Students all over the world are required to attend school for up to seven hours each day and practically without any breaks. There are, of course, the weekends, but most students’ time during that period is taken up by doing homework, studying for tests, playing sports, and so on.

The scientific consensus is that teenagers need at least nine hours of sleep each night to let their brain fully rest and be ready for the upcoming day. Without that sleep, teenagers will most likely have trouble focusing their minds and functioning well physically and emotionally.

Most high school students also have after-school activities, such as athletics and clubs, which can take up hours every week, making it so that they do not have time to do the hours of homework they are assigned each night.

School on top of sports can be very overwhelming. It has been for me, at least.

Last school year, I was on the cheer team. We had up to two practices each week and usually two games per week, too. This became very time-consuming, as I also had a job which added to the stress. The few hours I had left in my week were all I had for free time.

I used to be an average student. I had decent grades throughout middle school, but high school came and everything changed. I became exhausted from all of the activities I had on top of school each day. My schedule built up more and more, and I became incredibly busy, draining my motivation to go to school every day. 

School really messed up my mental health. I became miserable. Every day after school when I had days off from after school activities, I would go home and sleep for hours. This habit disrupted my sleep schedule, leaving me awake most nights. It got to the point where my friends and family started to notice something was wrong. Eventually my parents could not see me like this anymore, so they took me to a specialist. 

Visiting the specialist has taught me that I am not the only one who is experiencing these feelings. Actually, a lot of teenagers in high school are going through the same exact thing as I am. My doctor told me that over 60% of teenagers that she sees get put on anti depressant and stress relief medicine to help them get through each day of school. 

Hearing this from the doctor silenced me. My eyes widened, as I was very shocked to find out that I wasn’t going through this alone. It was enough to make me wonder why we do not do more to make teenagers’ lives more manageable.