I feel guilty every time I need less noise than my life naturally produces

Dear Delyara, By evening, I sometimes want silence in a way that feels physical. Not emotional silence. Actual lessness. Less talking. Less television. Less interruption. Less “Mum.” Less “can you.” Less sound moving through my skin after I have already given too much of myself away all day. And the second I feel that need, guilt arrives. As if kindness should make me more absorbent. As if motherhood should make me endlessly available to the environment of my own family. As if needing the world to be gentler than it is means I am failing at being warm enough to the life I built. I know overstimulation is real. I still treat it like a character flaw. That is exhausting in its own right.