[Music]
March of 2016 I was a blissfully happy
pregnant lady I felt strong and somehow
ready for Parenthood little did I know
we did all the unremarkable things that
expecting parents did we deliberated
over names we bought way too many
onesies and not enough diapers
you know life was good and we were
really happy our son appeared healthy
when he was born
a chunky 9 pounds 5 ounces we named him
Maximus and yes because a gladiator we
cuddled for a little while the nurses
came to clean him up and get his
official height and weight they noticed
a shudder when he was breathing and
things quickly escalated from there this
was the next time we saw max he was
diagnosed with congenital diaphragmatic
hernia and what this means is that
there’s a hole in the diaphragm so the
stomach moves into the chest cavity
crushes one of the lungs and inhibited
its growth and moved his heart over to
the other side of his chest
we were told babies with CDH which is
what it was the shorthand had a 50%
chance of survival
I remember having trouble remembering
what it was called I had to ask multiple
times I was finally given an Internet
printout max was stabilized and was
transferred to a hospital right away
that had the expertise to treat that
condition fortunately for us one that
was not far away we were devastated you
know scared terrified brand-new parents
our wedding song was the luckiest by Ben
Folds and we are the luckiest but it was
in that moment that I realized infant
loss doesn’t care what song you danced
to at your wedding
it doesn’t care that you didn’t take a
sip of alcohol and you controlled your
stress and you didn’t need all of that
delicious soft cheese that everyone was
always flaunting in front of you it
doesn’t care and we did everything right
but none of that seemed to matter and it
was a exercise and the lesson of you
know there are some things I can
influence but I
can’t control at all after a
particularly tough surgery the
physicians rolled max into our room and
triumphantly just declared a successful
procedure I did not feel their elation I
felt despair I do not see a baby that
had been successfully repaired but
instead one that was hopped up on
fentanyl puffy and non-responsive I
remember wanting to lay on the floor
because I had no nothing left to give
that was my emotional state and at that
very moment at my lowest a friend
brought us dinner and it wasn’t just
like takeout you know this was a grand
dinner there was brussel sprouts
bacon you know cheese bread beer wine
like all that is good in the world like
so much food was in this food and we
felt cared for and we felt loved and
supported by a community it was spirit
lifting at that time I wrapped all the
food up there was a shared family lounge
so I brought all of the food to the
family lounge to put in the fridge and I
ran into a person that had traveled all
the way from Tennessee to support a
loved one traveling for care she was
disoriented she didn’t know where to
print things for insurance paperwork she
wasn’t sure you know she wanted healthy
food that was cheap she was sick of
hospital food and most notably she was
stressed about housing she was spending
thousands of dollars on hotels on top of
all of these medical costs and I said
hey I live I live really close by like
here’s my phone number call me I know
where everything is in whole city I will
help you and she thanked me she never
called and I went back to the room and
it was a long day but I just couldn’t
sleep I couldn’t stop thinking about
this woman I was what I’m like why
didn’t I get her number
why does like I gave her all my stuff
why did I get nothing from her and I
just couldn’t stop thinking about it
I wondered are there were there other
people wandering around the hospital you
know like her that were separated from
their communities that were spending
thousands of dollars on health care
costs
thousands of dollars on housing and all
of this on the roller coaster that is
the ICU and I asked myself is there
something I could do here is there
something that I could do and I thought
about it for the night I was just awake
and then it came to me you know what if
people could open their homes to people
traveling to Baltimore for medical care
their spare bedrooms you know would that
be something to do but is this even a
big problem maybe this was just me like
sad mom in the hospital and maybe this
wasn’t as big as I thought it was so I
did some research I started talking to
families hospitals social workers and I
learned that the demand for housing was
greater than the supply I teamed up with
an MBA student and we looked at families
just making under seventy five grand a
year and learned that 200 people are
traveling domestically in their state
for care and then according to the CDC
the average stay is approximately 4.6
day four point six days for inpatient so
that’s almost a million nights of
housing per year
in addition we discovered there’s not a
lot of literature out there on families
that are traveling for medical care so
it was kind of a hidden population of
people and so after 23 days we got to
take our son home which was exciting it
was also a tiring time it was a time of
like new parent hazing and all of the
things that come along with that
but whenever there is a quiet moment I
thought about this woman from Tennessee
and I thought about it when I went to
sleep and I thought about it when I woke
up and then one day I just said I need
to do something about this so I wrote an
email to my friends and family and said
I am going to recruit strangers with
spare bedrooms and I’m gonna find
families that are traveling here that
need a place to stay and I’m going to
connect them and this will be very safe
and so I wrote this email it was like
January 1 because that’s what you do on
the 1st of January yeah I didn’t send it
till the end of March like it waited a
long it took me a little while to get
the courage to send the email and then I
started the project I started doing
research I’m not an expert on housing
I’m not an expert on social work so I
just read a lot I talked to a lot of
different people
I became incorporated as a non-profit I
named it host for humanity I applied for
a lot of local small grants for social
entrepreneurs and was a little
successful there getting my feet on my
feet underneath me from a financial
standpoint I got the trust of some local
Social Work teams I recruited hosts that
were crazy and very supportive and so I
had a handful of hoes and I just knew as
soon as this website went up I was like
I’m gonna get inundated like I am going
to be completely overwhelmed by the
number of people that need this right
now and then I waited for months like
literally months and it was it was huh
kind of humbling I was just like oh man
I’m solving this huge problem and then
nothing
it was crickets and so I started
doubting you know maybe this isn’t a big
problem after all maybe this was just
something I needed to work on to heal
you know like all of these things that
you tell yourself and then one day this
January I got a call from a mom in
Minnesota and she needed to come to
Baltimore with her daughter for a very
specific type of care and she did five
days of housing she was driving all the
way from Minnesota which is a long drive
and she said if there’s no place to stay
you know maybe you have a driveway and
if maybe we could use the bathroom
because we will need to use the bathroom
but you know we can just sleep in our
car and I thought we can do better than
that so I wrote to our hosts and a
lovely woman took them in for five days
and the family was able to get the care
they needed here in Baltimore and since
then we’ve had a lot more requests since
January we’ve hosted 45 people for 270
days saving families about 25 grand on
housing
which is pretty cool we have 39 hosts in
the Greater Baltimore area and a lot of
the hosts of are doing it because
they’ve been through some stuff
themselves which is interesting and
something that I did not expect and a
lot of the hosts first I felt bad like
hey what’s going on with your spare
bedroom this weekend can you can you
take these people in and I felt a little
bit apologetic in asking and one post
actually took me aside and said this is
an honor for us to be able to do this
like I’ve been waiting for an
opportunity like this you know I’m using
things that I already have a big heart
and a spare bedroom to care for other
people so this helps me to when I first
started there was I knew nearly all the
hosts or they were friends of friends
now I don’t know very many of them which
is kind of cool too and then of those
that were serving 94% are women and
children which I know like women are the
majority of the caretakers but I was
really surprised that I was talking to a
lot of moms and daughters throughout
this process too
something that stood out to me beyond
the relief of financial burden is the
one we asked people like why is the
service valuable to you was the human
element and chance to interact with
someone who cares it makes a difference
to these families to go home to a home
and not a hotel to go home to someone
who could you could ask hey like where’s
the nearest grocery store or you know
I’ve had a long day can we talk about it
you know just to go home to a human and
not like a hotel that makes a difference
and that’s something that I think is
really special about you know what we’re
doing
and I can’t wrap this up without talking
about the most important part of the
story my son Max is now a thriving and
resilient toddler and sorry it’s what I
want to do is like come up here and cry
today oh and you may have noticed he’s
gonna be joined by like a little sibling
in the spring so we’re very excited
about that and you know I often reflect
on this project and there’s nothing
particularly special about me or my
family’s journey we all go through
things
that are painful and hard I mean that’s
the human condition right and when I
first started doing something about this
project I was immobilized for a time by
fear and I was a little embarrassed
about that but now I’ve kind of made my
peace with that too
you know we all need to start somewhere
you know fear could look like
procrastination or a feeling of not
being ready or perhaps it manifests as
you know this idea that you’re going to
be a very public failure and I felt all
of those things too and to be honest I
still feel those things but at least now
I get to see the outcome of my work and
I know that it is helping these families
and that it’s giving them access to
health care as housing is a big part of
that equation I would encourage
everybody here like everyone here has a
story inside of them to embrace that
story to embrace the thing that keeps
them up at night and embrace their pain
and go out there to use it to create a
better world it doesn’t take as many
resources as you think it will it’s not
it will take time this does take a lot
of time I’m not gonna like undersell
that but it’s consistency I do this at
night I do this after I put my son to
sleep you can do it you can start in
five minutes if you’re fast maybe you
can start in like you know two minutes
just send an email get started there I
know you’re probably looking at me like
do you know how busy I am Jenny I think
you just look at your habits like maybe
watch one last Netflix show you know
maybe like five less posts on Facebook
and then heaven forbid do not send that
work like that work email late at night
because no one really wants to get that
anyway like there is time in your life
that you can use to put towards a
purpose and put towards a passion
project I’ve come to believe that
creation in a world of consumption is a
form of protest it’s also a radical act
of healing and it was a very healing and
is a very feeling project for me and it
started with empathy and it started with
an idea but
importantly it started with action so
I’d encourage all of you guys to go out
today and take action and do it now
thank you [Applause]
March of 2016 I was a blissfully happy
pregnant lady I felt strong and somehow
ready for Parenthood little did I know
we did all the unremarkable things that
expecting parents did we deliberated
over names we bought way too many
onesies and not enough diapers
you know life was good and we were
really happy our son appeared healthy
when he was born
a chunky 9 pounds 5 ounces we named him
Maximus and yes because a gladiator we
cuddled for a little while the nurses
came to clean him up and get his
official height and weight they noticed
a shudder when he was breathing and
things quickly escalated from there this
was the next time we saw max he was
diagnosed with congenital diaphragmatic
hernia and what this means is that
there’s a hole in the diaphragm so the
stomach moves into the chest cavity
crushes one of the lungs and inhibited
its growth and moved his heart over to
the other side of his chest
we were told babies with CDH which is
what it was the shorthand had a 50%
chance of survival
I remember having trouble remembering
what it was called I had to ask multiple
times I was finally given an Internet
printout max was stabilized and was
transferred to a hospital right away
that had the expertise to treat that
condition fortunately for us one that
was not far away we were devastated you
know scared terrified brand-new parents
our wedding song was the luckiest by Ben
Folds and we are the luckiest but it was
in that moment that I realized infant
loss doesn’t care what song you danced
to at your wedding
it doesn’t care that you didn’t take a
sip of alcohol and you controlled your
stress and you didn’t need all of that
delicious soft cheese that everyone was
always flaunting in front of you it
doesn’t care and we did everything right
but none of that seemed to matter and it
was a exercise and the lesson of you
know there are some things I can
influence but I
can’t control at all after a
particularly tough surgery the
physicians rolled max into our room and
triumphantly just declared a successful
procedure I did not feel their elation I
felt despair I do not see a baby that
had been successfully repaired but
instead one that was hopped up on
fentanyl puffy and non-responsive I
remember wanting to lay on the floor
because I had no nothing left to give
that was my emotional state and at that
very moment at my lowest a friend
brought us dinner and it wasn’t just
like takeout you know this was a grand
dinner there was brussel sprouts
bacon you know cheese bread beer wine
like all that is good in the world like
so much food was in this food and we
felt cared for and we felt loved and
supported by a community it was spirit
lifting at that time I wrapped all the
food up there was a shared family lounge
so I brought all of the food to the
family lounge to put in the fridge and I
ran into a person that had traveled all
the way from Tennessee to support a
loved one traveling for care she was
disoriented she didn’t know where to
print things for insurance paperwork she
wasn’t sure you know she wanted healthy
food that was cheap she was sick of
hospital food and most notably she was
stressed about housing she was spending
thousands of dollars on hotels on top of
all of these medical costs and I said
hey I live I live really close by like
here’s my phone number call me I know
where everything is in whole city I will
help you and she thanked me she never
called and I went back to the room and
it was a long day but I just couldn’t
sleep I couldn’t stop thinking about
this woman I was what I’m like why
didn’t I get her number
why does like I gave her all my stuff
why did I get nothing from her and I
just couldn’t stop thinking about it
I wondered are there were there other
people wandering around the hospital you
know like her that were separated from
their communities that were spending
thousands of dollars on health care
costs
thousands of dollars on housing and all
of this on the roller coaster that is
the ICU and I asked myself is there
something I could do here is there
something that I could do and I thought
about it for the night I was just awake
and then it came to me you know what if
people could open their homes to people
traveling to Baltimore for medical care
their spare bedrooms you know would that
be something to do but is this even a
big problem maybe this was just me like
sad mom in the hospital and maybe this
wasn’t as big as I thought it was so I
did some research I started talking to
families hospitals social workers and I
learned that the demand for housing was
greater than the supply I teamed up with
an MBA student and we looked at families
just making under seventy five grand a
year and learned that 200 people are
traveling domestically in their state
for care and then according to the CDC
the average stay is approximately 4.6
day four point six days for inpatient so
that’s almost a million nights of
housing per year
in addition we discovered there’s not a
lot of literature out there on families
that are traveling for medical care so
it was kind of a hidden population of
people and so after 23 days we got to
take our son home which was exciting it
was also a tiring time it was a time of
like new parent hazing and all of the
things that come along with that
but whenever there is a quiet moment I
thought about this woman from Tennessee
and I thought about it when I went to
sleep and I thought about it when I woke
up and then one day I just said I need
to do something about this so I wrote an
email to my friends and family and said
I am going to recruit strangers with
spare bedrooms and I’m gonna find
families that are traveling here that
need a place to stay and I’m going to
connect them and this will be very safe
and so I wrote this email it was like
January 1 because that’s what you do on
the 1st of January yeah I didn’t send it
till the end of March like it waited a
long it took me a little while to get
the courage to send the email and then I
started the project I started doing
research I’m not an expert on housing
I’m not an expert on social work so I
just read a lot I talked to a lot of
different people
I became incorporated as a non-profit I
named it host for humanity I applied for
a lot of local small grants for social
entrepreneurs and was a little
successful there getting my feet on my
feet underneath me from a financial
standpoint I got the trust of some local
Social Work teams I recruited hosts that
were crazy and very supportive and so I
had a handful of hoes and I just knew as
soon as this website went up I was like
I’m gonna get inundated like I am going
to be completely overwhelmed by the
number of people that need this right
now and then I waited for months like
literally months and it was it was huh
kind of humbling I was just like oh man
I’m solving this huge problem and then
nothing
it was crickets and so I started
doubting you know maybe this isn’t a big
problem after all maybe this was just
something I needed to work on to heal
you know like all of these things that
you tell yourself and then one day this
January I got a call from a mom in
Minnesota and she needed to come to
Baltimore with her daughter for a very
specific type of care and she did five
days of housing she was driving all the
way from Minnesota which is a long drive
and she said if there’s no place to stay
you know maybe you have a driveway and
if maybe we could use the bathroom
because we will need to use the bathroom
but you know we can just sleep in our
car and I thought we can do better than
that so I wrote to our hosts and a
lovely woman took them in for five days
and the family was able to get the care
they needed here in Baltimore and since
then we’ve had a lot more requests since
January we’ve hosted 45 people for 270
days saving families about 25 grand on
housing
which is pretty cool we have 39 hosts in
the Greater Baltimore area and a lot of
the hosts of are doing it because
they’ve been through some stuff
themselves which is interesting and
something that I did not expect and a
lot of the hosts first I felt bad like
hey what’s going on with your spare
bedroom this weekend can you can you
take these people in and I felt a little
bit apologetic in asking and one post
actually took me aside and said this is
an honor for us to be able to do this
like I’ve been waiting for an
opportunity like this you know I’m using
things that I already have a big heart
and a spare bedroom to care for other
people so this helps me to when I first
started there was I knew nearly all the
hosts or they were friends of friends
now I don’t know very many of them which
is kind of cool too and then of those
that were serving 94% are women and
children which I know like women are the
majority of the caretakers but I was
really surprised that I was talking to a
lot of moms and daughters throughout
this process too
something that stood out to me beyond
the relief of financial burden is the
one we asked people like why is the
service valuable to you was the human
element and chance to interact with
someone who cares it makes a difference
to these families to go home to a home
and not a hotel to go home to someone
who could you could ask hey like where’s
the nearest grocery store or you know
I’ve had a long day can we talk about it
you know just to go home to a human and
not like a hotel that makes a difference
and that’s something that I think is
really special about you know what we’re
doing
and I can’t wrap this up without talking
about the most important part of the
story my son Max is now a thriving and
resilient toddler and sorry it’s what I
want to do is like come up here and cry
today oh and you may have noticed he’s
gonna be joined by like a little sibling
in the spring so we’re very excited
about that and you know I often reflect
on this project and there’s nothing
particularly special about me or my
family’s journey we all go through
things
that are painful and hard I mean that’s
the human condition right and when I
first started doing something about this
project I was immobilized for a time by
fear and I was a little embarrassed
about that but now I’ve kind of made my
peace with that too
you know we all need to start somewhere
you know fear could look like
procrastination or a feeling of not
being ready or perhaps it manifests as
you know this idea that you’re going to
be a very public failure and I felt all
of those things too and to be honest I
still feel those things but at least now
I get to see the outcome of my work and
I know that it is helping these families
and that it’s giving them access to
health care as housing is a big part of
that equation I would encourage
everybody here like everyone here has a
story inside of them to embrace that
story to embrace the thing that keeps
them up at night and embrace their pain
and go out there to use it to create a
better world it doesn’t take as many
resources as you think it will it’s not
it will take time this does take a lot
of time I’m not gonna like undersell
that but it’s consistency I do this at
night I do this after I put my son to
sleep you can do it you can start in
five minutes if you’re fast maybe you
can start in like you know two minutes
just send an email get started there I
know you’re probably looking at me like
do you know how busy I am Jenny I think
you just look at your habits like maybe
watch one last Netflix show you know
maybe like five less posts on Facebook
and then heaven forbid do not send that
work like that work email late at night
because no one really wants to get that
anyway like there is time in your life
that you can use to put towards a
purpose and put towards a passion
project I’ve come to believe that
creation in a world of consumption is a
form of protest it’s also a radical act
of healing and it was a very healing and
is a very feeling project for me and it
started with empathy and it started with
an idea but
importantly it started with action so
I’d encourage all of you guys to go out
today and take action and do it now
thank you [Applause]
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