When Monday Feels Like Drowning
When Monday Feels Like Drowning
7:15 AM, Monday. Subway entrance at the 34th Street station. I’m the third person in line for the uptown 6 train, holding a coffee I already forgot I bought, watching the board flip from “2 min” to “8 min” to “delayed.” Nobody tells you why. Nobody apologizes. The train just doesn’t come.
That was last Monday. October 6th. I remember because my phone showed the date when I finally gave up and opened Instagram to distract myself from the fact that I was going to be 40 minutes late to a meeting I didn’t even want to attend.
I had this moment — I won’t lie — where I wanted to just turn around and go home. Back to bed. Pull the covers over my head. Stop existing until Tuesday.
But I didn’t.
I took the stairs, missed another train, got yelled at by a man in a suit who said “excuse me” like it was a curse word, and showed up at 9:42 AM with mascara I didn’t put on this morning smeared under one eye. I told my boss “subway issues.” He nodded. He didn’t care. Nobody cares. That’s the thing about monday drowning — you can be literally underwater and the world just keeps scrolling.
The Sunday Before
It started the night before. Actually, no. It started three Sundays ago when I realized I wasn’t recovering from weekends anymore.
I used to love Sundays. Pancakes, coffee on the couch, a long walk, nothing planned. Now Sundays feel like the countdown timer on a bomb. Sunday morning I’m fine. Sunday afternoon I start getting tight in my chest. Sunday night I’m in bed at 9 PM pretending to sleep because I don’t want to face the fact that in nine hours my alarm is going to scream and I’m going to have to do it all again.
My friend Jess asked me, “Why don’t you just plan something fun for Monday nights?”
I told her, “Because by Monday night I’m not a person. I’m a sponge that got wrung out.”
She laughed. I didn’t. Was that funny? I guess it was. I don’t know.
The thing about monday drowning is it’s not one big thing. It’s a thousand tiny drops of water filling up a glass I didn’t know had a limit. The Slack messages I didn’t answer on Friday. The email I owe my accountant. The laundry I didn’t fold. The text from my mom asking “how’s work” and me typing three different answers and deleting all of them because none of them were true.
What 7:15 AM Actually Looks Like
Okay so 7:15 AM on a Monday morning in October, the 34th Street subway entrance smells like wet concrete, someone’s leftover croissant, and the faint chemical smell of the hand sanitizer dispensers they installed in 2022 that nobody uses.
There’s a woman ahead of me in line scrolling TikTok with the sound off. There’s a guy behind me breathing too loud. There’s an MTA worker leaning against a pole looking at his phone like the rest of us, as if he also doesn’t know what’s going on with the trains.
I checked my email while waiting. Six new ones since midnight. One from my boss: “Quick sync at 10?” A “quick sync” is never quick. A “quick sync” is 47 minutes of someone presenting slides they could’ve sent as a PDF. A “quick sync” is me sitting there with my camera on, nodding, drinking water so I don’t have to talk.
I wanted to throw my phone into the tracks.
I didn’t. But I wanted to.
The Bathroom Floor Moment
Last Wednesday, October 8th, I was in the bathroom at work. Not for any reason. Just to sit on the floor for three minutes with the door locked.
I do this more than I want to admit.
The floor is cold. The lights are humming. I can hear someone washing their hands outside. The fluorescent light makes my face look green in the mirror I refuse to look at.
I just sat there. Three minutes. Counting my breaths. In, out. In, out.
I thought about quitting. I really did. Like actually typing “I quit” into an email right there, standing up, walking to my manager’s desk, dropping my laptop on her table and saying “I’m done, I’m so done, I can’t do this anymore.”
I didn’t.
I took a slow breath, washed my hands, walked out, smiled at a coworker who asked how my weekend was, and said “fine, you?”
“Fine.” I always say “fine.”
That’s what monday drowning looks like up close. It’s not drowning in the ocean. It’s drowning in a coffee mug. Slowly. Quietly. While everyone around you keeps asking how the weekend was.
I Tried to Fix It, For the Record
I bought the planner. The $34.99 one from the bookstore in SoHo with the leather cover and the inspirational quote on the front. It sat on my desk from August 12th until I used three pages.
I downloaded the meditation app. The $59.99 annual subscription one with the sleep stories narrated by someone with a British accent. I used it twice.
I tried meal prepping. Made chicken and rice on Sunday night. Ate it from the container at my desk on Monday while answering emails. It tasted like cardboard. I cried a little bit at my desk, then wiped my face, then went to a meeting.
I tried going to bed early. Set an alarm for 10 PM on my phone that said “STOP LOOKING AT YOUR PHONE.” I ignored it 11 times. The 12th time I actually stopped. Lay in bed for 90 minutes not sleeping, just staring at the ceiling, dreading the alarm that was going to wake me up to do it all again.
None of it worked. Not because I’m broken. Because monday drowning isn’t a planner problem. It’s not a meditation problem. It’s not a meal prep problem.
It’s a “I don’t want to do this for the next 30 years” problem.
And nobody wants to hear that. So I say “fine” and drink my coffee and do the meeting and the email and the laundry and the text from my mom and the dental appointment I keep rescheduling and the therapist I keep saying I’ll book and the gym I keep paying for but haven’t gone to in four weeks and I just keep going. Keep going. Keep going. Keep going.
My Mom Doesn’t Get It
Last Sunday I called my mom. She answered on the second ring. She always does.
“How are you, baby?”
“Mom. I’m tired.”
“Of what? You sit at a desk.”
I almost hung up.
She meant nothing by it. She’s 63. She worked in retail for 30 years. She doesn’t understand that sitting at a desk for 9 hours while answering 200 emails and attending 11 meetings and feeling like every single one of them could have been an email is more exhausting than standing on your feet for 8 hours. She doesn’t understand that some days my brain feels like a browser with 94 tabs open and I can’t close any of them.
I love her. She loves me. We don’t speak the same language about this.
“Have you tried going outside more?”
“Yeah, mom. I went for a walk yesterday.”
“On the street or in a park?”
“The street.”
“You need to go to a park.”
“Okay, mom.”
She worries about me. She just doesn’t know what to do with me.
What I Actually Feel
Gonna be honest here because I’m writing this at 11:47 PM on a Sunday and I have nothing left to perform.
I feel like I’m running out of air.
Not in a dramatic way. Not in a “call 911” way. In a “I’ve been holding my breath for so long I forgot what breathing normally feels like” way.
I’m 31. I have a job that pays the rent. I have a cat who depends on me. I have friends I see every few weeks. I have a therapist I’m going to call on Tuesday. I have a family that loves me.
And none of that makes Mondays easier. None of that.
I think about my grandparents who fled a country with nothing. I think about my dad who worked two jobs until I was 12. I think about how I’m sitting here on a Sunday night in October 2026 in a one-bedroom apartment with a dog bed I bought for a dog I don’t have (long story) feeling like Monday morning is going to kill me.
I’m not being dramatic.
I’m just being honest.
Because if you clicked on this article, I think you’re like me. And if you’re like me, you don’t need another productivity hack. You don’t need someone to tell you to “prioritize self-care.” You don’t need another $19.99 wellness journal.
You need someone to look at you and say: yeah. I know. It’s a lot. It’s too much.
The Train Finally Came, For the Record
Going back to last Monday. October 6th. 7:15 AM subway entrance.
The train came. Of course it came. They always come eventually. I got on. Found a seat next to a woman reading a paperback with the cover folded back. I didn’t pull out my phone. I just sat there. Looking at nothing. Letting the train rock me back and forth.
I thought about all the Mondays I’d already survived. The 600-something Mondays since I started working at 22. The thousands more ahead of me.
I closed my eyes. Did not sleep. Just rested.
The conductor said, “34th Street, last stop.” Wait no. That’s the opposite direction. Whatever. He said some stop. I got up. Walked out. Took the stairs. Walked to work. Smiled at the security guard. Said “morning.” Said “fine” when asked.
And that was Monday.
I did the same thing today. I’ll do it again tomorrow. And next week. And the week after. And the week after that.
If You’re Here Right Now, Reading This, at Whatever Time It Is on Whatever Day
I don’t know what day it is for you. Maybe it’s Sunday night and you’re already bracing. Maybe it’s Tuesday morning and you’re barely holding on. Maybe it’s Friday afternoon and you’re finally exhaling and you clicked this because you wanted to remember what it feels like to be a person again before Monday comes back around.
Wherever you are in your week, I just want to say:
You’re not weak. You’re not ungrateful. You’re not “too sensitive” or “dramatic” or any of the things people have probably called you in your life when you’ve tried to explain.
You’re a human being who has been carrying too much for too long without enough help. That’s all.
That’s all.
What I Don’t Have
I don’t have an answer. I wish I did. I would put it in this article and sell it for $4.99 and buy a house in Maine.
I don’t have a podcast. I don’t have a Substack. I don’t have a 5-step plan to “conquer your Mondays.” I don’t have a sponsored link for blue light glasses.
I have this.
A 11:47 PM Sunday night post from someone who is also in the middle of it.
I have hot tea with honey. I have a cat who just jumped on my keyboard and added “jjjjjjjjjjjjj” to this document. I have a heating pad on my lower back because I threw it out somehow on Saturday reaching for a coffee mug. I have a lot of blankets on my bed and an alarm clock I don’t trust that I’m going to set for 6:30 AM in about 12 hours.
And that’s it.
That’s all of us, isn’t it?
Somewhere on a Sunday night, setting alarms we don’t want to wake up to. Drinking tea we keep forgetting to make. Watching shows we don’t really watch because we need background noise. Saying “fine” when we mean “I’m drowning.”
Okay. I have to go to bed now.
Monday is coming.
It always comes.