Transcript
WEBVTT
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Parenting Up family.
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We did it, we did it and we really means you.
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Thank you so much.
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Supporters, caregivers, everybody in the village.
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We got an award.
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Baby, we did it.
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Mama, we made it.
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Hilarity for Charity, hfc one of the most preeminent foundations, foundations in the whole nation around caregiving and awareness and brain health and Alzheimer's made us, the Parenting Up community, our podcast top three for the whole year.
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Yes, hfc boom.
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That's Seth Rogen and Lauren Miller-R.
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They decided that we wanted a three best for the whole year.
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Couldn't have done it without y'all.
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That's from Zeddy.
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I know she would have gave y'all a big old, wet, sloppy kiss.
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Parenting up caregiving adventures with comedian Smiles is the intense journey of unexpectedly being fully responsible for my mama.
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For over a decade I've been chipping away at the unknown, advocating for her and pushing Alzheimer's awareness on anyone and anything with a heartbeat.
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Spoiler alert this shit is heavy.
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That's why I started doing comedy.
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So be ready for the jokes.
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Caregiver newbies, ogs and village members just willing to prop up a caregiver, you are in the right place.
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Hi, this is Zeddy.
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I hope you enjoy my daughter's podcast.
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Is that okay?
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Today's supporter shout out LaQuinda Thomas, 64, 17.
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My great grandmother died at 101 in 1979.
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I was 13.
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And she would always say Black women are strong and we always have been the mother of humanity.
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And today our power is in our vote because we are to always be opposite of what is wrong with humanity.
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The knowledge of truth From YouTube.
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Listen, zeddy would agree with your great grandmother.
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If you want to be featured as a supporter, shout out a word.
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Porter, shout out a row.
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Then leave a comment and a review on Apple Podcasts, youtube or Instagram.
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Thank you.
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Today's episode sending love and spreading smiles, showing caregivers.
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You care, parented Up, community.
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You know how we do it.
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We always find someone that is fun, fantastic and full of information.
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Why?
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Because the universe loves caregivers.
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The universe knows we are getting our ass kicked every single minute of every day and today we have somebody that feels like a sister, cousin.
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You know, when you come across people like do I know you?
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Did your mama or grandmama go to school with my mama or grandmama?
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Because the energy just hits like so much.
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So we were through filming and recording for this month, but the interview went so well the pre-episode interview I had to call the team and say listen, okay, listen, we got to figure this one out to score walls, this chicken cause, this one just feels so right.
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Yep, I think this is the first time I've ever done this.
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Hell yeah.
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So here we go, let's get it in.
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Parenting Up Community.
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Meet my girl, sheena.
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What's up, sheena?
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Hey Jay, hey Parenting Community, how y'all doing today.
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Girl, you are what I call a let's talk and let's do.
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Yes, Right so you are part of the caregiving community, the village community, so your mom was the primary caregiver for your grandmother.
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Yes.
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And then out of that you've also created a product that will help caregivers.
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But before we I don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but I do like tempting our audience so they know what's ahead and have a reason to lock in and stay on board.
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In the audio and in the video, let us know what your grandmother's disease ailment was.
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As I recall, she's no longer a physical body on Earth.
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Is that correct?
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Yeah, she's not here anymore.
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She died in 2004.
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She did, yeah, that was a tough year.
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That's the same year my grandmother got her wings.
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I don't know if I knew that from our previous conversation.
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Girl, I'm going to have to put some stronger in my coffee.
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Listen, look, I put a little Baylis in here.
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I'm going to have to go put some 1738.
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Not no more than 1738.
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Yes, this is the Remy Martin 1738.
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Look, everybody knows that is my go-to.
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This is the way that I stay off that cane.
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Remy Martin 1738 helped me stay away from cocaine.
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People can talk about cognac if they want to, but it is better than cocaine.
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It is okay.
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That much I can promise you.
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So yeah, 2004 took me over the edge, sweetheart, with my grandmother passing.
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Let us know what was her disease.
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What was her disease?
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And then, how did you all kind of determine that something was going on with your grandmother, and what were the steps that you took medically for her treatment?
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Well, honestly, she didn't get diagnosed till my grandma died at 91.
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And that's the same year she got it.
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So it was like that summer she was fine.
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In March I had went there for my birthday.
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She was her normal self, always joking when she sees you, baby, you're getting so fat.
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I'm like grandma.
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I look the same I did when you sent me last year no, no them hips.
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I'm like okay, honey, if you say so.
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But anyhow, after you know, we just had our good outings, as we used to.
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And then when I went back home I would say that was August she started deteriorating.
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She just was in her same jolly self.
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So, my mother, they took her to the doctors and they were like you know, it's the onset of dementia she was going through because she started forgetting she would leave the stove on.
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She became more argumentative and it just wasn't a good situation.
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She ended up being hospitalized for a little while because her blood pressure and all that stuff was up, and then she came home and that November she passed away.
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Wow, that was kind of fast.
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It sounds like in the scheme of life it wasn't a lot of years.
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No kind of fast.
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It sounds like in the scheme of life that wasn't a it wasn't a lot of years.
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No, not at all.
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When you said she was argumentative, was that with everybody or with specific family members?
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With my aunt that was there with her all the time.
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So my grandma would leave the stove on and my aunt was like turn up now.
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You know, I like to cook.
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So one night my aunt slept in the basement.
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So my grandmother had locked the basement door and I heard this knocking on the door.
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My grandmother's up because she gets up at the crack of the dawn.
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She's sitting in her chair like she never heard the door.
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No one knocking at the door and she's like ain't nobody there.
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I was like grandma, there's auntie down there.
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You know, you don't lock her in the basement.
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I didn't lock her down there.
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I didn't lock her down there.
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But I said this is gave your auntie that cared for her every day the most pushback yes, she did, and it was unfortunate because she'd do anything Any of us would do anything for her, but she gave her the most pushback.
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And if say, for instance, they were arguing about something and I took my aunt's side, oh, you don't love me, and no, I thought she was in for me.
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I'm like grandma really.
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So then you know I get emotional because that's grandma.
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Right, where did your grandmother grow up?
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She where did she grow up?
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She grew up in Virginia, but we lived in New Jersey for years.
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Ok, OK.
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She's a northern girl, spicy.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely Did she.
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When the doctors diagnosed her, did they just say dementia, or did they say Alzheimer's or Parkinson's?
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Or they just said dementia.
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OK she did have diabetes, but they just said it was just dementia, just the onset of dementia.
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And when I say it was quickly, it was quickly because when I said she was fine all her years, until just that that August was where she started to deteriorate.
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So it was just a few months.
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Yeah, just a few months.
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And my grandfather had passed at 99, and she lived five years after he passed, so that wasn't even an issue, because you know, sometimes that can trigger different emotions, but no, she was fine, absolutely yes, different emotions, but no, she was fine, absolutely yes, that's as um many in the parenting up community know.
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That's medically.
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You never know about any of this shit, but it appears that's what happened with my mom.
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Um, something might've been like, you know, something in the milk wasn't clean, but it was actually my dad's passing that just ripped the top off the can and my mom, you know, within a handful of months she was at two full blown forms of dementia and she couldn't care for herself in any significant way.
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When you're did your mom ever share anything with you about the care of your grandmother?
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Yeah, they hired someone to come in to take care of her, along with my aunt, and my mom was there because my mom lived in New Jersey at the time and then she came back home to stay just during the duration of the period that she got the diagnosis and she was just like it was a lot, because you go from seeing your mom jolly happy to I still know who you are, but I'm not functioning to the capacity that she normally would.
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She didn't want to take a bath and when I would come home I was like, grandma, don't you want to be pretty?
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And she was like, yeah.
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So mom was like you're the only one that can get to take a bath.
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I said, well, thank God.
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I was like come on, grandma, let's get pretty, okay.
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Hold up just a minute, sheena.
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Your grandmother would bathe when you gave her the.
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I guess the Q word was pretty.
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Yes, ma'am.
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She said listen here, Now don't nobody care about being clean or smelling good, this dirt is fine.
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However, I do want to remain pretty.
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Yes, ma'am.
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The various things that a different, you know individuals keep as a, as a trigger, or I wouldn't say a trigger often is negative.
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But so I want to think of a more positive as a reminder, a reminder point or a word that says, yeah, OK, oh, yeah, that's, that's a positive, that's OK, yeah, okay, oh yeah, that's a positive, that's okay, yeah.
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So with my mom is that red lipstick baby?
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If I'm trying to get her to go somewhere, I want her to do something.
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If I pull that thing out, she wants to put that on.
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And now, all of a sudden, now we can comb the hair, now we can brush the teeth.
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Okay, now we can put some shoes on, because red lipsticks means first things first.
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We about to go somewhere outside of the house and do something, so grandma wanted to look pretty.
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Yes, honey, cause my grandmother loved to dress, she's going to have her best suits on, I mean, even around the house.
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You know, sometimes grannies are wearing their muumuu's back the day, remember muumu?
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Yes, yeah, honey, she's going to know.
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She got on her skirt and her shirt and her shoes and her little knee highs.
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I'm like okay, granny, you're going to be pretty all day long and fly.
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I love it.
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So that's amazing, even though.
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So where were you living when this was happening?
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In New Jersey, I lived in Atlanta, georgia, for a second.
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To focus on this point to new caregivers and to the newbies and to the OGs everyone pours in in their own way.
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So you were living in Atlanta, but for the times that you were home, you were the one who got her to bathe and your mom and your aunt.
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Your aunt lived there with her the entire time and then your mom moved back to New Jersey.
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However, they couldn't always get her to.
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You know, do soap and water to the whole body and there's no rhyme or reason to this.
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It's like everybody who has the energy, the emotional capacity, just get in, just show up.
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You will be amazed at what you can think.
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I know when you showed up in New Jersey, you didn't say on the airplane or if you drove.
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When I get home, I'm going to say grandmama, don't you want to be pretty?
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Like, how did it come to you to even say pretty?
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You know, because I just remember how much she loved to dress and she I mean my grandma bathed all the time twice a day In the tub and in the sink and the shower, just whatever she was getting it done.
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So I was like I wasn't used to this.
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When they said grandma was not bathing, I'm like, huh, well, mom wasn't bathing, so I don't know, I just I was like grandma, let's get pretty, you want to be pretty?
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And she was like yeah, it's like it just perks something up in her Right.
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It's like well, thank you Lord for giving me that word, cause I can't.
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I don't understand no other way, how I can say it.
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You were there and it came to you in the moment.
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Yes.
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There's nothing that you could have read in a book previously.
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Your mom or your aunt could not have taught you to do that, and they also knew that she loved to bathe.
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But often the person or the persons who are there and in it every day are so bogged down with the bits and pieces of feeding or medicine and things of that nature that it is wonderful when other family members or close friends stop by and they have, like yourself, you're the granddaughter, right, baby girl, and you have such a wealth of knowledge about your grandmother that the universe is able to give you such a spark of light right there in the moment to do something.
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That is because, okay, cause she needs to get clean.
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All right, we all can get clean and believe it or not.
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Uh, utis and infections can start from a lack of cleanliness.
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All kind of bacteria can grow in your little hoo-ha and just travel.
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You know it can reverse engineer.
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No matter how old you are okay back up into some stuff where it wasn't supposed to be.
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Yeah so, but uh so, but thank, yeah, thank you.
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Thank you for sharing how that unfolded and I hope that others know and and really learn from your experience, that there's something for everybody to do and just show up and show up and stay engaged.
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It does it, does it, does it does.
00:18:04.829 --> 00:18:09.615
Yeah, yeah, so you have a product.
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Yes.
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You have a company.
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Yes.
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Give us the name of the company and then tell us who it's for and how it came about.
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The name of the business.
00:18:22.615 --> 00:18:43.419
It's Send a Prayer Now and it's a stuffed animal care package company that sends love and prayer in a box to you, especially to my go to around it is you know, you always see emojis and people always or they'll say they're praying for somebody, but you're like are they really praying for that person?
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It's like I was like, how about let's just put some action behind those words.
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And since it's National Caregivers Month, I was like you know what?
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We're even going to build something just for caregivers.
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Usually every year I like to donate plushies to seniors or caregivers because they go so unnoticed.
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They really do.
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You pour so much into everybody else, but it's not always reciprocated to you, okay, hold on.
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I just want to stop you right there and say thank you on behalf of all the caregivers, because we do go unnoticed, so much so that the lion's share, the majority of us in the United States, don't even know that November is our damn month.
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We don't even know we got a whole freaking month and we don't know it's our month, freaking month, and we don't know it's our month.
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We're so busy doing the work and trying to keep afloat and not lose our minds and our bodies and our souls and give up.
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We don't even know it.
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And to have you actually lock in enough to execute on creating a company that allows people who want to support us to do something where that expression is tangible.
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So that's my, that is, that is my air applause.
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That is my air applause.
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People, they don't realize that stuffed animals, they are their medicine for your soul, without the prescription.
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You know it is, it's a, it's a feel good.
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You need that hug, or you know it's.
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That's what they're there for.
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Let you know you're being appreciated, ok, so how does it work?
00:20:37.255 --> 00:20:37.778
So what you do?
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You go to sendaprayernowcom and you scroll through all of our collection and you just pick the one that you like and then at checkout you'll put a uh, put your message, the note that you want to include.
00:20:49.648 --> 00:20:57.258
We include a prayer with it, but you also as well include the note that you want to your recipient and we box it up and ship it right out to you for your charge.
00:20:57.258 --> 00:21:00.416
Just have to pay the shipping.
00:21:00.416 --> 00:21:04.339
You don't have to pay the shipping, you just pay for the product to go out, but we pay for the shipping.
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Wonderful, that is listening.
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We are offering 10 percent off of the orders.
00:21:11.351 --> 00:21:12.071
What?
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Yes, ok, ok.
00:21:14.636 --> 00:21:24.201
First of all, hear that parenting up community, okay, okay, all right, membership has its privileges.
00:21:24.201 --> 00:21:29.095
I told y'all Look at that, look at that, look at how we are improving the economy over here.
00:21:29.095 --> 00:21:33.912
There's two ways to have more money you can make more and you can spend less.
00:21:33.912 --> 00:21:36.394
We are helping you spend less.
00:21:36.394 --> 00:21:46.666
Thank you so much for offering that savings and that discount for the Parenting Up community.
00:21:46.910 --> 00:21:49.317
JSmiles10 at the checkout.
00:21:50.140 --> 00:21:50.601
One more time.
00:21:51.029 --> 00:21:54.161
They just need to enter code JSmiles10 at the checkout.
00:21:55.291 --> 00:21:56.419
Oh my God, look at that.
00:21:56.419 --> 00:22:02.865
We got a code J smiles 10 at the checkout.
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Yay, yes, so you also.
