In honor of National Family Caregivers Month, host Thérèse reflects on her recent NYC Marathon journey—and how the hundreds of spectator hands reaching out along the course revealed a profound truth about life after caregiving: it’s time we learn how to receive care, too.

For years, caregivers are the ones who do the reaching, holding everything together even when running on empty. But in "the After," when the medical appointments stop and the house grows quiet, receiving help can feel surprisingly uncomfortable—especially when past attempts to ask for support have left us handling things alone.

In this episode, Thérèse explores the shift from being the dependable one to becoming your own advocate, honoring the disappointment of empty offers, and learning how to let kindness reach you without feeling the need to pay it back.

In this episode, we explore:

• The Hands on the Course: What failing to reach the marathon finish line taught Thérèse about accepting human connection.

• The Caregiver’s Identity Trap: Why being "the dependable one" makes receiving help feel so unfamiliar.

• When Reaching Out Comes Up Empty: Validating the real disappointment of unkept promises and handling things alone.

• Micro-Acts of Receiving: Accepting compliments, meals, and honest conversations without apology.

• A Message to Friends & Allies: How to offer specific, actionable support to caregivers during National Family Caregivers Month – and always.

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Just days before the New York City Marathon, host Thérèse is preparing to enter one of its final waves—not as the youngest, fastest, leanest, strongest, or best-trained runner, but proudly as an underdog.

For caregivers, underdogs are familiar.

Illness, disability, aging, and slower communication can cause the world to underestimate the people receiving care. Thérèse remembers an eye specialist speaking over her father after Progressive Supranuclear Palsy slowed his responses—and the moment the physician dismissed him as someone who was “just here for the ride.”

Her father was not there for the ride. It was his vision, his body, his appointment, and his life.

Caregivers become fierce advocates for the people they love. They ask others to speak directly to them, give them time to answer, and see the whole person beyond the diagnosis. But when caregiving ends, many former caregivers discover that they have become underdogs too—older, physically changed, professionally interrupted, financially strained, and attempting to rebuild lives the world may not fully understand.

In this deeply personal final episode before race day, Thérèse considers what it means to turn that advocacy inward. She refuses to let age, injuries, fear, or other people’s assumptions decide whether she belongs at the starting line—or what remains possible in her life.

Love the underdog. Every time.

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Fourteen days before the New York City Marathon, an acute right-heel injury leaves host Thérèse facing the possibility that she may not reach the finish line she has spent months preparing to cross.

The sudden uncertainty reveals a familiar caregiving instinct: the need to anticipate every crisis, control every variable, and ignore personal pain so the people we love receive the care they need.

Drawing from her 25 years as a family caregiver, Thérèse explores how overriding physical and emotional pain becomes a survival mechanism—and why healing in "The After" requires learning to listen to ourselves again.

Inspired by her namesake, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, and her "Little Way" of trust, Thérèse begins practicing surrender not as one dramatic act, but as a series of small, repetitive releases. She cannot guarantee what her heel will feel like on race morning, but she can rest, adapt, make wise decisions, and care for the body she has today.

Because surrender is not resignation. It means doing what is ours to do without pretending we can control what happens next.

In this deeply personal episode, Thérèse invites listeners to reflect:

• What is true in this exact moment?

• What is mine to do today?

• What is my pain asking me to notice?

• What can I release—just for now?

Thérèse also makes a personal request: please send her love, positive energy, and prayers as she moves through these uncertain final fourteen days toward November 1st.

"I surrender the outcome—not my responsibility. I surrender certainty—but never hope."

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