Keeping a consistent sleep schedule in high school is more than beneficial, but scrolling one more time won’t hurt, right?
Nope.
According to the app “Calm Sleep”, statistics show that screen time should come to an end at least 30 minutes before bed. Blue light from screens can slow your body’s melatonin production, disrupting your sleep cycle.
Avoiding social media before bed is an essential part of getting your brain trained to go to sleep earlier. Even staying up late can strain your eyes and brain, possibly leading to headaches, blurred vision, and dry eyes.
While screen time can mess up your sleep schedule, so can having a long break from school.
“Whenever school starts again it’s always hard for me to fall asleep and wake up the next day for school, but it doesn’t ruin my grind, I still show up for school,” senior Daygan Lucas said.
Thanksgiving break gave most students a week to get off schedule. After two weeks of Christmas break, everyone is going to need help getting back into the swing of things.
“Sleep is very important to me, but now I just can’t ever fall asleep,” junior Haydn Murray said.
Rest is one of the most important things you need in high school. From focusing to simply listening, sleeping affects a good amount of our daily functions.
“Daylight savings time messed me up completely, like completely, I was always thinking I was late to school, but it was actually two hours early, so I ended up waking up almost three hours early,” sophomore Jaylyn Conner said.
However, when it comes to fixing your sleep, it can be a tough task to accomplish. There could be a million things to worry about tomorrow and another instagram reel won’t fix that.
“Surprisingly, I don’t stay on my phone too much or too late. Like today, I only slept one hour and yesterday was only fourish hours,” junior Caroline Miller said.
A good way to get back in routine is to simply turn off all electronics, giving you complete focus elsewhere. Slowly, you’ll adjust back to the transition.
“(Sleeping) is just as important as a good diet, it’s extremely important,” nurse Christy Higginbotham said.
It’s hard but making yourself turn off your screens around the same time every night would help wind you down and give you a healthier outlet to staying energized.
“It’s really hard even for adults, but you just have to do it, you just have to adjust,” Higginbotham said.
Limiting your screen time also significantly decreases your exposure to stressors. For example social media, you know how everyone says “comparison is the thief of joy”, well it’s true.
“Sleeping resets your brain and helps you rest better, you’re almost helping yourself be smarter,” Miller said.
In the amount of time you spend scrolling through TikTok shop, or Snapchat stories, you could be helping yourself in more ways than one just by getting the extra sleep.
“Sleep is when your body is in recovering mode, so your brain heals, your muscles are healing and that’s just when most of that happens,” nurse Heather Cook said.
Either way, there are a wide range of methods you can try to heal your sleeping schedule over time, but the biggest beneficial change you can make is putting your phone down.