The Sandwich Generation and Your Mental Health with Mary Ann Hughes

Mary Ann Hughes shares her experience as part of the sandwich generation, balancing care for her two adult sons with autism while supporting her elderly mother after a health crisis. She brings wisdom, compassion, and practical strategies for maintaining boundaries and finding yourself amid overwhelming caregiving responsibilities.

• Navigating the simultaneous care of aging parents and neurodiverse adult children
• Finding appropriate support systems when crises emerge
• Building a business to help families navigate special needs and divorce
• Managing the grief process while adapting to changing family dynamics
• Creating boundaries to maintain mental health and personal identity
• Becoming more compassionate and open through caregiving challenges
• Understanding that some days are neat "finger sandwiches" while others are messy "club sandwiches"
• Learning when and how to ask for help

If you're interested in connecting with Mary Ann Hughes, visit her website at www.specialfamilytransitions.com or find her on social media under Special Family Transitions. All her other sites are here:

Special Family Transitions Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/specialfamilytransitions

Special Family Transitions on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/specialfamilytransitions/

Special Family Transitions YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/@specialfamilytransitions

TikTok:

https://www.tiktok.com/@SpecialFamilyTransitions

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mary-ann-hughes-special-family-transitions/

Personal Facebook profile:

https://bit.ly/MaryAnnPanoHughes

Private Facebook group:

bit.ly/specialneedsdivorcesupport

RISE Mini-Course:

https://bit.ly/SpNeedsDivorce

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to the Sandwich Generation
• 3:09 Balancing Caregiving Responsibilities
• 8:49 Finding Support and Self-Care
• 14:46 Navigating Grief and Personal Growth
• 23:48 Setting Boundaries and Asking for Help
• 27:23 Special Family Transitions and Resources
• 31:44 Final Thoughts and Episode Closing

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome back to Advancing with Amy. I'm your host, amy, mental health warrior and neuro spicy mama. Today we're diving into the reality of the sandwich generation what is like to balance caring for both aging parents and neurodiverse children, while still trying to hold on to yourself in the process? My guest, marianne Hughes, is not only living this every day, but she's also built a business to support families navigating special needs and divorce. She brings so much honesty, wisdom and compassion to the conversation and I can't wait for you to hear the story. Welcome, marianne. Hi Amy, how are you? I'm doing well, thank you. The question is how are you?

Speaker 2: 0:59

I am doing, okay, I'm balancing a lot of things today, but we make it through. We always make it through.

Speaker 1: 1:05

Yeah, talking about balancing things. That's kind of what we're talking about today. Is you being part of the sandwich generation? Can you tell me how that started?

Speaker 2: 1:14

Sure. So I'm the mother of two now young adult young men on the autism spectrum and I've got a mother who's elderly she doesn't want me saying her age I won't actually say her actual age but she's doing well healthy. She had a health incident recently but she's doing better. So between taking care of both my boys, who have different needs and neurodiverse needs, and my mom, and then trying to take care of myself and being a divorced mom, it sometimes is a lot and sometimes we can manage some days better than others.

Speaker 1: 1:48

That makes sense. Does everybody live with you?

Speaker 2: 1:52

My mother does not, so she's in an independent living community and doing well there. My sons do live at home. They're in their early 20s and they live at home. One goes to a university program. He actually just graduated from a learning differences program and did great, and now he's actually going to start his master's degree. So oh wow. And my other son has different types of challenges and behaviors and so he's not able to go to any kind of higher education. But he is in a day program, which basically a school day take him, pick him up and then he's home after that.

Speaker 1: 2:32

Right, I actually work for a managed care organization for Medicaid, so I know a lot about working with individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, on top of my own work with my own child for her neurodiversity. So I get it. And your mom being in an independent living center, does she have home help that comes in and helps her as well, or is it just you so?

Speaker 2: 2:56

she before her fall. She was independent, granted some challenges with memory and whatever comes along with age, but she was doing fine until one day she had a fall, which actually happened to be on a day on a book that we co-authored. There was a summit and literally 30 minutes before was my time to go on. I get these texts and emails that I need to actually not text because she can't text, but I got a bunch of calls that I need to that she had a fall. Basically I fall and I can't get up really literal fall. So I had to make a choice.

Speaker 2: 3:32

Of course family comes first and they were very understanding. I had to not present and excuse myself and take care of my mom and turned out we had to go to the ER. She got admitted, she was there for a week spent, spent a week in different types of settings and then finally rehab yeah, rehab, yeah, kind of like a skilled nursing facility, for about it was almost a month then at that point, after spending a week in the hospital and then, speaking of home health, she didn't want anybody to come and help her. We got signed up to have home health care come, but that was going to be just sporadic visits here and there based on what she was approved for, and even that process took a while to get that service started. So basically it was me taking care of her. Now, I will say, and part of this whole journey is that you have to know when to ask for help. And so when my mom had the fall and I saw the severity of it and it would entail her being in the hospital for a while, and I was able to arrange then for someone to stay with my kids that night because it was a last minute thing and thankfully I was able to find someone to stay because I had to stay over with my mom Then I called my sister, who lives in another state.

Speaker 2: 4:41

I said this is what happened. She's like do I need to come? Like, yeah, you need to come. So luckily she was able to come. She's got a young daughter herself. She was able to fly to Houston, where I am, and was able to spend a week here, which was wonderful because she's got her own commitments there and also a single mom. So we were able to make that work.

Speaker 2: 5:02

So if she wasn't, if it wasn't for that, it would have been really difficult, but so she helped us with the transition, then to go to the skilled nursing and get her adjusted there, and then I was able to come in and be there. But then I saw that I couldn't be there all the time and all the time that she would need me Granted. They have people there who say, you know, we'll take care of her, she'll be fine. But neither she nor I felt comfortable with that situation. So, besides my being there, I was able to find a resource group which recommended different caregivers. I was able to find a caregiver then to spend some of those overnights with my mom and then I would come in during the day. So it's kind of tag team. Luckily I was able to bring my kids on the weekends and just hang out, and it worked out. So I guess the point is sometimes we have to make adjustments, but finding the right help and resources and being the right mindset, then hopefully it all works out.

Speaker 1: 5:57

Right and you look great, you look like you've got it all together, but how is your mental health really and how has it changed?

Speaker 2: 6:03

But how is your mental health really and how has it changed?

Speaker 2: 6:06

Yeah, so, granted, there's days that are harder than others, depending on what is going on with my kids or my mom, and so I have to recognize that sometimes we do need help. So, for instance, today I had a call with a physician for my son because he was having some challenging behaviors. It's a medical need that needs attention. That may have been contributing to what we're seeing and they were seeing in his program, and so I made an appointment with somebody who had seen on off over the years and he was able to offer some suggestions. They were going to start a new medication I think too serious, but something to help maybe address some of his physical ailments to. Maybe then we'll address some other issues that we see going on. If I hadn't made that call then we might be stuck in a situation where his situation maybe is getting worse and of course that has an impact on us and our patients and our ability as a primary caregiver and mom to be able to handle that and balance everything else that we have to do as well.

Speaker 1: 7:07

Definitely. And so, on top of all of this, do you work outside the home?

Speaker 2: 7:13

So, I do have a business. I started a business after my divorce, really could have find support to help in what I call a special needs divorce, and so I decided, okay, I'm going to take my knowledge, what I learned over the years, that it took, and lots of time and effort and just the whole energy of it, to start a company to help others going through this similar challenge. So I started my company, special Family Transitions, the first time I had started any kind of entrepreneurial venture. I have an MBA and I've worked hard to having kids but really was a stay-at-home mom for 20 years, so decided to put my energy there. Been doing that about four years now, and so that's what I do, and so I work out of the home, so I don't have an office.

Speaker 2: 7:54

So I have to balance what I have going on for my kids and my mom and myself and try to schedule my appointments and my activities around that and sometimes around my business, my appointments and my activities around that and sometimes around my business. Sometimes I have to maybe get sitters, maybe get help or tell my mom no, I can't be there today, I'll have this other thing going on, and so I think it's a matter of managing our time as well, in terms of maybe approaching things different ways, so creating time blocks and boundaries for ourselves and for our loved ones. Okay, this is the time that I need For me. It brings me fulfillment as well, so it's self-care activity for me to do my business and work with my clients and promote what I do and share information out there To me. It brings me joy and that's one of the things I do for me as well as to help others.

Speaker 1: 8:39

Yeah, so doing your business is a release for you.

Speaker 2: 8:49

It is. It is. I enjoy it. And, granted, there's always more to do and sometimes we feel like we want to do more, but you have to look at how far we've come over time. And so people do acknowledge and recognize the work that I do. It's very unique in the marketplace. There are a few people who do it I collaborate with them as well, but it's something that's needed, and so it gives me a lot of fulfillment to be able to do that type of work.

Speaker 1: 9:10

Oh yeah, when I was going through my divorce and I've already said I have a neurodiverse child as well I would have paid good money if I had known somebody like you. That would have helped so much for me and for her.

Speaker 2: 9:22

Right, that's the goal, yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:24

Probably her dad as well would have got something out of it.

Speaker 2: 9:27

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:28

Yeah, so we have a lot in common. We both had a divorce, we both have neurodiverse children and we both got our MBA no-transcript. Do you ever get to rest, and what does that look like nowadays?

Speaker 2: 10:18

Yeah, so my rest mostly happens when everybody else is doing something else. So when my son is in his day program my other son, he's going to restart school and when my mom now she's in a good place, great, I still have to check on her and do a lot of things, but it's a lot less than it was in terms of the ongoing care. So I try to rest when I can there and schedule my appointments, work and rest and self-care. I try to work out when I can. But when the kids are with their dad, I call them kids. They're young adults, but I still call them my kids. So that's a time that I can just maybe relax as well. Granted, it's an awful time to catch up and do things and see my mom, because it's hard to take them over there and that's part of my relaxation is maybe just not doing anything. My son will say are you going to go out with your friends while I'm at dad's? Like no, I'm just, I'm tired. I just want to relax today and do whatever I want to do.

Speaker 1: 11:11

Yeah, sometimes it's hard to think do I need time with my friends to re-energize, or do I just need to like bed and just be alone?

Speaker 2: 11:21

Right, and so it depends what your circle of friends looks like. I do have some friends, but, given that they're all, a lot of them are moms of kids with different abilities. Sometimes it's hard to schedule and so, granted, one of my goals is maybe make more of an effort to be able to do that, but sometimes, like you said, it's just good to just relax.

Speaker 1: 11:40

Yeah, speaking of friends, do you have any support groups you belong to or anything that helps with other people that are in the same spot that you're in?

Speaker 2: 11:48

Yeah, so I'm in some great organizations one specifically for special needs moms, as they call it, where they have a great Facebook group, they have social events, they have educational sessions or one next week about managing grief and things like that, and they have some having what they call a mom's camp and a few weeks where it's a retreat type. You can either go for the day or for the weekend. For me it's more difficult to go for the whole weekend right now, so I'm going to go for the day, maybe an hour from where I live, and just have a chance to socialize, be pampered and just have a nice time. So that's great that I found this organization. It's called Seal Magnolia Moms for people who are interested, and yeah, there's a whole story behind it, but they do lots of great things. And so there's other groups as well, and there's some smaller one, there's some bigger ones. So I would say, find something in your community that you can connect, meet people who have going through similar things in life.

Speaker 1: 12:44

But even if you can't go in person, sometimes there's online groups or online events or, like you said, find a coach or a program that can be of support. That helps too. Yeah, that's amazing that you found them. I'm glad to hear that. What kind of makes you feel overwhelmed or like maybe it's getting to be too much? Do you ever see that in yourself?

Speaker 2: 13:04

You know. So sometimes when my son's behaviors whether it's repetitive behaviors or whatever it might be not that he can control right, these are just things that happen, the different things going on in his body and his mind it can be frustrating, especially we're in a rush. And so, as an experiment to see if we can make a difference, I brought somebody in actually yesterday to see if that morning routine might look different with a different approach, and it did so. Part of it was we got up a little bit earlier and we took some different approaches and that stress level for all of us went way down, went way down. And so, yeah, I mean otherwise, yeah, when I see myself and see the whole situation escalating, we just think, okay, how can we intervene, how can we make it better and how can we change it if we?

Speaker 1: 13:55

can't. That's great. I know my daughter has a very regimented getting ready routine, and if you even wake her up five minutes late, the whole day is ruined.

Speaker 2: 14:06

So she's got to follow that While I was getting myself up earlier and then getting him up earlier and now we're not rushing as much and maybe changing the expectation. We use a timer a visual timer as well. Found it online for a cheap price and so that worked. Didn't work so much today, I'm like we'll try it again.

Speaker 1: 14:26

It's all a process. So you were talking about grief a little bit ago and that you discussed that in your support group. Do you find that you have grief or loss of who you would be if you didn't have all of these, these involvements, or do you grieve loss before it happens? What kind of grief are you talking about?

Speaker 2: 14:50

So I would say it depends where you are in your journey. So I'm on these Facebook groups and read a lot of comments and try to contribute where I can. But I see a lot of moms who have especially newly diagnosed children with different disabilities or whatever it might be. They go through a grief process and so it's hard for them to accept and I learned about the whole grief cycle, about all the phases that we go through that are natural, and once I learned about that, it made sense and it made it easier and easier to explain to other people that this is okay, it's natural for you to feel this way, and I think it helps them to feel validated that that's going on. It's okay to have those kind of feelings. I'm not a mental health professional, so maybe you can correct me if I have them in the wrong order or the wrong stages. But we've got denial and anger and bargaining, and then another one in there, and then depression and then, yes, acceptance, right, so whatever. Hopefully I'm pretty much right. But when we finally get to the point of acceptance is when we can do things for ourselves and for others and make progress, and that's what I try to do in my coaching. Okay, we've been through there. You know where are we now and how can we then get to where we want to be? And so I find that in my work a lot of the sometimes both parents aren't on the same page in terms of where they are in the grief cycle for their child's disability. That affects things in the divorce and the discussions I guess.

Speaker 2: 16:10

Back to your original question. I think when I was a younger mom, early in this journey as a special needs mom, there was a lot of grief and just through life and through the divorce, I think I had to make a choice, and my choice was I'm going to get through this and I'm going to do what I need to do for my kids, and that's how I came through that journey of grief. In and of itself, granted, there's a whole grief of the divorce and the loss of that whole marriage and the whole life that we had. The dream you had, yeah, exactly. And so now enough years have gone by and I'm to the point where that's in the past and now I can focus on other things.

Speaker 1: 16:53

That's great, and I think you did an excellent job explaining the grief cycle, and I don't think it matters what order it goes in, because grief is not linear, it's just whatever you're feeling that day, and you might feel it one day and get out of it and then hop back to it another day. That's true that's true.

Speaker 2: 17:09

So you'll sorry for ourselves for whatever reason, or just be in a rut and that's okay. And that's okay to feel that way, as long as we find a way to to get out right.

Speaker 1: 17:17

How do you find you and your mom's relationship has changed since you've become a caregiver yeah.

Speaker 2: 18:19

So I don't think she wants to consider me a caregiver, but she is appreciative of the assistance I give her, so let's put it that way. So I think, by stepping back and letting her find her independence again and her routine, I think that's helped. I think she was relying on me for a lot of things and maybe I was trying to be very involved as much as I, and there was a point where I needed to be. But now that she's rebuilt her strength and so on, yeah, I'm spending less time there. Part of it is because I've got other things to do, but partly because she doesn't need as much support. So, for instance, she was maybe afraid to do certainly self-care tasks by herself, like, no mom, you can do it. So I had to encourage her that she could do it and, yes, it was a process.

Speaker 1: 19:13

But yes, that probably makes her feel better, even if she doesn't want to do it in the beginning. Everybody feels better when they're independent and have something to wake up and do in the morning.

Speaker 2: 19:25

Right, rhyla, you asked about some Susan who's coming to help her now. So she's only got a very few sessions left of that the support that she was receiving different therapies that come to her and she was like, well, why do I still need them? I'm done, I feel like I'm done. I don't want them to come anymore. Part of it is she doesn't like disrupting her routine. She may want to wake up when she wants to wake up and do what she wants to do, and they have activities where she lives that she's very active in and so yeah, so I'm glad that she's back to normal again, or at least fine for where she is now.

Speaker 1: 19:53

Yeah, is she making?

Speaker 2: 19:54

Yeah, she's been there for a while and so has friends. She loves doing the arts and crafts activities and today my son was over there having lunch with her, so she enjoys that.

Speaker 1: 20:06

That's amazing. I love that. All right, and do you feel like you are who you want to be at this point, like you've been able to be yourself, or do you still feel like you're pulled in too many directions, or now that your mom's able to do more for herself?

Speaker 2: 20:26

are you able to do more for yourself? I'm trying to. That's a great question because there's a lot of things that I want to do still that I haven't been able to do, part of which are maybe health goals. Maybe I've kind of let myself not focus on myself and focus more on my mom's and maybe eating the unhealthy things when I was taking care of her kind of just eating when I was able to, which wasn't maybe the best choices for what I was putting in my mouth, and being more sedentary than maybe I should have been. So I need to get back into that.

Speaker 2: 20:55

But in terms of professionally, yeah, there's still so many things I want to do and I've made a lot of progress and I continue to. It's not maybe at the pace that maybe I would have liked or hoped or that would work, but we are where we are and it's okay. It's not a race, it's a journey and we have to have goals for who we want to be. If we don't have deadlines. I find that helps me to maybe meet some more things and milestones that I would like in my business and my professional life. But, yeah, I'm still doing a lot and sometimes new things come on my plate every day that I've got to handle, and then somehow we make time for that.

Speaker 1: 21:32

Well, yeah, and I personally have to have a goal, or I just don't even want to get out of bed some days. I think we've all been there, all right. And do you ever feel like anyone's judging you for struggling if you do struggle or for being too happy if you're happy, or anything like that? Or do you feel like you've got a good support system and their understanding of whatever emotions you're feeling at the time?

Speaker 2: 21:59

I feel. So I guess hard to answer that because I don't know what other people think and I'm at the point in my life where that's not so important to me. I used to know what people thought and now I've learned through my divorce and everything else, they can think what they want to think. I just recently listened on audio I was driving back from taking my kids to camp and activity and I had a big drive and I listened to the Let them Theory by Mel Robbins and so, even though some of that is intuitive, but it's a good reminder that people are going to think what they're going to think and we can't let that bother us. And the other flip side of that which I learned, which I didn't know before, is the let me. So we take, let them do whatever thing, think what they want, but then what am I going to do about it? How am I going to approach a situation? So that was powerful too.

Speaker 1: 22:47

I love that. Yeah, yeah, I'm a big fan of Mel Robbins and I've read that book. It was amazing. And you're right, it is very simple and it's so succinct, but that's why it's so helpful.

Speaker 2: 22:58

Right, right and yeah, so I probably could benefit from a greater support system. Sometimes, when I need that support, I feel like, when I do need that support, I can reach out to my sister, I can reach out to some friends or just listen to these things that help and get back on the right track.

Speaker 1: 23:16

We've talked about help for your mom and her being more independent, but what about your boys? They're boys, right, right. What about them? Do you ever need help with them?

Speaker 2: 23:26

No, I do. That's a great point, so we can't do it alone. I find that having people to come in either when I'm home or bring people in so that I can do what I need to do less opportunities for me to work on my business, which, in turn, like you said, works on your mental health, to be able to do different things and have another purpose in life. My kids are important, my mom is important, but it helps to do things for us, and that's what I do for me as well as for others. So it's a multi-faceted approach there. But, yes, so, for instance, sometimes when I have events or commitments and I have to be creative sometimes and make the effort to find people to take care of my sons, or at least one of them who needs that that can't be left alone. Right, yeah?

Speaker 1: 24:30

Have you had to put in special boundaries in place with friends and family to make sure that you do save your sanity?

Speaker 2: 24:38

It could be as simple as saying well, you don't call me after this time, right, it could be. This is not a topic I want to talk about. For instance, in my divorce my mom would ask me some questions, or even after, and I just maybe wasn't comfortable, where I was in my either grief cycle or where I am in life, to really want to talk about those things. So I had to put a boundary on that kind of thing.

Speaker 1: 25:01

Yeah, we all have to do that, so that's good. Do you think that you've become more compassionate now that you've gone through this, or are going through this, for sure?

Speaker 2: 25:13

So I would say before my focus was just all of my kids and granted my marriage, and maybe putting kids first was definitely my number one priority and maybe I was less flexible and less open to other things. And so, through what happened to me in the relationship and ways I had to grow, my sister commented during my transition, during my process she's like Marianne, you're a different person now than you were before, and so I became more accepting, I became more open. I became more open to what people go through in life, because before it wasn't something I had dealt with, I wasn't from a divorced family and I didn't know really how to relate to that. But it makes you definitely more accepting of people and who they are and the journeys that they've been on.

Speaker 1: 26:27

I love that. And then one last question.

Speaker 2: 26:28

If you had to tell somebody today something that could help them, if they were going through this for the first time ever they just started taking care of their parents and they've still got children to take care of what would you tell them to help them them? You don't say balance as much as you can. That was thought thinking about before our conversation about the sandwich generation. But I kind of saw it differently about sandwiches on a plate. Sometimes we have neat little mini sandwiches on our plate and they're nice and cut in nice little squares or whatever they are, but sometimes it may be a club sandwich. It's all kinds of layers and all kinds of mess and all kinds of things that we can't control and that's okay. But it's not always going to be like that.

Speaker 2: 26:57

One day things are nice and neat and some days are more messy, and some days one person may need more attention and another day it may be somebody else. So we have to know that we can shift in terms of our needs each day and what we give and bring to that situation, and that need may change over time as well. So just because somebody is having a really bad day and one child needs a lot of attention is having some issues. Hopefully that will get better. We find ways to help it get better or sometimes to deal with it, and part of the let them is accepting that. So maybe we can't change that, maybe that's just who they are and that's their way they are, and we have to figure out okay, how can we then adjust to that?

Speaker 1: 27:43

Exactly so. I know we're talking about the sandwich generation today, but as we were talking, we did discuss the work that you do. Now what if somebody wanted to get in touch with you so that they could get some help with their neurodiverse children and their divorce?

Speaker 2: 28:02

Sure. So my company is Special Family Transitions, so the easiest way to reach me is through my website, wwwspecialfamilytransitionscom. There's a contact form there and there's a link to all my social media, which is also under Social Family Transitions, and I share a lot of information and try to help in any way I can. I'm also trained not just as a divorce coach, which is basically helping one parent mostly it's the mom, sometimes the dad, but I love the opportunity sometimes to work with both so I've also been trained as a mediator and a parenting coordinator and a life coach as well.

Speaker 2: 28:39

That's how I started my whole journey there, so I can see things from different perspectives and maybe support people no matter where they are in their life challenges and transitions. So it may not just be before, during and after divorce. It could be maybe looking at a bigger picture. How do we co parent? How do I deal with some of the challenges I'm dealing with at home? I'm happy to try to help out from my experience and my professional background as well, as much as I can to help either one or both parents, to help facilitate conversations and try to find ways to make things better for them and for their kids.

Speaker 1: 29:13

That's great and I know you're also a wonderful speaker. So is there a place where they can watch one of your talks and get to know you better?

Speaker 2: 29:22

Sure, so on my YouTube channel I have a whole playlist of podcasts that I've been on and webinars, so people are welcome to look there and I appreciate you saying that. And that's kind of a journey I've been on. I never thought I would be a speaker, be in a public eye or talk about these different challenges I've been through in my life. So I appreciate you saying that and it's something that I love doing. I share from the heart and share from my experience and try to help people find a way through their challenges. But, yeah, so definitely reach out, I can share some information with you. But, yeah, that's probably the easiest way to find and I'll put our episode there as well, so people can find, maybe, different topics that are of interest to them. A lot of them are about divorce, but some are about just overall life and overcoming challenges and adversity and things like that.

Speaker 1: 30:17

Great, and I'll put all of that in the show notes as well, so people can easily access all that information. Is there anything you'd like to leave our listeners with today? Just the last little piece of something.

Speaker 2: 30:25

Yes I would say. No matter what you're going through, just be true to who you are. The challenge that you're facing will get better. Just know that you can find support. Don't be afraid to reach out for help. I think that's what helps people a lot. And help me is not doing it alone and knowing that there are people like yourself, like myself, who are there to help other people, to help them through the difficult times, so they can get on the right path and then continue on from there. So it's okay to ask for help. For me in the past that was hard for me to do, but it's made a huge difference in my life. Well said.

Speaker 1: 31:01

Very well said. Thank you so much, marianne. I appreciate you coming on today. Great, my pleasure. Thank you, amy. That was such a powerful conversation with Marianne Hughes. I hope you heard not only the challenges but also the resilience, resourcefulness and heart it takes to juggle life in the sandwich generation. Marianne reminded us how important it is to ask for help, to set boundaries and to keep finding little ways to care for ourselves, even when the plate feels too full. Little ways to care for ourselves even when the plate feels too full. You'll find links to connect with her and learn more about special family transitions in the show notes. Thank you so much for tuning in today. Until next time, keep advancing, warriors.