There is a particular kind of exhaustion that does not show up on any medical record.
It is the exhaustion of women who have spent years, sometimes decades, in giving. Giving their time, their attention, their emotional labour, their muted witness, in rooms where their voices were not quite welcome. Giving until the giving became invisible, even to themselves.
If this resonates, then this is for you.
Because this exhaustion is not accidental. It is relational. It is inherited. And it is reinforced in ways so subtle that many women do not recognise it as conditioning at all. It’s just life.
The System We Inherited
Patriarchy is built on the myth of female inferiority. A false narrative that positions women as inherently ‘less than’, while simultaneously binding them to impossibly high standards. Be agreeable, but not weak. Be successful, but not intimidating. Be attractive, but not demanding.
Within this system, girls are taught early that safety lies outside themselves – in approval, in being chosen, in staying small and non-threatening. They learn that belonging is earned through usefulness. That love is secured through being accommodating. That the quickest way to calm a room is to take responsibility for its tension.
This is modelled in mothers who apologise for having needs. In workplaces where assertive women are labelled difficult, while assertive men are labelled decisive. In families where daughters help clear the table while sons are excused. Where a daughter is praised for being ‘no trouble’, and criticised for being ‘too much’.
Over time, many girls learn to put their own needs aside to keep the peace and avoid disappointment or conflict. They become attuned to everyone else’s moods before they can name their own. They learn to manage feelings that were never theirs to carry.
And within the hierarchy of family life, they often find themselves lower down the order – after fathers, after brothers, after the comfort of others. Boys are granted space. Girls are expected to adjust. Boys’ behaviour is excused. Girls’ behaviour is corrected.
No one may name this as patriarchy within the home. But its structure is silently reinforced: whose needs matter most, whose anger is tolerated, whose voice carries weight.
And girls notice.
“You Know What He’s Like”
There is a phrase many women will recognise. It is said quietly. Often casually.
“You know what he’s like. Just ignore it. That’s just how he is. He doesn’t mean anything by it. It’s easier if you don’t make a fuss.”
It is said by friends, colleagues, relatives – by men and women alike. It travels through families and workplaces like inherited wisdom. It can sound pragmatic. Mature. Peacekeeping.
But underneath, it is instruction.
Instruction to absorb.
Instruction to excuse.
Instruction to accommodate behaviour that was never hers to manage.
In that moment, the focus shifts subtly but decisively. The behaviour itself is no longer the issue. Her reaction is. Her discomfort becomes the disruption. Her boundary becomes the problem.
Excuses are made for some men’s poor behaviour so routinely that it becomes cultural reflex. He’s stressed. He’s old-fashioned. He’s blunt. He’s just joking. He’s always been like that.
There is quite a bit of decoding going on in society about expectations of some men’s unacceptable behaviour and how women are to tread carefully, lest they upset those men, their families, the community they all live in, and the perceived ‘hurt’ that could eventuate for these men.
Women are taught, sometimes by other women who learned the same lesson, to reinterpret disrespect into misunderstanding. To downplay dismissal as personality. To treat patterns as quirks, “oh, that’s just who he is.”
Entire sections of society participate in this reframing. Media narratives romanticise emotionally unavailable men as complex. Workplaces reward aggression as leadership. Families protect sons from consequences in the name of loyalty. And girls watch.
They watch who is corrected and who is comforted.
They watch whose anger is excused and whose tears are criticised.
They watch which behaviours are tolerated, and who is expected to tolerate them.
And when a woman finally says, “No. That is not acceptable,” she often finds herself standing alone. Suddenly she is too sensitive. Overreacting. Dramatic. Divisive.
The relational cost of breaking silence can feel higher than the cost of enduring it.
So she adapts. Some women tell themselves it is easier this way.
But every time she swallows a reaction that was valid, a small crack forms between what she feels and what she expresses. Over years, those cracks accumulate.
This is how self-trust erodes. Not in dramatic moments, but in daily dismissals.
What Over-Giving Really Looks Like
Over-giving does not always look dramatic. Often it looks competent. Capable. Reliable.
It looks like the woman who says Yes while her stomach tightens. The colleague who volunteers again because she does not want to seem unhelpful. The partner who minimises her own hurt to keep the evening smooth. The mother who runs on empty, privately resentful but publicly cheerful.
It looks like women who have become so practised at anticipating others’ needs that they lose connection to themselves.
And when resentment surfaces, it is often judged harshly. By others, and by themselves. But resentment is rarely the problem. It is usually the voice of a boundary that has been crossed one too many times. It’s the small signal that something inside is asking to be noticed.
Many women I work with in my private practice do not need to learn how to give. They need to learn how to stop giving without thinking. To pause long enough to ask, “Do I want to do this, or have I just assumed I should?” “Is this coming from me, or from fear of what happens if I don’t?” “Am I choosing this, or have I never been given the chance to choose?”
When your belonging has historically depended on being accommodating, it stops feeling like a choice. It feels like the way you keep relationships calm. The way you stay close. The way you avoid upsetting the balance. After a while, keeping the peace doesn’t just feel kind, it feels necessary.
Choosing yourself can feel like a threat to connection. As Harriet Lerner writes in The Dance of Intimacy, when one person begins to change a familiar pattern, the relationship often reacts. Things can feel awkward, tense, unsettled. There can be subtle pressure to go back to how it was, to be the easy one again.
But that discomfort does not mean you are doing something wrong. It often means the old pattern is being questioned.
Specifically in mother and daughter relationships, small reactions from the other person can feel more intense or wounding because old patterns are being challenged. A daughter who stops smoothing things over may be called distant. A mother who starts naming her own needs may be seen as difficult. When a mother or daughter begins to assert boundaries or stop over-accommodating, it can feel shaky or uncomfortable, but that tension is not a failure of love. Instead, it’s the relationship learning to be honest while still caring. It opens the door to authentic communication and real emotional honesty.
The Difference Between Generosity and Self-Abandonment
There’s a real difference between giving from generosity and giving from self-abandonment.
Generosity comes from being full enough to choose. It comes from feeling enough inside yourself that you can give freely, without keeping score or hoping your giving will earn approval or prevent someone’s disappointment.
Self-abandonment feels different. It feels urgent. Compulsive. It comes from fear – fear of conflict, fear of disapproval, fear of being seen as selfish.
So many women are praised for always putting others first that self-sacrifice starts to feel like who they are – the Good Woman, the Good Mother, the Good Daughter. But when giving costs you your voice, your boundaries or your dignity, it’s no longer generosity. It’s unsustainable.
Reclaiming the Meaning of “Give To Gain”
The theme for International Women’s Day is “Give To Gain” – an invitation to embrace generosity and collaboration as pathways to collective progress.
It is a powerful idea. But for many women, the phrase may land with a familiar heaviness. Haven’t we already given? Haven’t we already gained approval by being accommodating? Haven’t we already paid the price of staying small?
The invitation is not to give more. It is to give from a different place. To give and stay whole. To be generous without making yourself smaller in the process. When a woman knows her own worth, when she trusts her instincts and stops treating her needs as an inconvenience, her generosity becomes something different entirely. Something real. Something that lasts.
In mother-daughter relationships, this shift can ripple across generations. A mother who stops excusing poor behaviour, models something radical: that love and accountability can coexist. A daughter who sees this learns that her discomfort is not disloyalty. That boundaries are not betrayal.
This is how systems begin to shift – not only in policy or protest, but in living rooms, workplaces and conversations where women decide that ‘keeping the peace’ will no longer mean keeping themselves small.
The world does not need more depleted women giving from empty reserves.
It needs women who are resourced, who are honest, and whose generosity is rooted in self-respect rather than self-sacrifice.
That is the kind of giving that truly gains something. It is dignity, equality and relationships built on mutual regard.
And that is something women have always deserved.
My work centres on supporting mothers and adult daughters who want to untangle the complicated feelings that can show up in their relationship. I create a respectful, non-judgmental environment where you can explore your dynamics, gain insight and build tools for meaningful change. I work with women individually, as well as with mother-daughter pairs.
Reach out when you’re ready, and we can begin the conversation.
Image: Freepik
Janice Williams is a Counsellor and the only Certified Mother-Daughter Coach in Australia and the South Pacific, specialising in Mother-Daughter Relationships.
Sessions are available across Australia and worldwide.