Sleep Deprivation

In today's world no one gets enough sleep with their own busy schedule, especially teens. Teens need sleep for their body, considering the fact that we have a rapid growth and developing bodies to take care of. As an adolescents, we need a good nine hours of sleep so we do better in school and extracurricular activities. What most of our society is not informed about is the fact being sleep deprived is terrible for your health and may cause life threatening situations. As well as, being sleep deprived is some what of an annoyance.

Sleep deprivation are things are one of the few things that society already knows about, but they do not know the full affects about it. Many of us have sleep deprivation but we usually use things that contain caffeine to keep us awake. While caffeine in many beverages can give you "a short term lift, too much can make you crash and leave you feeling sleepier then before." (Wysong) This shows that caffeine will give you a little bit of a boost but then in an hour or so you will crash. This also shows that, all that caffeine is basically a sugar rush in your body, that will not last so long. Some people usually use caffeine to stay awake while driving so they do not fall asleep. Mahowald stated that fall asleep car accidents probably "kill more young Americans under the age of twenty five than alcohol related crashes." This shows that people who are sleep deprived usually do have car crashes, not because they have been drinking but because of the lack of sleep they get. This also shows that, young Americans who are sleep deprived and whom drive as well as do not drink, have more accidents then the intoxicated drivers. Being sleep deprived does not help you on the road in a anyway nor using products that contain caffeine which means you will crash sooner or later.

A lot of things cut out on our sleep being teens, such as, school, jobs, and so much more. Because of that our grades and attention span goes lower and lower as well as our attendance to class starts to decrease because of either of us catching up on our sleep or school starting way to early for us. For example, when Wysong stated that with many schools starting as early as 7:15 am, "getting the right amount of sleep can be difficult." This shows that, with school starting as early as seven o'clock, that does not give students enough rest time. They have to be up at five o'clock in the morning so they are not late, and that means they leave the house six fifty to be on time. This also happens to show that, starting school that early most of the students will start to zone off fast because teens we do get tired fast because we do not have that much energy that early in the day. Starting school early is not the best idea for teens who are sleep deprived fro five days every school week. Students who have the right amount of sleep daily on school nights are more likely to pay attention and be active during class. For example, Mardon and Epstein said that when you are encouraging more sleep you have"increased attendance, better grades and caused fewer driving accidents." This shows that, when students sleep more their academics go higher because they are more active in class when awake than the days they are sleepy. This also shows that teens who go to sleep on time and then go to school as well as have a job to go to afterward have fewer driving accidents. When students are more awake in class they often make their teachers a lot happy as well as when teachers see you not zoned out during school hours they are a lot happier. For example Mardon and Epstein said, "Teachers get a close up view of sleep deprivations effects, as blearly students zone out and even doze off in class." This shows that, teachers see a lot of students sleep deprived during class and they understand that they do not get much time for classes or school starts as early as seven fifteen A.M. This also shows that, adolescents who do not get enough rest have learning problems and slowly fall behind. Teens need nine point five hours of sleep for optimal alertness.

Adolescents who do not get enough sleep end up with some sort of health problem from being sleep deprived. For example, "Insomnia, the ability to get to sleep well at night, is an all-too common sleeping problems- in fact it is the most common sleep complaint." (Smith and Segal) This shows that, insomnia can be cured with changes you can make on your own without relying on sleep specialists or turning to prescription or even turn to sleeping pills. This also shows that, sleeping pills can make insomnia worse in the long run. Therefore, it is best to limit sleeping pills to situations where a persons health or safety is threatened. Another sleeping danger is called sleep apnea. For example, "Sleep apnea is a serious and potentially life threatening sleep disorder." (Smith and Segal) This shows that, people who have sleep apnea have breathing pauses that interrupt their sleep, which leads to interrupting hours of being awake when trying to sleep. This also shows that, most people with sleep apnea, do not remember these awakenings, they feel the effects in other ways, such as exhaustion during the day, irritability, depression, and decreased productivity. Sleep apnea temporarily stops during sleep due to blockage of the upper airways. People with delayed sleep phase disorder are unable to get to sleep earlier than two to six a.m, no matter how hard they try.

Being sleep deprived can affect the body in many ways, especially being teens considering the fact that we are in our growing phase, puberty. For example, when Wysong stated that when a teen is going through puberty, "that the internal clock shifts." This shows that when an adolescent is going through puberty, their sleeping schedule changes because of the hormonal changes, which is not the best for the teen since they will be sleep deprived. This also shows that, puberty will be shifting the on set of sleep about an hour later for teenagers. Because of puberty, most teens can not go to sleep until midnight since their biological clock shifts. The changes taking place in their bodies requires more sleep and they may be physically challenged to getting up early in the morning. Another example, Lamber said that puberty resets the hands of the biologic clock "shifting the onset of sleep about an hour later in teenagers." This shows that the body secretes the sleep-related hormone melatonin at a different time than it normally does. This also shows that, the biological clock in adolescents slow down, which usually means not falling asleep until around two in the morning. The body's internal clock, which controls when a person starts to feel tired, shifts after puberty, making it hard for most teens to fall asleep before eleven at night. Teens struggle to learn to deal with the whole body changing thing-- being sleep deprived makes it even more difficult.