I used to call myself lazy every single day.
I’d look around at the half-done laundry piles, the dishwasher I stacked but never emptied, the form I’ve been meaning to fill out for two weeks but keep forgetting until midnight – and I’d think, Why can’t I just get on with things like everyone else?
But the truth is, I wasn’t lazy. I was overwhelmed. Exhausted. Holding too much invisible weight.
And if that sounds familiar, this is for you.
Take a breath. You’re not alone. You’re not broken. And you’re definitely not lazy.
What Overload Actually Looks Like
Overload is sneaky. It doesn’t always show up like a packed calendar or an obvious crisis.
Sometimes it looks like standing still because you can’t decide which thing to do first and even if you did, there are ten steps between here and there. Too many options. Too many unknowns. Too many chances to mess it up.
It’s looking at a simple task – like starting something at work, and feeling like it would take everything out of you. Because it’s not just “send the email” or “write the document.” It’s “remember where you left off, reread the brief without zoning out, fight the panic that you’ve left it too late, figure out what needs doing first, stop yourself opening another tab, try not to spiral because it suddenly feels too big, too late, too much.
It’s coming back from holiday and knowing that the suitcase can’t just be unpacked. Because unpacking means doing laundry, and doing laundry means drying, and drying means the worst task of all: putting it all away. Then there’s the toiletries, the tangled wires, the random crap you brought ‘just in case’ that now has no home. It means sorting, deciding, relocating. And somehow, putting the suitcase back in the loft feels like a personal attack.
If you leave the suitcase closed, it’s just one task. If you open it, it’s a hundred.
Overload isn’t a lack of effort. It’s your nervous system trying to protect you from a constant sense of too much.
Why Overload Gets Misread as Laziness
From the outside, overload often looks like nothing.
You’re sitting on the sofa. The washing-up still isn’t done. You said you’d call the GP today and didn’t. Maybe you’ve spent hours “doing nothing”, but inside, your mind has been spinning, frozen between options, running through everything you should be doing, then shutting down under the weight of it.
Sometimes you’re not even doing nothing — you’re watching cleaning videos on TikTok, convincing yourself that any minute now you’ll get up and start. You’re picturing what it would look like if your space was clean. You’re mentally preparing. But your body won’t move.
And if you do manage to clean the whole kitchen one day, people assume you can always function at that level. They don’t see the recovery time it took, or how long you had to brace yourself to get there. So when you can’t do it the next day, it gets chalked up as laziness or inconsistency. Even by you.
But it’s not about ability – it’s about capacity.
Some days your brain has the bandwidth to push through the mess. Other days, just existing takes all your spoons. That’s not a failure. That’s a fluctuating nervous system, often dealing with things nobody can see; sensory input, chronic stress, executive dysfunction, or trauma patterns.
And underneath it all is this quiet, cruel voice whispering you should be able to do this. That voice? That’s internalised ableism. It’s the voice of a system that only values productivity. That sees “rest” as laziness. That ignores how much energy it takes to live in a body or brain that’s constantly adapting to the world.
But you don’t have to believe it.
You’re not inconsistent. You’re surviving an inconsistent load with an overloaded system.
The Freeze Response (aka Why You’re Not Just Being Avoidant)
When people talk about fight-or-flight, they usually leave out the third (and most common) response: freeze.
That feeling of knowing what needs doing… but doing nothing? That’s freeze.
It’s not a conscious choice. It’s your nervous system slamming on the brakes to protect you from overwhelm, shame, fear, or burnout. And it’s incredibly common for neurodivergent people, especially those who’ve had to mask or push through for years.
Freeze can look like:
- Procrastinating until the last possible moment
- Numbness or zoning out
- Being physically unable to start, even with urgent pressure
- Avoiding eye contact with the pile of laundry, hoping it’ll disappear
- Wanting someone else to just tell you what to do
And because it often shows up quietly, not with visible panic or chaos, it gets mistaken for laziness, disinterest, or poor time management.
But freeze isn’t a flaw. It’s a system error in response to unmanageable load. Sometimes the freeze kicks in before you’ve even started – because your brain has already scanned the task and gone Nope. Too risky. Too hard. Too much.
For me, the worst freeze moments are when the task should be easy. Like I’ve done it before. Like other people manage it without thinking. That’s when the shame hits hardest, and the freeze digs in deeper.
But the more I understand it’s not a failure of willpower, the less I punish myself for needing a different route in.
What Helps (or At Least Doesn’t Make It Worse)
I wish I could say I’ve figured this all out. I haven’t. What helps isn’t some perfect system or magical routine, it’s just slowly learning how to live with an overloaded brain without hating myself for it.
The shame is still there. The stuckness still shows up. But some things make it a bit easier to bear.
Here’s what helps – most of the time:
1. Taking the shame off the centre stage (even if it still shows up sometimes).
When I can remind myself I’m not lazy, just overloaded, everything feels a bit more possible. The more I stop beating myself up for being stuck, the easier it is to unstick myself.
But I’m not going to pretend I don’t still use shame sometimes. Inviting people over used to be my go-to trick – I’d suddenly find the energy to clean the whole house. It worked, but it also wrecked me. I’d be so overwhelmed before they even arrived that the social bit afterwards left me totally drained.
Now, I try to use just enough pressure. A timer. A small deadline. A nudge from someone I trust. Enough to help me start — not push me over the edge.
2. Doing one thing. Just one.
And letting that be enough. Not one thing to start the momentum — just one thing, full stop. Sometimes it’s “put the plates in the sink.” Sometimes “put the clothes in the machine but don’t press start yet.” Momentum comes later — or not. Either is okay.
3. Externalising the chaos.
Not just on paper, out loud. With my partner. Letting them see what it’s like inside my head sometimes. How hard it is to start.
Sometimes I ask them to set a timer for 30 minutes so I can just do what I can without overthinking it. Sometimes they just sit nearby and do there own thing and that’s enough to get me moving.
Honestly? If someone else is doing house stuff around me – cleaning, fixing, tidying. I can’t just sit there. I feel like I should be doing something too, and that kicks me into gear.
Sometimes all I need is someone else to start.
4. Creating external accountability (without relying only on shame).
I don’t have a cleaner now, but when I did, it made a huge difference. Not because of what she cleaned, but because of what I did before she came.
I’d clear the sink so she could clean it. Pick up the floordrobe. Change the sheets. Because I didn’t want her to think I was a dirty bitch.
Her cleaning was basically a bonus. The real power was in the structure. The pressure, the expectation, the deadline. It gave me something to work toward that wasn’t internal.
I haven’t quite replaced that yet. But I’m aware of it now and sometimes I build in little fake deadlines or use “future me will thank you” to try and trick my brain into giving a shit.
5. Accepting the “good enough” version.
I still fall into the trap of watching TikTok cleaning videos and feeling like I need to bleach grout or reorganise my entire life. But honestly? That’s never going to be me.
Sometimes the dishes get done. Sometimes I just throw away the worst of the mess and pretend the rest doesn’t exist.
And that counts.
Good enough is good enough.
Especially when the alternative is feeling like a failure for not living up to someone else’s highlight reel.
You’re Not Broken. You’re Full.
If you’ve been calling yourself lazy, I hope this gave you a different way to look at it.
Because most of us aren’t lazy. We’re just full.
Full of mental tabs and emotional pressure and sensory input and half-finished loops. Full of the weight of just existing in a world that wasn’t built for our kind of brain.
You don’t need fixing. You don’t need a productivity hack or a fresh start or a brand new colour-coded planner. You just need space. Gentleness. A way to move through the fog without blaming yourself for the weather.
Whatever you’re carrying, it makes sense that it’s heavy. And even if you haven’t ticked a single thing off your list today, you’re not failing. You’re trying. That counts.
You’re not lazy. You’re overloaded.
And you’re not alone.