Jessica King: Trauma at Work, Overhelping & Why Being Capable Can Become a Trap

A throwaway workplace comment — “the boss’s shiny new toy” — cracks open a much bigger truth: many of us are not chasing excellence, we are chasing safety.

In this episode of Women Like Me Stories & Business, Julie Fairhurst sits down with Jessica King, a licensed social worker, speaker, and founder of Elder Care Collaborative, for a powerful conversation about trauma, identity, burnout, workplace patterns, and the hidden cost of always being capable.

Jessica shares how trauma adaptations often get rewarded at work: hypervigilance that looks like leadership, people pleasing that passes as teamwork, emotional suppression disguised as professionalism, and overworking that earns applause until your nervous system finally taps out.

We talk about Jessica’s own turning point after a job loss during COVID triggered an identity crisis and panic attack, and we name the kind of exhaustion that sleep cannot fix. This conversation also explores blame as part of grief, “pathological hope” for an apology that may never come, and how forgiveness can bring peace without excusing harm or tolerating unprofessional behavior.

Jessica also shares the powerful “rock” metaphor for generational trauma and offers practical tools for boundaries, overhelping, and overexplaining. Then we shift to her work with Elder Care Collaborative, where she supports families with elder care navigation, Medicare education, advocacy, and care coordination, especially women in the sandwich generation who are balancing careers, children, and aging parents.

If you have ever been praised for being strong, dependable, productive, or endlessly helpful while quietly falling apart inside, this episode will speak directly to you.

Subscribe to Women Like Me Stories & Business for more conversations about healing, resilience, business, caregiving, leadership, and the stories that help women rise.

Connect with Jessica:

www.eldercarecollaborativepa.care
https://www.facebook.com/eldercarecollaborative/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessica-king-msw-lsw-4ba724187/

If this conversation stirred something in you… good. That’s where change begins.

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I’m Julie Fairhurst, and this is where stories turn into power.

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Transcript

Welcome And Meet Jessica King

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Well, hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of Women Like Me Stories and Business. I'm your host, Julie Fairhurst. Today on the Women Like Me Story and Business podcast, I'm joined by Jessica King. She is a licensed social worker, an entrepreneur, empowered speaker, and founder of Elder Care Collaborative. For much of her life, Jessica believed that being highly capable, independent, consistently helpful was always outperforming what was simply who she was. A pivotal moment came when a coworker called her the boss's shiny new toy. What may have been an off-handed comment became a turning point, and it forced Jessica to examine why she had spent so many years seeking validation through achievement, why she tolerated environments that did not align with her values, and why her identity became tied to being needed, productive, and successful. I can see so much of that in me, so much of that in a lot of women that I know. Absolutely. Jessica, thank you. Thank you so much for being here. Do you want to start off by telling us a little bit more about yourself and about the work that you're doing today?

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Yeah, absolutely. So I do just always like to speak, uh, start anytime I speak with anyone as a reminder that I am a licensed social worker, but my message is not intended to be therapeutic, but it can be triggering for some. So especially we talk a lot about trauma, and trauma can be something that's different for everyone. It doesn't have to be dramatic abuse or obvious dysfunction. Sometimes it's just a matter that our biopsychosocial needs were not consistently met in our childhood, even from loving well-intentioned parents. So I try to limit the use of some of words that can be triggering. But I encourage everyone, speak to a trusted friend, to a counselor, if anything that we talk about resonates with you to the point of causing you discomfort. Because as you mentioned, Julie, it is so apparent that so many women are overperforming and overanalyzing and overextending themselves. And they just think that it's what women are supposed to do because of societal conditioning. But again, my name is Jessica King. I've been a licensed social worker for about 15 years. And my background really has focused on medical and senior services. I've had a lot of different non-traditional social work career paths that at the time seemed a little disjointed. But when I needed to make a change for my own integrity, my own peace of mind, it really made the most sense to create Elder Care Collaborative, which is a combination of all of the different career experience that I have to be a trusted advisor for seniors and their families.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Perfect. So how do those roles connect for you? You know, your caregiver, your advocacy, your entrepreneur, your speaking, and the fact that you are a social worker.

SPEAKER_01 3:12

Yeah. So it's a really interesting inner connection between kind of the career paths I've led, my entrepreneurship journey, my healing, and making this connection that really becoming an entrepreneur was what helped my healing journey. And when I stepped back and realized three careers ago that I had this major identity crisis, I was working in a long-term care community during COVID, and that job was eliminated. And it

The Identity Crash After Job Loss

SPEAKER_01 4:05

caused me the most significant identity issue that I landed in the emergency department. I had my first panic attack. And prior to that, I probably would have told you that my family was a little dysfunctional, but I never realized to what extreme. And I navigated a lot during childhood: neurodivergence, mental health, cultural expectations, divorce. And it's very important to me that in this conversation, I focus on the fact that I don't blame anyone. I don't blame my parents. I don't have ill will towards any of my prior career experiences. But that moment of being in the emergency room and realizing how embedded my identity was to this career that I thought I had done everything right. You know, I was an ideal student. I got straight A's. I went to college, I graduated early, I married an amazing man, I had beautiful children, I had a career I was proud of. And losing that career was the first time I really had experienced significant loss, shame, rejection. And it was so funny though, because when I went to the emergency rooms for help because I could not sleep. I felt like I couldn't be in my own body. I was able to snap right into wearing that mask perfectly of the social worker, of the caregiver, of saying, I'm okay, but I know I need this help. And I told the doctors what they wanted to hear to get the outcome that I wanted. And it's just, it was so interesting to me looking back that the masks that we wear because of how we're conditioned to act, and just that we always feel that we're going to be okay. And because women can accomplish anything, right? We carry the emotional load for so many people, and we are conditioned that our worth needs to be tied to usefulness, performance, productivity, and what we carry for others while we abandon our own needs. And that was the pivotal moment that started this career journey. Not quite the comment yet, but that's kind of that was when I realized my identity was way too entwined with my career and my purpose. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

Well, what are some signs that high achieving or high achievement might be rooted in survival rather than simple ambition?

SPEAKER_01 6:35

I think that's a wonderful question. And I kind of juxtapose it when

When Achievement Is A Trauma Response

SPEAKER_01 6:39

we look at some of the trauma adaptations that get rewarded professionally. So hypervigilance is a key one where we are constantly scanning the room and being aware and managing other people's emotions. Hypervigilance can sometimes look, though, like strong leadership. Overworking, overperforming, overextending is often praised in professional situations. People pleasing looks like teamwork, but really we're people pleasing again to manage those emotions and try to manage the conflict. Conflict resolution is very important because if conflict is happening, it disrupts our sense of safety and our security. Emotional suppression looks like professionalism because we're being appropriate. And I think the biggest distinction when I do have these conversations between men and women is these dynamics in men are often praised where women are criticized. Men are assertive and women are seen as bossy. Men are decisive and women are seen as being difficult. Men are confident, but women are intimidating. And men are ambitious, but women are manipulative. And women are just pressured on to on both sides to be both highly competent and endlessly accommodating. And it is a battle that we will never win. And it's what systematically depletes depletes us and creates this exhaustion that sleep will never fix.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

It exhausted me hearing that. So much of what you just said is is just so true. How did how did overperforming show up in your relationships, your career, and leadership?

SPEAKER_01 8:29

Overperforming set me up for a false sense of safety and security. I kept entering systems where I hoped that my confidence, my integrity, my hard work ethic, and my overperformance would create safety and validation. That's how I showed up in the workplace. It's parallel, though, to how I also show up in personal relationships, in that I'm always the friend that people come to for advice and for needs. And it's very hard, though, to be in that position where that's not reciprocated. It creates this different dynamic where you're always on the giving side and never the receiving side. And that can build resentment. That builds resentment professionally and that builds resentment personally. But as someone who has experienced some form of emotional conditioning, childhood trauma, developmental trauma, our rejection tolerance is so low because we feel like we're doing the right things. And it's a very naive perspective. But if we do the right things, the outcome should be good. And that's really what made me realize in my careers, I felt like I was doing all the right things. I felt like I was being honest and overperforming and my confidence was shining and I was getting positive affirmations. But I had multiple outcomes that were not good in the in the short term. Looking back, I can realize they were lessons, important lessons I'll take with me. But in the moment, they've really jeopardized my financial security, my emotional safety, my identity and my self-worth.

SPEAKER_00 10:06

Yeah. Wow. It's true though, what you say, because you know, when I look back at my life, I also see those, those difficult, not the greatest situations. But then I also can now look at them and go, okay, I see how they benefit me today to be able to go through that. And I think that that happens to a lot of us. I was fired from a job once. I cried for three days straight. And then, but then now I know that was the best thing that could have happened to me. But at the time, it was devastating. It's hard, I think, for us to sometimes see that when we're going through it.

SPEAKER_01 10:44

I'm a very big believer in that everything happens for a reason. And you don't always know that reason when it's happening. But the part of internal growth and internal validation is eventually putting those pieces together to realize this is where I was meant to be, and this is why these things had to happen. And I had to learn those lessons. And I'm going to apply them going forward for my own emotional health and my own personal success.

SPEAKER_00 11:12

Yeah. Yeah. And you know what I love about that is, and you had said this in the beginning as well, is that when you just said that, that's a person who's not blaming. They're taking responsibility for what's happened to them. And and blame is just such a we don't realize how dangerous it is for us, for our well-being. And to but to be able to accept our our our part, our the responsibility of just basically our own life. It can really can empower us. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:45

Blame is a natural stage of grief. Whenever we've had something that we've experienced that has upset us, blame is the natural part of grief, but you can't get stuck there because then it doesn't propel you forward. It keeps you trapped. And sometimes when we don't

Blame Forgiveness And Moving Forward

SPEAKER_01 12:00

have the emotional intelligence or we are just too overwhelmed, it's easy to get stuck there because our brains are not always designed to be honest with us, because our brains are designed to protect us. And that's what I find so interesting when we talk about childhood trauma and early experiences that quietly shape our identity, our relationships, our caregiving patterns, our leadership, our self-worth, is because they were created before we had emotional maturity, before we had the language to understand what was going on in our environment around us. They are biologically connections that are there to protect us and keep us safe and alive. So it's so interesting, though, when you look back, and some of the other symptoms of addiction, of overeating, of ADHD can be tied to those early experiences because of how our brain is developing. Children are extremely resilient and we adapt intellectually to situations because we are trying to maintain connections. We're trying to have predictable environments and create stability. And some of these maladaptions later in life, we have to recognize and give ourselves grace that at some point they were serving us as children. They were keeping us safe, they were keeping us connected, but they're no longer serving us as adults. And that's that awareness is where the change can start.

SPEAKER_00 13:33

Why do some people become hyper-independent after early emotional experiences?

SPEAKER_01 13:39

I can speak to myself, and I'm sure this resonates with a lot of people. But in my world, again, there was a lot to navigate. And I learned that if I was hyper-vigilant and I could manage the emotions of the room and prioritize the emotional needs of others, I made myself smaller, but by making myself smaller, it helped me feel, again, safe and then stable in that environment. And that's why people try to help resolve conflict that sometimes they aren't responsible for creating, because if they can be conflict avoidant, they can maintain their homeostasis and the environment feels safe and calm. And that's why they're hyper hyper-vigilant because it's a protective capacity. And it goes again back to biology of if you can, if you are taught to be hyper-vigilant and an overachiever, maybe you can fly under the radar. And that concept of if I do everything right, everything will be okay. And we know that the world does not operate like that.

SPEAKER_00 14:41

No, no. And what an exhausting way to live.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

Always.

unknown 14:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

Always, always. It really comes down to nervous system dysregulation. Because we are constantly in this fight or flight pattern, we are emotionally exhausted. And again, sleep can't fix it. You have to learn methodology to re-regulate your system. And that's not that's outside of my scope. But I highly encourage if this does resonate with anyone, that nervous system regulation really is where it needs to be. Um, because your body is so attuned to that protective, defensive response that rest feels guilty, rest feels lazy, and you can't keep going at that pace. Women have to realize that burnout is often deeper than just the workload and what you're carrying. It's emotional exhaustion from performing so that you get that internal validate, that external validation of worth. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Wow. I want to go back to blame again because I do think that I think a lot of people don't really understand what maybe it is that you're you can explain it better. I have I have a writer and she wrote a chapter in one of my books, and her title was forgiveness is a word I don't understand. And so, how can someone acknowledge what hurt them without turning their healing into blame?

SPEAKER_01 16:15

That's a great question. And I would say, really, you are allowed to give yourself that moment of blame. We are allowed to expect an apology. And sometimes because of that pattern, we land in this cycle of pathological hope. I heard that recently on a on a podcast, and I really thought that was just incredible because when you have been conditioned to have certain expectations, it can really create certain schemas where you are self-sacrificing, where you have really high, unrelenting expectations, and you hold everyone else to the standards that you hold for yourself. And this idea of pathological hope is that you'll eventually get an apology from whoever you blame for whatever outcome. And until you can forgive them to the point and realize that apology may never happen. Forgiveness is for your own self and for your own peace of mind. So that's why blame is an important part of the grief process. But if we get stuck there, we aren't taking accountability for how we are moving ourselves forward. And that's what we really need to learn to overcome is you can recognize all of these patterns and adaptations. And until you can give yourself the grace to realize they were beneficial at one point and they're no longer serving me, you will stay stuck in that cycle.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

Yeah. What do you think about generational trauma? How does it look like to stop repeating inherited patterns?

SPEAKER_01 17:50

I love talking about generational trauma because I had a really

Generational Trauma And Putting Down The Rock

SPEAKER_01 17:55

eye-opening experience when I was having a conversation with my own mom about something that we were not seeing eye to eye on. And I had a grandmother on my maternal side who had significant mental health issues. She was absolutely the sweetest woman. She didn't speak much English. They were Italian immigrants, but she had a lot of psychiatric issues. And at one point, my mom said to me, you know, I really never had a mom. And that really struck me because I realized at that moment that all of my mom's struggles were because she didn't have an operational role model either. So it's really hard to expect someone to know what to do and how to provide guidance and nurturance and comfort, which are critical to early emotional development when they never had that opportunity either. So I think generationally we have to look at so many different factors, economic wars, depressions, mental health issues, gender issues, cultural expectations. And we need to recognize that everyone is operating from their own set of traumas, and we don't under, we can't understand specifically what someone else has gone through. I saw an amazing visual the other day of let's say a great-grandmother, a grandmother, a mother, and a child. And the generational visual was that the grandmother was holding this enormous rock, and she turns and she passes it on to her daughter. And then that person hands it to, I'm gonna say, my generation. And my generation holds this rock, this heaviness, this burden, and they decide to put it down. And instead of handing that rock off to their child, to the next generation, they crown their child with a crown of flowers because they've decided to break the cycle to put the rock down. And I love this visual, but in all reality, once you've held the rock, you can't always leave it down because you are predetermined and and and because of these psychological and these neural pathways that you've developed your whole life, you are predispositioned that you're gonna eventually pick that rock back up because that's your survival mechanism. And it's recognizing when we're feeling burdened, when we're feeling heavy, we have to put the rock back down. Because every time we pick it up, we are risking the chance of passing even a stone of it onto the next generation. And they're the ones we need to protect. And our generation is lucky in that we have access to research and technology. And we can learn that my parents and prior generations didn't have access to. So all parents, their goal should be to do better than the last generation. And that's not a dig on the prior generations. They didn't have the same resources that we have.

SPEAKER_00 20:46

No, that's absolutely true. My I I 100% believe the damage that generational trauma can cause. And I've seen that through my own family. And I have no blame for what happened. Like I don't blame any of them because that's exactly it. My mom had a serious trauma. Well, when she did, counseling wasn't a big thing, therapy wasn't a big thing. You couldn't just go on the instigatized. Yes, yes. And and so, and silence was important back then. So things never never got spoken about. And and just really quickly, I'll just tell you, I wrote my true life story a few, uh well, maybe six, seven months ago. And one of my stepsisters, I have six stepsisters, and she read it. And she phoned me and she said, Why didn't I know this about mom? And I'm like, Well, uh, I don't know, I guess. And then I realized, well, because nobody talked about it. It was silent. And she said something to me that will stick with me forever. She said, I thought she hated me. And I said, She didn't hate you, she hated herself. But my point in telling that story is that while we sit, if we sit in Silence. We think, oh no, you know, there's no harm being done, but oh, there's harm being done. You just might not realize the harm. She went through 40 years thinking she was hated.

SPEAKER_01 22:12

And so many people do suffer in silence. I mean, we when we first talked, you mentioned how much my message resonated with you. Every time I speak on this, I am connecting with other women who have gone through the same experiences. And it's challenging because as a social worker, we are taught to see the strengths in people. We are taught to understand that everyone is operating from their own set of traumas and experiences. But understanding someone else's trauma does not obligate you to tolerate abuse and unprofessionalism. And that's what that was really the pivotal moment that for me, when I was called the boss's shiny new toy, I could understand that person's traumas and I was trying to see the best in them, but at my own detriment. And that's when I was like, absolutely not anymore. This person needs to be accountable. And whether I get an apology or not, I need to set a boundary for my own, my own protection and advocate for myself that I won't tolerate this anymore. Because my whole life I tolerated a lot and I was done.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

Yeah. That's a super good point. And I think that's that's the key is is, you know, we can understand what happened, but it doesn't mean that we need to to stay in it, you know. So if if they're still, you know, that way to protect yourself, distance yourself doesn't mean you can't say hello once in a while, but just means I'm not going to your house every weekend to visit or or whatever that means for people.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

It's it's why women though stay in those professional environments because we are conditioned to be fixers, we are conditioned to be accepting of others, and that's why we tolerate staying in environments that are misaligned with our morals, our ethics, and and our integrity is questioned because we are just conditioned to try to fix it and make it better and at our own at our own detriment again.

SPEAKER_00 24:10

Yes, yeah. Well, how can someone tell the difference between helping and overextending?

SPEAKER_01 24:18

I think you have to take a step back and ask yourself, why am I offering to help? And

Boundaries Versus Overhelping

SPEAKER_01 24:25

am I expecting anything in return from this help? And how am I going to feel afterwards? Is helping someone going to deplete me? Is helping someone going to take away from my own family time? And that's really the assessment that you have to do because as a social worker, we are a helping profession. I will help anyone who needs help. Sometimes, though, at the own sacrifice of my free time, of my energy, of my of my heart. And it's when you start to learn that prioritizing yourself is not a bad thing. It's not selfish. Boundaries are not selfish. Boundaries are how we protect ourselves from the world. But that's really hard. It's really hard to set boundaries and stick to them because they feel uncomfortable, they feel unsafe. But really, they provide clarity and a sense of self-respect. Because just because you are setting a boundary does not automatically mean that you're doing something wrong. But it feels guilty to kind of set up that wall. But it's really protection.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

It is protection, yeah. So, what does overexplaining often reveal about the nervous system or self-worth?

SPEAKER_01 25:40

It reveals that you have always felt that you need to explain yourself. Instead of feeling that your worth is inherent for being a human being, for being who you are, because sometimes you don't know who you are. Being able to over being able to explain yourself is trying to seek that external validation because you don't have it inherently within yourself. And you hope if you have the right words that you can rationalize, and it all goes back to trying to prove that you're doing the right thing for that positive outcome. And some you have to learn sometimes people are not willing to listen and they don't care about your perspective. And that's really hard for someone who has these adaptations because it is a reject, it's a sense of rejection, and it it increases the likelihood that you're going to shut down.

SPEAKER_00 26:32

What was the hardest truth that you had to face?

SPEAKER_01 26:42

The hardest truth that I had to face was the fact that there was something missing in my life that led me to this. And I still wouldn't change it. And that's a hard truth. That if we could go back and change it, we would have had a wonderful life. But the hardest truth is I wouldn't go back and change it because it's made me the person that I'm I am. It's built the integrity and the expectations that while I recognize they are high and unrelenting, they are who I want to be because I want to hold myself to a standard. And it can be exhausting, but I'm learning to find that balance where I can have my expectations and live up to them and still make sure that I am creating space for myself and for my family. So that was the hardest piece to learn that this was maladaptive because there was something missing in my childhood, but it's okay. And I wouldn't change it because I appreciate the person I've become. Even though it was a journey to get here and I still have a lot of work to do, I appreciate, I appreciate her.

SPEAKER_00 27:56

Yes. Oh, love that. And I hope you all heard that because that's really what we need to do is learn to love and appreciate ourselves. And and yeah, we we all have our ups and downs and and and I love who I am. I would I'm with you. I wouldn't change it. I just wouldn't change it because or I wouldn't be who I am today. I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you. So let's let's let's turn to elder care collaborative. I want to know what that's all about.

SPEAKER_01 28:27

So elder care collaborative is the compilation of all my crazy careers. So licensed social work, I was a trauma social worker at a level

Elder Care Collaborative And The Sandwich Generation

SPEAKER_01 28:35

one trauma center for a number of years. That's where I learned discharge planning and care coordination. And then I was a clinical liaison at a continuing care retirement community and learned the continuum of care from independent living to rehab to dementia care. And then when that job went away, I was pursued to be a financial advisor because of my communication skills and my ability to engage and build rapport. And I said no a few times because social workers and math really were not best friends. But I I felt that external validation. So I pursued that path. And then when I was called the boss the shiny new toy, that had to end. And then Elder Care Collaborative was born. And again, it's the compilation of the fact that in the US, all of our social services for seniors are so fragmented and people are so frustrated about having to complete this form and call that agency and never hear back and not getting the full picture and understanding what's being shared with them by all of these different care providers. So Elder Care Collaborative helps seniors and their families navigate the complexities of aging by providing care coordination, advocacy, Medicare enrollment and education and emotional support. And this is the tie-in to my speaking platform. In the States, what was the quote I saw the other day? 11 million. There are over 11 million people providing care for aging loved ones. Disproportionately, that happens to be women. And it led me to understand that the women I want to help with Elder Care Collaborative are the ones that are overextending because we've created this sandwich generation where women are working full-time. They are raising children. And add on the complexity of helping an aging parent, they can't say no because they feel obligated and their time is already so precious and it's overwhelming. The systems are just so overwhelming. And another piece of advocacy that I like to remind people that is a direct tieback to no one's shiny new toy is the fact that as senior services providers, there is this underlying expectation or this false assumption that we have all just had idyllic childhoods and that we should jump to help an aging parent when they need help. That someone should step up. And there is this representation of remembering that our seniors have lived full lives and they've had careers and they've done everything. And those moments should be celebrated. But we have to remember that they also may have had decades of causing trauma to their children and their family members. And there may be a very good reason that someone is not stepping up to help them, that they've isolated themselves, they've caused these estrangements. So part of what I do with Elder Care Collaborative is validate when these women are overwhelmed and they need a resource and they want to maintain their boundary. I will help them maintain their boundary by professionally helping their parents navigate the complexities and they can maintain their emotional well-being. So that's where the connection comes in. It's not every case, but when I get to experience that, it is just extra purposeful to me to be able to validate you, don't have to do what everyone, what society is expecting you to do.

SPEAKER_00 32:06

Yeah. Wow. It's um, and with such an aging population that we have, the tail end of the boomer, boomers are coming up. And it's yeah, we're elder, elder care is needed, is needed. But as you said, it's I remember my sister and I taking turns. My brothers were useless. So it was my sister and I with my mom. And and I remember working full-time, having kids, being in a relationship, and then having to, you know, be at my mom's house at six in the morning to make sure she baths, and all of those things. It's it is exhausting, and it does just fall on us.

SPEAKER_01 32:45

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. It does. And um, I'll go back to my Italian grandparents because they were they were absolutely wonderful, but they were the impetus as well for Elder Care Collaborative because a lot of the responsibilities fell to my aunt for doctor's appointments and medications and pharmacy and Medicare and transportation. And if Elder Care Collaborative would have existed back then, my goal would have been to give her back some of that quality time that she could have had with them, some of that relationship where you can take the caregiver hat off and put it down and enjoy being a daughter, enjoy being a spouse, because that becomes the problem when we exhaust so much energy on caring for our aging loved ones. And then that person ends up passing away. There's this really horrible cognitive dissonance that's created that you are grateful for for the reprieve of the responsibility. And then you have the guilt because you are celebrating the loss of someone that was so important to you. So you have to be able to separate them. But as a caregiver, you've experienced that, you know, it becomes a part of your identity.

unknown 33:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

Just I take it back to my job. When you can't separate the responsibilities from your identity, when you lose that piece, it can be, it can be a major crisis.

SPEAKER_00 34:04

Yeah. No, absolutely. Wow. Well, everybody, we are almost out of time, but I want you to know that we are going to have Jessica's information in the show notes. So if you want to reach out to her, you want to discuss whatever you want to discuss, you want to find out more about Elder Cal or I'm sorry, Elder Care collaboration, you'll be able to do that. Jessica, can I ask you, what legacy do you hope to build through your work and your story?

SPEAKER_01 34:36

The legacy that I hope to build is that visual of crowning my two daughters with a crown of flowers

Legacy For Daughters And Closing

SPEAKER_01 34:43

as opposed to handing them a rock, a boulder. I want to show them that women can accomplish anything. And in a world that's full of misogyny, we can overcome by setting our own standards and expectations and living by them with integrity. We can do anything. And that's that's what I'm hopeful for them. And they're they're so wonderful. Sometimes they help me with the business by stickering some of my deliverables. And my oldest is volunteering with me at a local skilled nursing facility because I want to get her that exposure. I just I want them to not be fearful of helping. And I want them to have good boundaries to protect themselves. And if they can do that, then I will have accomplished my life's mission.

SPEAKER_00 35:29

Oh, beautiful. That's beautiful. Well, thank you so much, Jessica, for being willing to come and do this and be so open and honest with your story. You know, it's stories that really help others. And for us to be able to share those, even little, little pieces of the of our lives with others, it certainly is, it can be just a little ray of light, a little ray of hope for them. So remember, people, all of Jessica's information is in the show notes. So don't hesitate to reach out to her if you if you if she's resonated with you and if you feel like you need to ask her some questions. Okay. Well, thanks again, Jessica. I appreciate you doing this so much. And everybody will see you next time on the next episode of Women Like Me Stories in Business. Take care, everybody. Bye.