Emotions may be pivotal to understanding how fragmented care systems for older adults can generate structural carer burden. Analysing 78 interviews with 32 carers who navigated formal services for an older family member, we distinguish between the emotional experiences of navigation and the emotion work that navigation entails. Emotion work is salient in advocacy situations and when carers seek to maintain relationships with professionals; it is shaped by symbolic and normative understandings of interactions with providers and of ‘caring well.’ Discussion focuses on how broader contexts shape emotional aspects of system navigation, potentially contributing to carer stress and strain.