Summary
The CareLab team dives into the often-unspoken realities of sibling caregiving, particularly when supporting an adult sibling with a disability. Guest Elizabeth Miller shares her lived experience becoming the primary caregiver for her neurodivergent brother, navigating burnout, family dynamics, long-term planning, and the invisible emotional labor caregivers carry. The conversation highlights the emotional weight, invisible labor, and burnout that can arise—especially when caregiving responsibilities fall unevenly within families.
Key Questions Answered
-
What makes sibling caregiving uniquely challenging?
Sibling caregivers often step into the role without formal preparation, while balancing their own families, careers, and futures. The emotional load is amplified by lifelong family dynamics and unclear boundaries. -
Why did Elizabeth become the primary caregiver for her brother?
Access to better resources in Georgia, her role in advocating for a long-term care plan, and family logistics led her to take on primary responsibility—despite caregiving already being shared unevenly. -
How does caregiving for a neurodivergent adult differ from caring for aging parents?
Services, funding systems, routines, and social needs are entirely different. Neurodivergent adults often require long-term structure, social skill support, and proactive advocacy rather than crisis-based care. -
How can caregivers protect their own well-being long-term?
By intentionally planning joy, asking for help, building a support network, setting boundaries, and adopting sustainable self-care practices.
Transcript
Brandy Archie
Caring for a sibling with a disability is a role many people step into without ever really choosing it and without much guidance on how to carry it. You are a brother or sister first, but over time that line can blur into advocate and coordinator, protector, planner for the future. So in this episode, we are talking about what it really means to care for a sibling with a disability, the responsibilities people don't talk about.
the emotions that are hard to name and the questions that often get pushed aside into a crisis forces them forward. So if you've ever wondered how to support your sibling while still building your own life and not burning out, this conversation is for you.
Emilia Bourland
And we have here with us to discuss this very important topic, Elizabeth Miller. Elizabeth Miller is a family caregiver advocate. She's a speaker, an author, a certified caregiving consultant, and a certified senior advisor. Her experiences caring for her aging parents with chronic and terminal illnesses and for her neurodivergent sibling has inspired her to create Happy Healthy Caregiver LLC, which she created in 2015.
Through her coaching services, speaking, award-winning podcast, book, and online community, Elizabeth helps family caregivers infuse caregiving and self-care with their busy lives. She hosts the Happy Healthy Caregiver podcast on the Full Care Network, wrote the Just For You, a daily self-care journal, and facilitates support groups for family caregivers. Elizabeth, thank you so much for being here. Welcome back to the show. It's been a long time since we've seen you.
Brandy Archie
Welcome back!
Elizabeth Miller
Thank you. Happy to be back. Love chatting with you ladies.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah, so why don't we start by just saying it has been a while. Catch us up. What's been going on with you and happy healthy caregiver.
Elizabeth Miller
Woo, yeah. So we have seasons of caregiving. We talk about that, right? And what started Happy Healthy Caregiver was caring for my aging parents and navigating the resources that and clawing my way back from caregiver burnout. we did have responsibilities for caring for my brother when my mom was in the last six years of her life after my dad had passed away.
she had really detached herself a lot from caring for my brother. And so we were picking up some responsibilities for him, but we had our hands full, right, with family and work and caregiving for her and managing all of that. And so we, honestly, we kind of backburnered him. If he wasn't like on fire, we just kind of let things go status quo. And so for a while then after when that was happening, when my mom was continuing to decline and
spent her last two years, she passed in 2020. We were doing this thing with siblings of juggling care by, we were snowbird caregivers. He was spending some time in Michigan and some time in Georgia where I live. And that worked for a minute and then until it didn't. what you find with caring for somebody who, he has an intellectual and developmental disability, he's on the autism spectrum, that
The services, the resources are really different for him than they are for aging parents. My sister had him in rural Michigan, and I live in metro Atlanta. While every state has different resources and things for caregivers, and Georgia may not be the best one for caregivers, frankly, I have another two brothers that live down here with me. And so we made the sibling decision to move him to Georgia full time.
Because while the Snowberg thing was nice that we each got like a break for a while, it wasn't what was best for my brother. having said that, be careful what you wish for, So November of 2024 is when he moved to Georgia full time, and I'm his primary person down here. And so last year was spent with getting tests done so we could get him qualified for resources.
Elizabeth Miller
transitioning different doctors. And of course, every time you go to a new doctor, you've got a different care plan, you've got different treatments, can sometimes change a medication, sometimes he needed different procedures, he had to have two teeth pulled, like you just, go in and it's like one thing spirals into another thing. So I spent a lot of last year getting Tom situated and we were also looking for a community for him.
for a long-term care plan. And that was something that I was really pushing with my siblings to say, look, like we're all aging, we're getting older, we need a long-term care plan for him. And we are not professionally equipped to work with people with disabilities. So we did move him into a community in December. And so now we're in this phase in 2026 of like working out the kinks, figuring out what that looks like and.
working with this team of people to make sure that he's getting the best care, that he doesn't feel abandoned. He's got some issues there. It's been a lot. It's been a lot. And with that, in the fall, I really was like, look, I coach people on burnout, and here I am burning out. That's not OK. Yeah. I know that was more than you probably bargained for, but I feel like, are you caught up? OK. OK. OK. OK.
Brandy Archie
How'd you end up? No, that's great, that's great. Especially because you have spent so much time coaching people on burnout. And we can all be our worst, like, patients for a lack of better term. Like, how long did it take you, or like, what was it that made you realize, like, actually?
Emilia Bourland
No, that was perfect. That was great. Yeah.
Brandy Archie
I'm having burnout myself. Did you recognize it right away or were you like really struggling and then stopped and looked back and said, maybe I should implement some of my own strategies.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, I think it did present itself a little bit differently than with my parents, because when I was caregiving for my parents, I was working in corporate America. I was raising kids. I was certainly doing a lot of different tasks. But one of the things that I think compounded maybe the burnout for me last year is that I am an entrepreneur. I am like you all who I don't have paid time off. I don't have a team of people who can keep
get this slack that I'm leaving when I'm taking him to appointments and researching these things. So, and while I did have some help with some other siblings here in Georgia, I have a sibling that is not a lot of help, which a lot of people have. I have a sibling that is help, but kind of choosy about where he wants to lean in, has to kind of be specifically asked to do things. He's not gonna like see it and volunteer for it. So that really did fall on me.
While my sisters did what they can, I think, remotely, they also had some things happening in their lives. So I think it was maybe a combination of the entrepreneur and the caregiving burnout. And there was a lot of fun stuff that happened last year. I did a lot of traveling, internationally even. Three different times I went on international trips. So it was a very kind of unusual year and lovely trips. But you do pay for those things.
gearing up to take them both for caregiving and entrepreneurship and coming back. so while in some ways they felt my bucket, in some ways it was just different. I came back not as rejuvenated as I thought I would be. And so some of the other signs for me were the shaky voice coming to tears when I'm talking about things, or just lack of patience, I think, is a big thing.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
not so much whereas before, you know, maybe I was retreating from activities I enjoyed and my girlfriends and things like that. I did not do that. I was still doing all of those things because I know that those helped me. And so keep kind of showing up for myself, you know, physically, socially, mentally and all of that. So it was different. But I think that if that explains it, it is still a little bit like a frog in boiling water where you don't know, I think, until sometimes you're
that boiling point. And I feel like one of the big wake up calls for me was I did go to one of my providers for my health. And he said, you've gained 14 pounds since the summer. And I was like, what, what, you know, I'm doing the things like what is happening. So that was a big wake up call.
Emilia Bourland
I want to kind of ask you some more questions about like the shared responsibility of caregiving. And if you don't want to discuss any of this or it's like too personal, please feel free to just say so and we can move on to another topic. Well, I wanted to kind of ask you a little bit more. So you became the primary caregiver and you talked a little bit about this already, but I kind of wanted to dig down into that a little bit more like, do you think you became the primary caregiver because of
Elizabeth Miller
Sure.
Elizabeth Miller
What do you want to know? Yeah, no, it's okay.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
happy, healthy caregiver or because you had been the primary caregiver for mom and dad and people were like, Elizabeth knows how to do it. And obviously there are lots of family dynamics involved in this, but I think sometimes it might be helpful for other people to hear like, this is how you got into that situation because so often there's one person who just kind of ends up as the primary caregiver because they're the one who leans in, right?
Elizabeth Miller
Right.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Right, right. mean, so a lot of the caregiving work with both my parents and my brother has been on my older sister in Michigan. She's an artist. She has flexibility. She is the nurturer in our family. I think I got this from in Georgia partly because of the resources that are available here, partly because I was pushing for the long-term care plan. I knew that what we were doing was not working.
and that we needed to try something different. And I think that was kind of the narrative I was sharing with my siblings. was like, we know what this looks like. We can go back to this. But what if it's amazing? What if we really get him situated somewhere? And somebody with neurodiversity really needs structure and routine. So while I kind of knew what the role was going to be like, we're going to be transitioning doctors and
It still is a lot like I feel like there's this hidden, still this invisible part of, you know, I don't know that my siblings are waking up at, you know, three or four in the morning and thinking about like, is he having a good day today? Like they're probably not. So you can kind of, you know, hear the emotion there still. I'm still working. I'm a work in progress like most people. So I think I, and honestly started doing talk therapy to help with that.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
So that's been kind of a new twist. So I think that's where it's different, like the invisible part of that. And that he is different than an aging parent, and that he's got intermittent explosive behavior that is a lot. It's hey, you look fat today. You're constant repeat behavior.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
nagging phone calls, know, repeat phone call. Like there's a lot to manage there with that. And so I am his person that is like, and yet there's also this side of my brother that he can be appreciative more so than I've seen him in a while. Like he has been very reluctant to kind of try some of the things that we've been doing this past year with first getting in a minute a day program as like a trial, because one of the things my parents did
some amazing stuff and that they got my brother in a good spot financially. Like he's got a special needs trust. He's, know, that part I'm so grateful for and a huge blessing, a huge blessing and a weight off weight off of us. Will we run out of money? Maybe, but we're going to cross that bridge when we come to it. But I think the part that that they fell short on is the the social isolation for him.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah, what a blessing that is.
Brandy Archie
For sure.
Elizabeth Miller
And partly that might have been due to their own health issues where he did not really integrate with other individuals like himself since high school. And he's 63 years old. So it's teaching him skills of how to be kind and how to make a friend and remember a name. It's all of that stuff, kind of like parenting, but harder. Because I'm his little sister.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
And he's not neurotypical, so it's challenging in that way. But there was definitely a point where I've been tracking my hours. I encourage caregivers to do that, because I think that, yes, for the task, we want to have the visibility of what we're doing. But it's still impossible to track the 4 AM, the 5 AM wake up hours.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah. Yeah.
Brandy Archie
Sure.
Tell me a little bit more about why you feel like it's important to track your hours.
Elizabeth Miller
So I think if we want policy change and things, I'm always fascinated when I read the reports for caregivers, like the National Alliance on Caregiving, AARP, and that we see that the average caregiver is working 24 hours a week. And in the back of my mind, I'm like, how many hours am I doing caregiving stuff? And so I started tracking it last May.
Brandy Archie
Mm-hmm.
Elizabeth Miller
Because I did want some visibility to that. I think I could feel that it was heavy, but I was like, why is it feeling so heavy? What is it? And I think part of that was I wasn't changing in my workload. My workload was the same, and then I'm heaping on this other stuff. But I think if we want policy change and we want to really talk candidly about the invisible caregiving labor, we need data.
We need data in order to make decisions. And that might be a little bit of my IT background coming through where you make data with decisions, like throw things against the wall, see what sticks. And the same thing is true with caregiving. But I think I need some like a 10 % contingency on these hours or 15%. Like what percent do we add for the emotional load of it as well?
Emilia Bourland
Yeah, that's actually a really interesting question because you're right. There are like the hours that you can actually track and document. This is how long I spent on the hold, on hold with an insurance company to verify benefits, then talk with the pharmacy, then went to this doctor's appointment. Like those are things that we can actually track. But you're right. There is, there's also that time where you're waking up at 4 a.m. or maybe where you're so preoccupied during, let's say your paid employment hours that you're having
Elizabeth Miller
Sure.
Emilia Bourland
you're struggling getting work done because you're thinking about, you know, the things that you have to do for your loved one or you're just worried about them, right? And or feeling guilty or all of the emotions that come along with this journey.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Mm-hmm, so true. So we'll see if it helps, but I think at least it's visible. And what I have been finding is that for me, it was very telling, you know, as I started kind of looking back at the hours and saying, on average, you know, I'm spending 25 hours a month on caregiving. Well, it doesn't sound like a lot, but that's over half of a work week. That is a lot.
Emilia Bourland
Mm-hmm. Yeah, it is. It is. really is. So I have, we're gonna talk to you a little bit about some resources that you put together for 2026, some kind of like rejuvenating positive things. I have one more question for you first though. You know, having decided to move your brother into a community, how has that affected you and your life and your caregiver journey?
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, at first I was really worried and there is still this like little worry in the back of my head, like, is he going to get kicked out? Like is this intermittent behavior thing going to be too much? And then like, my God, what are we going to do? But I also can reframe that to say, you know, I coach on this, right? Like, don't worry about a problem until you have a problem, you you suffer twice in that instance. And so then I'm like, you know, snap out of it. And it's going much better than I anticipated.
I think it is a, I'm gonna pat myself on the back too for a little bit for that, for being the advocate for him and he has a case manager and I'm educating them. I'm saying, look, he needs to have a proactive relationship. doesn't need to just see you when he's getting in trouble. You need to create a relationship with him. Here are some of his triggers. We had an explosion this past week where,
They wanted to, he denied getting blood work done, because now some of his doctors come to the community, which is amazing. So that saves me. I see the sustainability of that, and that excites me. But it's got kinks in it. Well, he didn't want to do his blood work, because I know, because he needs to drink a lot of water. He's really hard. Giving blood is really hard for him. Don't we want to know when we got to give blood work and that we have an appointment? Do you want to be ripped?
Emilia Bourland
Mm-hmm.
Emilia Bourland
Of course.
Elizabeth Miller
ripped out of an activity that you enjoy doing and asked to give blood work on the fly, like nobody likes that. And so I'm telling them like, you're never going to be successful taking him out of his activity that he enjoys to do a blood or urine test and not preparing him ahead of time. And seem like common sense to me, but it's not, it's just not. And so it is the constant advocating and they have my number.
you know, already, you know, and maybe they know I'm a happy, healthy caregiver or maybe they don't. And I'm not saying I can. I don't hide it. I have a tire cover on my car. You know, I I think I've tagged him, you know, and commented on some of their posts. But yeah, you got to get it. It's it's it is a great community, though. It's kind of a unicorn community. There's not a lot of places for people like my brother.
Emilia Bourland
Do you disclose that? Probably not. I don't know. I wouldn't.
Elizabeth Miller
to live and he can age there in place, you know, all the way up to skilled nursing if it came to that at some point. So he's in a semi-independent community right now, apartment, yeah.
Emilia Bourland
That's great.
Emilia Bourland
That's fantastic.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Brandy Archie
And is it like a standard one, a standard continuing care community, or is it specific at all to...
Elizabeth Miller
And this is a private community. it's called an Annandale is what it's called in Swanee, Georgia. It was started from a family that had a need and it kind of gives you like a 70s, 1970s camp vibe other than they have this amazing new program center with a theater and a pool and a basketball court. And and he can work and have purpose and earn money for activities. And, you know, the
Emilia Bourland
wow, that's incredible.
Brandy Archie
That's a good one. Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, it's an amazing, amazing fit. And it's not perfect because my brother drove, which was really unusual for people like himself to drive. maybe that was, you we lived and grew up in small town Pennsylvania. And my parents were like, you're going to get your license like everybody else. And it's a little nerve wracking sometimes for him to drive. We've had him tested to make sure he's
cognitively available, able to do that. But he can't have a car there. They don't want the liability. And so that's been a real challenge of how do we manage and mitigate that as a family. And so for now, we are doing like little mini breaks here and there where he comes out for a long weekend. He loves to go to the drive-in movie theater in particular. They're not going to take them there. They don't have employees that work late at night like that. So I don't, you
Emilia Bourland
Mm-hmm.
Elizabeth Miller
I don't want him to give up those things that bring him joy, which I know we're going to get into the joyful fun stuff for this year. Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah, that's, I wanna just say first, before we make that segue, thank you so much for being so open and candid about your experience with your brother. And I think it's really helpful. I mean, we all know it's helpful to hear from other people about their stories so we know they're not alone. I just also wanna say thank you for sharing this story, you know, because he is.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Sure.
Emilia Bourland
neurodivergent person and that's not something that necessarily gets highlighted a lot in caregiving for adults who are neurodivergent. Yeah, and it is a really unique thing. It comes with its own struggles and I know people who
Elizabeth Miller
No, siblings and yeah, exactly.
Brandy Archie
Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
are also in that position or share that similarity when they hear that, like, I just know that that's gonna be really helpful to them. So thank you so much for so honestly and openly sharing.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, if I had the energy, thank you. In the back of my head, I'm like, should be sharing and talking about this more often on my social posts and stuff. But again, tired. I'm just tired of processing it myself in a lot of ways. Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah. Yeah. And like you can't live in that state of mind 24 seven. You got to think about other stuff. So speaking of that, let's segue into some fun stuff. So you have a thing for this year. It's 20 for 2026 activities. Tell us a little bit about that.
Elizabeth Miller
No. No. No.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Yes.
So this has been the eighth or the ninth year in the making where I kind of got this idea off of another podcast that I listened to and tweaked it so it fit us a little bit better. in the beginning of the year, people really focus on resolutions and changing their whole life. And for caregivers, it's really hard to, it's hard for,
regular individuals to do that. And you add the caregiving component on it. And so what we really need in our life is more fun. We need more fun. And I think a lot of times we lose ourselves and then we lose our identity when we're caring for other people. And so I want to encourage people to infuse more fun in their life. Like I call self-care anything that's going to energize me physically, mentally, give me peace of mind, or is just pure joy. And this is where the joy part comes in. there are 20 things.
that I have heard people mention or thought I wanted to try or I miss doing, that I want to infuse into my year. And I know for sure that when you write them down, they are more likely to happen. And so this is an activity that we do in family of four. My sisters do it. My sister's company does it. Caregivers do it.
And the power of it happens when you identify your 20, 20 things for 2026 and then you share it. A lot of times at our family table when we're doing it together is, I like that. I would like to do that or I'll do that with you. Or and so then we're creating memories. We're creating special moments. I think with a caregiver and a care recipient, we're starved for that. Like those relationships get really strained. The joy part gets disappears sometimes with that. So.
Emilia Bourland
Mm-hmm.
Elizabeth Miller
With that, this is what it looks like. And it's just like a regular form. And I can share the link where people can get one of their own. And now that I know that I expect this to be a thing every year, I'll hear things throughout this year. And I'm like, I'm going to try that sometime. And I put it in a little note in my phone. And I consider it as something I want to add for next year. But some of the things are just
are milestone related. So my husband and are celebrating 30th wedding anniversary this year. Yes. Thank you. I still like him too. know. Yeah. So I'm speaking out in the Seattle area in April around that. So we're building a trip around that. Monthly bouquets. So buying myself flowers. Like, why am I waiting for flowers? I can buy myself flowers.
Emilia Bourland
Wow, congratulations.
Brandy Archie
Yeah, congrats. Amazing.
Emilia Bourland
Good for you.
Elizabeth Miller
I want to take some kind of class. And so it's not real specific, but I'll know it when I hear about it or see it. Visit my daughter, who's a travel nurse. So she's going all over the place this year. I don't even know where she's going to be, but I'm going to go visit her somewhere. I want to do a food tour. And again, like, I don't know exactly where that's going to be. Could be in my hometown, could be somebody else. I want to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. So the past few years, I've seen people like,
take the day off and go wear green and drink green beer. And I thought, girl, you are an entrepreneur. You can do whatever you want. I'm going to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. You can do whatever you want. Host a mahjong. So I'm actually doing a mahjong party coming up this weekend. I want to go to a candlelight concert, a Stitch Night. I started needle pointing. I want to do one of those tea party buses where they're like,
Brandy Archie
You can do whatever you want.
Emilia Bourland
Love it. Yes.
Elizabeth Miller
drive around, different cities have these. So those, I don't have to go through, I love estate sales. And so sometimes I wanna do 12 estate sales. So I have little check boxes for that one where I'll check it off. But I love thrifting is kind of, I'm in my little thrifting era now. So it's changed over time. And I think, depending upon what kind of caregiver you are, yours might look a little bit differently than mine.
Brandy Archie
I have heard about this.
Elizabeth Miller
My kids are grown. I'm an entrepreneur. My brother lives in a community. And so I have more capability and capacity sometimes to do these things. But your things might be like over the years back when it might have been one year. The one that sticks out was I wanted to I knew I liked Malbec's wines, red wines, but I wanted to find my favorite brand of Malbec. so I was like, I'm to try a different.
Malbec wines and see which one I like the best. So what would some of y'alls be? Like is there anything that you're hearing that you're like, I would put that on my list or something that it triggered for you.
Emilia Bourland
You know, that's so funny. My last year was not filled necessarily with caregiving so much, but it was sort of like a hectic, crazy year. And also, I just feel like I have been working so hard as an entrepreneur and just grinding and raising kids. And there's just been a lot going on.
Elizabeth Miller
grinding. Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
for the last few years and then last year in particular was just a lot. Like we, my family moved states and it was a big thing. And I really felt like my, necessarily New Year's resolution, but New Year's intention, which like Brandy and her husband do this, I think it's the most amazing thing has just been to slow down and do things that I want to do.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
because I want to do them and not because, yes, yeah, not because I feel obligated and to really start saying no to the things that I don't want to do and start saying yes to the things that I actually do. So I, this year, like, I really want to take classes to learn a language. That's on my list. I want to be more intentional about traveling and we've already got a couple of trips booked.
Elizabeth Miller
It's a hell yeah. It's a hell yeah. Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Mm-hmm.
Elizabeth Miller
Nice.
Emilia Bourland
I want to go out to lunch with my girlfriends more, you know, and so I think that, you know, more coffee dates, more lunch dates, more things like that. I want to make, I want to volunteer at my kids' schools. And so things that I used to do more, I mean, I've never taken like a language class since college. I minored in German, but I haven't spoken in, you know, like, it's been a long time. Yes. Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Yes, do it.
Elizabeth Miller
Mm-hmm.
That you miss.
Mm-hmm.
Well, in the meantime, you can do a Lingo app. I love it. I'm addicted. Yeah.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah, so anyway, so those everything that you're saying I think just like resonated so deeply and yeah, I absolutely have those things that like I'm gonna say yeah, these are these are hell yeses and I'm gonna do those things and everything else can maybe just chill for a little while
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Mm-hmm. Good.
Brandy Archie
I think that's like, it's such a valuable point too that it doesn't always have to be a big thing. And it might be something small and it might not even be something that's continuous. So I love the idea that it's just like, kind of like a checklist of like, I'm gonna get, this is my bucket list for the year of 2026. And let's see how many of these I make happen, you know? And so I think it's so important to have a spark of something to look forward to. Like happiness is being able to have something to look forward to, no matter how big or small it is. And so I love...
Emilia Bourland
Mm-hmm.
Elizabeth Miller
Mm-hmm.
Brandy Archie
the way that you set it out. I've seen somebody else do, it's very similar to what you're talking about. Instead of having a vision board, it was like a bingo card. And so, yes.
Elizabeth Miller
I saw that this year. I was like, that's fun. It's very similar, I think, where they check it out. And you don't have to make yourselves all cutesy. Like, this is my daughter influencing me, too. But I look at it all year long. Yeah, so my husbands, my sons, they're just writing them out. Nothing fancy there. What about Brandy? What would be something on yours?
Brandy Archie
But cutesy makes you feel like, feel like it fun. Yeah.
Brandy Archie
Yeah, these are not little things. big things. Last year we intentionally did not travel to just like save money because we had done a lot of really big trips. So I'm glad that we were off our travel ban and we've got to have something, whether it's work or and travel for work to me is not problematic. I'd love to travel. And so whether it's initiated by work or initiated by family and friends, we've got something happening every month almost for the whole year, at least till like November. So I'm looking forward to hitting the road again.
Elizabeth Miller
Ha ha ha.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Brandy Archie
And then some other things that I think are like I want to do more of that are part of my everyday routine or like part of my every week is we have Friday night movie night and For a while there. I kind of just like let the kids do it on their own and I didn't participate But this year I wanted to be more intentional about being there even though I always fall asleep But they are aware of that and they're okay with it. They just want me to get up there and get started
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah.
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, I stay awake through the popcorn. It's when the popcorn runs out. I just need to eat it slower, and I can stay awake maybe. Yeah. Yeah, I'm out too.
Brandy Archie
Exactly. When we're done with popcorn, I'm knocked. Yes.
Emilia Bourland
That's one of my favorite things about family movie night is like it's usually not a particularly good movie. So halfway through I'm like passed out on the couch and it's you know I make sure and get ready in my jammies beforehand because I don't want to deal with all that you know muck once I'm half half asleep anyway but that's that's awesome. Yeah and I love again just pointing out like it doesn't have to be it can be big things but it doesn't have to be big things. It can be little things.
Elizabeth Miller
Mm-hmm.
Elizabeth Miller
Yes, love that.
Elizabeth Miller
No, a new hiking trail or yeah, anything, that you've just thought like this could be interesting. Writing a letter, know, or calling a friend or whatever it is that you kind of miss. I think, you know, for caregivers too, kind of connecting the dots are related to self-care. Obviously you're doing things that are fun for you. Sometimes,
we have a hard time asking for help, right? But it could be a lot easier to share this with a friend and say, hey, here's my 20 for 26 list. Is anybody interested in helping with these? Can you be my chief officer of fun and take one of these things to help make a reality out of it, like schedule it, and let me know enough in advance so I can make it happen? But I think.
it's much easier to ask somebody to help us infuse some fun versus some kind of a drudgery task. if that's, and it's another way, we need a care team for us just as much as our people need a care team for them.
Brandy Archie
Yeah, I think that's such a good, I think it's just such a good point to make sure that you have a team too, right? Like even if you're a team of like, you are the person's person, you have to be supported as well. And not every, you don't need to have just one person. Like that's also a strain on them. And like to make sure that we, you know, think about the people in our lives as like a helpmate.
Emilia Bourland
Elizabeth.
Elizabeth Miller
Yes.
Brandy Archie
And they all have their different purpose. Like, this is my friend I go bowling with and this is my friend that I call on Saturdays because I know they all kind of do in the morning time. This is my friend I walk with, whatever. So then you have enough people around you that are helping you do the things that bring you joy.
Elizabeth Miller
Yes.
Elizabeth Miller
Exactly. Well said. Well said.
Emilia Bourland
Elizabeth, before we wrap up here, let's tell people a little bit about where they can find more from you, more of your resources. We will definitely, if you want to share that link with us for the 20 in 26 checklist, we'll make sure and link that in the show notes for everyone. Also, if you all want to see, if you're just listening to this right now and you want to see the checklist that Elizabeth held up and showed here on the podcast,
Elizabeth Miller
Yeah, I will.
Emilia Bourland
If you're listening on Spotify, you can just go ahead and switch over to the video version of this. Otherwise, if you want to see it on our YouTube channel, you can go to the Care Lab podcast on YouTube and you can see it there too. So where can people find more from you, Elizabeth?
Elizabeth Miller
Mm.
Elizabeth Miller
Yes.
Elizabeth Miller
Best spot is to go to happyhealthcaregiver.com. You can go there. Hopefully you'll get a pop-up that'll ask you to join the email list. Every week I share something happy, healthy care related there. You can link to the podcast. And then you'll see on the blog, I've got the enjoy the mix in 2026, create your 20 for 26 list. And you'll see last year's picture. And then on my social, you can see the one that I did for this year as well. So it's another option. But I would love to connect.
supporting and helping, educating, supporting, and providing resources for caregivers is what I'm all about. So I wanna help make it easier for you and know that you can do hard things, but you don't have to do them all alone.
Emilia Bourland
Elizabeth, thank you so much for being back on the show. sorry, Brandy, go for it.
Brandy Archie
Well,
Brandy Archie
I was just going to wrap this up and say thank you, Elizabeth, for coming and sharing that with us. And it does.
Elizabeth Miller
It goes fast, yes. Yes, I hope that this is landing on people who need to hear it today and that it's lifting them up in some way.
Emilia Bourland
Yeah, I hope so too. And so if you are listening to this, especially if you made it all the way to the end of this episode, please take a moment to share this episode with someone you know who might benefit from hearing it. Take a moment to like and subscribe so you get notified the moment that we drop another podcast, which is every Friday. And if you have another second, leave a review, leave a comment. These are really the best ways to help us reach more people like you who can benefit from this information.
Until next week, we'll see you right back here on CareLab.
Brandy Archie
Bye everybody.
Emilia Bourland
Bye.
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