How do I cope with thankless work no one notices?

You keep everything running, and the reward for doing it well is that no one sees you at all, until something breaks and suddenly you are the problem. That invisibility is a strange, quiet ache. To be noticed only in failure, never in the steady success you build every day, wears on anyone. But do not mistake silence for worthlessness. The calm that others take for granted is your work. The fact that they can forget you exist is proof of how well you do it. The world runs on people whose success looks like nothing happening, and that is a real and honorable thing. Since the praise will not come from outside, build some from within. At the end of the day, name to yourself what you kept standing. Keep a quiet record of the fires that never started because of you. And where you can, make your value visible, a short note on what you prevented. You know the truth of what you hold up. Let that steady you.