The Quiet Exhaustion At Work
I didn’t realize I was exhausted until I couldn’t remember my coworker’s name.
Tuesday, 4:12 PM. I was standing by the watercooler, holding the same paper cup for what felt like a year, and my colleague Marcus — no, Mark — walked up and said “hey, how was your weekend?” and I just stared at him. Blank. My mouth opened. Nothing came out. Three full seconds. He laughed it off, said something about Mondays, and I nodded and walked back to my desk with my throat feeling like I’d swallowed sand.
That’s when it hit me. Not the dramatic “I’m burned out” kind of hit. Just a quiet thing. Like a small stone dropping into the middle of my chest and sinking slowly.
I’m not the kind of person who burns out loudly.
I don’t yell. I don’t slam keyboards. I don’t take smoke breaks every forty minutes crying in the stairwell. I just… keep showing up. I open my laptop. I reply to the Slack messages. I say “sounds good!” in the team channel like I mean it. I laugh at the joke about the printer being broken again. I ate lunch at my desk three times this week. I have a yogurt in the mini fridge that’s been there since last Thursday and I don’t even know if it’s mine anymore.
Quiet exhaustion work. That’s what this is. Not the kind you call in sick for. The kind you drag yourself through every single morning and somehow nobody notices.
I woke up at 6:30 this morning. That’s not early for most adults but for me, with my job, it’s basically a vacation. I used to wake up at 5:45 and do a whole routine — workout, shower, breakfast, podcast, the whole thing. Lately? I woke up, looked at the ceiling, and whispered “no” to absolutely nobody. Then I got up. Then I brushed my teeth while staring at the bathroom wall like it owed me money.
My commute is 38 minutes on the M train. I used to read on it. I used to write in my Notes app. Now I just stand there, holding the pole, with my earbuds in and nothing playing. Just silence. I look at the other commuters and I swear some of them look the same — like they’re going to a place they don’t want to be in a body that doesn’t quite feel like theirs.
How did we get here?
I keep asking myself that. There was no big thing. No trauma. No dramatic event. My job is fine. My boss is fine. My coworkers are fine. The project is fine. Everything is “fine” and that word has started to feel like a little knife tucked into the side of my mouth, the kind you smile with so no one sees.
Last Tuesday we had a one-on-one. My manager Sarah asked me how I was doing. Professionally. Like the question had a checkbox next to it.
I said “I’m doing really well, thanks for asking.”
I wasn’t doing really well. I had cried in the bathroom the night before. But not the movie kind of crying. Just the kind where your eyes burn and you stand there and you don’t even know why. I washed my face. I went back to my laptop. I finished the slide deck. I sent the email. I got an “awesome” emoji in the group chat.
I closed my laptop at 6:18 PM and sat in my chair for another nine minutes. Just sat there. The office was emptying out. I could hear someone’s heels clicking toward the elevator. I could hear the AC unit humming like a sad little wasp. I could hear my own breathing.
“Should I just leave?” I thought.
I left. I walked to the subway. I called my mom. She said, “Are you eating enough?” I said, “Yeah, mom, I’m eating.” I hadn’t eaten since the yogurt that might not be mine.
That’s when I knew. This is quiet exhaustion work. Not the kind that ends with a resignation letter. The kind that ends with you standing in your kitchen at 8:47 PM holding a fork and staring at the wall above the sink.
I’m 28. I have a job that pays decent. I have an apartment I can mostly afford. I have friends I see once a month. I have a dog (well, my roommate has a dog, but I share custody of the emotional bond). I should be grateful. I know I should be grateful. The internet tells me so.
Every other post is like “highly sensitive people do this” or “burnout recovery for the modern worker” or “5 signs your job is killing your soul.” And I read them. I read them all. I screenshot them. I save them to a folder called “read later” that I never read later. And then I go back to work and I smile at Sarah and I say “sounds good!” and I close my laptop at exactly 6:30 PM and I cry a little in the bathroom at 6:31 PM.
It’s not even crying anymore. It’s just leakage. Liquid leaking out of my eyes because the container is too full.
I want to name what this is. Because I think more people feel it than talk about it.
Quiet exhaustion at work isn’t the same as burnout. Burnout is the dramatic explosion. Burnout is the resignation letter. Burnout is the doctor visit. Burnout is the crying in the car in the parking lot for 22 minutes.
Quiet exhaustion is the slow erosion. Quiet exhaustion is when you can’t remember your coworker’s name. Quiet exhaustion is when you eat the same sad sandwich for four days in a row because deciding what to eat feels like climbing a mountain. Quiet exhaustion is when you watch a full episode of something and don’t remember a single scene. Quiet exhaustion is when you lie in bed scrolling your phone for two hours and your body is tired but your brain won’t shut up.
Quiet exhaustion is when you say “I’m fine” so many times that your own voice stops sounding like yours.
I went to bed at 11:15 PM last night. I scrolled. I dropped my phone on my face. Twice. I picked it up. I scrolled more. I thought about what I was going to wear today. I thought about whether I should respond to that email. I thought about whether my dog-roommate-mate’s dog liked me. I thought about nothing. I thought about everything. I fell asleep at 12:48 AM.
My alarm went off at 6:30 AM. I said “no” to the ceiling again. I got up.
Same routine. Same commute. Same pole on the M train. Same Slack messages. Same “sounds good!” Same smile. Same quiet exhaustion.
But here’s the weird part — and I don’t know how to explain this without sounding unhinged.
I still show up.
I show up every single day. I do the work. I deliver the slides. I answer the emails. I show up to the meetings. I even volunteered to present in Thursday’s all-hands because nobody else wanted to and I didn’t want to say no, because saying no takes more energy than just doing the thing. That’s the thing about quiet exhaustion — it doesn’t make you unproductive. It makes you brittle. It makes you one small inconvenience away from snapping at someone who definitely doesn’t deserve it.
Last Thursday I almost snapped at Marcus — Mark, his name is Mark — because he asked me where I saved the Q3 report. I took a breath. I said “in the shared drive, second folder.” My voice was calm. My hands were shaking under the desk.
He didn’t see it. Nobody sees it.
That’s the whole point of quiet exhaustion work. It’s invisible. It’s the kind of tired that doesn’t show up on your face. It’s the kind that doesn’t get a doctor’s note. It’s the kind that makes you laugh at the printer joke and then go home and stare at the ceiling for an hour wondering if this is just what being an adult is.
I told my friend Jess about it on Saturday. She got quiet for a second. Then she said, “Yeah. Me too.”
Me too. That’s all she said. But we sat there for two more hours and didn’t talk about it much. We just drank our iced coffees and watched some guy try to parallel park on Henry Street for way too long. We laughed at that. We laughed at something real. We didn’t have to perform.
I think that’s the thing missing. Not yoga. Not meditation apps. Not the supplements. Not the “morning routine” videos. Just somebody in your life who hears you say “I’m fine” and says “no, like, how are you actually.”
Most people don’t ask that. Most people ask “how’s work?” and they want a one-sentence answer. They want “busy” or “good” or “crazy.” They want the box checked. And if you give them the real answer — “I think I’m dragging myself through every day and I don’t know why and I can’t stop and I don’t know how to make it stop” — they get uncomfortable. They change the subject. They say “yeah, work is wild right now, am I right?” and the moment is gone.
So you stop saying the real answer. You say “busy.” You smile. You go back to your desk.
I keep thinking about the word “languishing.” I read that article. The one that went around. The one about how we’re all just kind of mildly depressed and not in a way that needs medication but in a way that makes everything feel like it’s behind a sheet of glass. I read it and I thought, “yes. That. That is the word.”
But the article gave advice. Manifesto. To-do lists. The article said “find flow” and “set goals” and “name your emotion” and I thought — okay, I named it. I named it. It’s quiet exhaustion. Now what?
Now I go to work tomorrow. Now I open my laptop. Now I reply to the Slack messages. Now I say “sounds good!” in the team channel like I mean it. Now I laugh at the printer joke. Now I eat the sad sandwich. Now I close my laptop at 6:30 PM. Now I sit in the chair for nine more minutes. Now I walk to the subway. Now I hold the pole. Now I stare at the wall above the sink. Now I go to bed. Now I scroll. Now I sleep. Now I wake up. Now I say “no” to the ceiling.
Now I do it again.
That’s the cycle. There’s no off switch. No advice that fixes it. No supplement. No morning routine. No “highly sensitive people” quiz. Just the cycle, looping, looping, looping, until you forget what you even were before the cycle started.
I’m writing this at 9:23 PM on a Sunday. I have work in less than 11 hours. I’m sitting at my kitchen table. The dog is asleep on my feet. I have a glass of water I keep forgetting to drink. I should sleep. I should prep my lunch. I should stretch. I should do all the things the articles tell me to do.
I’m not going to do any of them. I’m just going to sit here. With this. With the quiet exhaustion. With the feeling that something is wrong but I can’t point to it. With the feeling that I should be okay but I’m not. With the feeling that everyone else seems to be okay but they’re probably not either.
I think that’s the real secret. We’re all carrying it. The Marcus-Mark-not-remembering-name kind of tired. The yogurt-in-the-fridge-since-last-Thursday kind of tired. The bathroom-crying-but-not-really-crying kind of tired. The ceiling-staring-at-6:30-AM kind of tired.
We’re all just dragging ourselves through and pretending.
I’m not going to end this with a manifesto. I’m not going to tell you to quit your job. I’m not going to tell you to set boundaries. I’m not going to tell you to take a mental health day. I’m not going to tell you to journal. I’m not going to tell you it’ll get better.
I don’t know if it’ll get better. I don’t know if this is just what being a working adult is. I don’t know if I deserve better or if I’m just being soft. I don’t know if I’m allowed to feel this tired when nothing is technically wrong.
I just know I’m tired. And I think some of you are too.
And if you are — I see you. I’m not going to ask how you’re doing. I’m just going to sit here with you. On this bench. At this subway station. Holding the pole. Saying nothing.
Just quiet.