I hate Sundays

[mistymirror]

I've always hated Sundays. Ever since I was a little girl I would just get this really heavy, sad feeling on a Sunday and I wondered if anyone else did/does?
I used to spend my weekends with my Dad as a child and he would take me home on a Sunday where I would cry because I missed him so much in the week so I'm not sure if this feeling has just stayed with me deep down and now Sundays are tainted for me. But I'm in my 30s now, married with children and there's no need for me to hate this day so much but I still do. Sunday is like a January for me. Anyone else feel the same or do I need therapy? 🙈

Sounds like you need to rewire that particular bit of brain.

Make Sundays amazing, but not massively extravagant, I mean make your brain think they are amazing, set small goals, and say to yourself things like
I'm happy to be experiencing this
This is a good day
Look at that blue sky
OMG a puppy let's go stroke a dog
A beautiful sunrise/sunset
A hug from X how wonderful
I achieved my goal today, how brilliant
A tidy bed, to start the day - I did well

small things, but big outlandish celebrations (in private if needs be )

You have to start triggering some good hormones on a Sunday. Every Sunday.

I'm old enough to remember Sundays in the 70s and 80s when nothing was open, because it was before the Sunday trading laws changed. You were lucky if you could find an out of hours pharmacy; your local newsagents might open for a couple of hours whilst the newspaper boys and girls got ready to do their rounds; or a mini market place the other side of the city.
Sightseeing opportunities were also limited, unless they were free.
For me Sundays were all downhill after Sunday lunch because it meant homework, Antiques Roadshow, supper, bath and bed.

I'm old enough to remember Sundays being like this - and you couldn't buy alcohol on a Sunday!

I used to hate Sundays too as a child, they used to make me feel very anxious. I come from a country where everything is closed on Sundays and the streets are eerily quiet…like a ghost town. As an only child with pretty absent parents it used to make me feel intensely lonely. Now that I live in the UK it feels more like a normal day and I’m reconciled with Sundays.

OP the advice above seems great and I hope you get rid of your Sunday blues.

@mistymirror what do you do on Sundays ?

The anxiety caused by Heartbeats theme tune is well recognised by many!! I think Sundays are a funny day for a lot of people, the end of one week and the beginning of next, back to school/work after a day off doing what you want, nostalgic feelings of that back to school anxiety as a kid, it’s a strange one!

And the Bank Holidays!

I actually have (almost) written an essay on hating Sundays! (I just never got round to finishing it properly). I also hate Sundays. To me it feels like unfinished homework, and I can comprehend your comparison with January. I also have the same feeling about certain types of parks and formal gardens. Which as a child we sisters were often taken to walk around on Sundays. And maybe as a lonely adult I saw groups of people walking together on Sundays around overly trodden paths and it all just feels bad to me. Probably has something to do with religion too, I'm not sure (raised catholic) and aimlessness. Like the purpose of Sunday seems so gloomy.

Do you consider it to be the last day of the week or the first?

I think I can feel this way sometimes and often relieved when the week starts again. Winter and grey skies probably amplify it a bit.

I agree. Childhood memory and the gloom of back to school the next day.... Saturdays are great because you know you have the next day off. Sundays are a weird day sometimes.

As pp, every Sunday before the trading laws changed lasted at least a week. They were awful, dreary days. Change your Sundays, actively do that, and eventually the feeling will pass.

@toomuchfaff I loved your list, the omg a puppy bit made me laugh :)

I don't like Sunday. As a child it was church in the morning, Sunday lunch and then it was just counting down the seconds until bedtime and another week of school.
Felt the same working and always imagined I wouldn't when I became a SAHM. I still hate them.
It's not just Sunday evening, which would be more understandable. The whole day makes me sad but not entirely sure why.

I remember the 'sunday' feeling as a child ,the theme tune to songs of praise and antiques road show ,but now i absolutely love them .
I avoid supermarkets and malls but may have a potter round a garden centre early before it gets too busy , a bit of housework ,cook tea and actually not much else, i like a slow cosy day before the onslaught of another busy week.

It's OK, you don't need therapy.
Everyone is different and we all have anxieties, memories, triggers etc.
Do something pleasant for yourself on Sundays.

I hate and dread Spring, always have since childhood. Have to kick myself into a common sense due to anxiety and depression - from "new starts".
No idea why and I'm not gonna seek therapy. 😕

I'm another one who can remember Sundays in the 70s and 80s. Church, Sunday roast, clean out guinea pig cage, homework.

Now as an adult with a child with mental health problems Sundays make me anxious as all the services are closed til tomorrow.

Try and go to a supermarket or garden centre or something OP. Do something that involves mixing with other people if you can.

Have always disliked Sundays. Find them quite depressing, prospect of back to school or work the next day.

When I was a kid I used to go to my dad's house on Sundays, where I would sit watching him watch sport on the TV.

Yes, nothing to do, awful TV with depressing theme tunes.

I don't even like a roast dinner and I think that's because of the association with Sundays!

I can also remember Sundays in the 70s and 80s. I'm not Christian, so church wasn't in the mix, but Cheder (Sunday school for Jewish kids) was for a while and homework. Loads and loads of it, especially from 12 onwards. If it was the holidays - I was at boarding school - there might be time with the Sunday papers and visits to relatives. Once I'd left school and didn't have its structures behind me, I had to make Sunday much more on my own terms and to begin with, it wasn't easy. I wonder if the anxiety that some people feel on Sundays is associated with routines that they might not have liked, but gave the day some shape. Now they have to decide for themselves how they want Sunday (and Saturday for that matter) to go and find it disorienting rather than freeing. If that's you OP, you aren't alone.

Me !

Have hated Sundays for as long as I can remember. I now choose to work them and this really helps.

I hated Sundays as a child. Forced to go to mass, miserable family lunch, boring afternoon.

I like them now. I’m still in bed. About to get up and have a shower, then we’re off to the pub for lunch with one son (22).

I remember this too. Milling around aimlessly with the smell of cabbage lingering in the air, waiting until watching That's Life with wet hair meant bedtime and the end of the tedium was within sight. Funnily enough now, when Sunday has become another Saturday that ends at 4pm, a day of rest seems more appealing.

I can't bear The Last of the Summer Wine programme as associate it with Sunday nights.

Where I live you still can’t buy alcohol on a Sunday. Or even after two o’clock on a Saturday.

I used to hate Sundays as a kid, we didn’t do anything at weekends and I didn’t love school. Before I knew it, the theme tune for heartbeat would be playing and it was off to bed for me to ruminate and fret over Monday morning coming.

Now Sundays are my favourite day, went for a swim this morning and dh had lit the fire when I got home so after my shower i warmed up in front of it. He’s making roast beef and yorkshires for dinner tonight. Ds is feeling a bit coldy but we are going out for a walk this afternoon with some family and may stop off at a pub for a lemonade/beer/crisps.
Then back home for more fire, probably some games and relaxing while dh cooks.

Sunday is 50% of my weekend off and I’ll be absolutely damned if I’m going to spend it any other way than enjoying it. It does help that I also like my job, Monday is one of my WFH days so it’s always a gentle start to the week.

Give yourself something enjoyable to do on a Sunday. It might not shift your whole perspective of Sundays but for a brief time it may help you to see that they can have their positives.

Thanks everyone for all of the suggestions and reassurance that I'm not alone in disliking Sundays. It's interesting to me that other people feel the same about Sundays.
To answer a few questions: we don't do much on a Sunday just a very slow day, housework, go to see my Mum, maybe pop to the garden centre. It just feels like a day of waiting around somehow. And i definitely see Sunday as the last day of the week and Monday as the new beginning. I always feel much better about life on a Monday. I find Sundays to be quite lonely somehow, even though I'm not alone. I do think maybe I need to actively make plans for a Sunday to try and shift this pit I've got into about Sundays.

The theme of heartbeat used to make me cry. I don't think it the fact it was such a sad song helped. It's just got Sunday written all over it!