Monday in the morning. The alarm clock starts ringing non-stop. Your eyelids are weighing you down, you feel tired and making the greatest effort you finally manage to stretch out an arm to turn it off. You wake up with the feeling of having slept terrible or not at all and the only thing that remains is to wish with all you might that the working day passes as quickly as possible so that you can get home and throw yourself on the sofa to recover all those hours of sleep of which you have not been able to enjoy on the night from Sunday to Monday.
You can’t stop wondering why you usually sleep worse on Sundays than any other day of the week, but don’t worry, you’re not the only one this happens to. There is a reason why insomnia invades us on Sundays and we are going to tell you about it.
Why do you sleep so badly on Sundays?
Mondays are usually the day most hated by a large part of the population: we leave behind the weekend and welcome a new routine week full of duties and obligations. If we add to this the fact of not having managed to sleep well and rest on Sunday night, Monday can become very uphill for us.
It seems that most people find it more difficult to fall asleep on Sundays, at least this is revealed by a study carried out in the United States. 39% of the 3,000 Americans who participated in the research said that the night from Sunday to Monday was their worst sleep of the entire week, but why? The reasons are many and varied:
- Jet lag: This is one of the main reasons why we sleep worse the night from Sunday to Monday. Normally, on Fridays and Saturdays we tend to go to bed much later than usual since we have complete peace of mind that the next day we will not have to get up early to go to work and we will be able to get up much later. As a consequence of this, our biological clock is out of adjustment, altering and modifying itself. For this reason, when we try to return to normality on Sunday night, everything we did during the weekend takes its toll on us, attracting the dreaded and unwanted insomnia into our lives. Both students and workers will feel much identified with this.
- All the obligations that await us the next day: After having enjoyed a relaxed and exciting weekend, on Monday it’s time to start the routine again. It is inevitable to go to bed on Sunday and think about the work week that awaits us ahead: meetings, project delivery… In addition, Mondays are usually the day chosen by companies and schools to set and start the most important activities. Important and prominent: start of the exam period, presentations and lectures, assignment assignments… In general, this generates a lot of stress and anxiety in people, which leads to sleeping on Sunday much worse than any other day of the week.
- The prospect of having to wait another five days for the next weekend to arrive: The weekend flies by, yet the rest of the week seems to go on forever, doesn’t it? Unless you’re on vacation, Sundays can get you through a major existential crisis thinking about how long it takes to get back to enjoying a good rest. And of course this means that you spend the night awake torturing yourself.
Tips to avoid sleeping badly on Sundays
- If you are one of those people who find it very difficult to fall asleep on Sundays, these are some useful tips that you can put into practice to sleep and rest better:
- Try to keep the schedules during the weekend: This is a very difficult task, but the best thing to avoid altering the biological clock is to try to keep the same schedules during the weekend that you have during the week. Try to get up early and not stay up too long.
- Enjoy until the last minute: There really is no use in martyring yourself as the weekend winds down. Do not predispose yourself to feel bad mood, set yourself the purpose of living in the moment and enjoying every second of Sunday.
- Prepare everything you need for the next morning: There is nothing better to reduce the tension on Monday than to start the day with as little stress as possible. To do this, you can leave the clothes you are going to wear or the papers you will need ready the night before.
- Enjoy a quiet Sunday night: Have a delicious dinner and do something that relaxes you like listening to calm music or being with your family. The idea is to distract yourself as much as possible so that you don’t think that the next day is Monday and you don’t worry about work. Close the weekend with a flourish!
- Plan something special for Monday: Small details make all the difference and can really help you get through this day better. Why don’t you prepare your favorite dish to eat? How about watching your favorite movie at night or calling someone special?
