Jul 7, 2019
How supportive and inclusive is your organization to the needs of single parents? As her son fought for his life, Bre got a phone call from her company that changed everything. She shares her reflections on empathy, gendered expectations, and the particular challenges facing single parents.
If we want more women to be able to step up to the table and roles of leadership, we need to create cultures where you know what it's OK, you're a mom. That's part of who you are. You know it's OK. You know it's OK. You know your kid got sick
INTRO
Parenting is a joy…and it can be really, really hard. The years of providing love, nurture, instruction, of wiping noses and bottoms, signing permission forms, scheduling play dates, and generally helping little people as they grow up, is a big job. And if parenting is hard, single parenting presents a whole different level of complexity.
Today, we talk with Bre Sprague about the delight and challenge of being a working single parent, about the ways in which she was supported as well as missed, and about the scary weeks where she almost lost her son. In her story, there are insights for all those single parents out there…as well as for anyone who cares for or works with a single parent.
Bre is a small business owner with multiple streams of income. Since graduating from college, she had worked (in some capacity) in health and wellness. Bre stands at 5’10, almost six feet in a pair of heels, she is also the parent of a son that is preparing to join the army this year. In school, Bre studied exercise science and business, so she is very devoted to her daily workout.
- Bre Sprague
I guess you could say I treat my workout as it's on my schedule every morning at six fifteen five days a week. And if I can't go at that time I schedule it in another spot just like I would schedule with you because it's, it's one hour for me to really focus on me and focus on getting out energy and, and changing my overall being so that I can be a better mom and a better friend and have more energy.
She also loves to cook and takes a lot of what she calls “food porn” photos. As a young woman, Bre moved to Hawaii, her whole life crammed into a duffle bag. But her life changed at 22 when she found out that she was pregnant. Six months into the pregnancy, she parted ways with the father, realizing that she was going to begin the parenting journey on her own.
Walker was born and Bre reenrolled full time in school when he was seven months old. She had an on-campus apartment, found a great babysitter, and worked in the bursar’s office.
- Bre Sprague
We just had a routine we get up in the morning at five thirty. That would be his in my time to have breakfast and, and you know just enjoy the quiet of the morning. I'd give him to the sitter at about seven thirty I'd go to class between 8:00 9:00. I'd either be in class until 2:00 ish or 4:00 with some breaks in between. I worked part time at the bursar's office as a collection agent which tell me that was all sorts of fun. Nothing like calling people to say hey the reason you can't schedule for classes is because you owe the university a lot of money especially talking to angry parents and then also you know I'd pick them up in the afternoon and we had our time between you know four thirty or five until about seven thirty when he went to bed and then I would study from 730 until midnight and we get up and we do the same thing the next day
Bre was supported by advocates along the way, like her finite math professor. Bre would bring a blanket and toys to office hours, letting Walker roll on the floor while she did math problems on the whiteboard.
- Bre Sprague
I think out of a lot of his other undergrad students he was just impressed with the fact that I showed up as you know. By that point I was 23 but with a baby to do the work because my job was not to be a mom but was to get an education to advance our life.
After graduating, Bre worked at an athletic club as a personal trainer. But the work was dollar for hour, and she decided to make a move into pharmaceutical sales. She was motivated, a gifted connector, and did well selling pain medication. But the work was not for her.
- Bre Sprague
And for me I always say I was seduced out of personal training into pharmaceutical sales which is a fine industry for other people. For me I hated it. I gave up what I believed in and still believe in and preventative medicine by eating the right foods and doing the work even if it's a 10 minute walk you know to take care of your health to working in an industry that although there is a need for it there is also there is also a lot of greed and a lot of unnecessary prescribing I would say and unnecessary pushing by the pharmaceutical industry.
So, she left. Bre was recruited into home health care sales. There was a ninety-day waiting period for insurance to kick in. The monthly cost for a COBRA insurance extension was $968 a month. So, she decided to take a risk. She was healthy, her son was healthy, surely, they could make it 90 days.
- Bre Sprague
I mean I can see it right like I was holding it in my hand even right now and I had a mortgage that was like fifteen thirty one and I had a car payment and I had insurance and even though my base salary was seventy five grand a year which left me as a single mom going wow I really kind of made this I've got a great base salary and I've got bonus and I get a car stipend at the end of the day it didn't go that far especially with you know mortgage and student loans and all the bills that you need to live life I didn't have an extra nine hundred sixty eight dollars a month laying around so I made the decision to take a gamble and not to do it
Her company paid for 30 days of COBRA coverage. And on day 31, Walker came home from school drained; he was too tired to go to Boy Scouts. His belly hurt too much to eat dinner. Bre was concerned, she kept him in her room that night.
- Bre Sprague
So I brought him into my bed to sleep that night and the vomiting started at about 1:00 in the morning and I was almost every hour on the hour he just kept getting sicker and sicker and I would I would give him fluids and anything I put in him would come right back up
She called the doctor, and they said it was probably the flu.
- Bre Sprague
And I was in the position that so many Americans are when you put off going to the doctor or to the E.R. because you know you don't have you don't have health insurance and you don't know what it's going to cost. And so, it kept getting worse.
By that evening, Walker was lying, exhausted in the tub.
- Bre Sprague
And I don't know if you've ever seen somebody who's in respiratory distress, but you get this you can't even do it naturally you get this upper chest breathing it's basically a good death rattle is what it is. You get this upper chest breathing and you get. He was so white, he was so white, and I was on the phone with my friend Dr. Jesse. And he goes you can't wait any longer. You have to go you have to go to the E.R. now.
Bre went to the ER. Walker saw six different doctors throughout the long night. He was vomiting, continuing to decline. Walker was taken to surgery to remove his appendix the following afternoon. By that time, Walker was full of infection and the surgery took three hours.
- Bre Sprague
After the surgery the doctor comes out and he says I am so sorry but he's, he's full of infection inside and you're going to watch your child get sicker and sicker and sicker. And there's nothing you can do about it. There's nothing I can do about it until that abscess forms so I can go in and I can get the infection all the way out he goes So we're gonna give him around the clock antibiotics but he's gonna get really, really sick this week. And that week was probably the toughest week of my life because you know I called into my employer and I said Listen I'm not coming in. I can't be in right now and explain what was going on. I explain that my child could die because it was that bad.
- Bre Sprague
And he, he was so sick and I felt like I was grateful that my mom was able to come up and help and I had some good friends who came but it was a very scary time and I said to my employer that I wasn't coming into work and they said well you haven't been with us long enough to give you FMLA. And I said I don't care. Don't pay me. You know I'm going to be in the hospital at least two weeks and if not, I'll be back to work as soon as I can. And so, I really need a rep in the field. And they paused. I said I really don't need your job. And I got up and then I said Oh my God what did I just do.
- Bre Sprague
I have no job, but it was it was the right thing to do. It was scary. It was you know when your child looks at you and your child say you know mom if I die will you come to my grave because he knew how sick he was. Those are words I don't ever want any parent to have to hear and thank goodness he after he had another surgery when they got the abscess out and he was like a different child immediately.
- Bre Sprague
And we had lots of medicine and great care, but it was it was painful, and it was it was scary to go through not being so uncertain. And while you're going through all that stuff watching your child you know be sick and cared for. You're also dealing with trying to get assistance from people who represent the state to try to fill out the right paperwork to see if you can get the medical bills covered. And that's, that's another element of stress and, and, and so it really was something that even if I hadn't left that job and that standpoint there wasn't any empathy to begin with.
- Liesel Mertes
Yeah, I hear how just there was so much of a lack of anything on the other side of the phone as you think about that interaction. It's kind of an imaginative exercise but like what would what would you have wanted to hear in that moment as you're talking and saying I can't come in for the next week and this is really scary.
- Bre Sprague
I would have wanted to hear. Please keep me posted. I. I hope that your son is okay and that he's going to pull through and I'm gonna be sending you know good thoughts and that we're going to do what we can on our end to support you. And we look forward to you coming back fully present to work.
- Liesel Mertes
I mean I'm struck that one it's such a deep and miss on a human level but even if you were just representing like a business asset like you've been recruited this way you've been trained you've been wooed. I mean they've spent money and they've invested something in you and even if you're just looking at it from mishandling an investment like what a loss let alone to really realize now this is an actual person that matters even if you're just reducing it like
- Bre Sprague
I felt disposable. I felt that they were in such a growth mode looking at what they wanted to accomplish as a company and growth and they have done very, very well since I was with them but it did not leave me with a positive a positive feeling moving forward even when I was going.
- Bre Sprague
I felt very defeated moving forward even looking for a new a new job and looking at wow like I have a lot to offer here.
Bre does have a lot to offer and this situation made her feel like she was being treated as a liability to her employer because of her responsibilities as a single parent. And this doesn’t have to be the case.
- Bre Sprague
And you know for me when I look back at everything and I talk to other single mothers and other single parents and single fathers who do it you just find a way to make it work. You stretch the dollar you, you find a way to make sure that the needs of your child are taking care of and that's an asset that's thinking outside the box that's being able to go oh wow like let's look at this from a different perspective.
- Bre Sprague
Yeah, I really feel that a single parent male or female is a huge asset or a single caregiver because there are a lot of people who are taking care of parents who are having to live with them now. And you know as a single parent that that asset and what I say that you know you're showing up you're, you're doing what needs to get done you're structured you're scheduled and I feel like that and I'm not saying that every single parent or every employee like that is like that be great if everybody was but you know it, it isn't a huge asset to any organization when you have a person who is driven to take care of the needs beyond themselves.
In caring for the needs of her son, Bre has had to make sacrifices in her life to sustain both a career and her son. If she had to miss work for a doctor’s appointment, she made up the time late at night (just as she did in college). Bre missed birthday parties because of sales trips. She didn’t take a proper vacation until her son was 13 because she needed to save her vacation days in case he got sick. All of these decisions and others are part of the calculus of a working parent. In the midst of juggling all these concerns, single parents also have to manage the judgment of coworkers.
– Bre Sprague
but too often I feel like single parents get that rap of not being able to show up fully because they might be you know you'll hear someone say they're leaving work again early. Well maybe they're leaving work because their child has a therapy appointment. Maybe they're leaving work because it's the only time the dentist can get them in. You know maybe, maybe they're leaving work because they just need to go and have a picnic with their kid because they haven't spent any quality time with their kid and about two weeks. And I think if the if the leadership within the company doesn't create a culture where everybody whether you have children or not can show up and do their best work and feel safe and not feel judged then no matter what your station as I think everybody ends up feeling like just a number and a cog in the wheel and a liability.
I’d like to interject a reflection here. Bre talked about the power of the side comment, the coworker who snipes, “They’re leaving work early again…” Often, when we think about culture in organizations, we focus on the power of top-down change. But culture is comprised of a hundred little interactions. How you talk about your coworkers, that matters. Think of the difference. You see a single mom leaving at 4 PM. What if, instead of snarking about how you wish you could just leave in the middle of the day, you say, “She is a really dedicated mom. I am amazed how she juggles so much and still does such great work.”
In the space of workplace culture, Bre also noticed that there was a different standard applied to men than was applied to women.
- Bre Sprague
I love men and this is not meaning to be a bash on men. A lot of it is our society and still how programmed we are. And the, the double standards that do exist against women in the workplace. You know I, I know of fathers who coached baseball teams who have to leave work early to go and coach baseball and it's like wow that's great. He's coaching the baseball team and that same excitement and that same you know.
- Bre Sprague
You know really applauding and cheering somebody on as a woman needs to be there because all too often it's not. And, and if we want more women to be able to step up to the table and roles of leadership, we need to create cultures where you know what it's OK, you're a mom. That's part of who you are. You know it's OK. You know your kid got sick and isn't it great that we now have technology that you can work from home for a day if you need to work from home you know or that you know you can do the companies that do unlimited PTO as long as you're getting your work done. You know your kid got sick and isn't it great that we now have technology that you can work from home for a day if you need to work from home you know or that you know you can do the companies that do unlimited PTO as long as you're getting your work done. And I think that's the key factor is that moving away from cultures that are micromanaging the old way of thinking to saying how do we allow somebody to show up as their full self
Moving forwards, Bre wanted to be part of a company with a culture that was inclusive and supportive. Inclusion. This is a term that is used in business and it can bring to mind inclusion along the lines of gender or orientation of race. But what does it mean to expand inclusion to include those who are living through disruptive life events or are in the midst of life circumstances that fall outside of the norm?
- Bre Sprague
You know and I feel like inclusion in in in creating a culture that is inclusive, is that is inclusive. It allows people to, to be vulnerable no matter what boundaries need to be in place. I think it's totally fine. I love it.
One of the, the, one of my many hats that I wear the boss my CEO of that company she hasn't had to say to me but she and I have joked that she has no problem telling somebody that this is probably something you should be talking to your therapist about and it's and it's true that like you can have that vulnerability and say hey I'm going on I'm coming into work I have this going on for example my grandmother died in January and I went into work and I just was honest is that if I seem a little bit off today it's because I am my 97 year old grandmother died and there was no need I mean she was in Florida and arrangements had to be made it wasn't like I needed to be off of work but there was a you know that awareness could bring some clarity so they might understand why I might seem a little off not laughing at our jokes quickly.
- Liesel Mertes
Well in some way it gives it gives people more of the story. It's like in any relational dynamic you provide an answer to the question if you don't know: oh, she must be upset because of what you know people are providing their own answer if they're perceiving that you don't give them a context.
- Bre Sprague
Yeah, I am big on clarification.
MUSICAL TRANSITION
- Bre Sprague
It's not about balance it's about juggling. It's about being okay with leaving some dishes in the sink at night because that extra half an hour of sleep is so much more important than those couple dishes that just need to be put in the dishwasher. It's about not stressing over the small stuff.
- Bre Sprague
And you know if somebody even little things like you know I used to spend a lot of time on in the car driving for sales reps jobs and oh this person cut me off. Well maybe that person was just trying to get to muffins with moms like give somebody Grace and give yourself Grace and that's really what it would be that it's
- Bre Sprague
there's no such thing as perfection. It's just about doing your best with what you can at the time forgiving yourself for when you feel like you haven't shown up as your best and then just truly knowing that you have worth and that you're not perfect but you're a good parent and a good employee and a good friend and a good daughter.
Knowing that you are a good parent, a good employee, a good friend and daughter. These words are powerful; are you a person that gives these words of affirmation? Because there are people in your life, in your workplace, that would really appreciate hearing them.
- Liesel Mertes
Bree thank you for sharing.
- Bre Sprague
I'm really grateful to have had the opportunity to meet you to be on the show. I am a fan of your mission of your work because people we've heard over and over again people don't leave jobs they leave poor management and they leave toxic cultures and all too often people will make a quick lateral transfer and they're not making any more money but the environment that they're in has been so toxic that they cannot stay any longer.
- Bre Sprague
And I'm a huge fan of what you are trying to accomplish and what you are accomplishing because when a person can show up as their whole self in a workplace happy employees stay happy employees are productive and that's what we really need to try to cultivate more of. And so, congratulations to you and kudos and keep doing the good work. I agree. Thanks. Thanks for that.
- Liesel Mertes
Those words of affirmation I receive them so.
MUSICAL TRANSITION
Three lessons or perhaps questions emerge from my conversation with Bre.
- How inclusive and accommodating is your company to the needs of single parents? If you don’t know, ask the single parents that work with you. Create a focus group, send out a confidential survey. Then consider, what can you offer to show support to single parents? By offering support systems like flexible working arrangements and results-oriented hours, you can give essential support as well as differentiate yourself as an employer of choice.
- Conversations with people in the midst of disruptive life events really matter, do you feel equipped to have those conversations? As Bre was sitting at the bedside of her sick son, she had a phone call that changed her work trajectory. Bre’s life was upended and the company had to absorb the cost of recruiting and retraining her replacement. This could have been avoided. What if that person, on the other end of the line, had been able to offer basic support and empathy? If you would like further training for yourself or your staff in how to have these conversations well, consider engaging a workplace empathy consultant.
- Vulnerability can be a way of bringing clarity to a situation. For Bre, that looked like letting coworkers know that her grandmother died and that she was compromised as a result. Are you a part of a culture that allows people to feel comfortable expressing their emotional location? Do they believe that they will be met with empathy when they are vulnerable? If not, what can you do to bring more of this clarity and open communication to the workplace? If you are in leadership, perhaps this starts with sharing some of your own need for empathy and support.
As a parting note, Handle with Care will be taking a two-week break. We will resume the podcast at the close of July as we help you build empathy at work.
OUTRO