How To Lighten The Mental Load

Carrying that burden can be heavy

Back-to-school shopping. Managing everyone’s doctor’s appointments. Meal planning. Organizing vacation. They’re all things that have to get done. They’re also all things you do that no one may notice.

Carrying that mental load can take a toll. Here’s how to lighten the burden of managing it all yourself.

What is mental load?

Mental load, also called invisible labor, refers to the behind-the-scenes work you do to keep your household running smoothly. “This work is ongoing and often unnoticed,” says Sunkesula Sagar, DO, a primary care physician at Geisinger Medical Clinic Lock Haven.

This can include everything from:

Scheduling pets’ veterinary appointments
Making grocery lists
Taking kids to activities
Picking up your family’s prescriptions
Coordinating social plans

Besides physical chores, mental load can often involve emotional work, like supporting your child through personal struggles or disappointments.

“Invisible labor usually breaks down to 3 main aspects — anticipating, planning and monitoring,” Dr. Sagar notes.

Anticipating means noticing tasks that need to be done, like restocking the fridge, switching the laundry from the washer to the dryer or making sure mail gets sent out on time.

Planning can be more long-range, such as thinking about the next family vacation or reminding yourself to send money to school for your child’s upcoming field trip.

Finally, there’s monitoring. This involves making sure planned tasks get done, like emptying the dishwasher or mowing the lawn.

To the people not handling these tasks, this work is often invisible. They just see when it’s done.

“The invisible part is key; it involves both cognitive and emotional work. It’s not a visible task,” says Dr. Sagar. “You can watch someone fold laundry, but you can’t see them tracking a dozen things in their head such as birthdays, school forms, whose turn it is to do what and which supplies are running low.”

The toll of invisible labor

Besides being physically exhausting, managing the tasks that keep things running smoothly can take a toll emotionally, leading to things like:

Stress
Anxiety
Sleep disturbances
Difficulty concentrating
Mood changes
Feelings of burnout
Feelings of guilt
Resentment

“These feelings can be worse when the invisible work isn't recognized by others in the family,” says Dr. Sagar.

Taking a load off

If managing invisible labor for your family is wearing on you, finding relief is easier than you think. Not sure where to start? These ideas can help.

Write it down

By writing down tasks you’re responsible for, you make them “real” or visible to everyone. While writing it down doesn’t change the fact that the task has to be done, it does remove the work of having to remember it. Once it’s on paper, your brain can stop running the background loop of "don’t forget, don’t forget.”

After you make your list, assign tasks to various categories to determine priority.

Categorize tasks

Breaking down tasks into different categories can help you prioritize what’s most important. Consider putting tasks into one of these categories:

Urgent: Do now.
Not urgent, but important: Schedule this to be done.
Urgent, but not important: Delegate this task to others.
Not urgent or important: Drop it for now.

Prioritizing small tasks that are easy to check off the list can get the momentum moving. Once the small items are out of the way, you can focus on tackling the higher-effort items.

For each item on the "to do" list, consider asking yourself, "What happens if I don’t do this?" If the answer is “nothing,” that item probably isn't important and can be pushed back.

Sometimes, the question isn't really what's important, but how close tasks are to your priorities (health, relationships, finances, etc.). This can mean letting tasks earn their place based on whether they fit into one of these categories, not just because they showed up on your radar.

And if you can’t categorize a specific task, Dr. Sagar advises setting a specific time to think about it and not revisiting until then.

“Making sure to set some downtime where your brain isn't on call aids in recovery,” he says.

Delegate work

Once you’ve written things down and prioritized them, it’s time to delegate. Use a shared system, like a dry-erase board or digital spreadsheet, to assign specific tasks to people in your household. This can help assign tasks more evenly, giving people ownership of things. By taking ownership, that person will be responsible for all phases of the task, from anticipation to execution.

“When someone takes real ownership of tasks at home, this provides some relief,” Dr. Sagar says.

Check in

To be sure work is getting done, set up a designated time (or times) to review what needs attention. This may be asking the people who now own the task for an update, reviewing a digital calendar or checking your whiteboard. Avoid checking in randomly. Only check the status during designated windows to reduce the pressure.

Give yourself a break

You may not always feel like doing something at this moment, and that’s fine. To stay balanced, Dr. Sagar offers this helpful tip:

“Ask yourself if doing a particular task later in the day, and not perfectly, would be detrimental. Save your effort for urgent and important matters earlier in the day when you’re more ready or able to do them.”

If something minor gets missed, like forgetting to take the recycling out, give yourself grace. You may have a lot of balls in the air. Occasionally one of them might get dropped.

And if you things still feel imbalanced, it may be time for another review.

Take time for you

To help yourself feel your best, take some time for self-care. This could be anything from taking a nap, spending some time reading a book, going for a walk or calling a loved one.

Remember to start slowly. Small changes add up to big wins over time.