Rest Is Not the Same as Time Off

I work six twelve hour shifts in a row. Then I am off for eight days.

On paper, that sounds generous. People often comment on how nice it must be to have so much time off at once. And there is gratitude there. I do not miss that.

But time off is not the same as rest.

Those eight days are where everything else lives. The appointments that could not happen while I was working. The follow ups. The phone calls. The mental work of managing a household shaped by recovery and uncertainty. Caregiving does not clock in or out, and it does not pause just because my schedule says I am off.

When I am working, my middle son cares for my husband. When I come home, he steps back and rests. That makes sense. He has earned it. I am grateful for him.

And when I am home, I quietly become the default again.

Not because anyone is careless. Not because anyone is ungrateful. Simply because I am there. Capable. The one who knows the medications, the warning signs, the questions to ask. The one who notices when something feels off.

I work, and then I come home and continue working. Not in a resentful way. In a truthful one.

This past week made that truth impossible to ignore.

After a full stretch of work, my first day off was spent in back to back appointments for my husband. We learned there may be a cardiac component to what caused his stroke. An abnormal stress test. More testing ahead. More waiting.

The next day, I went to my own appointment, expecting something manageable. Instead, I left carrying news that settled heavily and quietly. Not dramatic, just enough to shift something inside me.

By the time I walked through the door at home, I felt drained in a way that went deeper than physical tiredness. I was emotionally spent, my body registering it before my mind fully did.

And for once, I listened.

I told my husband and my son that I was tired, upset, and drained. That I was going to bed. That they would need to handle things without me for a while.

Then I slept. For four hours.

That moment mattered more than it might sound.

Because rest did not arrive through having time off. It arrived through naming my limit and allowing myself to stop.

Caregiving follows you home. It lives in your nervous system. Rest does not automatically appear when work ends. It requires permission, and for many women in midlife, especially those used to being capable, that permission is hard won.

We wait until exhaustion justifies it. Until we can explain it. Until we feel we have earned it.

What I am learning is this.

Rest is not indulgence.
It is not a reward.
It is not something we should have to collapse to receive.

Rest is care.

And sometimes it looks like handing things over without apology. Like choosing sleep over availability. Like trusting that the people we love can carry the load for a moment while we put ourselves down gently.

I do not have this figured out. But I am learning.

Time off may come and go.

Rest is something I am learning to claim.

With Love and Kindness from Mabank,
Brandy