Being Good at Surviving Isn't the Same as Being Well

My grandmother built a nursing home from borrowed money and ran it for thirty years. She became a self-made millionaire. Both of her ex-husbands died in her facility.

She was, by every measure anyone in my family used, a success.

She also never learned a single boundary. Never learned how to pick a partner who wouldn't hurt her — she married the same abusive alcoholic twice. Raised four children in the fallout, and every one of them came out with something broken.

Here's the part I think about most: the money didn't fail to fix it. The money made it easier to keep pretending there was nothing to fix. When the bills are paid and the business is thriving, who's going to ask what's happening underneath?

That's the version nobody warns you about. We talk about money not buying happiness like it's a shortage — like you just didn't get enough of it. But that's not how it worked in my family. Financial success didn't leave a gap where the emotional health should have been. It covered it.

And if you're the capable one — the one who handles it, who has the career and the reputation and the people who count on you — that competence can do the exact same job. It's very hard to look at what you're carrying when everything you touch keeps working.

Being good at surviving isn't the same as being well. My grandmother proved that for thirty years.

Travel light. — TBT