How do we measure our own worth?
There are moments in parenting and caregiving when everything feels heavy. You’re juggling routines, emotions, expectations—and somewhere along the way, your sense of who you are can begin to fade into the background. It’s not that you don’t care. More often, you’re stretched thin, managing time, childcare, and the constant pull of other people’s needs.
When therapy comes up, it can quickly become a practical calculation: Can we afford the weekly fee? How would I even find the time? Who would look after the children? These are real and valid concerns. They matter.
But they can also, quite understandably, narrow the focus.
The weekly cost can start to stand in for the whole decision. It becomes the clearest, most immediate reason to step back. And alongside it, the effort of arranging childcare or carving out an hour in an already full week can feel like too much to ask of yourself.
In the short term, not going can feel like relief. Less pressure, less expense, one less thing to organise.
Yet often, what sits underneath doesn’t disappear. The same feelings return. The same patterns repeat. The quiet sense of doubt—Am I getting this right? Where am I in all of this?—remains.
From a deeper place, this is not only about money or time. It can also touch on how we come to measure our own worth. When everything is filtered through what is affordable or manageable, it’s easy to lose sight of other measures—those rooted in your values rather than your resources.
Your worth is not defined by what you can financially justify. It lives in less visible places: in your capacity to reflect, to care, to stay with something difficult, to want things to be different. These are not small things. They are the foundations of change.
Therapy is not simply a weekly cost. It is a space where your experience can be thought about, where you are not the one holding everything together. Over time, this can begin to shift how you see yourself, and how you feel within your family.
Looking at the bigger picture doesn’t mean dismissing the realities of money, time, or childcare. It means holding them alongside a quieter question:
What do I need, and what do I value enough to make space for?
Because sometimes, making that space—however imperfectly—is where something important begins.