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Let Teenagers Sleep

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#121

Post by yamtaddle »

solveit wrote: post #44
fdgsdfogijq wrote: post #17

As a teenager I was diagnosed with "ADD". Very intelligent, but unable to focus or complete assignments. My life habits were carb heavy unhealthy food (from the cafeteria), soda, lack of sleep due to long school commute, not much exercise As an adult, I eat no carbs, all meat and vegetables, I work from home and sleep in as far as I need every night. My thinking is laser sharp. They tried to medicate me with all sort…

> My guidance counseler suggested I dont attend college, just a community college (despite the fact that I got admitted to a decent state school) What's wrong with guidance counselors in American high schools? Why do I keep hearing about them giving kids incredibly stupid advice?

Most of them are really bad at their jobs, but the pay kinda sucks, so that's not likely to improve. And with all the glamour of telling burn-outs that they're not getting into Harvard all day long, and the low pay, you also get to be point person when a kid offs themselves or dies in a car wreck. Fun!

You get what you pay for, and the pay's low. Also, the job sucks. That's a recipe for terrible service.

[EDIT] Incidentally, you want consistently-great counselors, as far as the college planning side goes? Elite prep schools. Half of what you're paying for is an expert with insider knowledge & contacts to ensure your kid gets into the best possible school they can. They treat the position—at least as far as that side of it goes—very seriously, when hiring.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#122

Post by jermaustin1 »

fdgsdfogijq wrote: post #17

As a teenager I was diagnosed with "ADD". Very intelligent, but unable to focus or complete assignments. My life habits were carb heavy unhealthy food (from the cafeteria), soda, lack of sleep due to long school commute, not much exercise As an adult, I eat no carbs, all meat and vegetables, I work from home and sleep in as far as I need every night. My thinking is laser sharp. They tried to medicate me with all sort…

I was never diagnosed with ADD, but I had a long commute to school (2+ hours each way - I was closest to the bus barn, so first on in morning, last off at night). So I was on the bus at 5:15am, and not getting home until 5:45-6:30pm, just in time to eat dinner and go to bed so that I could wake up at 4:30am to get my shower, and walk a half mile to the bus stop.

The fact that they would pull that shit on 13 year old kids, then tell them they are dumb and fail them is ridiculous. Thankfully I had a few teachers that would stand up for me, but most of them though I was a lazy burn-out and would never amount to anything, and almost no teacher had empathy for me. I should be doing my school work on the bumpy bus that spent more than half its time on rural dirt roads.

When I got my first real job, I was glad to realize how wrong they all were. But it shattered my confidence.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#123

Post by deanCommie »

hgsgm wrote: post #99
gabereiser wrote: post #57

The real blame for early high school is extra-curricular sports. Basketball, Football, etc. For those sports to thrive, teams need to practice, in order for practice to be efficient, it needs to be at least an hour. So 2 hours are allocated (suit up, practice, suit down). In order for children to be able to commit to 2 hours extra of their time BEFORE their parents get home (5pm), class would have to end by 3pm. Now,…

Huh? Sports can practice before school. And high school athletes don't need parental supervision. School hours are set by transportation needs, as you already observed.

> Sports can practice before school

Hilarious, given the original thread.

School already starts far too early.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#124

Post by giantg2 »

Maybe schedule and school choice would be better. I even went to earlier classes before the official start of school and did fine. One size does not fit all, and pushing a universal change in start time will hurt some students.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#125

Post by snapetom »

gabereiser wrote: post #57

The real blame for early high school is extra-curricular sports. Basketball, Football, etc. For those sports to thrive, teams need to practice, in order for practice to be efficient, it needs to be at least an hour. So 2 hours are allocated (suit up, practice, suit down). In order for children to be able to commit to 2 hours extra of their time BEFORE their parents get home (5pm), class would have to end by 3pm. Now,…

Uh, this is pretty much the case with other extra-curriculars, too. My school had a very strong and diverse performing arts program and kids often stayed late enough for parents to pick them up after work.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#126

Post by jay_kyburz »

hgsgm wrote: post #87
beebmam wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As an adult, I eat no carbs, all meat and vegetables This is contradictory. Vegetables are high in carbohydrates as a percentage of their calories.

Non-starch vegetable have almost no carbs and almost no calories.

But they have the fiber and other green goodness you need.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#127

Post by rajin444 »

fdgsdfogijq wrote: post #17

As a teenager I was diagnosed with "ADD". Very intelligent, but unable to focus or complete assignments. My life habits were carb heavy unhealthy food (from the cafeteria), soda, lack of sleep due to long school commute, not much exercise As an adult, I eat no carbs, all meat and vegetables, I work from home and sleep in as far as I need every night. My thinking is laser sharp. They tried to medicate me with all sort…

I used to be really big on trust the experts, seek authorities for advice, etc etc. Especially for areas involving mental / general health. Specifics like fixing a broken arm I’m still on the experts side :)

Decades later I’ve had many (eerily similar) experiences to what you detailed above. I’ve gotten the best results evaluating issues on my own / with the help of a few trusted sources. Expert advice is about as reliable as chatgpt (in the majority of cases). There’s too many devils in the details when it comes to complex issues like health. Find people who got results or find results yourself.

I think the majority of modern healthcare exists to make a profit and curing patients isn’t really a good business model. Unfortunately they can use those profits to create an army of experts and studies.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#128

Post by xyzelement »

avgcorrection wrote: post #93

Pet peeve of mine: some older adults are proud that they get up early. And that’s OK in isolation. The problem though is that older adults rule society moreso than younger adults, and certainly compared to teenagers. So for many older adults it feels natural to go to bed early and to get up early. But then we as a society confuse that with universal “good behavior”/good character, so everyone has to dance to that tun…

I do think there's actual correlation between getting up earlier and achievement. I don't know many successful people who get up super late. Don't know if that's correlation or causation, just that there's something to getting up early to crush it.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#129

Post by ck425 »

_yb2s wrote: post #115
fdgsdfogijq wrote: post #17

As a teenager I was diagnosed with "ADD". Very intelligent, but unable to focus or complete assignments. My life habits were carb heavy unhealthy food (from the cafeteria), soda, lack of sleep due to long school commute, not much exercise As an adult, I eat no carbs, all meat and vegetables, I work from home and sleep in as far as I need every night. My thinking is laser sharp. They tried to medicate me with all sort…

Modern psychiatry entirely ignores mechanism. All diagnoses are sets of symptoms, and treatments are drugs that reduce specific symptoms. It isn’t surprising that in many cases the causes would be obvious, but there isn’t any type of system for even trying to approach mental health that way. Another problem is the feedback loop of mental illness. A lot of people might feel better if they got exercise, ate healthy, go…

> Another problem is the feedback loop of mental illness. A lot of people might feel better if they got exercise, ate healthy, got enough sleep, made some friends, took on some fun hobbies, etc. but most people aren’t willing or able to do any of that if they are stuck in a bad mental state.

I've found CBT super helpful for my ADHD because it focuses on the small steps to break that loop. I thoroughly recommend it for ADHD and mental illness, particularly for engineers as it's far more system based and obviously "logical" than any other form of therapy I've tried.

Re: Let Teenagers Sleep

#130

Post by rcpt »

avgcorrection wrote: post #93

Pet peeve of mine: some older adults are proud that they get up early. And that’s OK in isolation. The problem though is that older adults rule society moreso than younger adults, and certainly compared to teenagers. So for many older adults it feels natural to go to bed early and to get up early. But then we as a society confuse that with universal “good behavior”/good character, so everyone has to dance to that tun…

We have ceded far too much power to the morning people.
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