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When Marisa Renee Lee's mother passed away, Marisa tried to do everything right. She continued to work hard at her job. She saved her asks for time off and support at work for when she really needed it. And she tried to make sure all the tasks that surround a loved one's illness and passing were completed in an efficient way. Her lesson: you can't project-manage and hustle your way out of grief. Even if everything around you is saying that's the way forward.

We wanted to talk with Marisa after learning about the book she's writing, Grief Is Love, and after discovering she's been thinking about something we both get nerdily excited about: a new national policy! Yessss!

Seriously, though, Marisa has been thinking through what a national grief policy might look like, and why the US needs one. She was Managing Director for the My Brother's Keeper Alliance and the Deputy Director of Private Sector Engagement for the Obama Administration, and she worked with now-President Biden during that time. She says if any President can create and pass a national grief policy, it's Biden. And she says now is the time to move on it.

We both get pretty real with Marisa about our own grief in this episode, and she gets real with us about what it means to grieve, what it means to be there for our grieving friends and co-workers, and why workplaces and other institutions have to get their shit together when it comes to meaningful grief support. The conversation gets heavy, but we love it because it's also funny and hopeful and goofy. We hope you love it too.