How often do you find yourself postponing the golden hour that you lay your head down on your pillow and fall asleep because you have too much homework? Once a week? Every night? If you rarely get even close to eight hours of sleep a night, you may be in more trouble than you think.

Sleeping is an essential part of living a healthy lifestyle, especially for teenagers, and you should make time for it in your day. Homework and after school activities should be planned so that you can give yourself more time to sleep, at least 7-8 hours.

Even when your responsibilities pile up and you feel like you can’t breathe, going to bed can take away a significant amount of stress. And besides, what’s better: getting your work done and being a zombie in class or being well-rested with some work to make up?

A lack of mental awareness isn’t the only sign of sleep deprivation. A slowed down metabolism, forgetfulness, weight gain, and impaired judgment are some short-term effects of a lack of sleep.

However, chronic sleep deprivation can cause long-lasting problems. Heart disease, heart attacks, heart failure, a predisposition to strokes, and even diabetes can all result from not getting enough sleep.

The solution to this problem is not gulping down energy drink after energy drink, but rather making changes in your schedule to accommodate for more sleep. One important thing to do is to set a specific bedtime. This trains your body to expect sleep at a certain time each night and gets your body on track.

Also, napping in the late afternoon after school can disturb your sleeping schedule and keep you up late. Don’t stay up on your phone, either. Put it down and go to bed after you finish your homework.

But what do you do when it’s midnight and you still have tons of homework? There are times when postponing your bedtime is necessary, but it should not become a habit. If you find yourself getting 4-5 hours of sleep a night, which I’d say the majority of teenagers do, then you have to either work at being better at managing your time or take something out of your schedule.

And let’s be honest, you know that you’re going to be on Twitter instead of finishing your math homework, so instead of procrastinating and then finally scrapping your homework altogether, be honest with yourself and go to sleep.

Billy Jump is an In-Depth Editor for The Patriot and jcpatriot.com.