A Mother’s Cry for Help

At New Stone Age Retreat, we believe healing begins with truth. Too often, mothers, caregivers, and women carry impossible weight in silence, breaking under the load while the world expects them to remain strong. This piece is a raw cry for help, not just for one woman, but for every woman who has been the rock for too long.

We are making space for these cries because they matter. Because your voice matters. Because no one should carry it all alone.

There comes a point where strength stops feeling like a gift and starts feeling like a curse. People look at you as the rock, the anchor, the one who will always figure it out. And for decades, you do. You pick up the slack. You make the calls. You drive the miles. You carry everyone else’s burdens on your back because you can.

But strength, when demanded endlessly, becomes a chain. It hardens around you like cement until you’re no longer seen as a person at all, only a structure to lean against. People chip away at you as if you’re a wall that will never crumble. They pile their troubles on top of you as if you’re a foundation that can never crack. They mistake your endurance for invincibility.

And so you become less human in their eyes and more like infrastructure: the power line that keeps the lights on, the engine that never shuts off, the bridge that holds the weight of everyone crossing, even as it creaks under the load. Nobody wonders what happens when the power line snaps, when the engine overheats, when the bridge gives way. Nobody wonders what happens to the rock when the ocean keeps beating against it year after year.

Because you’ve always managed. You’ve always survived. And survival tricks people into believing you’ll always be there, ready to take the next hit.

But what happens when you can’t? What happens when the rock is slowly crumbling? When cracks form beneath the surface, invisible at first, until one day the weight becomes too much and pieces begin to break away. What happens when the anchor rusts in the water it has held steady for so long? What happens when the unshakable foundation starts to sink into the ground it once stood firm on?

The truth is, no one notices until it’s too late. Until the rock is dust, until the bridge collapses, until the light goes out. They only realize their burden on you when you are gone, when there is nothing left to lean on.

I am tired of being the safety net. I am tired of being the buffer. I am tired of being the one who figures it out when everyone else throws their hands up, gives up, or refuses to make a change. I am tired of being the ear for every complaint, every crisis, every story about how unfair life is,  especially when nothing ever changes after all the talking.

Why can’t you look it up yourself? Why can’t you try? Why is it always me who has to know, who has to fix, who has to carry?

It feels like I have become the library, the search engine, the emergency hotline, the roadside assistance, the counselor’s couch, the late-night 24-hour store where everyone comes when they’ve run out of options. But unlike those things, I am not staffed with endless workers. I am one person, stretched thin. And every time someone comes to me, it is another withdrawal from an account that no one ever makes deposits into.

I am tired of being treated like an infinite resource when I am running on fumes.

I have been the transportation, the caregiver, the financial backup, the problem solver, the therapist, the inspiration, the mom, the dad, the friend, the stand-in for everyone who disappeared. I have been the one who kept the wheels turning, even when mine were falling off. The one who held the roof up while storms ripped through. The one who stood in every gap left open by someone else’s absence.

I was the one who handled the death of a parent alone, making calls, sorting details, holding space for everyone else’s grief while carrying my own in silence. People said, “let me know what you need,” but what I needed was for someone to lift the weight off my shoulders entirely. To take it, not to ask. To show up without being told.

But no one ever did.

And here I am again,  the same person, the same role, the same weight. The same hands holding up collapsing walls. The same back breaking under loads that were never mine to carry. Nothing has changed except the years stolen from me, the energy drained out of me, and the silence that meets me when I need someone to hold me the way I have held everyone else.

I am burned out. My body feels it in every ache that lingers, every heavy breath, every night of restless sleep. My mind feels it in the fog that never clears, in the thoughts that circle without end. My spirit feels it in the hollowness where joy used to live, in the way hope flickers like a dying flame.

There is no break. No one to lean on. No space where I am allowed to fall apart. When I cry for help, what meets me is silence. Or worse, excuses. “I can’t.” “I don’t know how.” “I’m not ready.” But what I really hear is “I won’t.” I won’t step up. I won’t learn. I won’t carry my share. “Can’t” is the excuse you use to avoid facing your life and taking responsibility for it.

And so I am left carrying it all, even as I collapse inside.

Do you know what it feels like to want to run away and never look back? To fantasize about silence, about disappearing, about slipping into a place where no one knows your name or your number. To want to turn off your phone, get in your car, just drive until the road itself swallows you - anywhere that isn’t here.

Do you know what it feels like to be suffocated under the weight of everyone else’s needs, gasping for air, while your own lungs are already failing? To hold up a thousand lives when you can barely keep your own from crumbling? To be surrounded by people yet lonelier than you’ve ever been, because no one sees that you’re unraveling beneath the mask of strength.

This is survival.

A family, a home, is supposed to lift each other up. It’s supposed to share the load, to stand shoulder to shoulder when life gets heavy. But instead, I am carrying it all, and it is breaking me.

The cruelest part is when someone tells me, “you don’t have to.” If that were true, you wouldn’t come to me first. If that were true, you’d take responsibility for your own life: for your livelihood, your bills, your rides, your problems. But you don’t. You hand them to me as if I were built for it, as if I volunteered to carry what you refuse to carry.

And then, after weighing me down, you dare to call it my choice. As if drowning is something anyone signs up for.

This is not my choice. This is your refusal to rise, your refusal to carry yourself.

I am done. I cannot and will not carry the responsibility for everyone’s lives anymore. I will not keep burning myself down just to keep others warm, setting myself on fire so no one else feels the cold. I will not keep pouring from an empty cup, draining myself until there is nothing left but dust. I will not keep enabling adults who refuse to grow, who refuse to change, who refuse to take responsibility for their own lives.

I love deeply. I care with everything in me. I want to see the people I love thrive, to see them rise and build lives they are proud of. But love without boundaries is not love - it is destruction. It devours the one who gives until there is nothing left. And I refuse to let my care become the very thing that consumes me. I will not destroy myself for the comfort of others anymore.

So this is my cry for help -  but not the kind where I’m asking you to pile more onto me. This is not an invitation for more weight, more problems, more silence after the venting is done. This is the cry of a mother, a daughter, a sister, a grandmother, a wife, a friend, a woman who has been strong for far too long. The cry of someone who has carried generations of burden on her back without a net beneath her. The cry of someone who has stood as the pillar while everyone leaned, until the pillar itself began to crack.

This is the cry of someone who has reached the line where strength runs out, where the rock begins to split, where even love cannot carry what was never hers to hold.

If you hear this and it resonates, maybe you’ve been the rock too. Maybe you’ve been the one who handled it all while silently screaming inside, the one who smiled on the outside while breaking on the inside. Maybe you’ve been the one everyone leans on but no one protects, the strong one who never gets to rest, the dependable one who secretly wonders who will ever be dependable for you.

If you hear this and it makes you uncomfortable, maybe it’s because you’ve been leaning too hard on someone else. Maybe you’ve mistaken their resilience for endless capacity, their silence for agreement, their survival for strength that never runs out. Maybe you’ve convinced yourself that because they always show up, they always will. But even the strongest pillars eventually crack under the pressure.

I am not endless. I am not unbreakable. I am not your safety net anymore.

To the mother who is crying for help, hear me: you are not weak for reaching your limit. You are not wrong for wanting rest. You are not selfish for refusing to carry what was never yours. You are human, and you are allowed to step out from under the crushing weight. You are allowed to save yourself, even if they never save themselves.

You are allowed to put the oxygen mask on first. You are allowed to say no without apology. You are allowed to demand the same love, care, and respect that you pour into everyone else. You have carried enough, more than enough,  and you don’t need to prove your strength by destroying yourself with it. Your worth is not measured by how much you endure, but by the life you still have the right to live.

And to those who have pushed her to this breaking point, stop. Stop gaslighting her into believing she is the problem. Stop blaming her for your choices, your failures, your refusal to stand on your own two feet. Stop guilting her into being everything you need while she is losing the capacity to even be herself. She has given more than enough.

This isn’t just about her children. This is about the partner who mistakes her love for permission to take without giving. This is about the friend who only calls when they need rescuing, never when she needs to be heard. This is about the boss who loads more onto her plate because she “always gets it done,” without ever asking what it costs her. This is about every hand that has reached for her without ever offering to hold her up in return.

She is not your scapegoat. She is not your crutch. She is not your unpaid therapist, your backup plan, or your permanent solution. She is a human being, made of the same ingredients you are,  one with limits, one with dreams, one with a life of her own. And if you truly love her, if you truly value her, then you need to stop draining her dry and start standing on your own.

The time for excuses is over. The time for shifting blame is over. If you value her at all, stop breaking her to save yourself. Carry your own life, because she cannot, and she will not, carry it for you anymore.

Share this with every mother, every friend, every sister who has carried too much for too long. We’ve heard your cry, and it will not be ignored anymore.