Does anyone else feel too exhausted to do anything at weekends?

[Daisyfield90]

Me and dh work FT M-F. We run the house keeping it clean/tidying, cook from scratch most nights for us and x2 DC. Ferry DC around in the week. School runs, dc get cooked/hot breakfast if they want it (they are not cereal or toast fans), dc appts - dentist/haircuts/opticians (just had a run of that lot).
Come the weekend we are exhausted and our weekends are spent doing nothing.dc just want to chill. Me and dh go no where, do nothing. It feels like a waste of our weekend.

Anyone else resonate?

For a very long time, yes.
Are you ok with the rest or would you like to feel like you’ve ’done something’?

I'm the same, unfortunately dh thinks we need to get out. I just need a break from running around , getting everyone dressed & having to organize everything. Some days we stay in our pj's (much to dhs disgust lol) Aswell as that I love my Friday & Saturday evenings in, I don't want to go out socialising anymore!

I need a day at the weekend to recover from my week. I work full time with an hour's drive each way. Full time includes a really long day once a week, leaving home at 7:30am and arriving home at 10:30pm.

My kids are at uni so I can please myself most weekends. I literally plan one day of pottering/having my food delivered/laundry/read the newspaper. I always do something on the other day, usually my sport but sometimes arrange to see a friend for lunch and a walk.

My XH wouldn't accept that I needed a down day, he ran on adrenaline, constantly and couldn't fathom why I didn't have the energy to get up by 6am every day of the week.

Rest IS doing something. It’s important to have downtime. We do go out and do things some weekends, but most of the time is just spent at home pottering, kids playing outside or watching tv or a film, Dh and I read or do some gardening. This is definitely not a waste. It’s re-charging.

It's Friday night where I normally hit the wall. An early night and a Saturday morning ly-in usually sorts me out. It's been a blessing my ds's weekend football has moved from Saturday mornings to Sunday mornings.

THIS 110%.
I love the weekend nights in with DH. Shut the world out. Close the front door. I would happily stay in pjs most weekends.

i never thought that rest is doing something - is resetting and recharging

I really struggle with weekends these days too. We both work full time, DH is 60 and I'm 53. Just seen dd2 off to uni but dd1 is back from uni for now and applying for jobs, she'll be gone in December all being well. I am absolutely exhausted mentally and have various physical things going on, all small in themselves but the combined effect is I'm just drained. I'd love to do more at weekends but just catching up with housework and laundry, walking the dog and occasionally seeing a friend is as much as I can cope with. Need to visit my elderly parents 2.5 hours away more as well but atm I just couldn't get through the week if I did that, keep hoping it'll improve after some time.

I think long term stress and exhaustion have started having physical effects and I need a complete break but I'm self employed so that's not happening. I feel like a hamster on a wheel.

You really have to fight this urge to make your life so small. Don't give into it. You get out what you put in.

There has to be more to life than chores.

No-one cares if your house is a shit tip.. (I mean, it may not be - but we certainly let the house give in compared to actually doing something with 20 years of our lives)

In the old days "re setting and re charging" was rightly called laziness.

Get up, get dressed in proper daytime clothes and get out of the house as soon as you can.

@EmeraldDreams73 I hear you, I also feel guilty that I don't spend my quiet day visiting my elderly parents. A four hour drive round trip. Also have health niggles going on.

Bollocks.

Rest is very important and good for you. Society values productivity but good things can happen when you rest. Isaac Newton was lazing around under an apple when he came up with the idea of gravity. I have just read a (very readable) book by a psychiatrist who covers the importance of rest, among many other things. My psychotherapist recommended it to me:

https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/How_to_Make_Good_Things_Happen.html?id=E8ICEAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&gboemv=1&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

And the world basically shut down on Sundays, you weren't expected to take your kids to 100 clubs and be involved with school to the same level and that's for starters!

There's nothing wrong with having weekends at home. We love those! If I notice we have a few weekends on the run that will be busy then I make sure we have a weekend doing blocked off to follow. My favourite is when the weather gives you an excuse to hunker down and you don't feel like you have to justify yourself to anyone!

Rest and recuperation isn’t about just about being sedentary. Some movement and light stimulation really helps too. Try and do something even if it’s just an hour or so to a few hours.
Things like
A walk in nature for 45 minutes. Lots of national trust places are free to park and lovely to walk around. Country parks and local parks and woods.
If the coast isn’t too far, take a stroll there and get chips.
Go for a fun swim.
Visit a nearby town, check out a museum, get some lunch etc
See if there’s anything on at the cinema that you might all like to see.

plan it during the week so everyone knows it’s happening then you all work around it and hopefully have a nice time.

You still have lots of time for rest.

Fight this urge..? Very strange. Time for yourself and just being in your home environment (the one the OP like most of us works hard for) is just as important as going off on some weekend activity, in fact imo more so. Utterly ridiculous to call that a small world. Forcing yourself up and out 7 days a week unnecessarily for many people is a recipe for burn out. Emotional and mental health wellbeing matter, you know. As/when OP feels they fancy a trip out on a Saturday or Sunday, great. If they don't and they just need a bloody rest and, yes, might have to do some bits and pieces in the house too, to avoid chaos Mon-Fri, that's pretty normal.

I'm not saying this as someone who had amazing energy all the time - I actually have to force myself to do stuff most days

Absolutely, and statistically, turn the clock back to 1970, only 13% ish of households had two full time working parents which means that today’s two-income family may have substantially less non-work time available than 'in the old days'.

I'm not obsessed by a clean house (peak mumsnet comment), I have a cleaner and don't do much in between her visits.

Looking back to my own childhood, Dad's commute was about 20 mins, Mum taught music from home, schools were walkable, as was Brownies/Guides and swimming - all walkable and we made our own way from the age of 11. There wasn't the myriad of clubs that there is today.

Night and day compared to bringing up my two kids.

Utter nonsense.

I try to avoid having plans both days of the weekend. If I can spend at least one full day in pyjamas I am happy.

Once every six weeks or so I will get a weekend where I have absolutely nothing planned and that is absolute heaven!

Stop feeling guilty! Your life sounds very busy (cooked breakfasts!!??) and I bet you actually do lots at the weekend around the house.

But why do you feel that pressure? It's okay to take some days at home and not force yourself up and out! Yes, sometimes we need to do that or we end up wallowing and a bit of fresh air and movement can be what we need, but it's fine to stay home sometimes

In the old days people worked 8 hour days and once they logged out and clocked off that was it until they logged in the next morning.
Times have changed dramatically since then and so has people’s lives, people have always been told they can’t burn the candle at both ends (even in the old days)

I'm very happy to read (most of) these comments, as I've just finished breakfast in bed and was feeling slightly guilty for not being up and 'getting on'. Have had an exhausting week in work, with my to do list still running round in my head. I expect I won't speak to anyone all weekend and only leave the house to food-shop, and a swim, which is pretty much how I spend most weekends. My job's so people-heavy I need the time and space to recharge.

YES, OP! This is a common theme at work (farm workers). The ones with DC and a partner attempt to make more effort than those of us who do not. The rest of us spend one day resting and the other trying to catch up on laundry and get ready for the next week!

Why?
Is it good for mental health to fester in doors in pyjamas?