Work Live Care EP. 5
You Don't Get It Until You Live It: Dementia Caregiving, Boundaries, and Workplace Support with Lori Zoss
Episode Overview
What happens when the hardest part of caregiving isn't the diagnosis — it's everything else around it? In this episode, Denise and Lauren sit down with Lori Zoss, entrepreneur and founder of Growth Owl, for an honest, grounded conversation about caring for her mother who has mixed dementia — while running her own business, setting harder boundaries than she ever has, and finding her way back to joy.
Lori shares what it felt like to watch her mother's diagnosis unfold during a routine knee surgery, why she believes corporate America is failing caregiving employees, and how this season of life has fundamentally changed the way she leads, sells, and protects her energy.
This one is for every professional who has ever thought: I don't know how people do this when they work for someone else.
In This Episode
00:00 Meet Lori Growth Owl
00:15 AI Networking Connection
01:47 Defining Triple Shift
02:12 Dementia Diagnosis Journey
04:01 Daily Caregiving Reality
05:48 Work Versus Caregiving
13:55 Systems And Fatigues
15:31 Setting Firm Boundaries
19:11 Finding Joy On Purpose
22:07 Redefining Work Success
25:56 Creating Margin to Avoid Burnout
26:27 Choosing Aligned Clients
27:48 Triple Shift Hits Workplaces
30:44 Building Corporate Caregiving Programs
33:07 Embedded Caregiving Consultant Model
34:11 Culture Matters in Support
36:37 Talking Dementia and Planning Ahead
40:22 Family Emergency Planning at Work
43:18 Books and Where to Find Them
46:07 Workplace Support Beyond Joy and Death
50:31 Grief, Bereavement, and Retention
53:22 Episode Wrap and Takeaways
Key Concepts From This Episode
Grace Fatigue — The quiet depletion that comes from being repeatedly gracious to well-meaning people whose advice makes caregiving harder, not easier.
System Fatigue — The exhaustion of simultaneously managing multiple caregiving systems, each with its own paperwork, processes, and demands.
The 19 Caregiving Systems — Denise's proprietary framework identifying the distinct operational systems a caregiver manages — often all at once.
Family Emergency Planning — A proactive workplace program that normalizes caregiving conversations by anchoring them in something everyone understands: planning ahead for the unexpected.
The CARE Method™ — Lauren's four-stage operating framework (Clarify, Align, Reallocate, Elevate) for leaders navigating the collision of career and caregiving.
Quotes From This Episode
"It's not the dementia that's consuming. It's managing everything else around it." — Lori Zoss
"It is not my responsibility to provide access to my mother to make somebody else feel better." — Lori Zoss
"This is a season of life. Not the whole life." — Lori Zoss
"Caregiving is one of those things we all seem to be a part of at some point — yet the workplace has almost no formal structure for it." — Lori Zoss
Resources & Guest Links
🦉 Growth Owl — Lori's corporate sponsorship and revenue strategy advisory: thegrowthlowl.com
📚 Under Caution — Lori's romance suspense novel featuring a female race car driver: available on Amazon and BarnesandNoble.com
📚 The Boardroom Playbook — Lori's guide to corporate sponsorship for nonprofits and purpose-driven organizations: available on Amazon
✍️ Lori's author site: lorizossbooks.com
Lori Zoss📧 [email protected]
Connect With Us
💼 Lauren Yanoff on LinkedIn 📧 [email protected] 🌐theempoweredexec.com
💼 Denise Brown on LinkedIn 📧 [email protected]
If this episode resonated, share it with someone who is carrying a lot right now and could use the language to talk about it. Subscribe, leave a review, and tell us what you want to hear next — it genuinely shapes this show.
The Triple Shift: For people leading at work, caring at home, and trying to keep a life through all of it.
