Guest Post from Melissa Lefort: The Invisible Load & How Mental Labor Leads to Burnout
This week’s guest post comes from Melissa Lefort, who continues her series on burnout and balance with a powerful look at The Invisible Load. She explores where the term came from, why it still weighs so heavily on women, and how we can start sharing the responsibility instead of silently carrying it alone.
Did I Sign Up for This?
In last week’s blog, I mentioned The Invisible Load- and to be honest, I had never heard the phrase until I started doing research for this post! But just because I hadn’t heard about it doesn’t mean I haven’t been hauling my own Invisible Load around since a very young age.
The Invisible Load (also known as the Mental Load) is the 24/7 burden of unseen planning, organizing, anticipation, and worry that disproportionately falls upon women in most family units. It can be broken down into three major areas: anticipating (seeing what needs to be done), planning/organizing (figuring out how or when to do it), and monitoring (ensuring it was done and remembering when it needs to be done again).
The History of the Invisible Load
In 2017, French comic artist Emma popularized the term charge mentale (“mental load”) in her viral comic You Should’ve Asked (Emma, 2017). Her work found a wide audience during the COVID-19 pandemic, when lockdowns forced many partners to witness the sheer volume of work required to manage a home. The concept of the Invisible Load suddenly became a necessary household conversation.
But Emma wasn’t the first to study this phenomenon.
In 1983, sociologist Arlie Hochschild introduced the term emotional labor in her book The Managed Heart (Hochschild, 1983). She examined how people manage their emotions to meet professional demands (such as flight attendants), and the concept has since been expanded to describe the unpaid work of managing others’ emotional well-being- a key component of the Invisible Load.
Later, in 1996, sociologist Susan Walzer used the phrase invisible, mental labor in her study of new parents, concluding that mothers were primarily responsible for the majority of “worry work” related to children and the home (Walzer, 1996).
The True Cost of the Invisible Load
The Invisible Load is a thief in the night, it drains your energy and steals your joy. It contributes to stress, anxiety, and, in some cases, severe burnout if we don’t start lightening the load soon enough.
Many women take on the Invisible Load because they believe it’s part of who they are, what’s expected of them, or simply because they think they’re “better at it.”
Examples of Invisible Load Tasks:
Family/Social: Remembering birthdays, coordinating gifts, scheduling social outings, and being the emotional “peacekeeper.”
Home Management: Meal planning, tracking household inventory, noticing when supplies are low.
Logistics/Finance: Scheduling appointments, planning for future expenses, organizing school forms.
Maintenance/Care: Noticing when repairs are needed, researching contractors, ensuring tasks meet certain standards.
The Invisible Load is never-ending… it’s an unwelcome tenant that takes up permanent residence in your mind.
Self-Assessment: How Much Load Do You Carry?
Take a quick quiz to see how much of the Invisible Load you carry. For each task, decide who is mainly responsible for the planning and organizing: you, your partner, or both equally.
1. Social Calendar: Remembering birthdays, planning holidays, scheduling social gatherings
2. Meal Planning: Deciding what to eat, ensuring ingredients are available, creating the grocery list.
3. Financial Management: Monitoring bills, handling budgeting, planning for future expenses.
4. Appointments: Scheduling doctor, dentist, or other professional appointments for all family members.
5. Home Maintenance/Repairs: Noticing when things need fixing, researching contractors, scheduling work.
6. Children's School/Activities: Tracking school events, signing forms, coordinating extracurricular logistics.
7. Supply Inventory: Knowing when essential items (toiletries, cleaning supplies, pet food) are running low and adding them to the list.
8. Cleaning Schedule/Delegation: Deciding when cleaning will happen and ensuring it gets done, even if delegating.
9. Seasonal Prep: Planning for things like holiday decorating, wardrobe changes, or yard work specific to the time of year.
10. Emotional Labor: Being the primary person to check in on others' emotional states, mediating conflicts, and being the "family glue."
Did you find yourself carrying most of the load? Many of us do.
A 3-Step Plan to Lighten Your Load
To truly lighten your Invisible Load, focus on transferring ownership, not just delegating tasks.
Step 1: Share the Quiz Results & Visualize the Load
Show your partner the quiz results- not to blame, but to reveal the invisible work you carry. Use a shared digital tool (like Trello or a notes app) to track who owns each responsibility.
Step 2: Have an Honest, Goal-Oriented Conversation
Discuss how your household roles formed and acknowledge that this is a cultural pattern, not a personal failure. These talks may take time- be patient but firm. The goal is lasting change.
Step 3: Agree on One Full Ownership Transfer
Start small. Choose one area (e.g., Supply Inventory or Home Maintenance) for your partner to fully own. They handle the anticipating, planning, and monitoring- without reminders.
By lightening your Invisible Load, you take one step away from burnout and one step closer to joy.
Next week, we’ll explore how ignoring the Invisible Load leads to disconnection and deeper burnout.
For now, be proud of yourself for recognizing the work you do to create the life you deserve. Remember, you have a community of sisters walking this journey with you.
Until next week, consider yourself hugged.
~ Melissa
References
Emma. (2017). You Should’ve Asked: A Graphic Novel About the Invisible Load.
Hochschild, A. R. (1983). The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling. University of California Press.
Walzer, S. (1996). The search for symmetry in domestic labor. Social Problems, 43(2), 215–234.
I hope you loved this second guest post from Melissa as much as I did. We’ll be sharing her insights weekly as we build toward our Portugal Retreat in June 2026—created for women ready to move from burnout to balance.
If this topic resonated, you might also enjoy my earlier post, “The Invisible Load of Motherhood: How the Fair Play System Helps Women Reclaim Time and Balance.” Together, these pieces offer both awareness and action, a roadmap for reclaiming your time, energy, and joy.
