A Candid Conversation on Health, Motherhood and Work

Ever feel caught in the crossfire between maintaining your health, career, and life at home? Not to mention pursuing a social life, maintaining sleep, and everything else. We're with you.

Tune in as we welcome Dr. Andrea Feigl, Founder and CEO of the Health Finance Institute, for a candid discussion on all of the above. We've all heard of the idea of 'having it all' and 'leaning in', but it's perfectly okay not to want it all at every given point in time.

One example of this? Dr. Feigl shares her emotional, relatable experience of two high-achieving parents working in public health under the same roof during the height of the COVID-19. We also talk about how to cultivate a sense of inner calm, and why social connections could be the answer to finding pockets of peace.

Join us!

Show Notes:

Visit the Health Finance Institute
Follow Dr. Andrea Feigl on LinkedIn

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

creating in general, a better support for families and moms and parents so that we can actually be there for our children but also be there for the economy and you know the chronic disease burden is a huge economic burden on this country as well so it would actually create an upward spiral of better health and higher productivity and higher economic performance. So there's really a part from ideology view downside itself investing in these types of social and health related interventions and services.

Speaker 2: 0:35

Welcome to Working Mom Hour. Hi everyone, welcome to Working Mom Hour. I'm Erica and I'm Madeline.

Speaker 3: 0:52

We're Working Moms, business partners and friends with kids at different ages and stages.

Speaker 2: 0:56

We know moms tend to get more done in an hour than the average human, yet are often misunderstood and underappreciated in the workplace.

Speaker 3: 1:04

We are here to shine a light on the Working Mom experience, to help ourselves and others step into and advocate for the superpower. We are not experts. We're two women who have been there and are still there kids, clients and all.

Speaker 2: 1:17

Join us as we cultivate more joy in working motherhood at the corner of calm and chaos. Today, on Working Mom Hour, we are hosting Dr Andrea Feigl, an admired expert in global health and finance, as the founder and CEO of the Health Finance Institute. Dr Feigl has dedicated her career to understanding and improving health systems worldwide. Her extensive research at the renowned Harvard Chan School of Public Health and her role as a health economist with the organization for economic cooperation and development have positioned her as a leading voice in the field. Dr Feigl's work has had significant impact, from her comprehensive study on healthcare in 196 countries to her leadership in evaluating health programs in places like Chile and Jordan. These programs have tackled pressing issues such as smoking and obesity prevention, earning international recognition.

Speaker 3: 2:29

In addition to her research, Dr Feigl has collaborated with major global organizations, including the World Health Organization and the World Economic Forum trust the challenges of chronic diseases. With an impressive academic background from institutions like Harvard and Simon Fraser University, she brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to our discussion today. Let's get into it and introduce you to Dr Andrea Feigl.

Speaker 2: 3:02

It's so good to see you, dr Feigl. Welcome to Working Mom Hour.

Speaker 1: 3:05

Thank you so much, erica, and what a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 2: 3:09

So you study the financial impacts of health in the US and elsewhere, and healthcare decisions play a significant role in whether we choose to work and how much and at what level. So what is the impact of health on the decisions we have to make as working moms? I love that you just go. We're going to go right into it. You keep crashing, let's just go with it.

Speaker 1: 3:32

So at the Health Finance Institute, which is the organization that I lead, we look particularly at the economic impacts of chronic diseases, which are the predominant conditions in terms of mortality and morbidity. So we're looking at heart disease, diabetes, cancers, pulmonary disease, salam disease and mental health and basically early prevention, access and adherence at the economic level in the US would save us about 9% of a tax burden. So if we were actually instituting better preventive care, better public health measures, better access, making sure that people cannot hear the treatment, we would actually save a lot of financial burden both to the economy as well as to individuals. And you mentioned the work component. So the US is one of the few, if not the only, high income economy that had universal health care, if you can call it, at the very late stage in the game. So when you look at Germany, you know you had.

Speaker 1: 4:31

In the late 1800s they instituted the Bismarck system, which is basically social health insurance, and health care is like a right. It can be associated with your employer, like insurance can be offered through your employer, but it's not the only option that you have. So you know, now we have these marketplaces in the United States where you can buy insurance, but these insurances that are offered not through your employers but on the marketplace can actually be much more expensive and have a lower range of coverage than you know the employer based insurance would have. So a lot of moms, I guess in the United States, when it comes to the importance of having financial health coverage during childbirth and on just in general, may consider that they have to have a certain amount of minimum hours in order to be covered in health. Right, you know it might be then work hours work hours.

Speaker 1: 5:23

it's actually like you know, whatever the 20, 30 hours a week, they're actually participating in the workforce, but it's a little bit more complicated because you also have very high cost of child care. In the United States, right, I think there's only one state, which is DC, where preschool is actually covered at starting at age three. Usually, public school is offered at age five, but as you know as moms. It is very intense.

Speaker 1: 5:50

The first years are the most intense years of parenting in terms of the needs and the demands on our time. So it's often a trade off between the affordability of child care and the benefits that working financially in the child's health care benefits it offers. And then there's also the food component, where you know nutritional components for example, ultra processed foods have a massive impact both on mental health as well as diabetes and heart disease.

Speaker 1: 6:18

So it all kind of works together in a sense. So the choice of the health care that's available, but the socioeconomic environment and the services, and then another different calculus from us moms, I think in the United States.

Speaker 3: 6:32

Oh my gosh. And those ultra processed foods are also tend to be the convenient foods.

Speaker 2: 6:38

And less expensive yeah.

Speaker 3: 6:41

Yes, and so if we're trying to be efficient with our time, and our energy and those are like the shittiest foods we can offer. I mean, that is like daily struggle for us. How do I feed my child something that won't make them feel or act like a lunatic, and also that we can get them out the door and that they'll eat. It's like a constant struggle.

Speaker 1: 7:02

Yeah, I mean it's like the food marketing, but I have a background in nutrition as well, so I mean it's the marketing of foods, the marketing of unhealthy cereals to children, right, right, right.

Speaker 1: 7:13

So it's the sugar content, high fructose corn syrup and then also other additives like the food coloring some of the tripe in California that have been linked to ADHD, but if you look at the Halloween candy and the Funcandy. So we had this exercise. My son, who is 10, we were in Chicago, one of his friends invited us to I think it was called the sugar factory and they overselling this massive milkshakes and it was just, quite frankly, it shouldn't even be allowed to offer servings to children. We're one serving of a sweet or a dessert is two times their daily caloric budget. So he wanted to like buy a souvenir which was a candy, and I said, well, it cannot have the red dyes and artificial dyes in it. An entire store had, I think, one lollipop that wasn't included either high fructose corn syrup or that dye and I almost felt bad, but I'm like it's just just unhealthy, right, and all we can do.

Speaker 3: 8:04

There are study after study. No, really like I mean, we don't have to dive too far into this, but you were probably knowledgeable on this topic. But in European countries those dyes are banned. Right, you'll look at the back of a Skittles bag and it'll be like beta carotene and beet powder and it'll be colored with substances found in nature, whereas in the US, they are able to use those dyes and from my understanding, it's largely because of all the lobbying and money happening in the food industry. Is that your understanding, or do you have knowledge on this, or are we really going to stray here?

Speaker 1: 8:37

I don't have very deep knowledge on it. I know that the particular red dye, the Sinkdee ADHD, is banned in California, so there are some states that are banning it, and lobbying, definitely with high fructose corn syrup and palm oil, plays a huge role in the United States. There are European countries, like EU countries, where these dyes are also stolen in circulation. Got it? It's not blanket and I don't know exactly which countries that have outlawed them or not. But yeah, I think the general difference there is is that in order for a product to be launched or introduced into the market, you have to prove that it's safe, whereas in the United States you can offer it and then it gets banned if you can prove that it's unsafe. That also means that the likelihood of having unsafe substances in our food that we purchase is much higher.

Speaker 3: 9:27

So because who's going to pay for the studies that show that it's harmful? All the studies are paid for are from the food companies themselves.

Speaker 1: 9:38

Yeah, I mean I want to go to the part that all of them, but then you have to show them that evidence has to be good, you have to have a very good design, and then you have a pushback, For example, with vaping right Like again, it's not a food, it's a tobacco related product was introduced.

Speaker 1: 9:50

But the vaping industry had a leg up because he had to have a product in the market for a certain amount of time to do a retrospective study. So the CDC and the NIH were already catching up on the journey to prove that these substances are harmful. So instead of showing that it is safe, they could introduce it, and we have to show that it's harmful to take it off the market, and in the meantime harm can be done.

Speaker 3: 10:12

So there are all of these trade-offs and decisions that we're making every day about our time and our money and what we're feeding ourselves and our children. So the trade-off of working and paying for daycare which I know we touched on a little bit or staying home, feels like a constant challenge, especially with school ending at 2.30 and traditional work hours ending at 5. How is that even feasible? What are the implications of the decision to work or stay home on the economy and our mental health?

Speaker 1: 10:40

Yeah, I think the school hours are often designed with a family in mind, where one of the parents and traditionally the mom stays home, and I think different school districts have different solutions. So this is also where I used to be in Arlington and I was like a lottery for after-school care and now we moved to. First Church. In primary school there was no lottery. There was a spot for anyone who needed it, Wow.

Speaker 2: 11:04

So that is not the way it is. I live right up the road from you and in my county it's the same, it's the lottery and it's impossible. It's impossible to get.

Speaker 3: 11:12

A lottery for after-school care.

Speaker 1: 11:15

My hand- yeah, that is blowing my mind right now. They don't have spots for everyone.

Speaker 1: 11:18

Yes, and it's kind of like, well, if you're lucky you get to work longer, and if you're not, then you have to basically pay for services and even if it was at least income-based or things like that, right, so you have to offer the same kind of opportunity or make sure it is a bit of an equalizer of opportunity. For the most part, I think a lottery is almost like tone deaf towards the fact that we choose to work. We should be able to choose to work without being a strain, and so it can have implications on our career opportunities. It can have implications on our stress levels as mom and our mental health. Chronic stress is a condition in and of itself, but it's also linked to anxiety and depression and other types of health disorders. I think in terms of the labor force participation among moms, like the US is one of the countries that has on the lower end of high-income economies because of the cost of childcare. So I think there's some numbers around. Only like 70% of women who could be participants in a workforce are actually participating in a workforce under lack of affordable childcare as a direct impact on that, and during the pandemic, I think we fell back by about 20 to 30 years in female labor force participation. And then there were studies that our economy here in the US would grow about by double digits more in terms of GDP output if we actually solved the childcare equation.

Speaker 1: 12:33

So there's a lot of ideological discussion around. Well, you know, if people choose to have children, then they need to be able to responsibly take care of them as individuals. But what is forgotten is that we live in a society that is interdependent, right. We have times where we depend on the systems and then we have time where we give back to the system. So we have an aging population and there's going to be a growing dependency ratio and the birth rates have been falling more so like more precipitously in the last couple of years, and that means that that dependency ratio is going to grow. So if you don't offer reasonable childcare and opportunities for working moms, your economy will suffer in the short and in the long run. So from a financial sense, we get about empowerment, mind and choice. It makes a lot of sense. And also, I guess, from a health sense, it makes sense, right, because sort of integration for children and reducing economic pressure can actually help improve the chronic disease prevalence as well that you're dealing with. I mean, it's all interconnected.

Speaker 3: 13:30

Yes, if we and our families are healthy, we will most likely have a healthier mental health environment and home environment.

Speaker 2: 13:36

Yep, so you shared the metaphor that working moms have five critically important things to do in a day and can really only complete three. Can you tell us more about this concept? And then, how do you choose?

Speaker 1: 13:50

Yeah, excellent question. And so this is a concept that I borrowed I cannot take any credit for it from an author named Randy Zuckerberg, and she published a book that's called Pick Three, and she and her partner are both highly successful and very busy in their careers. And she starts with a promise that she always felt bad, that she just didn't get everything done in the day because it's just impossible. So she kind of looked at her life and bucketed it into like five categories, so it was work, fitness, sleep, family and friends. And she said as long as she has, over the period of a week or a month or a month, focused an equal amount of time on these five areas, then she feels like she lives a balanced life.

Speaker 1: 14:35

But on any given day. She's going to pick three. So the one thing I don't like so much about it is that sleep is one of them, because I think it's just. Sleep is like a basic and essential. And it's like a non-negotiable. So I think for me, sleep will always have to be there. And at the beginning I thought what is this? Three things, first of all, only three. And then, secondly, like I want to do, it all.

Speaker 1: 14:55

But then I was actually diving into the book and I thought you know what it actually released a lot of pressure, if you're thinking those terms right. You can't always succeed in work, can't always spend that much time with family, you can't always meet your friends on a daily basis, but if you're like, okay. So I'm feeling socially isolated today, but then I know, two days down the road I'm going to hang with my friends, I'm going to fill that bucket up as well. So it's fitness, work, sleep, family and friends. You might disagree with these five buckets, you might have different ones, you might have seven, but it gives you permission to basically not be perfect on all fronts, right?

Speaker 2: 15:30

And it's not today. It was a work day.

Speaker 1: 15:32

Exactly.

Speaker 4: 15:33

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 15:33

Exactly and there were a couple of articles I also appreciated in terms of that Ann Marie Slaughter and her. There was this notion of you know the lean in versus why women can't have it all Right, and again it has this one end of the spectrum versus the other. And there were a couple of articles that came out that basically said when you're planning and you have a partner and you're planning your life, think about your life in terms of episodes or in five year fragments For the next five years.

Speaker 1: 15:59

I'm really going to focus on being a mom and I'm going to focus on my career and my partner is going to step it up on a different front, and that, I think, again alleviates the pressure of like, oh my God, I want to do it all now, and understanding that we have time to allow us to basically have different versions of ourselves. Yeah, take front and center stage versus others. So I like that more because I'm like, well, you know, I don't have to do it all or have it all all.

Speaker 3: 16:26

Yeah at a time and you can change your mind and it can shift. I really love that and I remember as sort of like a mid to late twenties PR professional in one of my jobs watching our director of operations who had four kids, and I remember talking to her about working and raising kids and she shared with me that she had spent the past 10, 12 years really going all in on the kids and her husband was going all in on his career. And then she told me just what you were saying that they met. He had the opportunity to maybe change jobs and go pursue another opportunity, but they decided that this was her time to go all in on her job.

Speaker 3: 17:10

So he was going to stay put. He was an executive at his job, he had a good thing going and he could have tried something new. But they decided to make this decision as a family so she could now pursue her career for a second, and that that was just the decision they made for their family, and I thought that was so refreshing.

Speaker 1: 17:27

We can make these decisions.

Speaker 3: 17:28

We can support each other, we can ebb and flow, and if something's not working, we can change our minds. You know, it doesn't have to be a hard and set rule, exactly.

Speaker 1: 17:37

No, and it allows for that balance and even like your analogy of waves, right, I mean, you can't have a wave that's on top all the time. I mean it doesn't work that way and it shouldn't work like this in our lives. But I think as women we do get this pressure off. We have to look good, we have to be fit. Now we also, if we are passionate about a career, and then we have to be that perfect kind of mom too.

Speaker 3: 17:58

It's okay to not want it all. Yeah, I know.

Speaker 1: 18:02

And so I think the givers of mission is like. Well, now I'm focusing on my career and what I emphasize, also with my girlfriends, is that it's really it should be, about the choice, and it's fine not to be everything at every given point in time. You know, I have a friend and she was a top lawyer in a Mexican government and now she is a stay at her mom and she's like and she's been criticized for it, necessarily, you know that's okay.

Speaker 1: 18:23

You made that decision and try to live with your partner, and it's what you wanted, and you're not less a human being because of it, but it's your choice right now. So, anyways, I think we have that more compassion and also view our life with a lens of there's time. There's time to grow and there's time to change. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 18:41

I love the wave analogy and I was sitting two nights ago on the beach with a friend and all of our kids and we were talking about surfing and I'm currently afraid of waves. I don't really go in the water that often, but like I do have the desire and I remember saying to her I think my mid 40s is going to be my surfing era. I will do that when my kids won't drown and I don't have to worry about anyone else. That is going to be my time to serve.

Speaker 2: 19:06

Your kids are going to teach you how to surf in your mid 40s. I'll be out there with you. Exactly. They'll be out there with you and then it'll be like oh you know, mom, come on, mom, yeah, it's 100% what's going to happen?

Speaker 3: 19:18

Oh my gosh. Okay, speaking of achieving or choosing to achieve, you were in a household with two very high achieving parents and a child during COVID, and you both worked in public health. Can you share?

Speaker 4: 19:31

if you're open.

Speaker 3: 19:31

how did you navigate this and any insights you gleaned?

Speaker 1: 19:34

Yeah, I probably gained better insights than I can give myself credit for navigation. But you know, I think COVID hit us all by surprise and you know we were all super scared. So for my end, it was 2020 and we just had gotten like a couple million dollar grant to really set up our organization, but it was a grant we almost didn't get, we almost lost it, and so we had a very difficult relationship with our funder from the get go. So there was a lot of pressure to basically show that we deserved that money and so we opened our office I think it was like on February 20th, downtown in DC, and then we closed it a couple weeks later because of COVID, and that was a really tough time, and we also couldn't travel internationally. And then all the staff that had hired full time were moms with at least one child under two. Most of them actually had husbands who were lawyers, who were working crazy hours, who still were working in the office and all the day care shut down.

Speaker 1: 20:28

Just that in and of itself, of schools closing your office, closing high pressure environment, inability to actually set up our programs internationally that was a very massive pressure cooker and I said to myself nothing else. I just want to make sure that we can pull towards an organization and that I can make sure that those moms that are working in our organizations I mean they had to still work because we had these deliverables, but at the same time I wanted them to be able to work in a way that they could accommodate the children that they've now had at home. But that also meant that I had to work later hours, and then my son was a single child and they closed the playgrounds.

Speaker 3: 21:04

We were in a townhouse. That was truly the worst.

Speaker 1: 21:06

Yes, I mean that was? I mean, honestly, I didn't even know what they were thinking. And the school district we were in. They also stopped instructing and teaching new materials, which, as an economist, I knew. That's the worst thing you can do for children in terms of the long term economic growth, their earning potential, their socialization. And he was a single child. We didn't have a playground, we didn't have a yard. It was insanity. We had a six year old, hyperactive, smart kid in front of a computer for seven hours a day. It just doesn't work that way.

Speaker 1: 21:35

And then compound that with my then husband, became this overnight internet sensation, growing from like I don't know a couple thousand followers to whatever, several hundred thousand followers on Twitter and literally like CNN, being outside our house at five AM in the morning because it closed all the studios. So he was basically on social media or creating media related to content related to the pandemic, About 14, 15 hours a day. So I just felt that all the parenting was up to me. So I was running an organization, trying to set it up, trying to prove to our fund that we're doing all right, carrying also a larger load based on the fact that all the full-time employees were moms and then on top of that, basically having the homeschool I tried, and so it was kind of like this what do we do?

Speaker 1: 22:17

And we were fortunate that we were able to afford a tutor who was again the laid off teacher at the time and he came every day and we kind of formed this like little bubble and I know that that's coming from a very privileged position. But it was literally either that or it couldn't run my company. But I designed a curriculum, I made sure that he could test in mass and then down the road we decided to actually move closer to my family for about a year so that I could keep running my company and he could go to school. I don't want to speak negatively of my partner back then but given his voluminous media output, I think it's safe to say that his main focus really was on communication around the pandemic at that time and it definitely was an easy period for me personally and we actually are no longer together. So yeah, it's sometimes happens, but hope it definitely catalyzed that change for sure.

Speaker 2: 23:09

Yeah, I'm sorry that that was your experience. I think that was a common experience among moms trying to run their businesses. And you mentioned the pandemic. Put us back. I can't believe that. These are the real numbers 20 to 30 years. But we had to make a choice. Yeah, we had no choices.

Speaker 1: 23:27

I mean a lot of moms stopped working altogether or they had to pull back. And I think, again generalizing, that what I saw in their studies to back that up as well, is that our instincts as mom is we want to make sure our kids are all right and there was from a health perspective, obviously, and also a mental perspective than everything else.

Speaker 1: 23:46

We make sure that our kids are all right first, and then we go around and see what else is there to do in a sense, and so what I experienced is among my employees and among my network, is the assumption that the default parent is the mom became extremely transparent. It was the mom who picked up when the school closure came. It's the mom who picked up the kid, it's the mom who did the homeschooling. It was just literally like across the board. Where I would look, the burden was placed on the moms.

Speaker 3: 24:16

No matter what level. Yeah, yeah, they're operating at work, exactly yeah.

Speaker 1: 24:21

Exactly, it was just well, the kids here, the moms got to take care of them. Again, it's a generalization and it wasn't obviously true in every single household and every single circumstance. And then it's the mental health burden out that then precipitated, or I think we're still recovering from as moms.

Speaker 1: 24:35

I think I'm just like I personally and among my friends, like we're still coming out of it. We're running a company and high professionals who were lawyers and HR, real career women that I partnered with, but their husbands usually they had to work. They had to work and the moms were at home with the kids on their lap or running around or that kind of stuff, and that became the norm. And I also think on the flip side is there was also a lot of workers who just had partners and no kids or other workers. There was this lack of awareness that was going on as well, and I think that a lot of my male friends during the time who were single or just were partnered. They were like, oh you know, all these moms are just complaining and I was just like, well, hold on a second. This is like the massive amount of burden on moms in terms of it was just so disproportionate.

Speaker 3: 25:22

I really felt that you're doing the most. And then if someone shows even like an ounce of unreasonable this or judgment, I remember not being able to handle it. I was furloughed from my job and I was taking on clients on the side and I remember taking a call I don't know what time of day it was, but there was a kid in the background. It was a man and I remember him saying let's talk another time Like in a way that was really intolerant. I wanted to be like this is my reality all the time and if you can't I didn't say this If you can't handle this, we can't work together. But I quickly ended that contract. I finished that month with him and I was like here's a referral.

Speaker 3: 25:59

I think you'll be better suited working with someone else. If you can't take me in this current state, which is the current state, then I just I really can't have that energy because we are all trying to do the most right now.

Speaker 1: 26:11

Yeah, Thanks for sharing, and I'm sorry you had to. I mean being furloughed during the pandemic. Businesses, especially smaller businesses, were squeezed as well. Right, it was just a full-blown attack on so many different fronts. It wasn't just the virus, you know. It chopped on so many aspects of our day-to-day lives.

Speaker 2: 26:26

I think for me I can talk personally and I know you mentioned this too. You know, during the pandemic one of those five was connection to other working moms. We were all in such hell that we lost connection because we were surviving to other moms and to our tribes and our villages and I think we're all kind of trying to get that back. But you mentioned, like so many of us, craving that connection with other working moms. What has it been like for you to build your tribe post pandemic?

Speaker 1: 26:58

Yeah, and I remember there was this, and I think it started a university, where people were going on a field and like just having a primordial scream, scream, yeah. And then I think some of my mom groups actually picked it up you know the ones I was on Facebook with. I think it was all meat on the soccer field. Let's just oh.

Speaker 2: 27:14

I love that. I love that and I'm just like I actually never participated, but you know, I was like. You know, this is. I would still like to like this.

Speaker 1: 27:22

I would like to because, you know, I was like take that kind of like just releasing that yeah.

Speaker 1: 27:29

So, a couple of things happened, and so one of my neighbors. So she had this place outside the city and it was up in the mountains and she said, just come up, you need to get away. And I was like, yeah, maybe for a day or two. I'm just very aware that I'm speaking from, I'm coming from a lot of privilege because we were able to do that. You know, we were able to rent this like getaway place that had large outdoor space where kids could just play outside. They were wearing their masks and everything, but you know, nobody was visiting anyone and I was able to two, three months into the pandemic basically go there. And then my son was able to actually see other children and I remember at the beginning he just would tell everything, he would meet an adult or a person and he was like, you know, there's like a little thing, he's like I'm doing this, and then I'm like two, three months of lost

Speaker 1: 28:12

socialization and I was like this is so important. But you know, one of my really good girlfriends was like you know, you look terrible. I wasn't sleeping, I was stressed. Yeah, you know, marriage wasn't going well, the kid wasn't well, my organization was under a lot of pressure, my team was under a lot of pressure and then it was a pandemic that we were all scared about, right? So there were just so many stressors and then she said, you know, just come up, just come for the weekend. And she organized this place that we rented and on weekends I was able to. We had this like fireside jats. She had like a massive fireplace and on weekends, at night, we just can't be there with our tea or a cup of wine. You know, socially distant, but outside next to fireplace to take our own precautions.

Speaker 1: 28:49

But that really helped me to feel like a normal person with other moms who were struggling and carrying all that burden as well, and I think I would have just gone mental without that connection. So that really helped because you felt there were these pockets of the great normality rain, as opposed to, like you know, you go in and you wear your mask and you can't see, and you can't go on the playground and people don't even want to bike next to you and I mean, and the other thing is, is a you know like 50,000 deaths.

Speaker 1: 29:20

So it was just a pretty easy amount of deaths. But a quarter of COVID deaths I think happened in the United States. You know, talk about the mental health burden there. And I'm sorry again, erica, you ask about my connections to moms, but just carrying like what really was important, that I had these couple of moms to connect with, because it was just such a burden and such an uncertainty and we have mental, but at least only half, because I had some good friends. But what I did notice is that you know you lost some of those connections and it was much more.

Speaker 1: 29:50

You know, not every are teleworking much more frequently. I mean it's much easier in terms of work productivity but in terms of the social connection to your team and to other moms and especially for those of us who changed school districts or whose kids are now growing up in a new school, that natural tribe that would form around that at least has informed that easily in my circumstance. So the connectivity piece, I think overall the connectivity to other moms has definitely declined because they think what's the rest stayed with us is that we're teleworking much more often and I think you know if we're working moms with a busy job and focusing on our kids and our family and everything else that comes along, how much time is there really to stay social? And maybe probably all of you are doing a much better job than me, but sometimes we're just like probably not friends, you know?

Speaker 3: 30:39

No, yeah, thanks for sharing all of that. I really feel that, because this telework has happened, we all have almost like just greatly different schedules now.

Speaker 3: 30:51

There was some similarities before and now I'm finding and this is like tangible for me because I go on like one walk every week and I invite other working moms and I go every week at a time that works for me. It's like Thursday afternoons and I asked the group of moms what times work for you all and everyone had a different time, more after drop, lunchtime, afternoons, weekend, like I need to choose what works for me and whoever can join me can join me, but everyone's schedules are so different now that we have these work set up so I do feel that it is harder to get that in-person connection.

Speaker 4: 31:27

Yeah, I feel like we're talking so much about social connection and the importance of that, but what do you do when you don't have access to social connection and you have to build the connection with yourself? Good, question. Good question.

Speaker 1: 31:45

I thought you were going to ask and that would be an easier question to answer about the relationship between social connections and health and health?

Speaker 2: 31:54

You can answer that question too.

Speaker 1: 31:57

You know, the number one predictor of longevity, like living a long life, is the strength of your social connections. Wow, I think there's like three things Stay healthy and live long, eat a lot of red beans and lentils, sleep a lot and have a lot of friends. So how do you build the connection with yourself? I mean, I think that there are things you can do to kind of like overcome a sense of loneliness, and I find that, you know, I'm sort of a meditation, like I meditate, I go for a walk in the morning and it's my time. Hence I left my son by the school after he missed his bus, as opposed to driving him. He needs to learn responsibility and I need to. You know I need my walk, right, I think that.

Speaker 1: 32:38

So for me it was really, like, you know, finding these pockets of peace. For, like meditation, there's something, a program called positive intelligence that also uses in neuroscience and the knowledge of the psychology, about how to basically find your sort of inner calm and inner peace about no matter what life throws at you. I think that can really help. And then just also understanding, you know and this comes from elements of what they use in cognitive behavioral therapy around do more of the things that make you feel good, you know, is it spending time with your child? Is it slowing down, sipping that cup of tea? Right, and I was listening to Rosetta Paak was about sort of like external versus internal self-care.

Speaker 1: 33:21

What is more meaningful? So I think if, in the absence of having social connections, I think these things can really help, but I think that our brains are fundamentally wired to function better when we have social connections. So to say that we're just better off if we are able to connect and you know and we can, we can burn out like it extinguishes our flame of. I mean, obviously there's interwords and extroverts, but I would say, like you know, there's there's things we can do and people that I don't know what's his name? Nelson Mandela, after years in solitary confinement, comes out and you know it still changes the world. I mean, there is these examples, but not all of us are gifted in any way to withstand hardship like that Right Totally, and I see that so much especially as leaving college.

Speaker 4: 34:07

I'm in my late 20s now, so many friends are scattered all over the place, but I've always tried to move to cities where I have a bunch of connections. I know walking down the street and waving hello to someone always just makes my day better. We always joke about buying a bunch of property and living in a commune situation. I've seen that being talked about lately, that that might be the middle. Yeah, so what is it?

Speaker 1: 34:31

Both women gave up 13% of their time when they're in partnerships, and most women are actually happier when they're by themselves. So, as I'm like contemplating whether to enter like a serious partnership again, I'm looking at all of this and I look at these amazing women, yourselves included in my life. I'm like we've all thought it figured out right. We run a household, we run businesses, you know we take care of ourselves. Kind of to each other, yeah, aware, we're proactive, we're self-aware, we've done the inner work. You know we're educated.

Speaker 4: 35:01

I agree, I was talking to a friend who is? Complaining about.

Speaker 1: 35:08

Let's all go Honestly if I was wired the way I was, I would probably be better right now because I would have like a cool, functional human being so available.

Speaker 4: 35:17

Yes, yes. I was talking to one of my friends the other day who was complaining about her partner, and I just stopped her for a second and I was like do we need them? Do we need them?

Speaker 3: 35:29

Yeah, oh gosh.

Speaker 2: 35:32

All right, I'm going to ask another question because we are curious. Your answer to this one what are the major changes that need to happen, in your opinion, to ease this heaviness of working motherhood in the US?

Speaker 1: 35:45

Can I have a magic wand, or do I have to stay?

Speaker 2: 35:47

realistic.

Speaker 1: 35:50

Magic wand, magic wand. I mean. I think let's start with something where the US is the only among two countries in the world where we are not having basically mandated maternity leave. Right, you know, being pregnant and having a child is you? Basically you're classified as disabled, which I think is ethically highly questionable and does as a disservice. And what if you are disabled and pregnant? I mean, what are you then?

Speaker 1: 36:15

So I think the number one thing and that is, you know, healthy for families, that's healthy for the mom, that's healthy for the children, is actually mandated family leave that also guarantees a job security. So one of my friends she worked at Google for, I think, 12 or 13 years and she literally got laid off during her maternity leave with an 11 week old at home. And in no other country that I know of, at least in Western Europe, this will be legal, this will be absolutely illegal and I think it's just unethical beyond discriminatory. So I think the number one thing, if there was one thing I would say you know, pay parental leave right, because you want to decide. Not everyone is a mom and not everybody wants to stay the full time, which is fine, but something, you know, parental leave that is guaranteed. I think that's like number one.

Speaker 1: 37:00

I think the number two thing is probably something around a childcare system where there is childcare in a way that it's at least accessible.

Speaker 1: 37:10

You know, it could be co-ops, it could be this, I think, like saying, well, that should be affordable or free, childcare is probably too large and leave free to the United States. I mean, I've seen it work in France, like in, even in countries where I come from, in Austria, they don't have enough spaces for all the working moms and then you have to have a job in order to get the space. But in order to get the job you have to have the space and then it covers only 33 hours. And I talked to one of the ministers who was like in charge of it a couple years ago at the OECD is like, by the way, you know, we have 33 hours and I said well, you're talking to a working mom. Right now I work 40 hours a week. It takes me half an hour each day to commute, plus my one hour lunch hour that I must, must take. That's not compensated. That leaves me away from home 55 hours.

Speaker 3: 37:50

So how can I?

Speaker 1: 37:52

even have this kind of job, but you know something that so that the burden becomes more manageable. So it's not the financial pressure, the job pressure, the school pressure, backup care that kind of support system would absolutely be critical. And then you know, in terms of healthcare services, in terms of availability of healthcare services, most of the mental health care support that you know, even with good insurance between you know my ex-partner and myself, you have the therapist for a child. You know you went through the wars and things like that, you know you have to pay out of pocket and everybody else that would not have been out of pocket was either like very far away, massively long wait lists and things like that. So we have to really look at the mental health care support system that we have in this country and it's very, very inaccessible to those of with little means, yep, and that's just another burden.

Speaker 1: 38:39

Even you know, being in probably the middle upper middle class myself, like affording good mental health care, preventive care, so things don't escalate, is difficult.

Speaker 1: 38:49

So if we don't invest in these prevention services, then I think we have a huge opioid crisis in this country and it's coming from somewhere, right, yeah, I mean. So it's all related, like unstable homes, like there's a lack of stability. You know you're too poor for childcare and too poor to work, and then that sets up, you know, the next generation with parents that aren't as available as they could be and that could then exacerbate whatever is happening and exacerbate the mental health and other chronic disease challenges. And then you know the food choices and everything. So basically like just creating in general better support for families and moms and parents so that we can actually be there for our children but also be there for the economy and you know the chronic disease burden is a huge economic burden on this country as well. So it would actually create an upward spiral of better health and higher productivity and higher economic performance. So there's really, apart from ideology view downside it's of investing in these types of social and health related interventions and services.

Speaker 3: 39:57

Yeah, that's incredible. Let's leave the listeners with something positive.

Speaker 4: 40:03

Is there anything?

Speaker 3: 40:03

inspiring, like what inspires you most about working mother head right now.

Speaker 1: 40:08

I think there's a lot of inspiring things. I think the fact that we are having this discussion and that it's out in the open and it's in the mainstream, and that we are talking about mental health, I think that if I look at the generations of my parents like they all had their own mental health issues to contend with and it wasn't out there I think the fact that we are having this conversation is a huge step forward, because you have to first put it out there and discuss it. Awareness yeah, that awareness. And then the other thing is is that, as difficult as it is and as big as the roadblocks are, I do feel that there's a lot of liberty and freedom to actually move forward and to find support among other women and the ability to, you know, to run my own companies.

Speaker 1: 40:49

I travel a lot overseas, so I travel to Western European economies and obviously, like things are a lot better there for women. But I also travel to other societies and other countries where a lot of privileges from like freedom of speech to freedom of movement, to freedom of choosing your work is not guaranteed when you're a woman. When I went through my separation, I was very grateful to have that economic stability that I was able to create here because I had the opportunity to start my own business. I had the opportunity to raise the money I needed for my business and I was able to then not fall prey to a system where I didn't have that freedom.

Speaker 1: 41:27

So again, I understand it's not possible for everyone, but I do see hope in that, where my 50 years ago, 60 years ago, 70 years ago, that would not have been my story. My story would have been of a person being trapped in a situation I didn't want to like stay in, probably. So I think there is progress and sometimes we can forget that because there's still a lot of inequality that we experience. So I think, sometimes, just taking stock and say, well, we actually have come very far. We can't have those dialogues, yes, there's certain things that are regressing, but we also have come very far and we can have that dialogue and kinship among ourselves as well, without being repressed or oppressed.

Speaker 3: 42:13

Stigmatized, yeah, the more we can talk about it and just sort of be in it together and share sort of the deep dark that's going on. It feels like the more connected and supported we can all feel.

Speaker 2: 42:26

This has been a really fascinating conversation, Jen. Thank you for taking the time to join us. We will wrap for listeners interested in learning more about the work that you do and its impact. Where can we direct them?

Speaker 1: 42:38

Yeah, so you can check out our website, healthfinanceinstituteorg. You can email me andreaithelfinanceinstituteorg, or you can follow us on LinkedIn. Again. Just put my name in the search box and there will be lots of information that will pop up. So I would love to hear from you and be in touch.

Speaker 2: 42:54

We'll be sure to put all of those links in our show notes. Thank you again. Thank you Next time.

Speaker 1: 43:01

All right, what a wonderful conversation, thank you.

Speaker 3: 43:59

Thank you.