On a great career path, Marissa hit a wall: “Taking care of my grandma is more important than this job.”
When Marissa Hicks was young, her mom’s chronic pain illness meant that she needed Marissa’s care. That’s when Marissa found her calling.
“My heart is what made me start off doing this,” says Marissa. “Seeing my mother in pain…I knew I would be the best caregiver for her. She’s my mom. No one understands her like I do.”
For Marissa, who lives in the City of Antioch in Contra Costa County, caregiving feeds her soul. When she first started taking care of her mom, Marissa learned a lot about both mental and physical health, and she slowly but surely built off of that knowledge.
Marissa turned this into her career. She got a good full-time job in a care home. She was quick to learn and her supervisors saw leadership qualities and began to cross-train her in various duties.
Then her grandmother got dementia.
“When my grandmother was diagnosed with dementia years ago, I felt that same pull to be there for her. But this time, I wasn’t able to provide all the care that my grandma required while also working in the care home. I had to take a step back and say ‘taking care of my grandma is more important than this job.’”
Marissa cares for her grandmother and her two kids. It’s a struggle to make ends meet, but it’s worth it to Marissa, a caregiving veteran of seven years.
Marissa wakes up at 5 a.m. every morning, to make sure that she has enough time to get her day in order. On a typical day, she cooks breakfast, gets household chores done, and then packs the kids and her grandmother into the family car and they’re off to school.
After dropping her kids off, Marissa either takes her grandmother back home to watch her soap operas (The Young and the Restless is her grandmother’s favorite), or they run caregiving-related errands: getting her grandmother’s medication from the pharmacy and taking her to doctor’s appointments.
After that, it’s back to the house, where Marissa spends the rest of the day cooking, cleaning, making sure she takes her medications, going out for a walk and keeping her grandmother mentally stimulated playing checkers. Despite all that she does, Marissa barely makes enough to make ends meet, with an hourly wage of $15 and only three hours’ worth of IHSS paid work, even though she spends most of her day caring for her grandmother.
Marissa’s grandmother’s dementia only complicates things.
“The other day, we were in the bank. In the middle of helping to take care of her finances, that’s when grandma forgot who I was and told the bank people that I was a thief. In that moment, I was some stranger standing behind her, trying to talk with her about personal finance stuff she’d only discuss with family. The ladies at the bank looked at me like I was about to do something. Grandma was whispering ‘I don’t even know her. I don’t know this lady talking to me.’ The bank teller was scared when I asked about the situation. I went outside for a second, just to give grandma some space and clear the tension that was building up around me, and suddenly cops are there. The bank employees called the cops on me. Any other time, I have my caregiver documentation on me, but this time I didn’t. So I had to tell the cops what was going on, and the cops believed me because of how earnest and genuine I seemed about caring for my grandmother. I even told some jokes to lighten things; my superpower is keeping grace under fire.”
“It breaks my heart when my kids ask to go to McDonald’s and I have to say no.”
Even though Marissa can balance it all, it’s not easy.
“Most families can afford an inexpensive dinner out once in a while. It breaks my heart when my kids ask to go to McDonald’s and I have to say no. We just can’t afford it.”
Fortunately, Marissa, who has been making her own clothes since she was 12, is able to keep her head above water by owning/running a small clothing business.
“Even in high school, I was the best dressed — always. Everybody used to be like, ‘where’d you get those from?’ I always wanted to be a fashion designer.”
This small side business isn’t as profitable as Marissa would like it to be, but her profits combined with her IHSS salary allow her to make ends meet — barely.
Marissa is speaking out and supporting her Union’s Time for $20 campaign to establish a living wage floor in the industry. Learn more at https://www.seiu2015.org/timefor20/.
