More than 100 million people across the United States are caregivers to a family member, and the value of their unpaid labor is estimated at over $600 billion a year, according to the documentary “Caregiving,” premiering on PBS on June 24.
For caregivers who are paid, the labor can be thankless, with long hours and little pay.
From interviews with nursing home workers, to a profile of a daughter devoted to her ailing mother, Connecticut Public's Senior Health Reporter Sujata Srinivasan and visuals journalist Tyler Russell explore what caregiving means today and how society values, and often ignores, the work.
In Bridgeport, a daughter balances love, and burnout, as she cares for her ailing mother
Tyler Russell
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Connecticut Public
“Every day, I get her up, I take her into the bathroom, and I put her on the toilet and I clean her. Some days I let her brush her teeth. I put the toothpaste on there, and I stand in there, and I just let her, because I don't want to take everything from her.”Cookie Jones, 60, at home with her 87-year-old mother, Valerie.
CT nursing home workers reflect on emotional toll of job
Tyler Russell
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Connecticut Public
"I've been kicked, punched, pinched, spit at. I've had feces thrown at me ... then they roll over and say, ‘OK, bye,” just like nothing happened."Natasha Forester, 34, a licensed practical nurse (LPN) who works with dementia patients
New PBS documentary profiles often invisible work of caregivers in America
"My dad was somebody who I idolized. I used to dress up like him when I was a kid in kindergarten and get made fun of because I wanted to wear like a suit and a tie ... to go from that to giving him a bath is quite a traumatic thing."Bradley Cooper, actor and executive producer of "Caregiving," a new PBS film
'Your Name Dream' at TheaterWorks Hartford provides futuristic glimpse into world of AI caregiving
Mike Marques
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Images provided by TheaterWorks Hartford
"We all know folks who have become senile, or have strokes. And people who come to the theater for this play generally have had something in their lives that resonates with the play."José Rivera, 70, writer and director, "Your Name Dream"
