Latest / Women Who Lead: Leadership, Career & Influence / The Guilt of Taking Unpaid Mental Health Days | Women Who Lead
Transcript
- You are standing in the parking lot, hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly your knuckles have turned white, and you are terrified that if you don’t walk through those doors right now, you will be fired. Or worse, you’ll be forgotten. Let’s get real for a second. We need to talk about the specific, heavy kind of guilt that lives in your chest when you decide to take a day off. Not a vacation day. Not a sick day where you actually have the flu. I’m talking about the mental health day. The unpaid one. The one where you tell your boss you’re ‘sick’ because the truth feels too risky, or maybe you just don’t tell them at all, and you spend the entire morning paralyzed by shame instead of resting. I know this feeling because I’ve lived it. Years ago, I was sitting in my car outside a glass-walled office building in Chicago. It was raining, which is dramatic, but I needed the backdrop. My heart was hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. I had been promoted six months prior, and the weight of that promotion felt less like an achievement and more like a life sentence. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. And yet, the idea of calling in sick, of admitting that my mind was breaking even if my body wasn’t, felt like professional suicide. So I sat there. For forty-five minutes. I watched people walk into the lobby with their coffees and their confidence, and I hated myself for not being able to do the same. If you are listening to this while hiding in your car, or hiding behind your laptop, or hiding in the bathroom stall at work, I want you to know something important: You are not broken. You are not lazy. And you are certainly not alone in this war with yourself. But we need to unpack why taking care of your mind feels like a betrayal of your career. Here is the lie that keeps so many high-achieving women up at night: If I stop, everything falls apart. If I disappear for twenty-four hours, the projects will crumble, the clients will leave, and my team will realize I’m not as competent as they think. This is what I call the indispensability trap. It’s a subtle form of imposter syndrome wrapped in a badge of honor. We are trained from a young age to believe that value equals output. That our worth is directly tied to how much we can produce, how many emails we can answer, and how many meetings we can survive without crying. When we internalize this, rest becomes dangerous. Rest becomes a sign of weakness. So when we feel overwhelmed, anxious, or just plain exhausted from the emotional labor of leading, we try to push through. We power through. And when we finally can’t, we take that unpaid day, and immediately, the guilt sets in. But let me ask you this: What is the cost of that silence? What is the cost of pretending you’re fine when you’re not? I’ve seen brilliant executives burn out completely because they refused to acknowledge the friction in their own minds. They thought showing vulnerability was a strategic error. But here’s the truth I learned only after I walked away from my corner office: Sustainable success is not built on constant output. It’s built on rhythm. Input, output, recovery, input again. If you skip the recovery, you aren’t working harder; you’re working inefficiently. You are driving a car with the handbrake on and wondering why the engine is overheating. Now, we have to address the elephant in the room. Money. Because for many of us, especially women who are still navigating wage gaps and negotiating salaries, taking an unpaid day isn’t just emotionally difficult; it’s financially terrifying. You look at your bank account, you look at the mortgage, you look at the student loans, and you think, 'I can’t afford to miss a day of pay.' This is a rational fear. It is valid. But I want to separate the financial anxiety from the moral judgment. Just because you can’t afford to lose a paycheck today doesn’t mean you deserve to suffer tomorrow. The guilt often comes from a deeper place than money, though. It comes from the belief that you owe your company your sanity. That your mental health is a corporate resource, available for extraction whenever management needs a boost. I remember a client, Sarah, who was a senior project manager. She took a Friday off because she was having a panic attack in the elevator. She didn’t tell anyone why. She just called in sick. On Monday, she showed up expecting to be reprimanded. Instead, her director said, 'Glad you’re back. We missed you.' It wasn’t perfect. She still felt shaky. But that moment taught her that the world did not end. The company survived. Her job survived. In fact, her productivity on Tuesday was higher than it had been in months because she had actually rested. The guilt she carried was heavier than the actual consequence of missing one day. Often, the monster in our heads is far scarier than reality ever is. So, how do we move from guilt to grace? How do we stop viewing mental health days as a failure and start viewing them as a necessary maintenance protocol? It starts with reframing. You have to change the language you use in your own head. When you take a day off to reset, you are not quitting. You are strategizing. Think of it like clearing your cache. Your brain is processing thousands of decisions, reading micro-expressions, managing conflicts, and holding space for your team. That is cognitive load. Heavy load. If you don’t clear the cache, the system slows down. It glitches. Sometimes it crashes. Taking an unpaid day is an act of preservation. It is you saying, 'I value this role enough to protect the person doing it.' You don’t have to do it all at once. Maybe today, you don’t take a full day. Maybe you take an hour. Maybe you step away from your desk and sit in your car, just like I did, but this time, you breathe. You acknowledge that you are human. You acknowledge that leadership is exhausting. And you give yourself permission to pause without apologizing for existing. When you stop apologizing for your humanity, you start leading with more authenticity. People respect honesty. They respect boundaries. They respect someone who knows their limits and manages them wisely. I know it’s easier said than done. The guilt doesn’t vanish overnight. So here is a practical exercise for you. Next time you feel that pull toward burnout, before you book the day or send the email, write down three things. First, what is the specific emotion you are feeling? Is it anger? Fear? Numbness? Name it. Second, what is the smallest unit of rest you can take right now? Can you take ten minutes? Can you leave at noon? Third, what is the worst-case scenario if you take this break? Write it down. Usually, when you look at it on paper, it looks small. It looks manageable. And if you do take the day, please, do not spend it scrolling through LinkedIn or checking your email 'just in case.' That is not rest. That is avoidance disguised as relaxation. Real rest is boring. Real rest is staring at the ceiling. Real rest is drinking tea and reading a novel. Real rest is letting your nervous system know that you are safe. You are allowed to disconnect. You are allowed to prioritize your peace over your productivity. The work will wait. It always does. But your mind, your spirit, your ability to show up as your best self—that is fragile. Treat it with the same care you would treat a valuable client. We are redefining what success looks like. It’s not about how many hats you can wear or how late you can stay at the office. It’s about longevity. It’s about being able to look back on your career ten years from now and feel proud of how you treated yourself along the way. I’ve seen too many women reach the top only to find themselves empty, exhausted, and regretful of the sacrifices they made to get there. Don’t let that be your story. Your mental health is not a line item in the budget. It is the foundation. If the foundation cracks, the whole structure is at risk. Protecting it is not selfish; it is strategic. It is the most responsible thing you can do for your team, your company, and your family. When you model healthy boundaries, you give others permission to do the same. You create a culture where people feel safe enough to be human. That is true leadership. So, to the woman who is scared to take that day: Take it. Or take half of it. Or take five minutes. Start small. Be gentle with yourself. You are doing hard work. You are carrying a lot. And you deserve to put some of it down, even if just for a day. Let’s get real about this. You are worthy of rest, not because of what you achieve, but simply because you exist. I’m Deborah Doyle. Remember, you are building a legacy, not just a resume. Take care of the builder. Until next time, be kind to yourself.