Chapter 3: The Mental Load is Crushing Us

If housework is the visible mess, the mental load is the invisible one – and it’s just as exhausting. It’s the endless to-do list running through our heads, the constant calculations and planning that keeps our households afloat.

It’s remembering that Jamie has a swimming lesson on Tuesday, the dog’s vaccinations are overdue and your spouse texting you to remind you that it’s their mother’s birthday tomorrow (note: you’ve already bought and wrapped her gifts, the cards are written from everyone, including the kids, and you’ve already booked a table at her favourite restaurant for 7pm Saturday – which he would know if HE CHECKED THE BLOODY FAMILY CALENDAR!).

We’ve all heard the phrase ‘it takes a village’, but somehow we are the village. Everyone else? Tourists. Lovely people, sure, but they’re just here to enjoy the scenery. Again, take your partner. They’re wonderful – really, they are – but when they ‘help you’ why does it feel like you’re supervising a puppy? You ask them to pack the kids’ lunchboxes and suddenly they’re shouting across the house “Where’s the bread?” as though you have a secret bread vault somewhere. And then there’s the piece de resistance: the Weaponised Incompetence Special. “Oh, you’re just better at organising things than me.” Translation: “I don’t want to think about it, so now it’s your problem.”

You might think that the answer is delegation. Cute. See, this is the problem with the mental load: it’s not necessarily the ‘doing’. It’s the thinking behind everything. Take bin day, for example – you may not be the one physically taking the rubbish out, but you’re sure as hell the one reminding everyone that A) it’s bin day, B) which bins need to be put out and C) that no, glass can’t ‘just go in with the cardboard’.

Furthermore, the problem with delegation is that it requires effort. You could explain to your spouse how to manage school emails or show your kid how to actually put their laundry away, but let’s be real – it’s easier (read: faster) to do it yourself. Or, you could try to ‘let go’ of some responsibilities. But society has ensured you’ll get the side-eye if your child shows up at school without the cakes you promised for the PTA bake sale (what kind of monster forgets the cakes?).

But here’s the real kicker: the mental load isn’t just draining, it’s also invisible. When you’re doing it well, no one notices. No one sees the mental juggling act it took to pull off a successful Christmas or a seamless school run. And because it’s invisible, it’s easy for others to dismiss. 

So here’s your next challenge: leave something undone. Forget to buy milk. Skip the birthday card. Let the calendar lapse. Sometimes, letting things fall through the cracks is the only way to make the cracks visible.