More than 50% of teens do not sleep enough!

To protect your mental health, physical health, quality of life, and safety you should get a quality sleep at right times. Sleep plays a vital role in good health and well-being throughout your life. In children and especially teens, sleep also support their growth and development.

Sleep helps your brain to work properly. While you’re sleeping, your brain is preparing for the next day. It helps you to learn and remember information. During sleep your body releases hormones that helps to repair the damaged cells in the body.

It is correct to say that we feel so relaxed and lighterwhen we’re well rested.

It is found by scientists that teens who get more sleep tend to eat a better diet and maintain a healthy weight. It enables them to get better grades and mental health.

As per American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM), pre-teens need between 9 and 12 hours of sleep a night, and teenagers should be getting between 8 and 10 hours of sleep.

Now the question arises that how do you know that you are getting enough sleep or not , right?

So the answer is as follows:

• If you are getting difficulty in waking up in the morning.
• If you are not able to pay attention or concentrate to things important to you.
• If you are feeling sleepy during your classes.
• If you are feeling depressed or moody.

Important Facts about Sleep

• Sleep is needed for memory and learning. Teenagers perform better on mental tasks when they are well rested. Sleep allows the brain to act as a filter, retaining the important things and filtering out those unimportant things that happened during the daytime.

• Lack of quality sleep lessen the ability to remember positive memories and keep hold of negative memories

• Teenagers who are deprived of sleep need up totwo weeks of sleep without forced knock-up to eliminate their insufficient sleep on school days. Also, oversleeping during weekends is insufficient to overcome the sleep debt from a week of early rising.

Beneficial sleep tips for teenagers

Some suggestions regarding this are-

• As per biology tendency, the brain of a teenager wants to go to bed late and also wake-up late the following morning which is difficult to manage. It will take time but you should be able to adjust your body clock .

• You should avoid taking  coffee, tea, soft drinks and energy drinks during evening.

• Set a regular wake-up time.

• Avoid smart phones and television right before bed to reduce mind racing during that time.

• Keep your bedroom dark at night.

• Choose a bedtime routine which should also include meditation and yoga.

Prachi Agarwal

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