Teen Stress Essay, Research Paper

Teen Stress

Sweat glistens on the boy s forehead. His eyes locked in complete concentration. His fingers felt stiff his body tenses, his heart races. The pressure mounts as he soon decides to throw down the remote controller to the video game 007 in defeat. Parents would not consider this to be an abnormal trait, but every day children give up on their own video games of life. Teenagers are driven to desperate measures to divert pressure society places on them today. Teens can go as far as eating disorders, depression, or even suicide, but we can possibly prevent this from occurring.

Eating disorders are just one of the many effects stress has on teens today. Society praises those who are bequeathed with the perfect figure. For example, you ll never see an even slightly larger girl on the cover of seventeen magazine. Because of this, many teenagers are driven to eating disorders. They see how the model maintains the perfect body and assumes the only was to achieve this is to starve themselves. These diets are growing rapidly, both in men and in women. Disorders include anorexia and bulimia. A person would turn to these diets if the were when they feel they do not fit the social norm. According to Cooping with Family Stress by Kimberly Goodness, Susan is just another example of eating disorders. Amy, Susan s sister, is a perfect size six, on the honor roll, and is captain of the cheerleading squad. Susan says that she feels, fat ugly and dumb. Later Susan was diagnosed with an eating disorder. This disorder grew until she died. Susan s life may have been spared if students today were aware of the signs. These warning signs include feelings of self awareness or constantly putting themselves down. Teens can turn to eating disorders in the time of stress.

Another affect of stress is depression. Depression effects students every day. In fact, one in every five are effected by this disease. After an amount of stress school and work can place on students, they break down. Some signs of depression, according to dead serious by Jane Mersky, are sadness, pessimism, guilt, and hopelessness. Teens are greatly affected by this. On fact, twenty percent of those receiving treatment at depression help centers are teens. Every year, teenagers attempt to care for depression on their own possibly leading to suicide. Mersky also reports that three out of every seven suicide cases are associated to school related stress. Suicide in Young People s author Arnold Madison tells a story of child that too attempted to end her life. Cathy H. is a perfect example of this. She recalls her reasons for attempting suicide, “I remember everyone thought I was to quiet, I remember my grades were dropping, I had no future, and my hair was to sort.”. Cathy than attempted to take her own life by overdosing on sleeping pills. Students can get stressed out to the point of suicide. After seeing what causes students to throw in the remote controller before they even get the chance to succeed, we must find a way to find a solution to the problem of teen stress.

How many more lives can we stand to lose because of social pressure? How many more numbers can we stand to see before we take a stand of our own? One way to possibly help lower the numbers of suicide in teenagers today would be to add more emphasis on the DARE programs in our schools today. Newsweek February 26, 2001 claims that eighty percent of schools today include DARE programs in their curriculum. The DARE program was launched in 1983. Since then students have reported that they are less likely to attempt use of drugs. Jessica Ritter is just one of the students that attended this course. She says, “It Felt really good to know I was a DARE graduate and would be drug-free forever.”. By putting more emphasis on programs like these, more students can become aware of the dangerous use of drugs. I also believe it would be beneficial if students were required to make monthly visits with their counselor. In this the counselor could be able to spot potential stress and prevent the student from taking his or hers own action. Also by put more emphasis on stress causes and prevention in the required health class, we could let the students be more aware of the consequences from compiled stress. This course will also include a beauty focus were the students find their own beauty. By including the beauty focus students can feel more confident about themselves. All of these would be excellent ideas to help lower our teen suicide numbers.

So now, looking back, you now know the different kinds of stress and what it can lead to and we have a beginning to lower the numbers of suicide in teens. So with your help we can help to diminish the numbers of video games lost for teens.