The 35,000 Decisions You Don't Realise You're Making

35,000.

That's the estimated number of decisions an average adult makes every single day. When I first heard that number, I thought it was exaggerated. Surely not. I'm busy, yes, but thirty-five thousand?

Then I started paying attention. And honestly, the number started to feel conservative.

A Tuesday Morning in My House

Let me walk you through a completely ordinary Tuesday morning in my household. Not a dramatic one. Not a crisis. Just a normal weekday before 8:30am.

5:30am. Alarm goes off. Do I get up now or snooze? I get up. What do I wear to run in? It's humid but there's a chance of rain. Shorts and a vest or leggings? Vest. Which route? The long loop or the short one? I have a meeting at 9 so I'll keep it short.

7:00am. Back home. Shower now or after the kids are up? Now. Hair wash day or not? Not today. Which moisturiser, the SPF one because I'm going out later? Yes.

7:15am. Kids are awake. What's for breakfast? The seven-year-old wants toast. The five-year-old wants cereal but we're out of her favourite. Do I offer an alternative or make toast for both? Toast for both. But now she wants honey and he wants butter and there's a negotiation about who gets which plate.

7:20am. School bags. Has the seven-year-old got his reading folder? Yes. Water bottles filled? One lid is cracked. Replace it or send it anyway? Replace it. PE kit, is it a PE day? Check the app. It's not on the app. Check the WhatsApp group. One mum says yes, another says no. Send the kit just in case.

7:25am. Getting dressed. The five-year-old doesn't like her socks. Do I engage with this or hold firm? I hold firm, gently. She's upset. Do I comfort her now or keep moving? Quick comfort, then redirect.

7:30am. Sunscreen. Snacks packed. Library book, is it library day? I can't remember. Send it. Car keys. Did I lock the back door? Check. Yes. Leave.

That's roughly ninety minutes. And I've just made somewhere between 80 and 120 decisions, depending on how you count.

I haven't opened my laptop yet.

The Decisions You Don't Notice

Most of us massively underestimate our decision count because we only register the big ones, the ones that require conscious deliberation. Should I take this job? Should we move house? How should I handle this client issue?

But your brain doesn't distinguish between big and small. Every micro-decision, which mug to use, whether to respond to that Slack message now or later, which task to tackle first, whether to take the call or let it ring, costs your brain the same biological currency. Glutamate is released. Neural resources are spent.

And the categories stack up fast:

Food decisions alone account for over 200 per day according to research from Cornell University. What to eat, when to eat it, how much, whether it aligns with your goals, whether the kids will eat it, whether you have the ingredients, whether you have the time to cook it.

Parenting decisions are relentless and emotionally loaded. Screen time limits, behaviour responses, scheduling, social dynamics, health calls, emotional support. Each one carries more weight because the stakes feel personal.

Work decisions compound across the day. Emails, priorities, meetings, strategy calls, approvals, feedback, delegation. And if you're in a leadership role, many of these are decisions about other people's decisions.

Why Parents Carry a Heavier Load

Here's what I think gets lost in the decision fatigue conversation: not all lives carry the same decision volume. If you're a working parent, and especially if you're the one managing the household logistics, you are running two full decision-intensive operations simultaneously.

Your colleague who doesn't have kids isn't making fewer work decisions than you. But they probably aren't also deciding between Calpol and Nurofen at 6am, negotiating sock choices with a five-year-old, and mentally meal-planning for the week while sitting in a strategy meeting.

This isn't a competition. It's context. And the context matters because when someone tells you to 'just prioritise better' or 'batch your decisions,' they might not understand that your decision load is fundamentally different from theirs.

Start Counting

I'd challenge you to spend one morning, just one, trying to notice every decision you make from the moment you wake up to the moment you sit down at your desk. Don't judge them. Don't try to optimise them yet. Just notice.

Because once you see the sheer volume, two things happen. First, you stop being so hard on yourself for running out of steam. And second, you start thinking very differently about where your decision energy should actually go.

That's what my next post is about. The specific, hidden decision tax that falls disproportionately on the person running the household. And why it's the most underestimated form of decision fatigue there is.