i am spiritually dehydrated

the emotional hangover that follows a good night out

I usually have something to say by now. A small truth. A glimmer. A half-thought draped in metaphor. But today I feel hollow. Not in a tragic way, more like a bell that’s been rung too many times. Still vibrating.

I went out with friends on Saturday—one of those whole, glittery, unstructured nights where you say yes to things you usually don’t. Yes to the bar. Yes to another drink. Yes to hitting your friend’s vape like you're still in college. Yes to being someone else (or maybe your truest self?) for a night. The kind that pulls you out of your routine. And now I feel strangely… depleted. Like I had to cash in all my serotonin just to feel alive for a few hours, and now I’m spread too thin.

I read something recently about the neuroscience of presence. About how time feels like it moves faster as we age. About how novelty slows it down. As children, everything was novel. First kisses, grass stains, sleepovers, scraped knees. Our brains lit up with the newness of it all. But now? Now it’s the same coffee, the same chair, the same ache behind my eyes at 3pm. Our days blur because we stop noticing them.

So when you do something that interrupts that like say yes to a night out, dance without thinking about how tomorrow might feel, it does stretch time. But the next day collapses in on itself like a lung.

Sunday, as expected, was useless. My brain was foggy, my body resentful, my throat sore in a way that felt like both a consequence and a punishment. I floated through the day with a kind of emotional bloat. A longing for something you can’t even name. Dry-eyed and silent. I didn’t cry, but I felt a version of crying. A ghost of it. The kind that sits behind your eyes and never quite arrives. The kind of sadness that has no cause and therefore no solution.

There’s something so specific about the emotional hangover. The too-much-ness. The knowledge that you were loose and laughing and now you’re raw and quiet and staring.

I texted the group chat that honestly, I’d rather be sober. Everyone agreed. I drink maybe once a month, and still, the recovery makes me question the whole ritual. I keep circling this idea that joy costs something. That you can have fun and still pay for it in softness. In feeling raw and overexposed and tender in the days after.

Now it’s Tuesday. I’m technically fine. I’m at work. I’m answering emails. But I feel like I’m running on a three-second delay. My focus is scattered across the surface of my life. My body mildly resents me. I think I’ve caught a cold. And even though the fun was so worth it, I’m still here in the aftermath, trying to wring meaning out of a day that doesn’t want to be deep.

Some days just aren’t poetic. Some days are just... Tuesday.

And I know it’s not that deep. I know it was just a hangover. But as someone already treated for anxiety, it feels a little unfair to be brought this low by something so ordinary. Shouldn’t I be more buoyant?

But it’s not just about the drink. It’s the crash after joy. The return to routine. The quiet pressure to keep going even when you don’t feel entirely real yet.

I’ve had time to reflect, mostly because my office doesn’t have windows and I’ve been staring at the same blinking inbox for several hours. So, in the spirit of catharsis, I present:

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Things that are supposed to be fun but leave me spiritually depleted for 2–5 days

One (1) drink. Just one. I was glowing with love in a hometown bar. Now I feel like I’ve been lightly run over by a wellness newsletter.

A social interaction that required makeup. Loved it. Wouldn’t trade it! But now I must rewatch a show I’ve seen eleven times until I am restored.

Nostalgia. So sweet, so devastating. Like warm Snapple iced tea laced with heartbreak.

Being perceived. Doesn’t matter if I looked good or felt good. The act of being witnessed in public requires a minimum 48 hour reset.

Feeling joy too quickly. The crash is real. My brain registers this as a peak experience, but you know what comes after a peak experience? A very steep descent.

I’m not trying to be dramatic. I just think some of us—especially the already overthinking, sensitive crowd—need a bit more time to process joy. Especially the kind that comes fast and ends abruptly.

I know this isn’t groundbreaking. I know I sound like a parody of a millennial wellness TikTok (which is impressive, considering I am, in fact, Gen Z and not even on TikTok), with a vitamin drawer and deep feelings about Sunday scaries. But even with all that self-awareness, I still hate how long it takes me to come back to myself. Especially when I’ve done nothing wrong except try to feel good.

This might just be what adulthood is. Not becoming wiser, necessarily. Just more aware of the toll joy can take. A little more sensitive to time. A little more attuned to how novelty expands us and then empties us out.

I think about how, when I was younger, even being sick had a script. Saltines. Ginger ale. Peanut butter toast. A parent’s hand on my forehead. HGTV humming softly in the background. A cat on my lap. Someone else making the decisions.

There’s no one to name the things anymore. No one saying you’re overtired or you need to lie down. We have to self-diagnose everything. We have to be our own caregivers, even when we don’t feel like caring for ourselves at all.

That’s why the neuroscience stuck with me. How time slows down when we pay attention. How what we miss isn’t childhood itself, but the presence that came with it. Time felt slower because we were there for it. We looked closely. Felt fully. Lived inside the moment, not just beside it.

And when something does break the pattern, like a night out, it’s beautiful… but disorienting. The high is brief. The comedown is longer. And then you’re at your desk on a Tuesday, wondering why your joy made you feel so tired.

Maybe that’s what this is. The emotional hangover of being human. Of holding too much and still wanting more. Of trying to feel free, then aching for structure. Of being tender and tired and just a little bit lonely in the quiet echo of a good time.

Some Tuesdays are just like this. Not tragic. Not terrible. Just off. Like I left my spirit somewhere on the sticky bar booth and I’m too tired to go back and get it.

spiritually hydrating here

not as much here

restored <3