When Monday Feels Like Drowning
7:14 AM. The alarm hasn’t gone off yet but my eyes are already open. Staring at the ceiling. Stomach already doing that thing — that tight, sour, “I haven’t even stood up yet and I’m already behind” thing. My phone says it’s Monday. Of course it does.
I scroll Slack before I even brush my teeth. Bad idea. There’s already 14 unread messages in the team channel, two of them tagged with my name, one of them from my manager saying “let’s sync this morning” with no time attached. Just vibes. Just “sometime today, your whole morning is now mine.” Cool.
I get to the subway entrance at 7:48. The third bus is late. Of course the third bus is late. I watch a woman in a gray coat exhale through her nose like she lost a fight with God, and I think — okay, I’m not alone in this. That somehow doesn’t help.
You ever feel like Monday is a swimming pool with no ladder? Like you got pushed in on Friday and the whole weekend you were just doggy-paddling near the edge pretending you were fine, and now it’s Monday morning and someone threw a cinder block in your pocket?
That’s the vibe.
I don’t remember when this started. Maybe always? No — that’s a lie. I used to love Mondays in college. New week, new plan, new me vibes, I’d buy a latte and pretend I was the main character of a productivity podcast. What changed? Job. Rent. The slow accumulation of tiny responsibilities that each weigh nothing but together feel like I’m wearing a wet blanket to work.
Last Monday I sat in the standing room area of the F train at 8:11 AM, headphones in, not playing anything, just watching the tunnel walls flicker. A guy next to me was eating a breakfast sandwich one-handed while typing with the other, and I watched a piece of egg fall onto his shoe and he didn’t even notice. He just kept typing. I wanted to tap his shoulder and say “bro, your egg,” but I didn’t. I just kept staring at the tunnel.
Why do we do this? Why do we let Mondays eat us alive and then act surprised every single week?
Okay, real talk. The Sunday scaries are a cliché. I know. Every millennial has written about them, every therapist has monetized them, every podcast has a “fix” for them. But here’s the thing nobody says out loud: the scaries don’t actually peak on Sunday night. They peak on Monday morning, around 8:30 AM, when you’ve already answered three emails, already been asked to “circle back” on something, already realized you forgot to do the thing you promised yourself on Sunday you’d do. That’s when the drowning really starts. The Sunday scaries are just the warning. Monday is the wave.
I spilled cold brew on my shirt at 8:42 AM last Monday. White shirt. Black coffee. In a meeting room with six people. I said “excuse me” like I’d burped. Everyone laughed. I laughed. Inside I was a dumpster fire.
But the worst part? The worst part isn’t the spill, or the Slack pings, or the manager’s “let’s sync.” The worst part is the voice in my head going, “you’re 32, why is this hard, other people do this, what’s wrong with you, get it together.” Like I’m being trolled by a motivational poster.
I called my mom on the walk back from the coffee shop. New shirt, still feeling the cold brew shame. She picked up on the second ring.
“You okay?” “Yeah.” “You don’t sound okay.” “Monday.” “Ah.” She exhaled. “You want to come over for dinner?” “Mom, it’s 9 AM.” “I know, I’m just saying. Whenever. The offer is on the table.”
I almost cried on a street corner in Chelsea. I didn’t. But I almost did. There’s something about your mom casually offering to feed you when you’re 32 and falling apart that hits different. She didn’t ask what happened. She didn’t try to fix it. She just said “ah” and then opened her fridge across the city. That’s love, I think. Or at least, that’s the version of love I can recognize right now.
I told her I’d come over Wednesday. She said “good.” That was the whole call.
Here’s the thing about monday drowning that nobody warns you about: it’s not a one-time thing. It comes back. Every week, like a subscription you can’t cancel. You tell yourself “next week will be different” and then it isn’t, and then you tell yourself again, and then it isn’t, and at some point you stop believing yourself, which is worse than never believing in the first place.
Last Tuesday I had a good day. Genuinely good. Crushed a deliverable, made my manager laugh, ate a real lunch outside, got a compliment from someone senior. By 5 PM I was practically levitating. I thought — okay, maybe the cycle is broken.
Wednesday at 9:15 AM I was back in the pool. No transition. No warning. Just — there.
Is this what adult life is? Two good days and then a flat tire every week? Please tell me it gets better. Please tell me I’m not just signing up for decades of this. I’m not being dramatic. I’m not. The body knows. The body keeps the score, as the book says, and my body is filing complaints weekly.
I tried the things. Of course I tried the things. Bullet journal — lasted four days. Wake up at 5 AM — lasted two. No phone for the first hour — lasted one morning, then I broke and checked Slack while brushing my teeth. Meditation app — I meditate for 47 seconds and then I think about whether I left the stove on, which is a different kind of Monday.
I bought a fancy water bottle because a YouTuber said hydration fixes the “Sunday dread.” I now own a $42 water bottle and I am not less tired. The water bottle is great, actually — it keeps water cold for 12 hours, no lie. But it did not save me from my inbox.
I tried the “Sunday reset” thing. Sunday laundry, Sunday meal prep, Sunday therapy journaling. You know what happened? I spent all of Sunday doing reset stuff and then I showed up to Monday just as tired as if I’d partied. Because the reset itself was the job. I traded one chore pile for another and called it wellness.
I don’t know what the answer is. I really don’t.
Some weeks I just let it wash over me. I stop fighting. I let Monday be Monday. I answer the emails, take the meeting, eat something, go for a walk at lunch even if it’s just to the bodega. I don’t try to be a productivity hero. I just try to get through the day without adding a new wound.
Some weeks I don’t even do that much.
Last Thursday I left work at 4:30 PM, told my manager I had a dentist appointment (I didn’t), went to a movie alone at 2:30 in the afternoon on a weekday, ate popcorn for dinner, and went home at 7 PM feeling like I’d been on vacation. Did I pay for it Friday? Yeah. Slack was a war zone. But Thursday I was a person.
The compromise is: not every day has to be a triumph. Not every Monday has to be conquered. Sometimes you just survive it and that’s the whole job.
But the drowning thing — I want to talk about that more. Because it’s specific. It’s not just “I’m busy” or “I’m tired.” It’s a real sensation. The chest gets tight. The breath gets shallow. You can be sitting at your desk, completely still, no actual emergency happening, and feel like you’re underwater. Like your lungs forgot how to do their one job. Like gravity got heavier overnight.
I googled it. Apparently this is just what chronic stress does. Apparently millions of people are walking around feeling like they’re drowning on Mondays and calling it “being an adult.” Apparently this is normal.
Normal. What a horrible word for something that feels this bad.
I started paying attention to when the drowning actually starts. For me, it’s usually around 7:20 AM, right when I open my work laptop. Before the laptop, there’s a 30-second window where I’m still a person. After the laptop, I’m an employee, and the lungs start their thing. I’ve tried not opening it. Doesn’t work. The dread is already there. The laptop is just the moment I admit it.
My friend Jess told me she “manifests a good week” on Sunday nights. She does a vision board, lights a candle, the whole ritual. I asked her if it works. She said “I think so, I don’t know, it makes me feel like I have agency.” Agency! I don’t even want agency. I want a Monday that doesn’t require agency. I want a Monday that just shows up and doesn’t ask me to perform my life in front of a Google Doc.
Is that too much to ask?
Probably.
I think the truth is — and I’m saying this out loud for the first time — I don’t actually hate my job. I don’t even hate Mondays, really. I hate the gap. The gap between who I am on a Sunday afternoon (relaxed, human, eating a cinnamon roll in bed at 11 AM) and who I have to be by Monday at 9 AM (functional, alert, contributing, smiling in meetings about Q3 forecasts). The gap is where the drowning lives. The gap is the swimming pool with no ladder.
Closing the gap is the project of my 30s, I think. I’m not there yet. I’m paddling.
If you’ve read this far — and honestly, I’m surprised if you have — I’m not going to tell you it gets better. I don’t know if it does. I’m not going to tell you to drink water or journal or do breathwork. You already know. We all already know. The advice is everywhere. The advice is not the problem.
The problem is that some weeks are just hard. Some Mondays are just underwater. And you show up anyway, with a wet shirt and a half-eaten breakfast sandwich and an inbox that won’t stop pinging, and you do the next thing, and then the next thing, and eventually it’s Tuesday, and then Wednesday, and eventually you forget how bad Monday was, until the next Sunday night at 9 PM when it all comes back.
I’m not going to wrap this up with a bow. I don’t have a bow. I just have a $42 water bottle, a call with my mom on the calendar for Wednesday, and a meeting at 10 AM that I’m already thinking about.
See you on the other side of the week. If I make it.