This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Fairfield chapter.
Your first weeks away at college may be the first time in your life that you are forced to manage your own sleeping habits and sleep schedule. Unfortunately, Mom isn’t there anymore every day to be your alarm clock or to urge you to get to bed and get your day started. Balancing study time, a social life, and good overall health is definitely a challenge. You make time to eat meals each day because you see that as a necessity, and sleep should be as high of a priority as eating!
- Set a routine. As a college student, your sleep schedule will vary from weekdays to weekends. Despite these changes, you should try your best to keep it as close to consistent as possible so that you don’t spend all day Sunday catching up on your lack of sleep.
- Don’t lose sight of what you came for. We are all at college for the same ultimate goal—to get that degree. Prioritize sleep over other things that will inhibit your academic success.
- Use your free time to take power naps. Be sure that your naps aren’t too long, to ensure that you actually sleep at night. Your body completes a full sleep cycle on an average of 90 minutes, so that would be a good amount of time to set aside to re-charge. If you wake up in the middle of a sleep cycle, you may have a headache and feel more exhausted than you did before your nap.
- Keep your study space separate from your sleep space. Some people like to study on their beds, but keeping up with this habit will make it harder to fall asleep, as your body will associate your bed with a “work space,” instead of as a place to sleep.
- You must understand the negative effects that a lack of sleep can have on you, physically and mentally. The power to defeat those negative effects is in your hands. You don’t want to be laying in bed with tissues, cough drops, and a textbook at your side. Basically, the fear of not getting enough sleep and the fear of getting sick should be enough motivation to make you want to stay on top of your sleep game.
- Be sure that your room is an environment that your body feels comfortable shutting down in. I have lights across the tapestry on my wall, so I wear an eye mask to bed to ensure that it is dark enough. College residence hall beds probably won’t let you feel like you’re on cloud nine, so you may want to invest in a mattress pad to make your bed more comfortable.
- Set agreements with your roommate on a good time for lights out. For most people, college is the first time you are living in close quarters with another person. If your roommate has different sleeping habits, have a friendly discussion about how you can accommodate one another. College students are known for their lack of sleep, so try to be the one in a million who gets the rest that is needed for a successful semester.
College students are known for their lack of sleep, so try to be the one in a million who gets the rest that is needed for a successful semester.Â
Â