Our Spirit
“When you are a caregiver, you know that every day you will touch a life or a life will touch yours.” Unknown
Our Genesis
1 Day 1 Week was created in September 2021 by Todd “TJ” Keitz, after 3.5 years of what was often 24/7 caregiving and advocacy for his parents. The blog was an outlet to share his experiences, with the hope it would resonate for many other caregivers and advocates. As luck would have it, the blog resonated. Todd was encouraged to do more to reach those who had walked in his shoes and a wider audience to inform, educate and inspire.
That led to the creation of the Caregiving Insights podcast on YouTube, which provided a platform for Todd to speak with thought-leaders and everyday folks about caregiving and advocacy topics. From there, he knew there was more he could do on a larger scale — so he founded My Care Friends and rebranded Caregiving Insights to My Care Friends Network.
Before All Of That
Throughout his life, Todd had been actively involved professionally and personally in many facets of the healthcare world. On the professional side, this included leadership roles at a large health insurer, pharmaceutical market research and consulting firm, and international medical data company. On the personal side, Todd had volunteered in older adult communities since he was a teenager, listening to and recording life stories, creating programs for memory care, playing bingo (of course!), and much more.
In June 2018, Todd became the primary caregiver and patient advocate for his mom and subsequently his dad. The vast experiences along this journey with his parents have included 17 hospital stays in 22 months (over 100 hospital days!) with his mom from June 2018 to April 2020, and his dad’s radiation/chemo treatments every weekday over six weeks early in 2021…followed by a second shorter round of radiation in July 2021. In addition to those clinic experiences, there were countless hours of additional doctor appointments and tests, conversations with healthcare providers, coordination of schedules, research on anything and everything related to their conditions, and all of the in-home care you can think of.
Although this blog no longer posts entries, it remains active so caregivers and advocates can continue to draw insights, comfort, and inspiration from Todd’s heartfelt and earnest contributions.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To learn about Todd’s current endeavors related and unrelated to caregiving and patient advocacy, please visit his LinkedIn profile, his company 17 Commerce LLC, and role with Magic Horizons.