Triumph Through Pain as a Social Worker with Bas Moreno

Bas Moreno (00:00):

One of the podcasts I listened to called Earn Your Leisure. They did a whole podcast with ways you can potentially make money from podcasting. I was like, lemme give this a shot. And it was like literally one day January, 2020 sitting on my bed, like phone hovering over my mouth. So I had the name already picked out, and this is the Social Work Rants Podcast. I have no idea what I'm going to talk about, but we going to maybe figure out whatever I said the first episode. And it is literally whatever ideas I had in my head, I just did it.

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Michael Fulwiler (00:28):

This is Heard Business School where we sit down with private practice owners and industry experts to learn about the business of therapy together. I'm your host, Michael Fulwiler. Welcome to Heard Business School. My guest this week is certified financial social worker, host of the Social Work Rants Podcast, caregiver in the sandwich generation, Basiliso Moreno, welcome to the show.

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Bas Moreno (01:00):

Thank you for having me. Michael. What's going on?

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Michael Fulwiler (01:02):

Excited to have you on, man. I got to ask, it's Friday are your progress notes done?

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Bas Moreno (01:08):

They will be by 4:30.

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Michael Fulwiler (01:10):

All right. By end of day I'll check in again. It's funny, at some point during COVID, I started tweeting therapists are Your Progress Notes done on Fridays because a lot of therapists put their notes off until the end of the week and it just became a thing. And then therapists just started tweeting at me, finished my progress notes, shout out to Michael, thanks through the reminder and kind of just was the thing there for a while.

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Bas Moreno (01:33):

And then Elon messed up Twitter and that was a wrap.

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Michael Fulwiler (01:36):

Yeah, I know. That's it. Yeah, was there for a good time. Not for a long time, but excited to chat with you, man. It's been fun to meet online and then we got to hang out in person at an event for social workers in New York, and I love the work you're doing. You do a bunch of stuff as a social worker. So excited to chat about that. I want to start, so you grew up in the Bronx, you're first gen parents are from Puerto Rico, you told me that came over in the sixties. What was that like growing up in the Bronx as a kid?

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Bas Moreno (02:08):

Oh man, it's interesting to say the least that that's my forever home. Nobody can say anything negative about the Bronx, even though there's a lot of negatives that's happened and a lot of it's due to the systemic racism that exists in America and certain wannabe politicians had a lot of power for whatever reason and did things to the borough to separate folks and building highways in the middle of neighborhoods that causing asthma to folks to this very day. But besides the fact I grew up in the eighties, the crack epidemic and the first rumblings of HIV and AIDS that was out there and having President Reagan and Nancy Reagan talking about just say no to drugs and the commercials you see on TV with the cracked eggs on the pan, this is your brain out drugs. Any questions? And it's like finding out as an adult how America has done a terrible job addressing drugs in this country.

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Bas Moreno (03:13):

But it was cool. It was just meme. My parents grew up as an only child. Finding out later. I do have two have brothers and a half sister most of their lives that live in Puerto Rico. I think at least my two oldest were born in New York and then with their mom moved to Puerto Rico. So I didn't get to meet 'em until I was about 10 years old, one by one. I started meeting one individually and getting to know them and stuff like that, but it was just three of us for me. I would just go to school and go home. I wasn't a going out type of kid going out. Why the Yankee games At seven 30, I got to mentally prepare myself for the game. I ain't trying to go out. So yeah, so it was just going to school. I made friends at school.

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Bas Moreno (04:01):

Many of the kids lived in the neighborhood. So I go to the supermarket, I'll see my friends and we'll talk and kick it for a little bit and stuff like that. So obviously did see needles in the street, seeing crack vows on the streets and stuff like that. Occasionally heard gunshots in neighborhood from time to time. Unfortunately, I lost a classmate due to gun violence. Then as I got older, as an adult, a kid I grew up with, he was already an adult. We were both adults at the time. But yeah, I passed away too. So grew up with kids that rather be in the streets and do whatever. And the park that we had was, they were always trying to fix it. It looks better now as an adult that I did as a kid. There are certain blocks in my neighborhood that I wouldn't go hang out purposely. I knew stuff would happen. So it was safer at home.

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Michael Fulwiler (04:54):

And as a kid, were you exposed at all to therapy or mental health services? Was there a social worker at your school that you remember?

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Bas Moreno (05:02):

Thinking back, the only social worker or care manager would be, I grew up my mom being on public assistance welfare at the time. New Yorkers call it face-to-face meeting. Boy, I face to face, single seat, face to face. So basically you meet your care manager and recertify for assistance would be food stamps. The food stamps at the time where you actually got a coupon book, it'll have an equivalent to money. So it'd be like a $5 bill, $1 bill, but it would be, it'll say food stamps on it. So when you go to a supermarket, you literally have the whole book and how much is it be like $15 or you give cup fives or singles. It was interesting.

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Michael Fulwiler (05:47):

You remember that as a kid?

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Bas Moreno (05:48):

Yeah, absolutely. Now it's just like a EBT card. So yes, I would go with my mom to those appointments. Occasionally I may have to translate. Usually I would just be in the office playing with the other kids, running around the food safe office, playing with other kids.

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Michael Fulwiler (06:05):

Take care.

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Bas Moreno (06:06):

Because there was an office literally down the street from the old Yankee stadium where we would always go to. I think that office is still there actually. But yeah, so that was my first kind of indication of thinking back at adult. Oh yeah, that was a caseworker or a social worker.

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Michael Fulwiler (06:21):

Yeah. You probably weren't even aware of it.

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Bas Moreno (06:23):

No, I wasn't aware at all. No, not at all.

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Michael Fulwiler (06:25):

And then when did you start to become interested in becoming a social worker? When did that get on your radar?

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Bas Moreno (06:33):

Oh man. So I'm going to try to make this story short, kind of long. So my bachelor's is actually communications with a minor in education. So I actually wanted to be a sports broadcaster leaving undergrad. And then, so I graduated in May, 2001, and of course months later, the nine 11 terror attacks happened in New York. A crazy time to say the least.

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Michael Fulwiler (07:03):

Yeah. Were you in the city when that happened? Remember?

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Bas Moreno (07:05):

Yes. Yes. I could tell you because one of these days that you know exactly where you were, what you did. It was between that day and my first wedding, I could tell you it's exactly what I did.

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Michael Fulwiler (07:17):

Yeah, different kind of days, but

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Bas Moreno (07:19):

Yeah, but that day, just my routine at the time, again, I worked briefly after I graduated and then I left the job. My dad was still working. I don't remember if he was still working or not, but I know my mom was working. She was working at a school as a power professional for special needs kids in a school in the Bronx. So literally my dad was home and I were home wake up, I hear these sirens passing by, what the heck is going on? So that's my first syndication of waking up and then turn on the radio to listen to this shock jock at the time on Hot 97 radio station. Very controversial guy.

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Michael Fulwiler (08:01):

Show it to him.

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Bas Moreno (08:02):

And he says, one of the planes got hit and it was like, I like this guy better not be freaking kidding with me. So I turned on the tv, turned on CNN at the time, no, CNN, this is 2001. They're still credible. And I see one of the towers on fire and it snap. This guy was telling the truth and then live like many people did. So the other playing hit the towers. So long story short, maybe a few days before the towers hit, I went through a temp agency in Times Square. I needed a job. And my friend that summer told me about a temp agency and see what they offered and did the whole test. They have a placement test and I didn't get a call on until a couple of days after Christmas, 2001, Hey, we got this job, I'll take it.

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Bas Moreno (08:47):

I'll take it. They sleep on it. I called the next day and it was heads up being a foster care job as a caseworker. So I started literally January, 2022 working at this foster care agency making $8 and 25 cents an hour. Did that for a few months. Then I got bumped up to eight 50 an hour because I spoke Spanish. And I actually did that for six months. In between those six months, the agency changed the HR directors. So that was kind of in limbo. They wanted to put me on permanent. Then they changed as a permanent position, offered me a salary and HR changes happened and I'm sucking in limbo. I was like, I'm giving in another few months, otherwise I'm going to get out of here in between the timeframe I'm going to court. And there was this family court judge that hated our agency that we worked with and always threatened to shut down our agency at one time actually put me in contemp to court if I didn't do these certain things for this family, I was like stressing out already.

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Bas Moreno (09:50):

I, I'm literally 20, not even 22 yet, stressing out over this $8 57 an hour foster care job. They finally put me on permanent and that's how I got started in the field that actually worked there for three years. And so all these supervisors come in and out and I could tell I got for many of those who walked in the door, I got more skilled than they do. But they have these three letters after their name. It was like MSW was like, huh, I guess I'm going to have to go back to school and get this MSW degree if I want to make some more money. So the ball started rolling in and one of the supervisors I had at the time, he was my first mentor when he left, he was always in my ear talking, you need to go get your MSW, you need to go get your MSW. And eventually I went to school and we could talk about that. But that was a whole other experience right there. The school on 60th street in Columbus Circle in New York with the maroon and white colors.

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Michael Fulwiler (10:56):

Sure, yep. Why was that not a great experience?

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Bas Moreno (11:00):

I found out recently, a couple of people still have to do this, but I had to find my own internship. I'm like, I'm paying you all this money and money that I have to pay back in student loans and why you can't help me out with finding a field placement. That's your job. So luckily enough for me that I was already in the social service field and already having connections with folks. I left the foster care job. I went to another agency after that and finding out that agency. The director went to Fordham, one of the supervisors went to Fordham, and then once that director left that job and went to another agency, I still kept in contact with her. I had reached out to her like, Hey, I need an internship because the school's not helping me. And it is like, I got you, no problem.

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Bas Moreno (11:50):

So literally I got my own internship just based on networking and people that I knew already in the space. And I knew other, my friends, my peers at Fordham that they were working full time and they were able to still get internships. They were like, why can't you help me? So that was a pain, a real pain that I'm in my petty era. So still, even though it's 2025, I graduated in 2010 with my master's, it is stuff like when I talk to folks to Ms. W students now, you shouldn't be going through the same issues in 2025 that I did in 2010. And then to pay back student loans and be fighting to advocate for us for our loans to be forgiven. Especially with COVID, a lot of us actually were in a few helping folks and risking our own lives to care for others in the community. The least we could do is pay off our loans that we went to school for. So a long-winded winded answer why I don't big up my school, a lot of my peers do.

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Michael Fulwiler (12:52):

That's valid. You mentioned you worked in foster care, you've done case management work with severely mental ill adults. You've also worked with adults with A DHD. Have you ever thought about getting your LCSW in doing clinical work in private practice? Is that something that you're interested in?

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Bas Moreno (13:11):

I did for a while. So I'm a proud job hopper. So I would say so 20 12, 20 11, I started doing some individual counseling at an agency, working with adults, living with HIV and aids and then an opportunity came to work at an outpatient clinic doing individual therapy, obviously working under lc for progress notes, approvals and signatures and stuff. So I did that and during that time period I was studying to take their ASWB exam. Already had failed it by that time twice already, maybe three times. So the plan for me, I was living in New Jersey at the time, the test I was taking, it has a Jersey license professional. So the plan was to obviously pass the test and then find a job in Jersey since I was already living there and not do the travel back and forth from living in New Jersey, traveling almost two hours to New York to work and then travel almost two hours back home.

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Bas Moreno (14:19):

So I was living in New Jersey for nine years before I moved back home to the Bronx. And then I kept failing and giving every SWB more on my money. So those two years that I worked during the outpatient clinic, I was like, a lot of these clients were not coming in with a lot of real clinical issues, at least by the book type of thing and more cultural issues. So I'm first gen American, born and raised in the Bronx, and I got families who come in literally coming from many them coming from South America countries, different countries in South America, but they have first gen American kids coming in. So that cultural shock, that cultural issues that you had to do what I say and all the stereotypical stuff and traditional stuff happening or stuff, being depressed because your adult kid doesn't call you every day, you want them to.

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Bas Moreno (15:16):

I'm like, that's not what I studied at Ford, but it's like my head, if she don't call you, she don't call you. Why are you stressing? And it is like, I hear you, I understand. I'm like, no, just life happens. You got to live your life too. I'm like, come on. And I'm very down to earth, relaxed, chill, and they're like, rah, rah, rah, rah. So there was a disconnect there too. So it was like, I don't want to really do this much longer. If I do, if do, the population has to be more diverse. Majority of the clients were Latino from South America, I would say over 90% at the time. And eventually I ended up getting laid off just out the blue shockingly. But yeah, and then I stayed on for another three months at another agency that was in the same neighborhood that was like, no, I don't want to do this anymore.

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Bas Moreno (16:11):

Let me go back to case management with severely mentally adults or HIV folks. That's more like my bread and butter. So yeah, after the fifth time failing and I failed, but literally points I was like, I'm not sure if I want to get this lc anymore. At the time I was going, this was already 20 14, 20 15, prior to COVID was the worst year of my life. I got separated from my wife, my ex-wife had substance abuse issues thanks to the American healthcare system. When I had my son, literally she had a allergic reaction to the epidural and then having severe back pain to the point, started getting painkillers for it and got addicted to the pain pills and then alcohol joined the party with the pain pills. So it was not a good time whatsoever, but I'm always, unless I tell you, I usually have a pretty good poker face on.

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Bas Moreno (17:14):

I did mention to my supervisors kind of what was going on, but not really. And it was affecting the work at the end of the day and then a couple of times coming in late or last minute having to, I can't come in today, call out. And so it was a rough time. And then even the next job I had had pretty much the worst supervisor I ever had. It was the only job I had that most of the employees were male, which was an interesting experience to say the least. It might've been two females. Obviously the higher ups, like the VPs, they were women, but in the trenches, us, the case managers, the social workers, we were all male and just kicking it, supporting each other. And now I was back, I was in getting my group back era literally trying to, so finding about all these dating apps, what the heck is all these dating apps?

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Bas Moreno (18:08):

What is this? And I met my first wife in the club, so it was like dating apps, what is now I got to take selfies of myself and all my pictures of me and my kids and it was like, I'm not trying to post my kids on a dating app. So I started going back to the gym, gaining all this weight. When you're married and you're in love, we call it the love pounds and just started losing some weight and was ready to go back out there on the dating scene. So until 2016 was interesting. I started going to therapy last year, 2024. So I told my therapist about 2016 and she was like, wow, you had a very interesting 2016 too. So I started a new job, probably the best job I ever had to the point literally was hybrid model. Before hybrid was popular, I was able to, a lot of my clients literally lived in the neighborhood or at leased a train ride away.

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Bas Moreno (19:08):

So was a very convenient job. I was able to bring my kids to work if I needed to. Yeah, it was really cool, unfortunately. So I started a new job that summer. My ex-wife passed away, then I met what would be my second wife. Literally three months later I literally still grieving and then I go, I was so happy just to leave the kids with grandma. It was like Labor day weekend 2016, I'm kid free for a weekend, let me go to this day party, whatever that I was going to. It was like a New York City Latino professional meetup type of events that once in the blue I would go to. So I had no expectations meeting, I just needed a break, drink a beer at a rooftop party and no expectations of meeting anybody, just chill, relax. And then as I'm meeting somebody, I was like, oh snap.

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Bas Moreno (20:10):

I was all nervous. What's the protocol? So I texted, I called two days and texted her and then we went out on our first date, that same weekend to end the year of 2016, I had to get my appendix removed and she came, she was visiting her family to Delaware and she was going to move out there and then she meets me and my charm, my sex appeal, the stop there from doing that, at least initially. She comes up from visiting her parents to Delaware, came straight to the hospital to go visit me and she meets my mom for the first time while we're in the hospital and my mom got restless hose. So I literally, I went over 24 hours without eating. I need my coffee. I definitely addicted to the caffeine.

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Bas Moreno (21:01):

So I had more of a headache because I was going through caffeine withdrawal, then pain from my appendix and my mom comes up, I finally get to eat. So I'm literally scarfing everything down and there was this bread roll there and mom comes up for whatever reason without asking and tries to grab my bread roll. And I like, what are you doing? I didn't eat, I haven't eaten in 24 hours. What you doing? Trying to take my bed. And that was the first time Janice sees me angry like that for the first time. On top of that, on top of that me yelling at my mom. So I was like, I tell her all the time, that was your first opportunity to leave me, but you didn't. So I gave you a shot. But she stayed and then we get married in 2022, going on almost three years already next month.

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Michael Fulwiler (21:54):

That's awesome. So fast forward to 2020, you've been open about the fact that during the pandemic you lost 10 clients, you also lost your mom during that time. What was that like for you?

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Bas Moreno (22:09):

Alright, let me backtrack to the beginning. Summer of 2019. So my mom had history with vertigo and falling from time to time. She fell, really had a bad fall, I want to say like 2018, to the point that she needed seven staples in her head. So I told her the next fall you have is you really going to hurt yourself. So fast forward 2019, I'm going to taking the kids to go see their godmother in Poughkeepsie, which is upstate in New York for the day. And then the next day my best friend was getting married. So I was telling my mom, I'm not going to be home all weekend. You need to be careful. Don't go anywhere if you don't have to let dad go to the supermarket or whatever. Soon enough that the very next day I get a life alert message on my phone, just got to take it to the hospital.

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Bas Moreno (23:03):

And then coming to find out she broke her ankle in two places. So at the time also, I was working at a long-term care insurance plan company providing case management for adults, older adults, so the seniors helping 'em with their Medicaid application, recertifications, making sure any discharge planning from the hospital going back home or if they're in short-term rehab, going back home if need be or setting up long-term care for them in a nursing home. So just a lot of variety of different things with the older adult population. So I'm in it working and then I got two older adults at home and doing my own care management from my mom initially, and now I'm literally using my own work skills like finding nursing homes for my mom and based on her insurance, there was a couple of nursing homes that I wanted to put her in, but insurance wise didn't pay for it.

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Bas Moreno (24:04):

So doing all that backend stuff, she needed no nursing home care, at least for a short term rehab to take care for her ankle. The ankle turns into she had a bed sore on the same ankle, so was dealing with that. Her diabetes didn't cause the bedsore to heal properly. So put up an equipment, it's called a wound vac. So it's literally almost like a handheld vacuum that they literally put on your skin to try to heal any broken skin that older adults will tend to get. So that wasn't working. So literally this December and we start hearing these first rumblings, what's going on in China, something's happening out there in China. Then obviously 20 21, 20 20 comes in hearing more and more of it. Now it's hearing in Europe, I really didn't pay too much into it, at least not initially, and then literally pretty much was setting up my own discharge plan for my own mom to get out.

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Bas Moreno (25:10):

What would that look like? What equipment do I need? They were trying to give me equipment that I was telling them it doesn't fit my house. I literally have a one bedroom apartment with five people living in an apartment. All I need is a hospital bed and they're trying to give me these other equipment. And I was like, that doesn't fit in my house. And they're trying to say that I'm denying it or refusing the equipment. I'm like, no, I'm not refusing though. Dare write that on the notes. It won't fit. So we just doing the best we can and trying to talk to my mom. I'm literally having arguments with her my first time as an adult or having arguments with her, who's going to take care of you? I got to go to work you. Yes, I know you want to come home.

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Bas Moreno (25:51):

And it is only me and dad and I recently had got diagnosed with two herniated diss in my back. I literally was playing pickup basketball months prior and I hurt my finger that it was still not healing properly. And then my dad, dad was really the one with the health issues. So I was like, I don't care. I want to go home. I was like, I understand you want to go home, but let's figure it out. So basically I did an unsafe discharge from my own mom and literally it was a nightmare to say the least, but I'm glad I brought her home because literally two weeks or just over two weeks later, the world shut down and in COVID is full on. Even though in New York in the city, the mayor at the time was taking forever to shut down schools and letting things go.

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Bas Moreno (26:39):

And the governor at the time was putting people who was diagnosed with COVID in nursing homes. So now you're affecting people who didn't have in the nursing homes and now they getting it and it is this domino effect of that. And then I'm dealing with clients and then literally Microsoft Outlook became my worst enemy, literally seeing emails of this client passed away. Then we have our morning meetings and then during the meeting finding out somebody else passed away at the meeting, go back to my computer desk and seeing somebody else pass away. So it was a wild time and then still having to still do home visits, emergency visits. So the Medicaid renewals were still happening. We got people who lived on the projects and having their housing needed to be recertified. So literally having to dig through people's mail and finding all the documents I need to help recertify people's houses.

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Bas Moreno (27:42):

So I literally had my mask on, my gloves on and out there, or my headphones listen to music, they calm myself down. I did so much walking, a lot of my clients lives, at least a train ride, and then I have to take a bus to go see them. So I would somehow walk to the train to wherever I needed to. I lived in the Bronx if I got to go to Washington Heights and walk over the bridge to go into Manhattan and then just take the train so that I don't try to infect myself with people on the bus, then I was literally doing that and then walking back home just to try to protect myself. And later my dad has autoimmune issues. Obviously I wasn't trying to get sick as best as I could. And luckily at the time, my now wife, my girlfriend at the time, Janice, she was working out of school and they went full virtual.

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Bas Moreno (28:37):

So she took on the responsibility of taking care of my kids while I still had to go to work so that I only would see my kids on the weekends, which kind of sucked too, at least initially talking about March and April or April of my dad caring for my mom on his own. And then I would come back Sunday night and basically it became dad duty for babies, whatever mom needed overnight or whatever and was doing that into the morning. So it was a wild time and I was able to finally work from home mid April, 2020 because the company, they weren't ready at all for working remotely. So they were behind in terms of getting us what we needed to work from home. And then one day working from home, I'm literally, I was in the bedroom, the bedroom, I did everything in my bedroom.

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Michael Fulwiler (29:35):

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Bas Moreno (30:32):

So try to prevent myself from giving anything in the house, and my mom was taking her medicine choking on some Gatorade, and I was like, you all right? What's going on? And she's literally choking and she starts getting red and was like, oh, snap. Literally grabbed the phone call. I tried to call her doctor initially first and then this is getting worse. Lemme just call 9 1 1. So at the time, this is April, 2020, if you go to the hospital, that's it. You're not coming back. At least not in New York City,

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Bas Moreno (31:05):

So you can't visit either. So I literally say my last goodbye, I'm thinking in the hallway in my apartment buildings, and then literally that weekend got, I hope this doctor is still alive and doing well, but literally had a doctor from the ER using WhatsApp from his own phone or somebody's phone. And so I was able to communicate with my mom that weekend. Was still alert, oriented, yes, was confused, but she wanted me to come visit. I'm like, I can't go visit you. We don't know what this is and stuff, but just try to stay calm and do whatever the doctors tell you what to do. So I get a call that following Tuesday like, Hey, we're going to discharge your mom. I was like, what? It was like she's pretty much medically stable yet. Yes, she does have COVID, but pretty much there's no other really symptoms right now.

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Bas Moreno (32:05):

They were like, so I'm fighting with the doctors at the hospital. Then all of a sudden my dad's doctor is fighting with me, calling me because he's autoimmune, got my mom with COVID and I was like, they're trying to ask me can my dad go somewhere? Was like, closest family is in either Florida or Massachusetts, so that's not happening. We are going to figure this out. So all right, so she comes home and as soon as she gets out the ambulance, I can see right away she has a flat affect. I want to say this appropriately because it's a mental health podcast, but literally I could tell right away she wasn't there flat affect, just I knew something was off and it was like she only could say a couple words. She just needed some water. They put this emergency blanket type of thing that you could rip off. Surely you had no clothes on, literally no diaper on, no clothes on. So I literally, oh, snap. She got no clothes on. I'm rushing to go get a diaper, put her on in case literally how you deal with a baby. It's like in case of pee poop, whatever, you're not doing it on the floor or whatever. Put clothes on her and gave her some water.

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Bas Moreno (33:26):

She needed to go back to the hospital trying to calm my dad's nurse. He was like, she still got COVID. Yeah, we going to figure this out. I'm going to call the nine one one and have her go back to the hospital the next day. So literally what I did, they picked her up, took her back to the hospital, trying to explain to the doctors. I literally had a coherent conversation literally a few days ago. So they thought that was her baseline, just her not be able to speak and not able to say anything on mute for the most part and not really able to be coherent in speaking in her mind. No, this is not her baseline whatsoever. COVID must have did something with her brain or whatever messing with her body internally somehow, and they couldn't figure it out. I was telling of the doctors she needed to go to long-term rehab, I can't care for her in the house anymore.

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Bas Moreno (34:20):

It's just literally too much for us in the house. So I got set up again, finding nursing homes for mom. Nursing home was found. It was like I could walk there literally within the same neighborhood of where we lived at that I've walked constantly as a kid. So I walked past there without knowing that was a nursing home as a kid coming full circle moment, which even hits even harder of losing your own mom. So it literally goes there Friday, Saturday, literally I get a phone call. So her organs are literally failing her and then the next day I get a call, she passes away. Rough. Definitely rough to say the least.

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Michael Fulwiler (35:04):

So tough. Yeah, no, I appreciate you sharing that. Just so much going on at the time. So much loss.

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Bas Moreno (35:12):

Yeah, it was.

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Bas Moreno (35:14):

From that loss, you wrote a book of poetry and I'd love to hear more about that. How did that come about?

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Bas Moreno (35:22):

I guess thanks to therapy, it was basically my release or the trauma release came out of it because even prior to that 2019, I became a certified instructor and then went through a audition at a gym and actually got hired to be a Zumba instructor in case basically as a sub. So in case somebody calls out or couldn't do it last minute, they put me into sub and teach a class. So I was working at a gym and then COVID happens and then on top of me working my nine to five, and so I get furloughed from the gym job. So I got no gym to release all the stress of losing all these clients and then losing mom. So out of nowhere, I think one day I was sitting on a couch, I don't know, was either on a Zoom call or watching DJ D-Nice on Instagram or I don't know what I was doing, but I know was sitting on the couch and these words just started popping in my head and they started writing and oh snap, I got to poetry this rhymes.

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Bas Moreno (36:29):

And then writing some more words like, oh, just rhymes too. So the plan going into 2020 was to move to Delaware. So I still maintained that plan despite all my losses. And then I did end up leaving New York, moving to Delaware, actually July 4th, 2020. We stayed over Janice's older brother's house for the weekend and it was gracious enough, him and his wife was like, y'all can stay with us until you guys find a place down here. There's only so much Zillow you could do online that you actually got to walk into these houses and see if you like it or not. So that's what we did. So Janice actually came down with the kids first during the summer while I was still working. So Amtrak became my best friend. Literally the words would pop up literally anywhere at any time, day or night, so it could be sleeping.

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Bas Moreno (37:25):

Then all of a sudden these words pop up literally in the dark having a pen and pad or a pencil and started writing in the dark. I figure it out in the morning, what the heck I wrote or be in the bathroom. I literally had to take pen and pads to the bathroom, the shower and words would pop up there, and I got to write this down. I know I'll forget. And to the point got these 10 poems, and at first I was going to do an ebook, and then one of my past podcast guests has a writing program to write your book. So I did that program and had it formatted and was able to publish it out. And literally two years later, it was like 2022 on Amazon and was doing vending events and selling hard copies of the books. Yes. So it was able to publish a poetry book.

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Michael Fulwiler (38:16):

And that's Triumph Through Pain is the name of that. So we'll drop that link.

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Bas Moreno (38:21):

Triumph Through Pain: How to Maximize Your Full Potential in Hard Times. Public grief, loss, aelf-awareness, financial education. Yeah, definitely go get it. It is also available in audiobook too. If you can go on Spotify or Libros fm, you could get, if you're more of an audiobook listener.

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Michael Fulwiler (38:42):

I want to talk about your work as a financial social worker.

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Bas Moreno (38:45):

Yes.

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Michael Fulwiler (38:46):

Also. So you have your nine to five day job, but you're doing other things too. You have Bass City Entertainment I saw. So that's through, it's like a Zumba company where you're doing stuff virtually.

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Bas Moreno (38:58):

Yeah, initially, so October, 2020. So of course the financial literacy became all the rage during 2020.

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Bas Moreno (39:07):

And it literally started watching a lot of YouTube buying financial books. I started investing in the stock market for the first time, no open up, no accounts for my kids. So they became literally stock market investors through me, whatever I was learning, try to do, put it in practice. And so I started my LLC in 2020. So initially I wanted to merge my teachings of teaching Zumba online and then my poetry together had self-care for us mental health professionals. What I didn't do was do market research and see actually people were willing to pay for that. That was my first mistake. So that really didn't take off at all. So I literally rebranded. So I found out about the financial social work certification during the social work wealth conference of 2020. I want to say 2023 and oh snap. There's like a whole certification for this.

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Bas Moreno (40:06):

Not a lot of people know about it. I did the certification, I did it last year during 2024. I'm like, that's one of my goals for 2024 and do this certification. So I paid for the certification. This is literally on your own going through these books and at the end you take a test and was basically open book test based on the knowledge that you're reading. And then you get a certification and is accredited through NASW. So it was a legit certification and yeah, got certified. So basically my business now provides financial education and counseling for people of color in the sandwich generation. Folks like myself who are struggling with their finances while caregiving. The funny thing with that is a lot of people, especially us in our black and brown communities, or just people in general, don't like talking about money and those very taboo and talking about estate planning. For myself, I didn't really have those conversations. COVID took those conversations away from me with my mom, I knew my mom had a life insurance policy. She had one on herself, which when she passed away, I was like, so how much money I was getting? I was like, bro, that's it. You struggling to make all these payments every month, these premiums.

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Michael Fulwiler (41:24):

You're talking about, the hospital bed equipment, all that stuff at home, that's all going to cost, right? The nursing home, the care.

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Bas Moreno (41:29):

Part of the reason why she got discharged too was the insurance was no longer going to pay any more time. I maxed out her days and then the hospital bed, it wasn't fully paid for it by the insurance, thank goodness. So they actually called me, Hey, we're coming to get the bed. Thank you Lord Jesus, please take this bed. We need the space now. So they took the bed. So luckily that had nothing to do with the life insurance policy. So New York was so bad because so many people passed away that supposedly, well, I was told because mom died as a result of COVID, they had that cremate her body. And because so many people passed away in New York City, they had to send her body to Connecticut to do the cremation and then bring her remains back to New York. And so funerals was still happening.

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Bas Moreno (42:22):

So literally when I went to the funeral home, there was a funeral happening. I was like, damn, while all these people, I understand somebody passed away at a funeral, but I was very protective. I was low key germaphobe type, why are you close to me? That was any doorknob I accidentally touched or whatever, immediately wash my hands and put hand sanitizer. So I was really trying to protect myself and stuff like that. So literally they gave me her ashes. It was in a box, a string book bag had literally put the string book bag on my back and I'm walking to the train station and we passed by where the nursing home where she stayed at all those months, and it was in my head, hearing my mom's voice cursing that nursing home. Yeah, but that's one of the things too about Phil education is even if older adults got life insurance policies, trying to get more bang for your buck in terms of making sure you're getting enough coverage, that could actually cover a full funeral if you wanted, or if you own a home and you still have mortgage payments to make sure your home is paid for and things of that nature.

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Bas Moreno (43:33):

So that's kind of what I provide with my services, having those type of conversations and then building kind of a network of folks to act, refer people to like, Hey, you need a life insurance policy. I could refer you to these are people that I know that does this and could refer you to those people. Or if you need more financial management stuff in terms of stocks and options or whatever like that, I could refer you to somebody else because first thing off the bat, I tell people, Hey, you ever thought about the stock market and kind of give overview? These are companies that you could potentially open an account with, but I can't tell you to go invest in Apple or Tesla like that. That's a whole different certification that I'm not ready for it. So I tell people right off the bat, I'm not a financial advisor. I'm a financial social worker, educator and counselor. What does day-to-day look like? Normalize whatever feelings that you may have in of your day-to-day caregiver struggles. What does that look like? Navigating Medicaid, Medicare, Obamacare, while we still have it before Republicans take it off, potentially 2026. So those different things that use my already case management, care management experience that I already have regurgitated in terms of the financial space.

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Michael Fulwiler (44:55):

We're coming to the end here. You also have a podcast. We haven't even had a chance to talk about that, but definitely go check out Social Work Grants podcast, your 200 episodes in having a lot of conversations like this, which I really appreciate, especially bringing in folks from the black and brown communities, having conversations about finances and social work and really normalizing a lot of that. So I think that's so needed.

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Bas Moreno (45:16):

So I started a podcast quickly in January, 2020. It goes back to wanting to be a sports broadcaster. One of my friends had a podcast and one of the episodes he did was actually how to start a podcast. So I listened to it. It was like, oh, I could do this. And one of the podcasts I listened to called Earn Your Leisure, they did a whole podcast of ways you can potentially make money from podcasting. I was like, lemme get this a shot. And it was literally one day, January, 2020, I'm like this on my phone, sitting on my bed phone hovering over my mouth. So I had the name already picked out and this is the Social Work race podcast, and I have no idea what we're going to talk about, but we're going to figure out whatever I said the first episode and literally whatever ideas I had in my head, I just did it.

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Bas Moreno (46:07):

So having social work spotlights and meeting people who I followed on Instagram and it was like, Hey, you want to come on the podcast? So I want to hear boots on the ground. What is happening in your city, your state that I'm not going to get from any major network? What is happening? What's going on in your community, especially while COVID was still happening and what is happening in your community? So that started in doing that. Then we got the stimulus checks during 2020, so that when I interviewed my writing coach, and he's a financial expert as well, so had him on the podcast. I had NHL, former Superstar, Theo Flury on the podcast, former chairs of NASW, like New York City chapter of the podcast. So it was like D-N-A-S-W-C-E-O knows who the heck I am. He never met me before until we met last year.

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Bas Moreno (47:04):

It's been growing and heard was my first paid sponsor last year and no, thank you for that. And I'm still trying to find the eventual paid sponsors for the podcast and still trying to navigate, even though the whole podcasting space wants to go to video, which is very annoying because it makes editing harder a little bit. We still chucking along five years in 219 episodes as of this recording and goals somehow get to three, even though it's been a struggle sometimes, but what the heck to talk about? And literally something will happen on the news or anything will happen, or last minute somebody wants to jump on real quick. And how we've been talking for over an hour today. That's basically how our conversations go and let's talk social work and talk mental health and talk. You have a business and you're a social worker.

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Bas Moreno (47:58):

What are your struggles in terms of your business? They don't teach us business fundamentals and social work grad school, and we literally learning as we going and nothing about marketing, nothing about taxes, all the backend stuff, how to market yourself and all these different things that people struggle. I'm still struggling with that now in my business and finding clients and try to get government contracts from city and state and federal contracts to build our businesses and trying to get business credit and all the stuff that could help us maximizing our business and especially relates to social work entrepreneurship, definitely because of my, now, I wouldn't say hatred, but my extreme annoyance with the ASWB and there's ways now that you don't necessarily need to get your license to actually make a pretty good living. Yes, it'll be harder if you don't want to do clinical work.

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Bas Moreno (48:52):

You don't necessarily have to get your L. You do a variety of different things. So there's clothing lines, podcasting, you write books, host workshops, and you already have your basic skills once you have your MSW to use it, whatever passions you have. I've had somebody who uses the scope of group practice and teaches women how to defend themselves with firearms in Texas. So it's like don't need a license for that necessarily. So it was a variety of different things. So I reached the gamut in terms of what we could do in the space in social work.

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Michael Fulwiler (49:34):

Yeah, I appreciate that. You just have been so consistent over time. We have a lot of folks on the podcasts who do different types of things in their business, and something we hear a lot is it's just really about consistency. And you've been doing this podcast for five years and I'm sure at times it's like, is this really worth it? And don't feel like doing it today. If you're going to have a podcast, you have a newsletter or YouTube channel, just keep going.

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Bas Moreno (49:58):

The podcast definitely helped me with my mental health, especially the podcast also became my outlet on top of my book, going through what was happening with clients passing away and just living in New York during pandemic and my mom passed away, did an episode about that and when I got remarried, did an episode about that. So I include my personal life stuff in the podcast episodes as well. So the podcast has helped my mental health and still do now that I'm actually just allowing myself to feel all the feels of all the losses that I've had and sharing my wins too. So yeah, it's definitely been helpful.

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Michael Fulwiler (50:41):

Good, man. I know it's Mother's Day on Sunday, so I'll definitely be thinking about you. Two questions here.

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Bas Moreno (50:47):

Yes.

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Michael Fulwiler (50:49):

What's one thing that people in the sandwich generation need to hear right now?

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Bas Moreno (50:55):

Man, I feel like the government is attacking caregivers currently with all the cuts that they wanted to do. It's okay not to be okay, but definitely get the help that you need. Myself, I'm available taking clients. There's other financial social workers out there as well. So yeah, definitely get the help that you need. There's a lot happening right now, a lot to navigate, but there's help out there.

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Michael Fulwiler (51:20):

And then what's one thing that you want therapists and social workers to take away from this conversation?

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Bas Moreno (51:26):

Keep grinding. It's a lot. I know I've teased on the podcast about those who are in private practice going to be doing or potentially doing a lot of case management, and I know there's all this noise about care management versus no therapists online and stuff like that, but there's a lot of people that are struggling or people probably struggling more now after COVID that they were prior, or people who are already were struggling prior to COVID and are even struggling even more right now. Watch as much news as you can handle because there's literally stuff happening every single day, unfortunately, because you need to know what's going to happen. You need to know whether the house already passed to cut Medicaid and Medicare. Now the site that passes and you're taking Medicaid, Medicare for your business and seeing clients, how are you going to navigate that for your business? How are you going to help your clients? How are you going to pivot so that you can still make a livable living? You need to live too? And the United States of America is expensive right now to live anywhere. You got to know what's happening in the news to figure out how to navigate with your business.

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Michael Fulwiler (52:38):

Thank you so much for coming on the show. For folks who want to connect with you, where can they do that?

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Bas Moreno (52:42):

Yes, you can follow me on Bas Moreno Consulting, on TikTok, Instagram, and Threads. You can go to basmorenoconsulting.com, my website. For anybody in the sandwich generation. I'm offering a 45 minute free consultation to talk about what's your number one struggle in terms of your finances and caregiving. So yeah, definitely connect. And also anybody, I also do public speaking, so anybody needs a public speaker, definitely reach out.

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Michael Fulwiler (53:10):

Awesome. I hope folks take you up on that. Thanks for your time today. Thanks for sharing your story, and we'll talk soon. Yeah, thank you. 

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Bas Moreno (53:16):

Yeah, thank you.

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Michael Fulwiler (53:18):

Thanks for listening to this episode of Heard Business School, brought to you by Heard, the financial management platform for therapists. To get the class notes for this week's episode, go to join heard.com/podcast. And don't forget to subscribe on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. We'll see you in the next class.