When Grief Turns Into a Full-Time Job You Never Signed Up For
You don’t have time to fall apart, so you schedule your grief between responsibilities. You’re not fine. You’re functioning.
Nothing is wrong. No fights. No betrayal. Just a relationship that stopped asking anything of you — and that’s why it feels heavy.
Nothing is technically wrong, but you’re exhausted anyway. Not from conflict — from staying quiet to keep the relationship stable. If things only work when you edit yourself, that’s not peace — it’s emotional management.
The business works because you’re always on. If you slow down, things wobble—because what you built runs on your vigilance, not structure. That’s not leadership. That’s a system that never learned to stand on its own.
You don’t have time to fall apart, so you schedule your grief between responsibilities. You’re not fine. You’re functioning.