@merrykennedy647: There's a specific version of loneliness nobody talks about. Not the kind that comes from being alone. The kind that comes from being the one people come to. You answer. You show up. You hold it together. And somehow the question of how you're doing never quite makes it back around. Not because people don't care. Because you've never appeared to need it. You made yourself into someone who handles things. And the world responded by bringing you more. Every time you held something together without showing the cost, you taught people you didn't have one. The stronger you seem, the lonelier the work gets. Not because strength isolates you. Because it teaches the people around you that you're fine. That you always land on your feet. That checking in is something you need less than others. After a while, you start to believe it yourself. The exhaustion isn't from carrying everything. It's from carrying it in silence while looking like it costs you nothing. In the gap between how you appear and how you actually feel — most people never look. Because you've gotten very good at not showing it. The woman who never asks doesn't get asked. Not because she's forgotten. Because she's been too capable for too long for anyone to think to check. This is the particular invisibility that comes with being reliable. The more consistently you show up for others, the less others think to show up for you. Not out of malice. Out of trained expectation. You taught them that you're fine. Over years. Consistently. Without complaint and without visible cost. And they believed you. Because you were very convincing. That's its own kind of REAL isolation. One with no name. Which makes it twice as hard to carry.
