Emotional Labour in Brown Daughters: The Invisible Weight We Carry

“Why does it always fall on me?”
This is a question many Brown daughters find themselves asking quietly, often with guilt, and usually while juggling everyone else's needs. Does this sound familiar?

What Is Emotional Labour?

Emotional labour refers to the invisible, unpaid, and often unrecognized work of managing other people’s emotions such as soothing, supporting, anticipating needs, and keeping peace in relationships. For many Brown daughters, emotional labour begins early, often shaped by cultural expectations, gender roles, and intergenerational trauma. It might look like:

• Mediating between family members during conflict

• Minimizing your own feelings to maintain harmony

• Translating, explaining, or defending parents in public or institutional settings

• Absorbing your parents’ anxieties, guilt, and unprocessed trauma

• Acting as the “good daughter” even when it compromises your wellbeing

This labour is not always overt. It tends to show up in everyday tasks like being the one who remembers birthdays, checks in on relatives, explains mental health to elders, or keeps siblings connected. It’s in the way many of us have been conditioned to “hold it together,” smile through discomfort, and show up even when we’re burnt out.

Why It’s So Common Among Brown Daughters

In South Asian families and many collectivist cultures, daughters are often socialized to be caretakers, peacekeepers, and empaths. We’re praised for being selfless and criticized when we set boundaries. Emotional labour becomes a badge of honour, but it can also feel like a burden.

Some of the reasons emotional labour is normalized in Brown daughters include:

• Gender roles: Daughters are expected to be emotionally intelligent and relationally skilled, while sons may be given more freedom to be emotionally distant or uninvolved.

• Cultural expectations: The pressure to uphold family honour and avoid shame can lead to silence, people-pleasing, and suppression of personal needs.

• Intergenerational trauma: Our parents may have survived war, migration, racism, or poverty. Many Brown daughters feel they must "pay back" that sacrifice with emotional loyalty, even if it costs them their mental health.

• Lack of systemic support: Many families rely heavily on each other due to barriers in accessing culturally safe therapy, healthcare, or social services which leaves daughters to fill in those gaps.

The Cost of Carrying So Much

Unchecked emotional labour can lead to:

• Chronic anxiety or resentment

• Caregiver burnout

• Difficulty identifying or asserting your own needs

• Enmeshment in family dynamics

• Guilt for desiring independence or boundaries

• Depression masked as “functioning well”

Brown daughters often struggle to name their exhaustion because it doesn’t always look like crisis. Instead, it looks like competence and it is celebrated and something to be proud of. However, when your competence or your ability to do it all is built on suppression, it’s not sustainable.

I remember the moment it hit me. I was the one who remembered everyone’s appointments, soothed arguments over WhatsApp, helped fill out and submit documents on the computer, and never once asked if anyone had the capacity to hold me. It wasn’t until I started therapy that I realized I was exhausted. And that wasn’t noble. It was a signal. A signal that I needed to shift the narrative.

Healing from the Inside Out

Here’s the truth: Emotional labour shouldn’t be the currency for love. As Brown daughters, we’re allowed to rest. We’re allowed to say no. We’re allowed to feel anger, take up space, and expect reciprocity.

Ways to begin reclaiming your emotional energy:

• Learn to notice when you're performing vs. connecting authentically.

• Practice saying no without overexplaining.

• Seek culturally attuned therapy or peer support groups.

• Prioritize relationships where you're not just a giver.

• Journal about your emotional labour patterns to make them visible.

You don’t owe anyone your burnout. Your worth isn't measured by your sacrifices, and breaking this cycle is an act of both resistance and healing.