If your parents give you grief about sleeping late, tell them kids need more sleep than adults! Learn about insomnia, hallucinations and more in Kidzworld’s Why You Need Sleep!
Since your body does most of its growing during sleep, kids and teens need to get a lot more shut-eye than adults. Adults can go with only 7-8 hours of sleep, but kids and teens need from 9-11 hours a night!
What Happens Without Sleep?
Sleep deprivation is serious stuff. Without sleep, your mind can’t make sense of what it sees during the day. You need sleep for many things—growth, wound healing, memory processing and a whole lot more. Without rest, your body starts to break down.
When you don’t let your body rest, it still needs to process the information you take in. Serious hallucinations (seeing something that’s not there) can result from a lack of sleep. When a person has trouble getting to sleep or can’t stay asleep, the condition is called insomnia. Insomnia can lead to depression, bad memory, aches and shakes and a general crankiness. If you have trouble sleeping, try some physical activity during the day to make your body crave sleep.
Sweet Dreams
Dreams and nightmares are the movies running in your head while you sleep, but no one really knows why we dream. Many scientists believe dreams are the way our minds make sense of our daily experiences. Some cultures believe dreams have great meaning and can even be predictions of future events!
Why You Need Sleep
Sleepy Foods
Has anyone ever told you that peanut butter causes nightmares? The truth is that, aside from maybe a mild stomachache, food doesn’t affect your body while it’s dreaming. Even though food doesn’t affect your dreams, lots of people think food affects your energy level. Ever felt tired after that big turkey dinner?
Turkey contains a natural amino acid called tryptophan. People often blame the tryptophan for feeling tired post-Thanksgiving, but there’s no scientific evidence to back it up! So you’re probably just tired from overeating!
