The Invisible Scorecard: The Emotional Labor Women Carry

Sometimes I wonder who exactly I am trying to prove myself to.

I think of what everyone else likes when I cook. What my daughter will eat. What my husband likes. What my son loves when he is home. I can plan an entire meal around everybody sitting at that table and somehow not once ask myself - what do I feel like eating today?

And I don't think I am unusual.

I see this so much in women. I’ve watched men do it too, but among women it seems to be the rule rather than the exception.

This need to be a good mother. A good daughter. A good partner. Good at our jobs. To keep our homes a certain way. To remember the birthdays, make the appointments, check if everyone has eaten, notice when someone is unusually quiet, keep in touch with people, show up when somebody needs us.

To say yes when we really want to say no.

And then somehow do all of it without looking like we are struggling.

The strange thing is, I am not sure anyone is actually asking us to do half of it.

If I asked my children what they need from me to consider me a good mother, I suspect their list would be much shorter than mine.

And yet there is this invisible scoreboard in my head.

I should have done that.

I should have remembered this.

I should have called.

I should have cooked.

I should have made more time.

I should have been more patient.

I should be doing better.

And God forbid I choose myself occasionally. Then comes the guilt.

I know where at least some of this comes from.

I grew up watching my mother put herself last. We lived in a joint family, so there were always a lot of people to cook for. She would make sure my father had his favourite food. With me, she would keep making different things until she found something I liked and would eat. By the time everyone had eaten, sometimes there was hardly anything left for her.

I don't remember her making a fuss about it. That was just how she was.

And the thing is, she is over 80 now. And she is still like that.

We grow up watching love look like this. Feeding everyone first. Taking care of everyone first. Making sure everyone else is okay before asking ourselves whether we are okay.

And then I wonder : do we pass it on too?

When our daughters watch us constantly put ourselves last, what are we teaching them about what being a woman looks like?

And perhaps it isn't only what they watch us do. Sometimes we expect it from them too. Mothers from daughters. Mothers-in-law from daughters-in-law. Maybe without even realising it, we pass on the same expectations that exhausted us.

There is another uncomfortable truth in all of this.

When you do everything for everyone, people get used to it.

Something they may never have asked for in the beginning slowly becomes something they expect. Not necessarily because they are selfish or ungrateful. Simply because this is how life has always worked around them.

If you always remember, why would they need to?

If you always organise, they stop thinking about organising.

If you always say yes, your no suddenly feels like a problem.

And that is partly on us too.

I have spent a lot of my life bending over backwards for people I love. And I don't regret loving them or taking care of them. I don't want to become someone who doesn't do those things.

I just don't want to disappear somewhere in the doing.

I am trying to learn that now.

That I don't have to earn my place in people's lives by constantly doing things for them.

That saying no doesn't make me selfish.

That taking care of myself isn't something I should get to only after everybody else has been taken care of.

Maybe self-care doesn't always have to be something big either.

Buy yourself the flowers.

Order what you want for dinner sometimes.

Spend an afternoon doing absolutely nothing useful.

Go for coffee alone. Have lunch alone. Travel alone.

And don't be afraid of your own company.

I think there is something quite important about learning to spend time with ourselves. Not waiting for someone to come with us before we do something we want to do. Not seeing being alone as something sad or something that needs to be fixed.

Learning to enjoy ourselves. To take care of ourselves. Maybe even to love ourselves a little more.

We are so good at being kind to the people we love.

Perhaps we need to remember that we are one of those people too.