Among the many presumed benefits of the retired life is the belief that Monday mornings will deliver no more stress and anxiety than any other day of the week. There’s no chaotic commute, no tense meetings, no pressing deadlines; it’s just another day in which to bask in your freedom from the workaday world.
So I was struck last week by the results of a study suggesting that the “Monday blues” — and their unhealthy consequences — may not necessarily recede when we retire.
“Mondays act as a cultural ‘stress amplifier,’” explains lead study author Tarani Chandola, PhD, a sociology professor at the University of Hong Kong. “For some older adults, the week’s transition triggers a biological cascade that lingers for months. This isn’t about work — it’s about how deeply ingrained Mondays are in our stress psychology, even after careers end.”
And that stress can be fatal, researchers note: By some estimates, nearly 20 percent more heart attacks occur on Mondays compared with any other day of the week.
To better understand the pervasiveness of the Monday blues and its effects on the aging body, Chandola’s team analyzed the stress levels of some 3,500 older adults who participated in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) between 2012 and 2013. Responding to a questionnaire, the ELSA participants stated their level of anxiety on various days of the week. Researchers also recorded levels of the stress hormone cortisol in hair samples taken up to two months later.
They found that retirees were just as likely as working stiffs to see their stress levels spike at the beginning of the traditional workweek. And after accounting for various demographic and health factors, they found that cortisol levels in those who were most stressed on Mondays were 23 percent higher than their calmer counterparts.
By some estimates, nearly 20 percent more heart attacks occur on Mondays compared with any other day of the week.
High stress levels activate the sympathetic nervous system and cause what’s known as the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis to overproduce cortisol. Too much of the stress hormone can elevate blood pressure and trigger insulin resistance while crippling the immune system. This, Chandola notes, may explain the prevalence of heart attacks on Monday.
“The increase in [cardiovascular disease] events on Mondays is unlikely to be a random phenomenon,” he writes in the Journal of Affective Disorders. Most people, he adds, do not adapt to their feelings of Monday anxiety during their working life, and this anxiety “does not appear to diminish when they stop working.”
When my older brother retired several years ago, I remember him telling me that “every day feels like a Saturday.” (This sounded relatively blissful to me until he bemoaned the fact that Saturday had always been a shopping day.)
His ability to avoid the Monday blues may be related to his extremely rigid sleep schedule: He hits the hay at the same time every night and awakens at the same time every morning. As Thomas Rutledge, PhD, a psychiatry professor at the University of California, San Diego, writes in Psychology Today, this is quite rare. Most Americans shift their sleep cycle dramatically on their days off, producing “weekend jet lag” that affects their ability to slide smoothly into the workweek.
“In this mere 48 hours, the sleep-wake alteration markedly shifts the person’s internal clock and hormone cycles,” he explains. Sleep-promoting melatonin levels kick in later than usual, cortisol spikes later in the morning, and various other hormones are thrown off-kilter. (Learn more about cortisol at “How to Balance Your Cortisol Levels Naturally.”)
“These hormone cycles have profound effects not only on our feelings of well-being but even on the function of our internal organs,” he adds. “Therefore, when we’re out of alignment with our natural sleep schedules, we become vulnerable to a host of negative physical and psychological consequences.”
My brother seems to have dodged the hormonal imbalances that plague so many Monday-dreading seniors, which may account for his generally upbeat nature. Or maybe he’s just learned to enjoy shopping.
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