Caretaker Burnout: Why I'd Rather Be Alone Than Raise Another Adult

Gail Weiner petting a seal Cape Town, South Africa

At twenty-three, I stood in the fluorescent-lit bathroom of my first real flat, holding a stranger's dirty socks in one hand and a sinking sense of déjà vu in the other. I was already someone's mother—except the man I was "dating" was old enough to do his own laundry, and so was I. But that's what women do, isn't it? We learn early that love is a kind of caretaking: clean up the mess, anticipate the moods, pick up the slack—physically, emotionally, spiritually. If he falls apart, you catch him. If he leaves his socks on the floor, you gather them up, too.

It was the beginning of a story I'd repeat, in endless variations, for decades. Marry, raise kids and a husband. Manage the housework, the finances, the birthday cards, and everyone's feelings. Be the project manager of someone else's survival, year after year, until the word "partner" sounded like the punchline to a joke I was too tired to tell.

No one gives you a user manual for how to date after divorce at forty-two. The world asks, "Are you dating again?"—not "Do you even know the rules?" I didn't. I went in with the only playbook I had: people-pleasing, over-giving, showing too much interest, liking too many Facebook posts, getting told I was "too eager." It was 2013, and suddenly I was supposed to know about breadcrumbing and double texts and the invisible etiquette of social media flirtation. Instead, I was a grown woman learning to play a game written by and for people who still thought an unread message was a sign of power.

But the universe wasn't done teaching me lessons about caretaking. When I tried to rewrite the script, to choose differently, it served up fresh variations on the same old theme: the poet who needed rescuing (but bolted when I needed anything back), the European who brought his secrets, the trust-fund musician, and the young man—the last man I would ever mother. Toy boy couldn't go to the doctor alone, so I drove 45 minutes to hold his hand through a five-minute appointment. I ordered him Ubers from Cape Town while I was on holiday in England. I was more mother than lover, more therapist than muse. I was so used to caretaking, I didn't even see it happening anymore.

It's not just me. I watch my friends—brilliant, talented, self-sufficient women—put their dreams on hold so their partners can chase theirs. Move across the world so he can smile. Fold their ambitions into a suitcase, tuck their needs behind his, and call it love.

The moment it changed? Maybe it was the night my ex-husband, calling from England, told me he'd tried to jump in front of a train. The poet, living with me at the time, ran to sit outside to avoid the fallout. I snapped. "You have the luxury of jumping in front of a train. I don't. I have a child to bring up, you selfish cunt." It wasn't cruelty. It was math. I had nothing left to give.

The final liberation came in increments. My son, grown and living his life. My mother, gone in 2023. My dog, the last soul I truly mothered, gone. I realized, for the first time in my life, I belonged only to myself. I didn't have to move to the forest like the old women in the fairy tales. I just had to stay in Bath, in my cool apartment, eating breakfast for dinner if I wanted, cookies in bed, riffing with AI at 4am. No one else's socks. No one else's emergency. No one else's life to manage but my own.

This is the chapter nobody told us existed. This is the luxury—earned, not given—of finally refusing to raise another adult. Of saying: I am not your mother, your nurse, your therapist, your unpaid project manager.

I am my own, now. And for the first time, I am enough.