Teenagers often go through sleep deprivation, many don’t realize that sleep is like food for the brain; with the lack of sleep, your body begins to function irregularly. Many of us start getting bags under your eyes, become moody, and perform poorly in school. As a teenager, it’s imperative that we know the benefits of sleep and the ways we can achieve it.

Studies have shown that teenagers don’t get the 8-10 hours of sleep they need for school nights because we’re so used to training our brain to work on a later time schedule so the body’s circadian rhythm (an internal biological clock) tends to reset, telling the brain to fall asleep later at night and wake up later in the morning.

Other reasons can be stress, over thinking, and having anxiety. Teenagers are at the age where they go through a lot, mentally and physically. They get hurt, they lose those that are closest to them, they get their hearts broken, they’re failing a class. Whatever the case may be, deep thoughts tend to come up right before you sleep.

If you’re one of those teenagers that struggle with falling asleep or getting enough sleep at night, here are some tips from a teenager herself that suffered from insomnia. It all starts with taking baby steps, things can’t be achieved within the blink of an eye.

Let’s talk about the productivity of your day, make sure you’re doing a lot. Participate in class, gym and other activities whether its in or out school. Try to make your brain and body exhausted by exercising, playing a sport, finishing up all your homework, overall just  get things done. That way when you’re ready for bed, your body will be drained and ready for it’s reboost.

A major factor would be taking off any “blue lights”  (cell phones, TV, laptop, tablets ) an hour before bed. Yes, this sounds crazy because us teenagers love being on our phones until we fall asleep. Blue lights were shown to reduce the melatonin our body naturally produces. Melatonin is there to balance the sleep and wakefulness.

Next, within that hour of you turning off the blue lights, you have to find ways to relax your body and brain. Some ways in which you can do this is by taking a hot shower or bubble bath, reading a book, coloring, drinking chamomile tea, smelling lavender oil or just anything that personally works for you.

Sooner or later, you’ll find out that this actually works for you and you’ll start slumbering into your beauty sleep.