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Host Candace Dellacona welcomes author and philanthropist Marnie Schneider, Philadelphia Eagles royalty and creator of the Football Freddie children's book series, for a conversation about grief, resilience, caregiving, and legacy. Marnie reflects on growing up with the Philadelphia Eagles, then owned by her grandfather, Leonard Tose, whose community-minded leadership helped launch the first Ronald McDonald House Charities. She also shares the remarkable story of her mother, Susan Tose Spencer, the first woman in NFL history to serve as a vice president, legal counsel, and general manager. Marnie opens up about caring for her mother through nearly a decade of frontotemporal dementia while raising three children as a single parent, discussing the realities of guilt, financial and emotional strain, perspective, and self-care. She also reveals how her family's stories inspired her beloved Football Freddie and Baseball Billie books.
To learn more about Marnie Schneider and purchase her books, visit https://www.marnieschneider.com/.
- (00:00) - Podcast Intro
- (00:10) - Welcome and Guest Introduction
- (01:46) - Growing Up Eagles
- (03:23) - Grandpa Glam vs Mom Normal
- (06:28) - Giving Back Legacy
- (10:04) - Trailblazing NFL Mom
- (14:14) - Dementia Role Reversal
- (16:59) - Caregiving Survival Tips
- (21:43) - Kids Lessons and Tradeoffs
- (24:04) - Football Freddy Origin
- (27:48) - Self Care and Identity
- (30:16) - Final Advice and Wrap
- (33:08) - Subscribe and Resources
To learn more about Marnie Schneider and purchase her books, visit https://www.marnieschneider.com/.
Follow Marnie on social media:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/marnieschneider1/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/marnie.schneider.98
Creators and Guests
What is The Sandwich Generation Survival Guide?
Welcome to The Sandwich Generation Survival Guide, where we explore the challenges and strategies of navigating life caught between work demands and supporting our loved ones while maintaining our own well-being. Join us in this dynamic podcast series as we uncover the complexities individuals face balancing multiple roles in the modern world. Our host, Candace Dellacona, shares personal experiences and professional insights to guide listeners through this complex journey.
Empowering Women in Sports and Caregiving with Marnie Schneider
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Podcast Intro
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Candace Dellacona: Hey, survivors. Today's episode is about grief, resilience, and finding meaning through storytelling loss, healing, and the legacies we carry forward.
Welcome and Guest Introduction
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Candace Dellacona: Welcome to the Sandwich Generation Survival Guide. I am your host. Candace Dellacona. On today's episode, we have the one and only Marnie Schneider. I'm gonna embarrass her a little with a bit of an introduction, Marnie, because you have such a vast array of experiences. I'm so happy to have you here.
So for those who are listening, Marnie is an author, she is a speaker, she is the creator and the brains behind Football Freddie's children's book series, which was inspired by her very unique childhood, traveling with an NFL team that happened to have been owned by her grandfather who owned the Philadelphia Eagles. So we are so happy to welcome Marnie here to talk to us about life in the sandwich generation from her roots in an iconic NFL family to raising kids, to being a caregiver. For her amazing mother. We're gonna learn all about. Welcome Marnie.
Marnie Schneider: Oh, Candace, thank you so much. What a beautiful introduction and I appreciate that. It is always nice to hear people say nice things about your family and your loved ones, so thank you. I appreciate that.
Candace Dellacona: Oh, you're welcome. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. We've already spoken before Marnie, and we found each other on social media. I was really drawn to your warmth and lightness. So I'm so happy that you're here today and you're gonna fill us in.
Growing Up Eagles
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Candace Dellacona: So let's start in the beginning. Probably a lot of our listeners are excited to hear about someone who grew up literally traveling with an NFL team. So what would you describe as a quote, normal memory for yourself that would probably feel surreal for the rest of us.
Marnie Schneider: So I think that yes, I grew up in an NFL family. My grandfather, like you mentioned Leonard Toes owned the Philadelphia Eagles, and my mom Susan ran the team for my grandfather. So my mom, Susan, was, and to this day still is the only female that's ever held the titles of vice president, legal counsel, and general manager of a professional football team.
So what does that mean? Growing up being an only child of a single working parent? It means like other people that have had single parents that take their kids to work. I went to work with my mom all the time. It was no different than some of my friends whose parents were maybe in, the HVAC business or, going to be, a lawyer or a doctor.
My mom was also a lawyer, but the law that she practiced was traveling around with an NFL team and representing the team and the player. So I had an incredible opportunity to travel around going to different games and seeing different cities and still being a child and being told to get your notebook, get in the back of the plane.
This is for the, executives and the coaches up in the front. And take your Sony Walkman and your bag of cassettes 'cause I'm that old and your batteries. And go back there and I'll see you when we land. That's what it was like.
Candace Dellacona: Yeah. Yeah.
Grandpa Glam vs Mom Normal
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Candace Dellacona: So when you were living it, were you aware of how unique your life was at that time? And if not, then when did it sort of dawn on you, Marnie?
Marnie Schneider: I think that I knew that it was different with my grandfather. Grandparents spoil their grandchildren in different ways than parents do. So I don't think it was much different than other experiences my friends had with their grandparents because when a grandparent spoils their grandchildren, it tends to be on the more, grandiose side. When a parent spoils their kid, it's kind of vulgar and gross in a lot of ways. So I think that I knew with my grandfather, the experiences were different. It was definitely an elevated time and things were more unique. When I was with my mom, it was like, no, we shop at Lowman's or Marshall's, not at Neiman Marcus.
Whereas with my grandfather, It was like, oh no, we're gonna go FAO Schwartz, we're gonna go do all the good stuff, sit in the front of the plane, have lobster tail with drawn butter. But with my mom, it was like, you get a cheeseburger from McDonald's, go to the back. That was it. But I love both of them, so yes.
Candace Dellacona: I love that. You're kind of right that, that's probably an experience for those of us who were fortunate enough to have our grandparents in our lives. That is usually the job of a grandparent, which is to indulge and then the job of the parent to bring us back down to earth. So that, that's so funny. Do you have a favorite memory from that time related to football behind the scenes that you could share with us that still strikes you? I'm sure have
Marnie Schneider: I have many. I mean my grandfather, people would refer to him as our town's answer to the Great Gatsby, and there were many examples of that. So my grandfather, loved to have a good time and he loved for people to have a good time. So whether it was landing his helicopter, yes, his helicopter, Candace, on the football field of my high school, which was almost like, oh, embarrassing. There were times when you're just like no, I don't want, I just wanna,
Candace Dellacona: Flying to the radar.
Marnie Schneider: Yeah. But but looking back on it, it was like no, I'm gonna land the helicopter and I'm gonna take you to lunch with your friends and we're gonna fly to New York and go to PJ Clark's in New York City and have lunch and then go shopping and then bring you back home.
So yeah, there were moments like that. Most kids do not get that. But again, it was coming from this like place of love where the grandparent, not of this kind of yucky pretentiousness. Now, I guess nowadays it'll be, posted on social media, but it was really just to have a good time and my grandfather loved to give me great memories.
And then again you said know my mom was her responsibility of unplug the computer and reset me and get me back squared away. Back to normal. Not being like, oh no, we just fly to PJ Clark's for lunch and then turn around and go back. No, it was like microwave popcorn and some, frozen jello or whatever. That's your dinner tonight. 'cause I'm a working mom and that's fine. And it worked.
Giving Back Legacy
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Candace Dellacona: But that's a perfect segue though to talk about how multifaceted your grandfather was and the family legacy, because obviously he was a person that tried to show you the finer things in life and you are able to enjoy these things. But let's not forget the fact that your grandfather was one of the people who started the Ronald McDonald House. Which is such an incredible legacy of love and kindness thinking about sick children and trying to figure out ways to make the family their lives better when dealing something like that. Your grandfather really instilled upon you and your mom, the sort of family legacy. So when did you realize that it wasn't just about, having these treats with your friends and your grandfather brought you in on that family legacy of giving?
Marnie Schneider: So I think from a very early age, Candace, I knew that giving and making a difference were part of the responsibility of being involved in a professional team. My grandfather really treated the team as the communities team, as the fans team, and did everything to make sure that a, he wanted to have a winning team. So that meant getting great players and getting great coaches and great executives, but also finding ways to give back to the community.
I think I realized it, again, this will, definitely put an age on me. But in 1984 or something like that, cabbage Patch dolls were huge. All right. And they were the big rage. And he was able to, secure a few hundred Cabbage Patch dolls and we went to Children's Hospital to give out the Cabbage Patch dolls, and that was something during the holidays that was such an important core memory for me, of knowing that, that was fun.
That was what he loved owning the Eagles because he loved making a difference in other people's lives. It wasn't a vanity project for him as much as it was finding ways to give back, whether it was getting a few a hundred Cabbage Patch dolls and handing them out to the kids at the hospital. Of course, like you said, creating the very first Ronald McDonald House in Philadelphia in 1974.
Finding ways to make families feel comfortable while they were going through something incredibly traumatic. There's nothing more trematic than a sick child. I've had a sick child, I know. The flip side of that is having a sick parent and not knowing how to navigate that.
So the Ronald McDonald House gave families a place to go while their children were sick, and it was a place that they could get certainly meals and volunteers were there cooking meals and taking care of families while they were dealing with their sick children, but also getting emotional help and getting some support and understanding what was going on, and learning how to navigate this new life that they were experiencing with a sick child who hopefully was gonna get well.
There were no guarantees. And certainly back in the seventies and even today, you can't, you just don't know. You just gotta do the best, get a great team of doctors and roll the dice and hopefully you'll get lucky. That's really what it comes down to.
Candace Dellacona: Yeah, it's such an incredible legacy, especially thinking that your grandfather initiated this 50 plus years ago because the concept of supportive care is something that a lot of people are talking about now, a lot of grassroots movements for supportive care, which are the things that you just mentioned.
Making sure that families have a great meal and a place to be and economically they can afford it while their family member, in this case, their child is sick. So it's just an incredible legacy that your grandfather built, building this team, building an impact, and then passing that on
Trailblazing NFL Mom
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Candace Dellacona: To you, but let's transition and talk about your incredible mom who, you really served as her caregiver during the time she was sick, but she was such a trailblazer in the NFL and that cannot be overstated enough. The fact that she went to law school as a single mom. I know she went to law school later in life and she still remains the only person who filled all three roles, is just remarkable. So what did you absorb Marnie as the daughter of this incredible force in, let's face it, a male dominated sport, a male dominated industry, even for those who are NFL adjacent.
What is your biggest takeaway from watching your mom for all those years?
Marnie Schneider: And first of all, thank you Candace. Yeah, my mom is an incredible woman. I think that there's a couple different things. So first of all, Bravo to my grandfather, her dad, for recognizing her talent because sometimes parents are not capable of recognizing how great their kids are. Because again, it seems like, oh, that just a handout or a gimme because it's your kid. Of course he's gonna get that job. Or of course he's gonna get that job.
But you know, my grandfather was a very strong, resilient, very smart guy. And he was like, I looked around and you know what? My daughter is really the most qualified for this job, and I'm gonna put her in the highest position of all of professional sports and I don't care what anybody else says because she's good, she's smart, she's got it.
She's gonna turn this kind of hobby business back at the, in the eighties, NFL teams were kind of run like a hobby and now they're run like a business, but they were run , a little mom and pop shop in many ways, even though they weren't. But you gotta think about it like the seventies, everything was with cash.
There were no credit card, just everything was done. So I think that my grandfather understood that my mom was able to carry that job. And what I saw my mom do was say, okay, I'm in this position. It's the highest position in all of professional sports. I'm gonna hire the most talented people, whoever they are, man, woman, whatever.
It didn't matter. And my mom put together an incredible core group of people that are still friends today, that are still now my friends today, which is such a blessing for me that I get to be friends with people that my mother hired and I still talk to them consistently. Whether it's front office people, a few coaches, and I think that my mom understood talent, she understood grit, she understood resilience, and she wanted to give people, even if they had no resume, that looked great, she wanted to still, if they had core qualities that were great, she wanted them on her team, and that's what she did.
Candace Dellacona: Which is an amazing role model to be able to observe. So how do you think, looking back now, Marnie, as a mom and as an entrepreneur yourself, how do you think your mom was able to balance the sort of super high power role where she was in charge with being your mom?
Marnie Schneider: I think that it was very difficult, but I think that, every parent, whatever position you're in it's difficult. I think that my mom's position was incredibly difficult because people were publicly, calling her bad names and not so nice. 'cause now suddenly there's a woman in this job that has been traditionally held by, a guy.
I think that my mom had a good sense of humor. She knew she was qualified, she had put in the work, she was prepared. So I think with anything, when you're prepared, my grandfather would say, you're not prepared. Don't show up. So I think my mother was prepared. And she knew also that she could make mistakes and that we were gonna learn through her mistakes.
And so I think my mom did a great job of trying to celebrate the wins, but also not make it so, that I couldn't be me either. And she wanted me to have an as much of a normal, whatever that means, childhood as possible. And I think that I, I did.
Candace Dellacona: Yeah, obviously you turned out fantastic, so she must have done a lot right. We talk about the incredible person that your mom was.
Dementia Role Reversal
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Candace Dellacona: And you shared with me that you lost your mom in the last year. But before you lost her, you really stepped in, Marnie, as her greatest advocate and her caregiver when she was diagnosed with a memory impairment condition that a lot of our loved ones have. So can you talk a little bit about that role reversal from seeing this, icon, for lack of a better word who so brilliant and really commanded such respect in the industry to being diagnosed with a memory impairment condition, and then you taking over the role as the person caring for her.
Marnie Schneider: I was thinking about this Candace, and you had sent me a questionnaire about when did you notice or whatever. And here's how it actually kind of unfolded. I'm in the carpool line picking up my kids.
One of them, and I think it was my youngest one, and he was like, mom, I don't, where are you? Where are you? And he couldn't see where I was in the carpool line. And so obviously I was there and it was a similar situation with my mom right around the same time where she had flown in.
She was living on the West coast and we had just moved back to the East Coast and she was struggling finding me at the airport, which was something I was like, this is weird. I don't know what's going on. And it was a very similar conversation that I had just experience like a few days prior to that with my younger one at the carpool line. That like a little bit of urgency of like, where are you? And I was like, just look up and I'm right there. I'm the first one, always the first one in the carpool line. But my mom had that same experience. I was like, oh, here we go.
And like I knew that at that moment, I was like, here we go. This is what people have talked about, and what I've heard about, and I'm totally in an uncharted world, but I know what I'm about to experience and I like, you're never ready for it and never ready for any of it. You're never really ready for it with the, as a, with whatever part you're doing, but you know, you just roll up your sleeves and you do it, and that's it.
And that's what we do. You just roll up your sleeves and you do it. And so I think for me, navigating my mom's dementia for almost a decade now. And at the same time being a full-time single parent, emotionally and financially, their provider. The past 10 years, Candace, I feel like have kind of been, I've been living in a time warp of sorts.
Now I'm at a place where my kids are older, they're in college and one's graduated. My mother has now been gone for just about a year. So I'm like, okay, I have to restart myself again. And what is that gonna be like? I mean, it's gonna be great because that's the way that we do it, but I mean, that's really how it goes. It's like a, just a major restart and that's it.
Caregiving Survival Tips
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Candace Dellacona: And so all of our listeners that are in this space, Marnie, I think one of the hardest sort of feelings that we can escape is that this time really is a season, as you point out now, you had a long season. 10 years is a long time to be a caregiver, particularly as someone declines and as your kids get older, and there's so much tension there, trying to advocate for an older loved one and raise kids on your own and not lose yourself. So where did you find the biggest tension to be when you were doing both things? What's the best sort of advice or cheerleading phrase you can give to our audience who are exactly where you were for those 10 years when they were being pulled and you that you were being pulled in two different directions.
Marnie Schneider: Yeah, and you know what? Every journey is different and so I, what I say is it's scary and it's uncertain, but my experience, Candace, is the more invested I am in things, the better I feel. So if my mother wasn't living with me, and I was fortunate enough that I had a situation in my home that it worked out where she could stay here with me and live here.
Now, that is unique. A lot of people don't have that luxury that that happens. But for me the way that I coped with it was to get really invested and really involved and figure things out. I couldn't cure this disease. It was very frustrating. I still can't cure it. Believe me, for somebody who's a problem solver, it's very difficult.
My mother was a problem solver. She started her career solving problems and I wanted to be able to do that as well. You can't solve the problem, but what you can do is try to get invested in getting the best care and still trying to find ways to be a great parent and find some fun and, there's some ugliness, but trying to enjoy the ugliness and it's hard when you're sitting there and, it's kind of like a lotus flower, like you're growing through this swamp of ugliness, but eventually you're gonna bloom and blossom. But while you're doing it, and while you're in it it's rough, but you're gonna get through it. You are, but it's ugly. It's
Candace Dellacona: I love that. That's a great analogy though, because out of all of that difficulty comes something really beautiful. You and I talked about how you really looked at that time with your mom living with her or her living with you as such a blessing. And it's true, we don't often get that quality time with our parents one-on-one after we move out of their house. So making sure your perspective is something that can try to spin it even on the worst days. A lot of our listeners talk about the guilt that they feel not being able to do it all. Did you ever go through that Marnie where you felt guilty because you couldn't do it all between the boys and your mom?
Marnie Schneider: Yeah, of course. And also, as a parent, you feel guilt if you are trying to, have a life and do certain things. Like I wanted to be the first one in the carpool line to pick up my kids and, go to the riding ring with my daughter and then go to the football field with my son and you physically, like we cannot be in. I've now learned I can be in like two places at the same time. Almost, almost.
But three is almost impossible to do. So you feel guilt, but you cannot. You have to just remind yourself like, Hey, I'm human. I'm not a robot. I'm doing the best that I can. And everybody's just gonna have to just, take a moment because we all are trying to figure this stuff out, and at the end it's like, we're gonna get there.
But it's a long circuitous path and we're just gonna have to be on that journey and experience it. But we're better for it. My mom was such a great grandparent and she was such an incredible provider emotionally and financially for my kids. And that was fun and great for everybody. And then what happens when that stops? It's like, when the cheering stops, what happens?
You just walk away from that person and you're like, all right, bye? Whatever that show's over folks. No. You sit there and you still want to contribute and be part of that and then cheer for them. And I think that those are great lessons that my kids learned from learning to do that from my mom and being there and being supportive of my mom. She and frontal lobe dementia, which they refer to as the Black Belt of dementias.
She couldn't talk, she couldn't feed herself. She couldn't walk, she couldn't do anything. But she was a breathing human being very different than what they had experienced the first, early years of their life. But they still got some comfort, and she got comfort from being there with them and vice versa. So I think that my kids saw me step into this role that I was totally unprepared for. But in reality, what are we really prepared for in life? Not much,
Candace Dellacona: Yeah. Yeah.
Kids Lessons and Tradeoffs
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Candace Dellacona: I love that you're bringing it. That was gonna be my next question that what did you hope that your kids learned from this experience of A, you taking mom in and being her advocate, and B, watching someone this sort of powerhouse decline over time? So what do you think the lesson they learned that they're gonna walk away from?
And is it different for each kid, Marnie? Do you think like your boys would take something different than your daughter from their experience watching you take care of your mom?
Marnie Schneider: Yes, I would say this, that my three children are incredible young adults and very compassionate, and very empathetic and the four of us are incredibly close, and they like to be around me, and I love to be around them.
So I would say that their experiences of watching their grandmother decline was a very difficult one. Challenging to watch anybody. But I think that what they learned was, again, resilience and grit. My mom really hung in there for a very long time. The doctors gave her a very short timeline and she with everything she did in her life, she was like, yeah, no, I'm gonna far, far outlive that.
And from an economic point of view that becomes something that some families really do struggle with. And certainly I was no different. I was definitely trying to figure out ways to make it work. And we did. And we do. But the economic impact of having in-home healthcare and trying to do things at the same time be, providing for your children's, sports and college and tutoring or whatever. Vacations became a little more simple and that's a trade off. And everything in life I find is a trade off. And I think it's a good trade off. And it's good for my kids to say, you know what? We're gonna not go on a ski trip this year, we're gonna just stay home and, make ice cream sandwiches 'cause that's what we're doing this year because we wanna make sure that mom is okay and all of these things.
So I think that learning that pivoting and adjusting. It's such a good, useful life skill. I wish they never had to do it, but they, now that we've gone through it, I'm like, all right, now you guys know that you can do anything. And you've seen, you've seen and you've experienced pivoting for family. And that's really what I think defines your character.
Candace Dellacona: Absolutely.
Football Freddy Origin
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Candace Dellacona: And one of the things you just touched on is that you're in this new phase of life, Marnie, where you were there for your mom for the better part of a decade. You raised the kids on your own. You were the epitome of the sandwich generation. And now we're here with Marnie and the next chapter.
And one of the things I love so much about you is your positive attitude and turning your personal experiences into something that people enjoy and that is really what you did with the Football Freddie series. So let's talk about you a little bit. You've been kind talking about other people, but let's talk about you and how you came up with the Football Freddie series and what kind of made you finally tell that story, Marnie.
Marnie Schneider: Well, thank you. It's like at this point in my life, I'm a little loose 'cause I just don't know. My kids are older
Candace Dellacona: they still need us.
Marnie Schneider: And they want my guidance and they want my help. And there's, 25 phone calls a day, which I'm so thankful for. Believe me, if my phone didn't ring from them, I'd be like, what's wrong? That would make me sad. But at the same time Football Freddie and Fumble the Dog. And this is Fumble the Dog sitting on my lap right now. Fumble right here.
Candace Dellacona: For those listeners, very cute.
Marnie Schneider: So Football Freddie and Fumble the Dog is a book series, a children's book series based loosely on my life growing up and traveling around and seeing all these great NFL cities and learning about those cities that have professional football teams and the things that make them really unique. Whether it's history, whether it's food, travel, tourism and so forth.
And again, it started with my mom saying, my mom was a history teacher and an English teacher before going to law school and being an entrepreneur, she was a teacher. So when I would get on these long plane rides, she would hand me a legal pad and say, write down things. And so this started, in the eighties and then right before she was really, about to get diagnosed. I think she knew something wasn't right. She said, let's take out those stories that you wrote and let's do something with it. So Football Freddie, and Fumble the Dog Game Day in Philadelphia came to be, and then that book did really well and kids and families liked it. Freddie, who's a girl, based, like I said, loosely on me and
Candace Dellacona: Love that.
Marnie Schneider: And her friend Billy from Philly. So you travel around, you see the Liberty Bell, and you see the National Constitution Center and Independence Place, and then you make your way to the stadium to cheer on the home team because again, sports are my language. I speak sports. I think that it is the universal language.
I love the arts and I love obviously other cultures, but I love American sports. I love football, baseball. So you know, I like that. So we figured it was a great way to get families connected through learning about their local teams, speaking a little bit of sports, getting young women and young girls excited about being able to know what a touchdown is or a football it brings, everybody together.
We did Philadelphia and that did really well. And so I've written 12 other cities since then. So we've got Football Freddie and Fumble the Dog Game Day in the Carolinas. Game Day in Atlanta. Game day in Chicago. Game day in Dallas, Fort Worth. Game day in Tampa Bay. Game day in Green Bay. Game Day in San Francisco. Game Day in Kansas City, Denver. Game day at the Pro Football Hall of Fame and Miami will be out this fall. And we are now we just got a license with Major League Baseball. So Baseball Billie, she doesn't look like Freddie, but she's another character that we created and Bunt the Dog is out. And we've got two books, Philadelphia and Game Day in New York with the New York Yankees. So, learn about New York City and learn a little bit about baseball. Going on the actual, I really think that sports, and if kids can speak a little bit of sports, it brings everybody together.
Candace Dellacona: I love it.
Self Care and Identity
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Candace Dellacona: And you know what I also love Marnie, is that through everything that you have dealt with, throughout your life, you were able to hold on to who you are and your identity. Through all of these kind of derivations and these seasons of your life. So, what would you say to those, particularly the moms out there where we're doing everything we can for our kids to make their experience a good one, have a nice childhood, and be there for them, and be there for our aging parents. What was maybe something that helped you hold on to your identity when you were in the middle to be able to then take off and, now write this incredibly successful series of books.
Marnie Schneider: For me it was about, I liked myself. I, I wanna like myself, I wanna be somebody that is a good friend and I wanna be somebody that is a good listener and somebody that other people can turn to. And so I think as a mom it's hard sometimes because we get so wrapped up in this heaviness of our children and people that are around us.
But I also think that if you like yourself by just doing some simple basic things that are, that might seem a little bit selfish, like staying in bed all day, for example, some days or just a few extra hours. Those are okay, and you have to give yourself grace. You have to give yourself grace.
There are some days where I'm just like, you know what? I am gonna, I'll get up. I love to, get up, feed my dogs, and then get back in bed. And I'm like, I'm okay doing that, I know I've got other things to do, but I'm gonna just sit here and I'm gonna do that. And that's my own version of meditation.
And also, I write in my gratitude journal, and it sounds so corny, but it's it really is your business plan for life. If you can't spend a few and it's just two minutes a day, I just, I, on my phone, I write in my gratitude journal. I'm like, that is my business plan for my own personal journey every day. And I do that, it takes two minutes.
Candace Dellacona: And that is, that's a great lesson for those of us who hear about the term self-care and what that means? I think a lot of people are almost overwhelmed by the term because they say, well, how can I find the time, to go to get a massage? Or, I don't have money to do something like that.
So self-care can be these little pockets of time during your day to sleep in a little bit to write down something that you're grateful for. I love that you point out that it's accessible to all of us.
Final Advice and Wrap
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Candace Dellacona: And so, if you had to advise someone who's in the thick of it right now, Marnie, you and I are not in our caregiving days. I myself, I'm no longer a caregiver and my kids are a little bit older, although I still have one in high school. He's certainly more self-sufficient than they were when they were younger. But for those who of us who are overwhelmed, what's one thing you'd want them to hear from you about your journey?
Marnie Schneider: It's gonna be okay. And you're gonna be okay. And it's gonna be, again, like we talked about this, like similar to the lotus flower, it's gonna be ugly. There are gonna be moments of sadness and you just wanna rip your skin off 'cause you can't fix things and you can't do things, but it's gonna be okay.
And it sounds cliche. And you know what? There's gonna be moments where it's gonna be really hard, but we do hard things as people and the harder the things that you do, you do feel good about it in a weird way. Like I don't certainly feel good about my mom being gone, but I feel good about the way that she was able to live her last years of life.
And I was able to participate in that and be a good role model, I think for my children, for my friends. And also, you know what? Don't listen to what anyone else says. Here's the other thing. It's my kids know this. Like I don't really care at this point in my life what other people say.
I just nicely listen. I'm like, oh, thanks. That's so great. I'm like, I'm give a rat's ass what you say. But I, listen, I'm gracious enough to listen because unless you've really been through it, unless you've really been through it, other people's version or storyline is not yours and it never will be.
And they wanna be kind and they wanna give you suggestions, but you know, you're your own best advisor. Bet on yourself all day. I would say bet on yourself all day. You know what you're doing.
Candace Dellacona: that. I love that. And you said it before, showing yourself grace. Being so proud of the caregiver that you are, that it is just a season and it doesn't last forever and you are your best sort of counsel. I think that's such great advice, Marnie, and you have lived it I just wanna say thank you so much for spending some time with us today and sharing your story. We're gonna put links in this episode so that our listeners can find the Football Freddie series and the new series about baseball, even the Mets fans. Hopefully you'll come out with a,
Marnie Schneider: As a Phillies fan though, although I'm a, people say, how could you write books about other NFL cities? I'm like, I'm a football fan. I love people that, accomplish things and that work hard. Although I, of course I love Philadelphia, but the Mets will be coming. We'll get to the Mets. We, as a Phillies fan, I was like, all right, the Mets, they've beaten us the past couple years. I might a little bit.
Candace Dellacona: the Mets fans are used to waiting. They are patient for sure, Marnie. So we'll be on the lookout for it. And thank you again so much for spending so much time with us today.
Marnie Schneider: Thank you, Candace. Thank you everyone. Thank you.
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Candace Dellacona: Hey, survivors. Be sure to follow and subscribe to The Sandwich Generation Survival Guide wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss an episode. We're back with new conversations on the first and third Tuesdays of every month. If you're finding value in the show, I'd be grateful if you left a five-star review and shared it with other survivors navigating this season of life known as the sandwich generation.
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