Stop Calling It a Career “Pause”

Career “pause” makes me cringe.

Every time I see it used to describe individuals who pivoted to run a household, raise humans, support aging parents, or keep an entire ecosystem functioning…I cringe. Not because the work is small, but because the word is.

It’s not just inaccurate.
It’s insulting.

And yet, people and organizations — many of which claim to champion inclusion and modernize workplace culture — use “pause.” 

Let’s be honest about what “pause” really implies: that someone stopped learning, growing, making decisions, leading, or developing skills. That they were temporarily “off” — dormant, idle, inactive.

But anyone who has ever been a full-time caregiver knows the truth: Nothing is paused.

If anything, life accelerates.

• You’re negotiating constantly — with toddlers, teenagers, doctors, siblings, insurance companies, school systems, contractors, and anyone else who has an opinion or obligation tied to your day.

• You’re prioritizing under pressure — sorting what matters most when everything feels urgent and the margin for error is thin.

• You’re influencing without authority — guiding behavior, calming conflict, redirecting emotions, and motivating people who don’t report to you and can’t be “performance managed.”

• You’re managing operations, logistics, and crises — often before a corporate office has even turned its lights on for the day. 

There is no snooze button on caregiving. No PTO. No sabbatical. No clean job description.

And behind the scenes, you’re cultivating the exact competencies companies claim to want:

• Judgment

• Resilience

• Communication

• Management

• Delegation

• Emotional intelligence

• Patience

• Strategic thinking

These aren’t soft skills. They’re survival skills. They don’t atrophy outside corporate walls — they only sharpen.

If anything, a so-called career “pause” is a career accelerator in disguise.

• It forces adaptability.

• It heightens problem-solving.

• It strengthens EQ.

• It teaches strategy in real time.

• It builds confidence in the moments when no one is watching, applauding, or giving performance reviews.

Somehow we’re expected to summarize this period as a gap. A break. A step back. Something to apologize for or justify.

So let’s call this season what it actually is:

A reallocation of talent — not a pause.
A shift in focus — not a step back.
A strategic season — not a gap.

If we want to truly normalize these pivots we need to fix the language.

Caregivers were never the ones who needed help defending their lives. The issue was never their confidence, their commitment, or their capability.

The issue is the label — and the way society uses it to minimize the work.

It’s time to stop pretending a “pause” ever happened. Nothing was paused, only misnamed.