The Glue That Dissolves

Almost all my days begin already exhausted, before I have even done anything. There is no real difference anymore between night and day, only between what has to happen and what can still be postponed for a little while. The air feels heavy, the walls seem closer, and somewhere between the silence and the routine I try to remind myself that this once became my life.
The past few years, many days have felt as if I am no longer truly living, but functioning. As if my entire existence has collapsed into one task: preventing everything from falling apart. I am the one who makes sure there is food, that groceries arrive on time, that the laundry gets done and that some kind of rhythm remains. The one who anticipates, thinks ahead, constantly tries to preserve calm, even when nothing around us is calm anymore.
Mart does a lot too, I do not deny that. He drives, he fixes things, he makes sure we can get places and that things keep working. But I make sure he can do those things. That there is enough food and therefore enough energy for his body, that there is structure and that he does not have to carry the stress of what needs to happen tomorrow or the day after. Somewhere in that lies perhaps the most lonely part of all: that what I do is invisible, while at the same time it holds everything together.
It feels as if for years I have been the glue between everything that would fall apart if I stopped for even a moment. And that is exactly what exhausts me. Because that glue, that is what I myself have become, and nobody asks how it feels to be the connection instead of simply being part of something that continues to exist on its own. I took on that role not because I do not want care, but because I no longer know who I am outside of taking care.
It is an invisible burden, constantly occupied with everything that could go wrong. Even moments that should supposedly feel calm consist of preparing for new pressure. It lives in my head and in my body. Because I learned that letting go is dangerous, that relaxation is something you pay for afterward. If I stop paying attention, if I stop taking care, everything collapses and somewhere deep inside I still believe that.
That is what a nervous system in survival mode does: it stays alert, even when there is no immediate danger anymore. It keeps scanning, observing and controlling. And because it never truly learned how to rest, rest itself now feels unsafe. Even silence feels unfamiliar, as if something is missing.
I know Mart does not leave things unfinished on purpose. He does what he can, but he does not see what I continuously feel: that my mind never switches off. That I think for two people, plan for two, worry for two. That I feel more like a project manager than a partner sometimes. And the sad part is that I did not become this way out of a need for control, but out of necessity. Because at some point I learned that safety is something you have to create yourself, and that nobody else will do it for you.
And still I sometimes dream about what it would feel like if things were different. If for once I did not have to be the one who prevents, catches and compensates. If I could simply live without constantly thinking about what comes next. If the system could keep running without me.
Maybe that is what freedom actually means: being allowed to let go without everything falling apart. Not having to fear that the world will break if you stop being the glue for a moment.
Maybe this is the moment where the glue is finally allowed to dissolve.
Maybe this feeling belongs to unlearning survival.
No longer wanting to be the strongest one, no longer the one who saves everything.
Maybe things first have to fall apart before they can truly rest.
And maybe that is not the end, but finally the beginning.