my year!? We shall see. That's the episode I'm entering for that competition, I know it's a tricky question but I'm not going to interrogate you about it but you do need to answer that question.

I've also been absolutely loving the story that's come out on social media about a British law firm where a security guard got every single plant from every single office across 12 floors of the company and moved them all into the cafeteria for safe-keeping. I've tried to get in touch with the author of the post, no luck yet, but if you happen to know that person, I think they're called Wafflesrisa, I'd love to talk to them and to track down this wonderful security guard. I'm sure they were actually really happy all being grouped together rather than spread out around the offices, so it's a good story and I'm pleased that there's people everywhere who want to care for plants. Please do remember, if you have some kind of houseplant-related story that you want to share on On The Ledge, do get in touch, I'm always open to ideas for episodes and people to interview and so on. That's how some of the best episodes of the show come to happen, so please do get in touch. I am currently looking for somebody to interview about Croton, aka Codiaeum, aka Joseph's Coat, because I know a lot of you want an episode on this plant, but I just can't find an expert on these plants to talk to me. So, if you know of anybody who is really good on Crotons, please let me know.

Jane: Now it's time to talk about rare plants. I don't want this to turn into a rant. I want it to be a reasoned argument, but I hope that this will give you pause for thought about what's happening in the houseplant world right now. I got really alarmed about plant prices when a plant that I've been lusting after suddenly went up in price. As many of you know through the podcast, I've been looking for a piece of Bantel's Sensation, a cultivar of Sansevieria, or more correctly Dracaena, as it's been moved to the Dracaena genus; the Snake Plant. I've been looking for a piece, or a plant, of this particular cultivar for a long time now. For some reason, while they're common in the US, they just aren't that common here in the UK. I haven't found a shop selling them. A couple of people found a shop in Poland selling them, but I still do not have one of these plants. I put an eBay search save out there, so that any time anyone put one of these plants on eBay I would know. A few months ago, the last cutting that I had been watching, the last pup that I'd been watching, I think it went for about 25 and I missed out at the time because I thought "That's a bit expensive!". Anyway, another pup came up from the same seller, I think, very recently, about two or three weeks ago and I was getting excited because the price was still quite low and I was watching the countdown and the price was still about 10 and I thought: "I'm in with a chance here!" How much did it go for? Do you want to guess how much it went for? It went for about 87, for a tiny stick of a Snake Plant! 041b061a72