The Rice Ball That Broke Me
It always starts with rice. One scoop. Then another. A pinch of salt. A strip of nori. Maybe a plum in the middle if I’m feeling fancy. The humble onigiri, Japan’s iconic rice ball, shaped in my palm every morning as the house quietly stirs to life. My husband’s alarm. My son’s sleepy shuffle. The kettle clicks on. And me — I’m already at the counter, forming the first of what will be 10,000 lunchboxes in my lifetime.
For years, I wore this morning routine like a badge of honor. My bento boxes weren’t just meals; they were love letters, proof that I was doing motherhood “right.” Tamagoyaki spirals, tiny sausage octopi, panda-shaped rice. I told myself that my care was visible, edible, Instagrammable. But inside, I was running on empty.
The truth is, I didn’t know I was burning out. How could I? I was doing what every other mom around me was doing. Pushing through exhaustion. Prioritizing everyone else’s needs. Smiling when praised for my “ganbaru” spirit — that never-give-up energy we glorify here in Japan. But inside, I was quietly crumbling. There were days I’d stare at the fridge, unable to think of what to cook, my brain foggy and my heart heavy. I’d snap at my son for forgetting his socks. Cry over spilled miso soup. Resent the very people I loved the most.
What made it worse was that I felt like I couldn’t talk about it. Burnout, especially for moms, is almost taboo in our culture. We whisper about it, if at all. We joke about needing a break, but rarely take one. And no one wants to admit that something as simple as a bento — something that looks so cheerful and wholesome — could be a symbol of emotional overload.
I didn’t know what was happening to me. I just knew I was tired in a way sleep couldn’t fix.
So this is where my story begins — not in a therapist’s office or on a dramatic breaking point, but at the kitchen counter. Bent over another bento. Wondering why something I used to love now made me want to cry.
And maybe, just maybe, you’ve felt the same. If so, I hope this story will feel like a warm cup of tea on a hard day — not advice, not judgment, just honest company.
Signs I Ignored (Until I Couldn’t)
There’s a funny thing about burnout — it doesn’t show up all at once like a fire alarm. It arrives like steam. Quiet, invisible, creeping into every corner of your life until suddenly everything feels heavy, soggy, suffocating.
At first, it was small things. I’d forget to add soy sauce to my husband’s tamagoyaki, which never used to happen. Or I’d space out while folding laundry and find myself staring blankly at the window, unable to remember what I was doing. I started avoiding texts from mom friends. I’d skip PTA meetings, even though I was usually the one organizing them. It felt like my inner battery wouldn’t charge anymore, no matter how long I “rested.”
But the outside didn’t reflect that. To anyone looking in, I was still the put-together mom. My son was always on time, his bento always cute. My house was reasonably clean, my smile still automatic. I even got compliments — “You’re amazing, how do you do it all?” And I’d smile and say thank you, while secretly wishing someone would just tell me it’s okay to drop a ball.
The worst part wasn’t the fatigue — it was the guilt. What did I have to complain about? A healthy family, a home, a part-time job I actually liked, a husband who helped (well, sometimes). I told myself I was being dramatic. Ungrateful. Weak.
So I pushed on. I doubled down on doing things “right.” More elaborate bentos. More volunteering. More hiding.
But one morning, it cracked.
My son asked me if I could make his bento look like Pikachu — again. And something in me just… froze. I wasn’t mad at him. He was just a kid, asking for joy in a box. But I looked at the rice, the nori, the egg, and I just couldn’t move. My hands started trembling. I sat down on the kitchen floor and cried. Not loud, not wild — just quiet, exhausted tears I’d been holding back for too long.
That moment — me on the floor, surrounded by bento tools and half-formed ideas of who I was supposed to be — was when I realized something had to change.
It wasn’t just about the food. It was about me. Somewhere between motherhood, marriage, and the myth of the perfect Japanese homemaker, I had erased my own needs. I wasn’t just tired. I was disappearing.
That’s when I started asking different questions:
- Why do I think love must come with self-sacrifice?
- Why do I feel guilty for resting?
- Why do I tie my worth to whether my family eats vegetables shaped like flowers?
Those questions didn’t come with easy answers, but they cracked open the part of me that had gone silent. They reminded me that emotional balance isn’t a luxury — it’s a necessity. And no amount of soy-glazed carrots could fill the hole of my unmet needs.
At first, I didn’t tell anyone. Just quietly started making simpler lunches. I stopped shaping rice into characters. I wrote my son a silly note instead. “Pikachu’s on vacation today — love you, Mama.” And you know what? He laughed. And ate every bite.
That laugh was the start of something new.
Redefining Care—One Lunchbox at a Time
Let me be honest: I thought simplifying my bentos would feel like freedom. And it did — for a little while. Fewer steps. Fewer Instagram-perfect expectations. More time to sit down and actually drink my morning tea instead of letting it go cold on the counter.
But then, something surprising happened.
I started hearing whispers.
Not from inside me — from outside.
“Oh, no pandas today?”
“Your son must miss your cute lunches.”
“Are you feeling okay? You used to be so creative!”
They weren’t cruel comments. Just casual observations from other moms at the park or preschool. But each one landed like a paper cut. Small, but stinging. And after a few weeks, I began to feel it again — the doubt, the guilt, the internal tug-of-war between self-care and social approval.
Because in Japan, care is often seen. Measured. Compared.
A mother’s love is visible: in the color-coded schedule, the layered furoshiki, the bento cut into animal shapes. It’s written on her face as she bikes through the rain to get to hoikuen pickup. It’s whispered in the way she gives up promotions because her husband “can’t get home by 7.” It’s not enough to love your child — you’re expected to show it in a thousand quiet, exhausting ways.
And when I started doing less, I felt like I was failing some unspoken contract.
I had to face something uncomfortable: a part of me had tied my self-worth to being the “good mother” others expected. Even my idea of rest had become performative — only okay if I could prove I’d earned it.
So, I started reading. Listening. I found articles, blog posts, and quiet corners of the internet where Japanese and non-Japanese moms were whispering their truths. They wrote about the invisible load, the emotional labor, the cultural double standards. They wrote about resentment, about quietly envying their husbands’ freedom, about feeling guilty for even feeling guilty.
And suddenly, I wasn’t alone anymore.
I realized that my struggle wasn’t just personal — it was structural. It was about a society that praises self-sacrifice and calls it love. A culture that’s beginning to change, but still moves slowly when it comes to mothers reclaiming their emotional space.
The twist was this: maybe care isn’t about how much I do. Maybe it’s about how honest I am.
So I did something radical (at least, it felt radical to me): I asked for help.
I told my husband I needed mornings off from bento duty — just once a week. He hesitated. Then agreed. We started “conbini Fridays.” My son thought it was the coolest thing ever. I let him pick whatever lunch he wanted, and he’d proudly show off his onigiri and karaage pack like it was gourmet cuisine.
I also started therapy — online, once a month. It wasn’t magic, but it was mine. A space where I could say the things I was afraid to say at the kitchen table.
I began seeing my energy as a budget. And I finally gave myself permission to spend it on myself sometimes.
Was everyone supportive? Not always. But I stopped waiting for permission from others to care for myself. And in doing so, I began showing a deeper, more honest kind of care to my family too — one that didn’t require me to disappear.
A Different Kind of Full
Some mornings now, my son makes his own bento.
Okay — “makes” might be generous. He tosses in a jelly cup, a rice ball from the freezer, and a carton of milk tea. Sometimes a chocolate bar. And honestly? I let him.
Because these days, I’m less focused on the cuteness of his lunch and more on the conversations we have while packing it.
He asks me how my online work is going. I ask him what he’s excited about today. We laugh about how neither of us likes pickled daikon anymore. I still make bentos most days — but now they’re simpler, real, human. Sometimes a little messy. Just like us.
And in that mess, I’ve found balance.
I used to think balance meant keeping everything perfectly in place — work, marriage, parenting, health. Like a spinning plate performance where one wrong move would crash the whole act. But I’ve come to believe balance is more like cooking: tasting as you go, adjusting the seasoning, and knowing when to turn down the heat.
Burnout didn’t arrive because I was weak. It came because I ignored myself for too long. I confused sacrifice with love. And I believed the lie that a mother’s care must be visible, constant, and exhausting.
But love, I’ve learned, can be quiet. It can be choosing frozen karaage over homemade. It can be stepping back to make room for your child’s independence. It can be going to bed with dishes in the sink and your sanity intact.
I’m not a “new woman.” I still forget socks, lose my temper, and yes — I still cry sometimes on the kitchen floor. But I’m no longer afraid of those moments. They’re part of the rhythm now. Part of what it means to live fully, not flawlessly.
So to the other moms out there — in Japan or anywhere — staring at your fridge, wondering how you’re going to do it all again tomorrow:
You don’t have to.
You don’t need permission to rest.
You don’t need a picture-perfect bento to prove your love.
You just need to come back to yourself — piece by piece, rice ball by rice ball.
That’s how I began again.
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