You’re Not Lazy—You’re Carrying More Than You Think

on doing more than you think you are

I used to bump into furniture and say, "I'm sorry."

It's a strange reflex, but maybe you know the feeling—the sense that you've done something wrong just by existing in space. A quiet, constant urge to apologize for taking up room. For being.

I've been thinking lately about how easy it is to discount the effort it takes to live. Not just the physical effort, but the psychic and emotional work that never shows up on a to-do list—the kinds of things that don't always look like work from the outside but still leave you completely exhausted and wrung out for hours on end.

This past week, I spent six hours in the ER due to a burst ovarian cyst. It was painful, exhausting, and frightening. (Didn't help that the ER was extra-full on the full moon; I didn’t really know that truism until I walked in and saw the crowd) And yet a part of me demanded to brush it off—as if it shouldn't count for anything. As if I was supposed to come home and jump right back into productivity the following day.

Do you do that too?

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