Why Sarah Crumbled Every Sunday Night — And the One Technique That Finally Stopped It

Sarah had a reputation for being calm under pressure. She was the person colleagues called in a crisis. The one who kept her voice level when meetings got heated.

But alone, in the quiet of a Sunday night before a big week, Sarah fell apart. Every time. She’d lay awake catastrophising — running worst-case scenarios through her mind until 2am, arriving Monday already hollowed out. Then the week would unfold, she’d perform flawlessly under pressure, and the cycle would repeat.

“I can handle anything in the moment,” she once told a friend. “It’s the anticipation that destroys me.”

She was 33. She was a project director for a construction firm. And what she was experiencing had a name: anticipatory anxiety — the chronic suffering caused not by what is happening, but by what might happen.

Why High Performers Often Suffer More in Anticipation

Anticipatory anxiety is paradoxically common among high-performing, detail-oriented people. Because the same trait that makes someone a strong planner — the ability to model future scenarios — becomes a liability when it’s applied to imagining failures rather than designing solutions.

Cognitive behavioural therapy pioneer Aaron Beck identified this pattern as rooted in what he called fortune telling — one of his 10 core cognitive distortions. Fortune telling is the mind’s tendency to predict negative outcomes with unwarranted certainty, generating the full emotional response of something that hasn’t happened and may never happen.

Sarah wasn’t weak. She was running an overactive threat-prediction system — brilliant in emergencies, destructive in anticipation.

The One Technique That Shifted Everything

Sarah’s therapist introduced her to a structured practice from CBT called the three-scenario analysis. When anticipatory anxiety spiked, instead of letting the worst-case scenario dominate unchallenged, Sarah was asked to write out three scenarios with equal rigour:

• The worst realistic case: What is the most likely bad outcome? (Not the catastrophe — the realistic worst.)
• The best realistic case: What might go well that she hadn’t considered?
• The most likely case: Based on evidence from her past performance, what would probably actually happen?

The crucial word is “realistic.” The catastrophic imagination is rarely realistic — it is emotionally amplified and evidence-free. When forced to identify the realistic worst case, most people discover it is manageable. When forced to identify the most likely case, most high performers discover the evidence of their own track record is, in fact, reassuring.

The first time Sarah did this exercise on a Sunday night, she spent 20 minutes writing. At the end, she looked at the “most likely” column — which contained seven bullet points of evidence that she’d handled situations like this before — and felt something unexpected: she felt bored by the anxiety. It had nothing new to say.

The Physical Practice That Supported the Cognitive One

Sarah’s therapist also recommended a physiological technique that neuroscientist Andrew Huberman has discussed extensively: the physiological sigh. A double inhale through the nose followed by a long, slow exhale through the mouth. This technique directly activates the parasympathetic nervous system — the body’s rest-and-digest system — within 20–30 seconds, measurably reducing heart rate and cortisol levels.

Sarah began using this every time she caught herself spiralling on Sunday nights. Not to suppress the anxiety — but to bring her physiology into a state where her prefrontal cortex could do the three-scenario analysis properly. You cannot think clearly when your body is in fight-or-flight. The sigh was the bridge between emotional overwhelm and rational examination.

Pressure Didn’t Change — Her Relationship to It Did

Sarah’s workload didn’t get lighter. The stakes of her role didn’t decrease. What changed was her internal relationship to anticipation. She stopped treating Sunday-night anxiety as evidence that something was wrong — and started treating it as a predictable pattern that could be managed with a specific set of tools.

That distinction — between something being wrong and something being manageable — is, Brené Brown argues, one of the most important shifts emotionally resilient people make. Not minimising difficulty. Maintaining agency in relation to it.

For related reading, explore our anxiety and stress management hub and the Feel Stronger resource centre for more tools on emotional resilience.

Try This Tonight (Not Next Week)

1. When anxiety about an upcoming event spikes, do the physiological sigh first. Double inhale through nose, long exhale through mouth. Repeat 2–3 times.
2. Write out the three scenarios. Worst realistic. Best realistic. Most likely. Spend equal time on each.
3. Scan your own evidence. What has actually happened in similar situations in your past? Let your track record speak to your nervous system.

This content is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice. For persistent anxiety that affects your daily functioning, please consider reaching out to a licensed therapist. BetterHelp offers accessible online therapy.