Awards

• Commended for Best Wellness Book 2019
• Winner of Best Books of the Year 2019
• Winner of Best Wellness Book 2019

Overview

Working Daughter is a revelatory look at who’s caring for our aging population and how these unpaid family caregivers are trying to manage caring for their parents, raising their children, and pursuing their careers. It tells the story of one woman who was enjoying a fast-paced career in marketing and raising two children, until both of her parents were diagnosed with terminal illnesses on the same day. In the challenges she faced and the choices she made, readers will learn how they can navigate their own caregiving experience and/or prepare for when they are inevitably called on to care for their parents. Working Daughter sparks the conversation we so desperately need to have about women and the workplace. With 10,000 people turning 65 every day and a shortage of caregivers predicted in the next few years, it’s time we talk about how family caregivers and their employers will face the impact of a rapidly aging society. This book fills the gap in the literature on women and work; there are volumes of books about managing career and children, but little advice on how to balance career and parents. Working Daughter provides a blueprint for women and a call to action for business leaders and policy makers. This is book is for women who want straight talk and real advice about the challenges of eldercare, the choices they will need to make, the aspects of caregiving they can control, and that which they cannot. And finally, Working Daughter shows family caregivers how they can achieve, the underreported but well-documented upside to caring for an aging parent, the caregiver’s gain.

Full Product Details

9781538124659

Table of Contents

Reviews

Liz O'Donnell, an expert on life challenges faced by working women, tackles an issue that most will eventually face: how to help an aging parent while keeping up with work and everything else a modern woman is often juggling. This book provides essential understanding, encouragement, and practical advice. I especially loved her suggestions on how to manage at work and how to handle the inevitable expectations and judgments that women encounter (not the least of which come from themselves). This is a great resource to help working daughters and I'd also recommend it to employers and policy-makers, who need to do more to support the many working family caregivers of aging adults. -- Leslie Kernisan, MD, Geriatrician, Founder of BetterHealthWhileAging.net and HelpingOlderParents.com Women might be able to shoulder both work and motherhood, but throw an elderly parent's care into the mix, and these mighty women can collapse into a heap of wine, cheese dip and tissues. Liz O'Donnell gives them some guidance on how to accept their fates, manage the mess, and even find some joy in the moment. -- Virginia Morris, author of How to Care for Aging Parents

Liz O'Donnell, an expert on life challenges faced by working women, tackles an issue that most will eventually face: how to help an aging parent while keeping up with work and everything else a modern woman is often juggling. This book provides essential understanding, encouragement, and practical advice. I especially loved her suggestions on how to manage at work and how to handle the inevitable expectations and judgments that women encounter (not the least of which come from themselves). This is a great resource to help working daughters and I'd also recommend it to employers and policy-makers, who need to do more to support the many working family caregivers of aging adults. -- Leslie Kernisan, MD, Geriatrician, Founder of BetterHealthWhileAging.net and HelpingOlderParents.com Women might be able to shoulder both work and motherhood, but throw an elderly parent's care into the mix, and these mighty women can collapse into a heap of wine, cheese dip and tissues. Liz O'Donnell gives them some guidance on how to accept their fates, manage the mess, and even find some joy in the moment. -- Virginia Morris, author of How to Care for Aging Parents Liz O'Donnell is a woman who knows how to write, how to be brutally honest, how to tell caregivers' unique stories, and how tell a bigger story about the new normal we're all experiencing as our parents live so much longer than any generation before now. I love this book so much. It's required reading for every grown-up with a loved one to care for. Heck, it's just required reading about modern American life. -- Anne Tumlinson, National aging expert, and founder of Daughterhood.org, a community of caregivers Finally a book that respects and addresses the challenges faced by women in the workforce who are simultaneously caring for aging parents. Working Daughter is an essential guide that will help and empower caregivers at a time when they need it most. -- Dr. Nanette Fondas, D.B.A., M.Phil., author of The Custom-Fit Workplace: Choose When, Where, and How to Work and Boost Your Bottom Line Working Daughter is an essential tool for the millions of families facing the crisis of elder care in this country. Liz crafts a gripping narrative that describes her own experiences and combines her story with a treasure trove of practical strategies that are universal in application. The book is a must-read for both daughters and sons of aging parents. -- Lauren Stiller Rikleen, president, Rikleen Institute for Strategic Leadership, and author of The Shield of Silence: How Power Perpetuates a Culture of Harassment and Bullying in the Workplace

Author Information

Liz O’Donnell is an author, speaker, and consultant to women who want to thrive and the organizations that want to reach and mobilize them. Her book, Mogul, Mom & Maid: The Balancing Act of the Modern Woman (Bibliomotion, 2013), spent weeks as an Amazon Hot New Release and as a bestseller in the Women and Business category. Her first blog, Hello Ladies, was named one of the top 100 websites for women by Forbes, a Best of the Net by Working Mother Magazine, and a Voice of the Year by BlogHer three years in a row. It was also a finalist for a Stevie Award (the world’s premier business awards), in the Blog of the Year category. Liz has written articles about the challenges of working daughters balancing careers and caregiving for numerous national publications including The Atlantic, Forbes, TIME, and PBS’ Next Avenue. She has also written about balancing career and motherhood for The Atlanta Journal Constitution, The Globe and Mail, and Daily Worth. Liz has been a repeat guest expert on Good Day Sacramento, one of California’s highest-rated morning news programs, a regular guest on the podcast Your Caregiving Journey, and she hosts a monthly local cable show about caregiving that reaches 130,000 viewers in the Greater Boston area. CNN, The Washington Post, Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Investor’s Business Daily, and Care.com have all cited her as an expert on women in the workplace. A dynamic and highly sought after speaker, Liz has delivered talks and led workshops at Harvard University, Symantec, The Mass Conference for Women, Wake Forest University, Babson College, Emerson College, the Marketing To Moms Conference, Women in Technology International, the International City/County Management Association, Regions Bank, Ellevate Network, and the Mom 2.0 Summit. She is the co-founder of SheStarts, an organization that supports the growing pipeline of women entrepreneurs in Boston through networking, coaching, and events, and, as a result of this initiative, she was invited by the Mayor of Boston to help plan the city’s first women’s entrepreneur week and to create a channel for female founders on Medium, the blogging platform started by Twitter’s co-founders. Liz, who also co-founded Women in Democracy, a non-partisan organization that seeks to engage more women in local politics, currently serves on her town’s Warrant and Finance Committee and is the former chair of the town’s Sustainability and Advisory Committee. She lives outside of Boston with her husband and two children, and she is the primary caregiver to her 90-year old dad.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available