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Five Lessons on Caregiving from Wilderness Survival

In 2015, after a violent attack on her beloved partner, Virginia Eubanks suddenly became a family caregiver. In the weeks, months, and years that followed, she and her partner struggled to stay afloat as they faced wave upon wave of setbacks, including a serious case of post-traumatic stress disorder. Then, a second case. Eubanks developed “collateral” PTSD, a condition common among caregivers but rarely discussed.

An old lifesaving manual provided unexpected help. Inspired by its lessons, Eubanks studied wilderness first aid, kayak self-rescue, winter survival, bushwhacking, and lifeguarding. She interviewed experts and everyday heroes—from neuroscientists to monks to forest rangers. Join Eubanks to discover what it takes to build communities of care that can sustain us in uncertain times. 

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About the Speaker

Virginia Eubanks, PhD. Associate Professor. Department of Political Science. University of Albany, SUNY

Virginia Eubanks is a longform investigative reporter, essayist, memoirist, and Associate Professor of Political Science at the University at Albany, SUNY. She is the author of A Guide to Open Water Lifesaving: Lessons on Love and Survival (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, August 2026). She is also the author of Automating Inequality: How High-Tech Tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor; Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age; and co-editor, with Alethia Jones, of Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith. Her investigative reporting and personal essays have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Scientific American, The Nation, Harper’s, and Nature. With Andrea Quijada, she is the co-editor of a forthcoming collection of oral histories, Not a Number: Global Stories from the Automated Welfare State. She has been a fellow or resident at MacDowell, Edward Albee, New America, Carey Institute for Global Good, and Blue Mountain Center.

When not sleeping in her truck in the Adirondacks, she lives in Troy, NY.