When Money Becomes Love… It Breaks Her

Published 15/8/25 9.00 am

There is a kind of love many women learn to chase —

not through words or hugs or being seen for who they are,

but through doing more.

Giving more.

Earning more.

From a very young age, many daughters are taught that love is something you earn.

That worth is something you prove.

Not always in harsh words…

Sometimes it's in silence.

In who gets praised.

In who gets compared.

In who gets noticed only when they are doing more than they can carry.

And so she learns.

She learns that to be a good daughter means to provide.

To make her family proud by putting herself last.

To become the one who gives and gives… and gives —

until there’s nothing left.

Not because she wants recognition.

But because deep down, she believes:

“If I do more… maybe then I’ll be loved.”

She doesn’t question it.

She becomes the rescuer.

The responsible one.

The strong one.

And for a while, it works.

She is celebrated. Admired. “The good one.

”The one siblings are told to be like.

The one who shows up with money, support, and solutions —

even when she’s silently falling apart inside.

But the moment she chooses to stop…

To rest.

To set a boundary.

To say, “This is for me now.”

She is met with silence.

Distance.

Or worse — rejection.

She is no longer seen as the good daughter.

She is now the selfish one.

The ungrateful one.

The one who has “changed.”

All because she stopped giving beyond her limits.

This story isn’t just mine.

It’s the quiet ache of so many women I’ve met —

women who gave everything to be loved,

and were still left out, still unseen.

We are daughters. Sisters. Partners. Mothers.

We have poured ourselves into others hoping it would be enough.

Hoping that finally, someone would say:

"You don’t have to do anything. You're already enough."

But we were raised in homes where doing was valued more than being.

Where love was tied to performance.

And where money… became the way love was measured.

And that’s the wound I’m speaking to now.

Because your worth is not in how much you earn.

It’s not in how much you give.

It’s not in how much you do for the people you love.

You were worthy the moment you were born.

You were a gift to your family — not a transaction.

It was never your job to pay back your childhood through self-sacrifice.

Yes, helping parents is a beautiful thing.

But only when it’s done from love, not obligation.

From freedom, not fear.

From wholeness, not depletion.

So to the woman who feels like she’s only lovable when she’s doing more:

You are not broken.

You are not selfish for choosing yourself.

You are not bad for setting boundaries.

You are healing a wound that was never yours to carry in the first place.

And if they cannot see you when you stop giving…

That does not make you unlovable.

That reveals the places where love was always conditional.

Let them say what they will.

Let them misunderstand.

But you?

You keep choosing you now.

You keep filling your own cup.

Because your worth has never been based on what you give.

You were always enough —

even when no one told you so.

Rosheka Chandra