Photo credit: Lena Sakhnini

My friend and I enjoy a Celcius before school. Teenagers at Archer and across America have become reliant on morning coffees and energy drinks to get them through the day, causing potential detriment to their health.

As my schedule becomes fuller and the school year gradually starts to ramp up, I’ve found myself with one solution to my never-ending to-do list: consuming more and more caffeine.

Even though I am only a sophomore in high school, balancing my schoolwork and extracurriculars with time for my family and friends has become increasingly difficult. In order to complete homework, study for tests and Harkness discussion preparation, I have found myself staying up late to finish my work. After only getting a couple of hours of sleep, I wake up, get ready for school, grab an energy drink from my fridge and get into the car to drive to the bus stop. As many people tell me, I drink a lot of Celcius. It helps me focus and, most importantly, stay awake during class. However, at this point, it doesn’t even feel like an obsession or dependence; it’s completely normal to me, which may be part of the problem.

And I’m not the only one with a caffeine addiction. It seems like caffeine has become a staple for both upper and middle school students at Archer, as well as teenagers across the nation. I often see many students, including my friends, drinking iced coffee with extra espresso shots or downing energy drinks like they’re going out of style. It’s almost as if caffeine has become the unofficial mascot of teenage life.

According to a study conducted in 2017 by Michigan Medicine, “Roughly 73% of kids consume caffeine each day.” Another study by Medical News Today showed that “many adolescents are consuming 60-800 mg per day. The Mayo Clinic suggest[s] a maximum of 100 mg a day for adolescents.”

This caffeine dependency among teenagers is an alarming trend that warrants serious attention. With the endless creation of new energy drinks, coffee shops and caffeinated sodas, young people are consuming caffeine at unprecedented levels. This dependency not only disrupts their natural sleep patterns, leading to chronic sleep deprivation, but also poses risks of heightened anxiety and concentration issues. The developing brains of teenagers are especially susceptible to these adverse effects, which can have lasting impacts on their academic performance and overall well-being.

Parents, educators, and students must recognize that social and academic pressures within our society are what lead to caffeine dependency. As we continue to prioritize academic and extracurricular achievements, we can’t overlook the importance of healthy habits and the negative effects of relying on caffeine to keep up with demanding schedules and social pressures.

In order to balance school with life, we need to communicate with our teachers about looming deadlines, talk to our parents about how to better manage our workload and utilize coping strategies to manage stress. Most importantly, we should try our best not to procrastinate our assignments so we don’t resort to chugging an energy drink at 2 a.m., just to drink another a few hours later. The idea of being a “superhuman” who doesn’t need sleep is glorified in the media, but sleep is a fundamental part of our natural state and is crucial for maintaining good health. Our bodies and minds are designed to thrive with regular rest, and attempting to bypass this isn’t healthy or natural.

Both my personal experience and clinical studies show the normalization of high caffeine intake leads to a dependency that disrupts sleep patterns and poses significant health risks. Despite the pressures of academic and extracurricular activities, it is very important to prioritize healthier habits and educate students and teenagers about the dangers of excessive caffeine consumption. So, instead of reaching for energy drinks or an iced latte with extra shots of espresso the next time you feel sleepy, think about why you’re craving it. Do you need energy for an upcoming assignment you are stressing over and staying up insanely late to finish? Maybe instead, reach out to a friend, a parent or a teacher; building a support network is a powerful step toward reducing stress and finding healthier ways to stay energized.