People who refuse assistance sometimes spend twice as much protecting the appearance of capability.

Keeping up an appearance of never needing anything is expensive. The extra hours, the roundabout ways of finding out what one question would have answered, the energy spent making difficulty invisible. It frequently costs more than the help would have, and the person paying it is the only one who thinks the performance is convincing.

Count the actual cost the next time you decline assistance, including the hidden time. If it exceeds what asking would have cost, that is worth knowing. Most people are not evaluating your self-sufficiency nearly as closely as you imagine they are.