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So, my partner recently had shoulder surgery. We’re talking complete replacement.
Naturally, I kicked into super-helper mode — meals prepped, gallons of homemade ginger iced tea, pillows fluffed, iPad charged, and yes, laundry handled. I wanted to be the MVP of post-op recovery. You know that feeling when you want to be so helpful, so competent, so supportive… if there were an Olympics for the best helper, I wanted to be the champion.
So, back to the laundry. I think it’s important to know that my partner does not allow me to do his laundry. He does it all, including ironing (he even irons my pyjamas).
However, with only one working arm, he relented. I threw his dirty clothes in the wash, then into the dryer. Normal process, right?
I started to remove things from the dryer and my heart nearly stopped.
The shirts.
Not just any shirts — his designer shirts. The kind that don’t belong anywhere near a tumble dryer, much less a washing machine. And just like that, his grown-man Balmains came out ready to be worn by a boy.
I wasn’t trying to be careless.
I was trying to be helpful.
And yet, the result was… not helpful.
I wasn’t thinking — or rather, I assumed everything in the basket was grub wear, not nice wear.
Post-hospital logic, right?
And that’s when the familiar people-pleaser panic set in — not because of the shirts (okay, maybe a little because of the shirts), but because I felt like I failed.
In my quest to be the best helper I’d botched it.
This is the dilemma of the high-achieving people-pleaser: we want so badly to be useful, to be appreciated, to get it right — that even one misstep feels like a full-blown character flaw.
We over-function, over-give, over-do… and when things don’t go perfectly, we don’t just feel disappointment. We feel defective.
And here’s what it really comes down to: We think I’ve made a mistake, that must mean I am a mistake.
Where does this narrative come from?
I think we’ve all had someone say to us “I’m so disappointed in you.” But what we actually hear is, “You are a disappointment.” Not that the thing we did is disappointing—but that we are the disappointment.
But here’s the thing: messing up while trying to help doesn’t make you a bad person.
It doesn’t even make you a bad helper.
It makes you human (albeit a little laundry-challenged.)
What it does highlight is the hidden pressure we put on ourselves to be irreplaceable, essential, and mistake-proof. We tie our worth to our usefulness — and that’s a dangerous metric.
Because no matter how many tasks we tick off, we’re always one shrunken shirt away from feeling like we’ve failed.
So what if we rewrote the rule?
- What if helping didn’t have to mean flawless execution?
- What if being a good partner, friend, or colleague meant being there — not being perfect?
- And what if making a mistake didn’t disqualify us from being enough?
After the Great Shirt Shrinkage of 2025, I took a deep breath, fessed up (using the Picked Onion Approach), and we both laughed (eventually).
It wasn’t the laundry that mattered in the end. It was the fact that I showed up, that I cared, that I tried.
And sometimes, that’s the most helpful thing we can do — let go of the need to nail it every time, and just keep showing up. Wrinkles, shrunken shirts, et al.
Because in the end, the most powerful kind of help isn’t perfection. It’s presence.
Until next time,
Back yourself,
Bet on yourself and
Be Respected.
DrK x
PS: In case you’re wondering — we managed to stretch the shirts back out. They’re a little snug, a little humbled, but wearable.
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