6 Emotional Stages Of Realizing Summer Break Is Over

Summer is over in a blink of an eye, and once again, we are dreading the thought of fall and everything that comes with it. It’s time to face reality, no more short shorts, crop tops or long maxi dresses. For most of us it is time to go back to school, and for others it’s work, but regardless, we go through this emotional experience. Here are the six emotional stages of realizing that summer break is over. Which one are you at right now?

1. Denial

You simply refuse to accept that summer is over. Despite knowing that your summer break is ending in a few days, you somehow manage to make yourself believe that you’ve got another month of summer left. Most of us like to speak things into existence, but it doesn’t really work when you’re up against calendar days. Let’s face it girls, summer is over, now let’s face it head on.

2. Regret

Once you start thinking about the possibility of summer break ending so soon, you start to question yourself and your activities throughout summer. You remember feeling super busy a few months ago, but you can’t recall what it is you did exactly. Questions like, “What have I been up to?” and “Did I see my friends during the break?” come to mind. Once you think hard and realize that you didn’t hit everything on your summer bucket list, you regret your choices and fall into the next emotional stage, anxiety.

3. Anxiety

Now that you realize you haven’t taken full advantage of your summer break, you start to panic. You had so many plans before summer had begun, yet somehow managed to do nothing. Remember how you wanted to go bungee jumping, learn a new language, and study to get ahead of your classes? There’s just a few more days of summer left and there’s no way you can fit these activities in now! Noooo!

4. Sadness

There’s no more point in denying it, summer is ending and there’s nothing you can do about it. You can’t complete your summer bucket list so there’s only one thing left for you to do–tie your hair up, put on some comfy pants, grab the sweets and binge watch Netflix. You’ve now reached a point where you want to distract yourself from the thought of everything that is happening.

5. YOLO

Luckily, the sadness stage will not last too long because after a couple hours of self-pity Netflix time, you start to get bored. Although you can’t be too productive for the remaining days of summer, you decide to make the best of it by getting out there. This is the YOLO stage, where you grab a few of your closest girlfriends and hit the party scene. It doesn’t matter that you haven’t been out in forever, the point is now that you are out of your house you are going wild!

6. Acceptance

It took us some time but we can finally accept that summer break is over and we’re neither angered, nor saddened by it. It doesn’t matter if we didn’t get to hang out with our friends and family as much as we liked to, or if we didn’t have an exotic summer vacation. There’s no point of thinking about it anymore. It’s time to power up and anticipate what’s to come in the near future.

It’s a short roller coaster ride of emotions when summer comes to an end. But soon we’ll forget all about our summer time sadness as new fun and exciting things roll in during the new school, or work, year. Just take the time to enjoy your last few days of summer while you still can!