Does anyone else feel like weekends are more exhausting than weekdays?

[Alyah]

I swear weekends used to feel relaxing, but lately they just feel like chaos from start to finish. Between kids’ activities, birthday parties, house chores, food shopping, and trying to actually spend time as a family, I end up more tired by Sunday night than I am on a Wednesday.
I keep thinking I’ll plan a “quiet weekend” but somehow it never happens — something always pops up. Is this just life now? Or do other people actually manage calm, lazy weekends where you do nothing but potter about and rest?
Would love to know if it’s just me or if everyone secretly finds weekends exhausting too.

It doesn't make much difference to me. We're flat out all week & flat out all weekend. If I have free time then I'm prepping food etc for the week ahead.

I find weekends particularly exhausting because I can't sit down, even for a coffee break. if I do, DH automatically stops as well, falls asleep on the couch & I can forget about him doing anything else. And there's always a mountain of things to do.

I do see families enjoying lovely afternoons at the park or festivals & wonder how they find the time. We've been looking for a newer car & it's 6 weeks until we have a free Saturday to go again - IF something doesn't crop up!!

For me the weekend family and household life far outweighs the Monday- Friday rat race of rushing to get to school and work on time and only seeing each other for an hour or two in the evenings so it doesn't bother me.

I’m always exhausted by Sunday night and feel lucky if I get to finally sit down by 9:30pm for an hours Netflix before I have to go to bed to get up and start it all again! My weeks are chaos and my weekends chaos. Always something needs doing and the list I give DH overwhelms him to the point that if I let him have a breather over the weekend, he’s like an earlier poster said … falls asleep and nothing more gets done. Life seems relentless for most people nowadays, relaxing weekend … what’s that?

I dream of a weekend away in a static caravan by a beach, just me and my lab and I have no one to look after or provide meals for for an entire weekend (as it’s just me and the dog there). Long walks, easy meals, caravan couch, a good book and tv. Only have to make breakfast for myself and feed the dog. DH stays at home and fends for himself. Nice dream, never happen lol.

i think we all have so much to do now and we all have to work so hard, there’s no time for rest or fun. Not unless you’re rich of course, they seem to have plenty of time for fun. The rest of us working ourselves to the bone to pay all our money out to them, so they have an easy life. Plus they have staff to do everything. Nothing is relaxing about weekends any more, designed that way I think and the plan to exhaust us all at the same time as impoverishing as many as possible is working perfectly.

What are the kinds of things you’re doing that fill your weekends so much? How many kids do you have?

I have tiny children so weekends are exhausting too. But for us the “lovely days at the park” etc you mention are the main sort of thing keeping us busy. We can’t stay in the house or the kids all attack each other and cause a huge mess so we are always out, always compiling a list of free things to take the kids to.

We never get to relax either (kids don’t sleep so we haven’t even had an evening together in over three years now) but I like the weekends best as we get to see friends and do fun things with the kids then.

I agree with you about the ever-increasing enormous gap between rich and poor. But what do you mean when you say we all have so much to do “now”? What kinds of weekend things are you having to do now that you didn’t in the past?

As I said above I am mostly busy at weekends with trying to entertain the kids out of the house. It’s harder than ever as everything is so expensive now. But other than that i’m not seeing why there’s more we need to do now at weekends than there used to be…?

Mine are older now. I’ve three close in age. What saved us was cutting right back on parties and activities. Clean as you go during the week and tidy as you go along (big one this) plus not having so much stuff.

Kind of, we have a very early start on weekdays and then pretty busy every single day. On weekends I now just stay in bed until 9:30 and DH gets up with DC (I am up 45 minutes before him during the week). We are never at home on weekends, same thing, playdates, parties, hobbies etc, definitely need to be out as DC are pretty active tbh and need a good run around.

I sometimes have busier weekends if we go away for the weekend but we try and plan in nice family time like a walk, new park, lunch out, film and takeaway etc. Or we might have one busy day and one more relaxed day getting on with jobs in the house but we’ll add a walk and breakfast out into that or similar.

Yes, I can understand that with younger children.

I'm more active at the weekend than in the week even though mine are older as my job involves sitting down, and often get 50% more steps than on a weekday.

I do now, but only because the DC have grown up, just DD (18 in a few months) left at home now. I remember the chaotic weekends of kids parties, football matches miles away. I don’t miss it!

Not really, the Mon-Fri is more stressful in our house with work / school / clubs etc.

Weekends we alternate a lie in for each parent normally till 9am. We don’t have lots of parties now we are out of foundation but we also didn’t go to every party, if my DD wasn’t keen on a person we didn’t go. If I can see we have lots on for a few weekends I then block out a weekend for rest.

Generally we have time for a park trip / bike ride most weekends but we also spend time watching a movie to help everyone chill.

I completely understand and tbh I like the business but if you don’t, just stop! Decline some party invites if not their best friends, organise a food delivery for Thurs eve so food is all sorted in advance for the weekend and next week. If you have plans one day (eg a birthday party and bonfire night party on the Saturday) block out the Sunday from plans so you can have a nice walk and cosy roast. Do as much life admin in the week as you can so weekends are free for relaxation.

this isn’t meant as a criticism but I have friends who moan constantly about being busy and then miss all the spontaneous fun (anyone free for the pub this afternoon? Anyone fancying taking the kids down to the local footy at 3!). Those are the weekends I look back on fondly anyway not the super organised ones!

We have no tv or screen time or clubs on a Sunday. It means no rushing around and no noise (apart from the kids fighting now and then). Saturdays is busy but Sundays are bliss. On the odd Sunday we socialise, I find the weekends too hectic. We all need a full day of downtime in our family.

When kids were young I was busier. No kids at home now and this weekend I went to parkrun, did a shop, saw my daughter and her baby and went for a coffee, went for a wine, cooked dinner andcaught up on traitors.
Sunday i walked the dog and watched a lot of TV so wasn't busy at all. Oh I cooked a lovely dinner as well. House was clean from a viewing in the week. I've had a full on few weeks so I protected this weekend and turned down other offers.

I say no a lot but appreciate that is a benefit of having no kids at home probably.

Yes our weekends are non stop with all 4 of us playing competitive sport. Usually we get a few hours downtime on a Sunday afternoon. I would hate a whole lazy weekend of pottering though, it would feel like a waste to me. I have however dropped to 4 days at work and my free day is invaluable for getting chores done that I can’t do at the weekend. It’s made a massive difference.

Say no to more parties
Reduce family visits to once a month
Shopping delivery on Thursday evening
One sport and activity a week for dc
Reduce or have no pets
Have boundaries around fixe family time and never change it
Schedule quiet weekends and don’t allow anything to ‘crop up’
Stretxh to a cleaner on Friday

The only way you can reclaim your own life is to start saying no.

You need to make Sunday a quiet day and really not accept anything on that day at all or you will burn out.

DS is nearly 9 and it's got much calmer at weekends. Previously when he was younger he needed to be "exercised" or he would be bouncing off the walls. Now he is much more chilled of a morning and we don't have to rigorously plan things to keep him busy.
Also, he has discovered reading, finally!

My weekends aren’t filled with manic rushing around because I only have one child and we never signed up up for weekend activities, precisely to avoid this kind of thing. Not much family around either.

I struggle with weekends due to the lack of routine.

I had a mini strike this weekend and only did essentials.

Unfortunately, the essentials were dropping one child of at 4.30am on Saturday, driving the other child and a friend into town (30min round trip), washing a load of muddy rugby kit between practice and the match, cooking two dinners, a couple of hours work (for the business I run), supervising the workmen fixing the porch, committee stuff for Scouts, basic housework.....

There's no house chores on weekend here, try to get washing done for uniforms on Friday night, ofc load dishwasher etc and cook 1 day, usually eat out 1 weekend day, but no chores, they're done during the week

Yes but in an enjoyable way. Weekdays definitely feel calmer, especially as I work from home.

Same here, I’m always more tired by Sunday night 😅 feels like the only “rest” is going back to work!