I can feel invisible in the middle of being needed

Dear Delyara, Children need things. Work needs things. The house needs things. Family needs things. I am not ignored in the practical sense. I am deeply woven into the daily life of several people. And still, there are days when I feel emotionally invisible all the way through it. That is the confusion of this kind of loneliness. The outside evidence says I matter. The inside experience says I am being used functionally without being held personally. I think a lot of women live there and don’t have language for it. Useful and lonely at once. Needed and unseen. Surrounded and not met. I do have language for it. It still hurts.