The Guilt of a Good Time

Last week I spent several days away from home. I missed my husband and my daughter. I missed our evening routines, the endless negotiations around bedtime, the random stories that appear at precisely the moment a child is supposed to be brushing their teeth. 

I also had an absolutely brilliant time.

Even now, writing that sentence creates the tiniest knot in my stomach, which is strange when you stop and think about it. Not the fact that I enjoyed myself. The fact that admitting it feels uncomfortable.

Nobody has ever looked concerned when I've said I was exhausted.

Quite the opposite.

Exhaustion is perhaps the most socially acceptable emotion available to women. Tell people you're tired and they'll nod sympathetically. Tell them you're overwhelmed and they'll reassure you that everyone feels the same way. Tell them you're running on fumes and you'll be met with understanding, concern, perhaps even a little admiration.

There is something oddly virtuous about being knackered.

It suggests you are trying hard enough.

Caring enough.

Giving enough.

Exhaustion has somehow become evidence.

Joy, on the other hand, seems to require a witness statement.

Last week I spent my days working with schools I admire deeply alongside people who care enormously about their craft. The conversations were rich and energising. Ideas emerged that left me reaching for a notebook before I lost them. For long stretches of time I found myself completely absorbed in the work, that wonderful state where hours disappear unnoticed and effort transforms into momentum.

It was the sort of week that reminds me why I do what I do.

And yet, somewhere underneath all that enjoyment sat a faint but persistent feeling that I couldn't quite put my finger on.

Not homesickness.

Not sadness.

Certainly not regret.

Something closer to guilt.

That took me a while to understand.

For years I assumed the guilt came from being away. It seemed like a reasonable explanation. After all, I love my family deeply. Of course I would miss them. Of course there would be a cost attached to being elsewhere.

But as time passes, the less convinced I am that absence is the issue.

The guilt isn't about leaving.

The guilt is about enjoying it.

That feels almost ridiculous written down. Yet I suspect many women will recognise it immediately.

The guilt doesn't arrive when you're sitting alone in a hotel room eating mediocre room service and watching bad television. The guilt arrives when you're genuinely enjoying yourself. When the work is stimulating. When the company is good. When the days feel expansive rather than restrictive. When you find yourself thinking, entirely unprompted, what a wonderful time you're having.

That is often the precise moment the voice appears.

Shouldn't you be missing them more?

Shouldn't this be harder than it is?

A good mother wouldn't be enjoying herself quite this much.

The voice is nonsense, of course.

Unfortunately, nonsense has never prevented an idea from becoming a powerful belief.

For years I managed that tension through exhaustion. I became remarkably skilled at logistics: the latest flight out, the earliest flight home, a hotel stay compressed into the smallest possible window. Sleep became negotiable. If there was a way to squeeze another few hours out of a trip and return home fractionally sooner, I would find it.

Looking back, I can see that I wasn't just managing logistics.

I was managing guilt.

Exhaustion became a receipt I could produce as evidence.

See?

Look how tired I am.

Look how hard I'm trying.

Surely nobody could accuse me of enjoying myself too much.

Least of all me.

What’s most fascinating is not the guilt itself, but the assumptions hiding underneath it.

Because when I follow that voice all the way to its conclusion, what it seems to be saying is that love should somehow be measured by deprivation. That if I am truly devoted to my family, then being away from them should hurt. Not in a dramatic way, but enough to prove that they remain at the centre of my world.

It is a strange equation when written down.

The more I enjoy myself, the less devoted I must be.

The less I enjoy myself, the more evidence there is of my love.

And yet, when you hold it up to the light, the logic begins to unravel.

I am reminded of the stories people sometimes tell after losing someone they love. Not the grief itself, which is far too profound a thing to compare to a few days away from home, but the guilt that can accompany the return of joy. The first laugh. The first genuinely good day. The first holiday that is enjoyed rather than endured.

People often describe a feeling that happiness has somehow arrived where it doesn't belong.

As though joy is disloyal.

As though continuing to enjoy life says something about the depth of their love.

Of course, we know it doesn't.

A good day tells us nothing about the depth of our grief. Joy and sadness coexist remarkably well. One does not cancel out the other. One does not diminish the other. The presence of joy is not evidence that love has disappeared.

Which makes me wonder why we struggle so much to apply the same logic elsewhere.

Why is it so difficult to believe that I can miss my family and have a wonderful time?

Why do those two experiences feel as though they should be competing?

The reality is that I missed them every day I was away. And still, I found myself sitting across from people whose ideas challenged me, energised me and reminded me why I care so deeply about the work that I do.

Both things were happening at the same time. The contradiction only existed in my head. Or perhaps more accurately, in the story I had attached to it.

A story that suggested devotion should be visible.

A story that suggested love should cost something.

A story that had somehow convinced me that exhaustion was a more respectable emotion than fulfilment.

Looking back, I can see how often I searched for evidence that I was getting it right. Evidence that my family remained my priority. Evidence that I cared enough.

Exhaustion was convenient evidence.

Guilt was convenient evidence.

Missing them was evidence.

Enjoying myself, however, felt suspiciously like evidence of the opposite.

And that seems to be the flaw in the whole thing. Love was never measured by my absence of joy.

The people I love most are not honoured by my deprivation, nor diminished by my enjoyment.

The truth is far less dramatic.

I missed them.

I had a wonderful time.

Both things are true.

Neither requires defending.

Neither requires an apology.

A few thoughts to leave you with

Pay attention to the stories attached to your guilt.
What is the feeling trying to prove? What assumptions sit underneath it?

Notice what you treat as evidence.
Exhaustion, guilt and sacrifice can feel persuasive. That does not make them proof of love.

Allow two truths to coexist.
Life is rarely either/or. More often, it asks us to carry both.

Don't apologise for joy.
The people you love are not honoured by your deprivation.

The goal isn't to stop feeling guilty altogether but maybe to stop treating guilt as a measure of devotion.