When the Weight of the World Feels Too Heavy to Carry

There are moments when the world feels like too much.

Too many headlines.
Too many lives disrupted.
Too many systems failing the very people they are supposed to protect.

Lately, it feels impossible to turn away. We are constantly connected… scrolling, refreshing, witnessing tragedy in real time. Our nervous systems were not designed to carry this much grief, this much injustice, this much responsibility all at once.

And yet, here we are.

We are angry, afraid, and exhausted by systems that seem untouchable. We are mourning the loss of Dr. Janell Green Smith, a physician who dedicated her life to advocating for her patients, especially Black mothers, only to die from childbirth complications herself. The cruel irony of her death sits heavy in our chests.

If someone like her is not protected, what does that say about the rest of us?

This is not just sadness.
It is moral injury.
It is collective trauma.

For those of us who work in maternal health, racial equity, and advocacy, this grief compounds. We carry our community’s pain alongside our own. We show up to meetings, interviews, and caregiving roles while quietly wondering if anything we do is enough against systems that feel immovable.

It can make you feel hopeless.

It can make you feel small.

It can make you wonder if change is even possible.

But here is what we hold onto at Edith Institute:

Systems are powerful. But so is care. So is memory. So is refusing to look away.

Every story shared in our Mama We See project is an act of resistance. Every mother who trusts us with her truth is shifting something, even when the results aren’t immediate or visible. Change does not always arrive as a victory parade. Sometimes it arrives quietly, in data, in policy language, in training rooms, in the hearts of clinicians who begin to listen differently.

It is okay to be tired. It is okay to step back from the news. It is okay to admit that this hurts.

Rest is not retreat.
Grief is not defeat.
And caring deeply in an unjust world is not naïve, it is radical.

If you are feeling overwhelmed, you are not alone. You are part of a community that is grieving, pushing, questioning, and still choosing to care even when it feels unfair that we have to.

We will not carry this forever in silence. We will keep telling the truth. And together, we will keep going gently, imperfectly, and with one another.