The Mental Load, a Viral Mom, and the Story the Camera Missed

A commitment to show up and write my truth | Day 271 of 365

I saw the video before I knew anything about the people in it.

A mother at a Giants game was making her way down a row of seats with a baby strapped to her chest, a diaper bag on her back, and three trays of food balanced in her hands. The announcers were having fun with it and crowned her mom of the year. Beside her, a man was already eating.

I didn't know their names. I didn't know what kind of week they'd had or what was said before the camera found them. I'd watched maybe ten seconds, and I was already furious on her behalf, because I thought I was finally seeing the mental load mothers carry, caught on camera where everyone could see it.

I was angry.

I was also wrong.

What the "Mom of the Year" Clip Couldn't Show

A few days later, a woman identifying herself as Erika—the mother in the video—published a first-person account of that night on Substack. The man beside her is her husband, Ramses, and not long ago he lost one of his oldest friends, a gifted ballplayer. There was no funeral and no memorial, nowhere for the grief to go. So Erika suggested a ball game. She wanted him to sit in the stands, eat ballpark food, and have a little room to remember his friend.

When she got up to take the baby to the restroom, Ramses offered to hold her. Erika kept her in the carrier because it was a chilly San Francisco night and the baby was keeping her warm. She picked up food on the way back. He asked if she wanted to eat first. She'd eaten before they left, and he hadn't had a real meal all day, so she told him to go ahead.

That was the whole scandal.

The camera, she wrote, "couldn't show what he was carrying that night." I haven't been able to shake that line.

Meanwhile, strangers were telling her to leave him. Some went digging for their names and phone numbers. A grieving man became a stand-in for every lazy husband on the internet, and his wife had to stop and defend the very person she'd been trying to take care of.

Erika and Ramses, I'm so sorry. I judged you from a fragment, and I know better. Thank you for being gracious enough to tell us the rest.

Maybe someone once sized you up in a single glance, at work or in the pickup line or across your own family's dinner table, and got you completely wrong. Maybe you've been on the other side of it, sure of yourself right up until you heard the rest. I've been both. I'd guess you have too.

Why the Mental Load Felt So Familiar

That clip isn't my marriage. We've traveled for work with our daughter since she was two months old, and my husband is the one who packs and unpacks the car while telling me, "Just take her. I'll handle the rest." I don't take that for granted.

So why did it hit me so hard?

Because I understood the women in the comments. We're expected to be devoted mothers and have thriving careers, just not so devoted that we fall behind, and not so successful that anyone at home seems neglected. Keep the house clean. Get a decent dinner on the table. Stay patient, keep the marriage happy, remember everyone's appointments. Blah, blah, blah. And please do it without looking tired.

The mental load isn't only the trays in your hands. It's the permission slip you remembered at eleven at night, the gift you already ordered for a birthday party your kid hasn't mentioned yet, the running list of who needs what that never quite switches off. It can live in a home full of love, with a partner who genuinely shows up. It still weighs something.

I knew mine had gotten too heavy when I started waking up in the middle of the night to work. My daughter would sense I'd left the room and wake up too. I was accidentally inviting a baby to my midnight shift.

When people hear how much we travel, they say, "I have no idea how you do it." Some days that sounds like a compliment. Other days it sounds like they think I've lost my mind. It's probably a little of both.

Regulate, Realign, Receive: Letting Help Count

I thought this series ended yesterday. Three days on regulating, realigning, and learning to receive, and I had closed the notebook. Then this story showed up, and I realized it was the piece I'd been missing.

Regulating gives me the pause before I react, the same pause I skipped when I watched that clip. Realigning means catching the moment the story in my head stops being true, whether it's about a stranger at a ballpark or about me at three in the morning. And receiving? That's letting help actually count.

What stays with me most is that her husband offered, and she said she had it. For her, that was love. She was carrying things so he could grieve. But how many of us say "I've got it" out of pure habit? How many times has someone reached for the bag, the baby, or the dishes, and you waved them off because it was faster to do it yourself, or because letting them felt like admitting you couldn't?

I'm grateful for my husband, for the people on our team, and for an amazing chiropractor whose care has helped our whole family feel more regulated. Their support is what lets me be present with the people I love, instead of half here and half running tomorrow's list.

So this is where the series ends for me. Before you decide you understand someone else's marriage, leave room for what the camera missed. If you saw yourself in that mother, be honest about what you're carrying. And the next time someone offers, let them take something.

I used to think abundance meant having more. Lately it looks a lot like having people who help me carry what already matters.

And when you see a woman you love with her hands full, don't just tell her how incredible she is.

Reach for a tray.

About the Author | Day 271 of 365

I'm a soul-led coach, entrepreneur, mother, and recovering perfectionist, currently navigating healing, uncertainty, temporary chapters, motherhood, work, big transitions, grief, nervous system healing, overstimulation, emotional growth, and the ongoing lesson that life works a whole lot better when we stop trying to carry everything alone. Today that lesson looked like admitting I judged two strangers from a few seconds of video, apologizing when the full story proved me wrong, and feeling grateful for the people who help me carry what matters.

Day 271 of 365. Still showing up. Still grateful. Still learning to pause before deciding I know the whole story. 🐧