Ruhi has a conversation with four remarkable and articulate teenagers about their sleep patterns, peer relationships, school, life and how digital ecologies are reshaping their world.
To sleep, perchance to dream,” Hamlet laments to himself in Shakespeare’s famous play. While some have interpreted the quote as being about the protagonist worrying about carrying his troubles to the grave, I see something else: an insomniac. Even worse, I see an insomniac whose lack of sleep is leading to an increasingly unhinged state of mind. Those who have read Hamlet know how it ends (and it’s not pretty).
Whether or not Hamlet was a teenager remains hotly contested, the fact is that too many young people are struggling in their own ways thanks to a lack of sleep. A teenager’s real-world clock – that is to say the clock our world expects them to adhere to, rather than their biological one – can start early. For some, it’s as early as 6 or 7am, and is earlier for those who compete in swimming or who play hockey. For others, long commute times to school can also require an early wake up time.
The first bell for most high schools in Ontario currently goes off at 8:30am, with the day wrapping by 2:37 or so. Many then stay behind to pursue extracurricular activities, resulting in kids not stepping through their front doors until well after 4pm – even later for those who play organized sports or who participate in other activities. Many teenagers say that the two to three hours of homework that follow are the most significant barrier to them getting a good night’s sleep.
Not wanting to miss out on social media, young people have stated that their window for scrolling their friends’ feeds is midnight to 2am. They say this is the only uninterrupted time they have where they can decompress.
The result, of course, is that too many of our young people are deeply sleep deprived. On weeknights, many teenagers report that their average total sleep time is 6- 7 hours. And while many may sleep on the weekends, this ongoing deprivation/restriction is a tough thing to make up for, especially for those who have jobs.
The other challenge is the teen habit of staying up late and waking late on the weekends, delaying their already misaligned circadian clocks.
The fact remains that teenagers need anywhere from 8.5 to 9.5 hours of sleep daily. During adolescence, their circadian clocks are delayed and their drive to sleep builds up slowly. Young people generally want to go to bed later and wake up later than adults do. The problem, of course, is that their social clocks are totally out of sync with their biological clocks. As a result, they are living in a constant state of bio-deregulation caused by sleep deprivation, sleep restriction and misaligned circadian clocks. The result is making Hamlets of them all.
Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD (an appropriate acronym) or Winter Blues occurs with the change in seasons as the days get shorter, greyer, and darker. There is a general feeling of lack of motivation and energy and it is often accompanied by sadness, anxiety, increased sleep duration, lack of concentration and weight gain. Morning light therapy has proven to be more effective (10,000-lux light treatment in 30 minute sessions) in conjunction with consistent sleep time (Principles and Practice of Sleep Medicine, 5th edition). If you are a shift worker light therapy is not a good option as your circadian clock is already misaligned and you do not have the luxury of consistent bedtime. Being a shift worker, I had to be inventive.
After trying a variety of different options I found that a really good way for me to beat the winter blues is to add fairy lights everywhere in my house and also by creating indoor micro jungles. Fairy lights will not disrupt your circadian clock but will add an element of joy; greenery is good for general well-being and helps elevate your mood. Combine the greenery with the lights and you have wonderland. Make sure you get your Vitamin D and get some exercise. If it is sunny outside make sure you get outside and bask in it. If the symptoms persist please see your health care provider.
It’s Exam Time in Ontario High schools! Last week during my sleep workshops, students expressed how the end of semester heightens their levels of stress and anxiety. The pressure to hand in assignments and prepare for exams ramps up, which can be challenging or even overwhelming.
Stress and anxiety are part of being a human. A little stress is good as it motivates us to get things done and to move forward. Too much stress can be debilitating and can lead to flight or freeze reactions, which can be detrimental to our physical and mental wellbeing.
Here are few strategies to maximize learning during these stressful times:
Make sure you are getting adequate amount of sleep. Learning gets consolidated while you are sleeping, so sleep is part of studying! Please refrain from pulling an all-nighter – it will not serve you well in the long run.
Make sure you move – get some fresh air, go for a short or long walk, jog, or run, or do those pushups and sit-ups.
Do your exams prep in 20 – 30 minutes blocks, and divide the information into chunks by using the chunking process i.e., take big chunks of information or a difficult concept and reorganize it into smaller bits. This will make it easier to process information. Then take a 5 – 10 minute break – meditate, do some jumping jacks, or go for a short walk.
Stay off your phones/screens close to bedtime – it will negatively impact your sleep and your learning process.
Keep hydrated, eat well, and be mindful of your caffeine intake. Remember, caffeine has a quarter life of 12 hours. It will still be in your system 12 hours after ingesting it.
Good luck in your exams. Sleep well. You guys are doing great!
“A 24/7 environment has the semblance of social world, but it is actually a non-social model of mechanic performance and a suspension of living that does not disclose the human cost required to sustain its effectiveness”– Jonathan Crary
The fact is that there is strong evidence that teenager’s biological clock is not compatible with the sleep schedule the rest of the society runs on and this model is referred to as “The Perfect Storm” and yet we continue to ignore it and then wonder why are our kids are so tired and agitated.
The fact is that global data is showing that the total sleep time in teens is averaging around 7 -7.5 hour which is two hours shorter than what they need on a daily basis.
The fact is that loosing those two hours of sleep in the morning means compromising their REM sleep aka dream sleep which is crucial for emotional regulation and creativity.
The fact is that there is a strong correlation between sleep restriction/deprivation and anxiety, depression and addiction, and that depressed and anxious individuals have much worse sleep, compounding the issue.
The fact is that the teens are the largest youth cohort in the history of humanity, 1.8 billion with 90% living in low-and -middle income countries and are currently at # 4 on the Global Burden of Disease list for anxiety, depression and addiction.
The fact is that the cost of dealing with addiction in Canada for a teenager is approximately around $ 80,000- 120,000.
The fact is that overall cost in terms of dealing with mental health and development of our children outweighs any costs incurred from changing the system to fix this.
Self Regulation is the key component of the longitudinal case study that was initiated in 2011. Can regulating that variables within one’s control mitigate the slow violence of shift work? What does this process look like? The Sleep and Society Podcast explores this in detail from the lens of biology, economy, and society. This poster is an aspect of this decade long case study and it looks at the role that self regulation and shift schedules play to counter the negative impact of shift work. It has been presented at the Canadian Sleep Society Conference, the International Symposium of The Working Time Society, and at the Kingston Nursing Research Conference.
Over 30% of Canadians are shift workers. National Sleep Health defines shift work as irregular work hours, regular being 8-4 or 9-5. International Labour Organization defines it as ” a method of organization of working time in which workers succeed one another at the workplace so that the establishment can operate longer than the hours of work of individual workers”. In our 24/7 society, shift work is a reality for many. Early morning shifts, evening shifts, night shifts, rotating shifts are associated with an increased propensity towards disrupted sleep. Night shift and rotating shift workers have an increased risk of acquiring circadian rhythms disorder, mood disorders, metabolic and cardiovascular disorders, cognitive dysfunction and cancer. Shift work is an act of slow violence against our bodies and can have serious consequences on our physical and mental well-being.
The Sleep and Society Podcast examines this topic in detail and does deep dives into what it takes to keep somewhat healthy when going against one’s own biological rhythms.
