Wellbeing with Yasmin · Articles
The Hidden
Cost Of Yes
When over-serving quietly costs your energy, confidence, and sense of self.
For a long time, saying yes was my default.
Not because I always wanted to.
Not because I always had the energy.
Not because it always felt right.
Sometimes it was a favour. Sometimes it was helping someone sort out a problem. Sometimes it was visiting someone when I was tired, unwell, or simply did not want to go.
But somewhere along the way, I had learned that saying yes kept things easier.
It avoided disappointment.
It avoided awkwardness.
It avoided the feeling that I had let someone down.
I remember one moment very clearly from early in my first marriage. I was newly married, maybe within the first eighteen months, and one of my mother-in-law’s relatives had invited the family for lunch.
The day before, I had been unwell. I had a temperature, a horrible headache, an achy body, and I had taken paracetamol just to get through the night.
In the morning, I knew I needed to rest.
I said, “I am not feeling very well. You can all go, but I do not think I can come.”
And the response was immediate.
“No, no, no. You have to come.”
So I went.
I did not sit with my no.
I did not protect my body.
I did not honour what I already knew.
I went, and I remember sleeping on their sofa because that is how unwell I was.
Looking back, that moment says so much.
What might have been a short illness became harder because I did not rest. But more than that, something inside me was being trained.
One no became a yes.
Then the next yes became easier.
Then, over time, people begin to know you as the person who will always do it.
“Ask Yasmin. She is always available.”
For years, I wore that almost like a badge of honour.
Now I see it differently.
It was not proof that I was generous. It was proof that I was not looking after myself.
There is nothing wrong with serving. Serving can be beautiful. Helping others can be part of who we are.
But over-serving is different.
Over-serving is when you keep giving from a place that is already empty.
It is when you say yes while your body says no.
It is when you keep everybody else comfortable while you slowly disappear from your own life.
For me, this pattern went back a long way. As a child, I often had to accept what was chosen for me. Clothes, colours, visits, expectations. Whether I liked them or not, I obliged.
And because I had practised that from such a young age, I carried it with me into adulthood, marriage, family life, and work.
In one job, I said yes so often that I worked on days off, took on too much, and pushed myself beyond what was sustainable. I burned the candle at both ends until I could not keep going in that role.
That is the hidden cost of yes.
It is not only time.
It is energy.
It is self-esteem.
It is self-worth.
It is the quiet message you send yourself every time you override your own needs:
What I feel does not matter as much as keeping everyone else happy.
I used to be afraid that if I said no, people would think I was unhelpful, unkind, uncooperative, or not a team player.
I felt as though it was my job to be the buffer.
To hold everyone else’s emotions.
To keep everything smooth.
But when you keep numbing your own feelings in order to manage everyone else’s, something happens inside you.
You start to dim yourself.
You switch off parts of yourself.
There was a point when I realised I could not cry.
That frightened me.
It showed me how much I had encased myself. How much I had learned not to feel what I was feeling.
This is not only an emotional pattern. It can affect our wellbeing too.
The NHS notes that stress can show up in many ways: physically, mentally, and in our behaviour. It might appear as headaches, muscle tension, stomach problems, overwhelm, irritability, difficulty concentrating, or changes in sleep, appetite, or how we treat ourselves.
That does not mean every headache or every illness is caused by saying yes too often. Life and health are more complex than that.
But it does remind us that stress is not imaginary. The body is often involved in the story.
Mayo Clinic also includes learning to say no, delegating, and respecting physical and emotional limits as part of stress management. Mayo Clinic Health System describes healthy boundaries as something that helps us communicate what is acceptable and what is not.
So when we talk about boundaries, we are not talking about becoming difficult.
We are talking about protecting capacity.
We are talking about protecting steadiness.
We are talking about staying present enough to serve from love, not depletion.
The journey back did not happen overnight.
I started with little noes.
Small boundaries.
Small moments where I chose not to explain myself endlessly.
Small moments where I allowed myself to disappoint someone rather than abandon myself.
And slowly, those little noes helped me build myself back.
My confidence came back.
My self-esteem began to return.
My sense of self became stronger.
I know many women worry that boundaries are harsh or selfish. I understand that fear deeply.
But boundaries are not there to make us cold.
They are there to keep us whole.
You are not doing anyone a service by running yourself into the ground. You are not helping your family, your work, your friendships, or your community by becoming invisible inside your own life.
A boundary can be warm.
A boundary can be kind.
A boundary can sound like:
“I would love to help, but I do not have capacity for that right now.”
“I am not well enough to come today.”
“I need to rest.”
“That does not work for me.”
“No, I cannot do that.”
No essay.
No over-explaining.
No apology for being human.
I have also learned to respect the physical cost of ignoring myself. I cannot and would not make medical claims about what causes what, and I would never want another woman to read this and feel frightened or blamed.
But I do know this:
Years of overriding my body, emotions, energy, and limits affected my wellbeing.
The body keeps asking to be heard.
Sometimes gently.
Sometimes loudly.
And when we keep saying yes to everyone else, we may be saying no to the very care we need.
So perhaps the question is not, “Is it selfish to have boundaries?”
Perhaps the question is:
What is the cost of not having them?
This week, ask yourself gently:
- What did I say yes to that drained me?
- What was I afraid would happen if I said no?
- Where am I over-serving instead of serving with love?
- What is one small no that would help me come back to myself?
A boundary is not a rejection of others.
Sometimes it is the beginning of returning to yourself.
If this has stirred something in you, I would love to sit with you for a gentle Virtual Tea. No pressure. Just a warm conversation about where you are, what you are carrying, and what it might look like to protect your energy without closing your heart.