It’s almost Sunday evening, and you’re beginning to think about the workweek ahead.
Do you find yourself feeling nervous or anxious, even a sense of dread?
I call that special kind of anxiety “Sunday Night Syndrome.” It’s when you think of the coming workweek and experience anything from mild anxiety to severe dread.
All of us experience some form of SNS from time to time. The important thing is how often and how severe it is.
Mild SNS: Symptoms typically include a minimal level of nervousness and anxiety.
The anxiety usually begins on Sunday evening as you are preparing for the next day. These feelings seem to pass quickly and are gone by Monday morning when you arrive at work.
What to do: Relax – and remember the feelings will pass. Or rent a movie, play a game, enjoy being with family and friends.
Moderate SNS: The anxiety begins earlier in the day and doesn’t seem to pass.
A key symptom of moderate SNS: we begin to stay up later and later on Sunday night in the hope that we can keep Monday morning from arriving. As a result, we feel sluggish on Monday morning, which leaves us ill equipped to deal with our feelings and the week ahead.
Other symptoms include increased irritability and inattentiveness around family and friends, as well as the beginning of decreasing work performance.
What to do: Make sure you get to bed early enough to be rested for the next day. Identify things in your job that you can feel good about, even look forward to. Some clients have found that going into the office, or doing a little work at home on Saturday or Sunday, seems to help at this point.
Severe SNS: The third level of SNS doesn’t wait until Sunday to arrive. It begins on Saturday or even Friday after work. By the time Sunday evening rolls around, folks are experiencing severe anxiety and a strong sense of dread. Some people become physically ill at the thought of beginning another workweek.
Depression is common at this point, as well as drinking and other forms of self-medication to try to calm emotions.
What to do: It could be time to consider a change – either in the details of your job or perhaps an entire change of job or career. Consult a career counselor to look at what options you may have.
Make sure you are doing something, talking about it to physical exercise, in order to relieve the stress.
You might want to seek counseling or coaching to help you manage the stress, emotions and decisions involved.
Jeff Herring, MS, LMFT, is a marriage and family therapist.
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