By Emma Trapp
Round Table reporter
Study for math test, science project due tomorrow, dance class after school, drivers-ed and read chapter twenty-three of To Kill a Mockingbird; these are just a few things that a teenager in middle or high school stresses about.
A busy schedule like this can lead to extreme stress. Stress is mental or emotional strain or suspense. Teens constantly stress about things they need to worry about in and out of school; the thinking process never seems to end.
Adults often say to teens, “Stop complaining; you’re only a teenager. You have nothing to worry about, you have your whole life ahead of you,” but teen life is the exact opposite.
Teens of today have plenty of things to stress about, even if they are only in middle or high school. The future is one of the main causes of stress on teens today.
Stress can cause pain physically, not just mentally. Stressing too much about things such as school, the future, pressure to do drugs or drink, and the pressure to fit in and live up to others’ expectations can cause serious problems with the body.
Constant stress can lead to head aches, back pains, and stomach problems. Stress affects the blood cells in the body that fight off infection, causing a person to get sick.
The most change in one’s life is during adolescence, making teen years the most stressful time in a person’s life.
When a student gets sick and is required to stay home from school, the recovery time is doubled because when they are home all they do is stress about what they are missing.
Stress affects teens and adolescences differently than it does adults.
According to Sheryl S. Smith of SUNY Downstate Medical Center, “A brain chemical that reduces anxiety in adults has the opposite effect on adolescents, a new study finds, explaining why many teenagers are so touchy.”
Stress can cause teen irritability, anger, and rebellion. This can lead teens to things such as violence, which explains one reason why there have been a recent increase in fights during school.
Adults have different ways of handling stress, such as yoga and exercise. Teens are too busy to take the time and do things adults can do. Adults don’t realize how much schools have changed since they went. They don’t understand how different life as a teen has changed.
There is more to learn in school now that technology has changed over the years. With the advances in technology and new discoveries in the world there is more to keep up with.
This also puts pressure and stress on teens to fit in and be “popular” with their friends in and out of school. There is always a new style coming out, and the prices keep going up.
Teens need to worry about money to do most of things they do. They even need money for school to go on school field trips. Some teens’ parents don’t have the money to just give for movies, new clothes and college.
Teens of today have more things to stress and worry about than adults do. Teens worry about school, friends, being “popular,” and most of the time all this usually has to do with is their future.
Teens are constantly told that what they do now and who they are defines what kind of future they will have, and that is true.
Teens have so much to do, and with their busy schedules their minds are constantly working. That’s why teens need to have a day here and there to just relax and stop stressing.
