When a loved one is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, the grieving starts years before the end. In The End Is the Beginning, Jill Bialosky tells her mother’s story in reverse. Jill and Vanessa talk about what it means to “eulogize” someone while they’re disappearing, and how writing can be both tribute and survival. You can read Jill’s New York Times essay on losing her mother during the pandemic.

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Lily Houston Smith is our senior producer; music by Mark McAdam and Amber Devereux.

Elder care and childcare costs are rising fast, while wages and support for caregivers lag behind. Longtime care policy advocate Julie Kashen breaks down how we got here, what it would look like if we treated care as real infrastructure, and offers a surprisingly hopeful framework for what’s still possible.

Learn more about Julie's work at The Century Foundation.

Kim Elliott’s caregiving story includes a leukemia diagnosis, a stem cell transplant, and some truly deranged insurance battles. She talks with Vanessa about surviving all of it — and building Gray Monster so other caregivers don’t have to start from scratch.