If someone were to ask you how stressed out you were on a regular basis, how would you respond? If you’re having trouble answering that question, ask yourself these three questions:

• How often do you find yourself literally crumpling to the ground due to the thought of all the homework you’re going to do on Sunday night?

• How many times did you cry last Finals Week?

• Is contemplating how much stress you endure stressing you out?

If at least 2 out of 3 of the above questions were answered ‘yes,’ you’re probably put under a sufficient amount of stress.

Americans teens have been found to be just as or even more stressed out than adults, and it is affecting their physical and mental state in a negative way. The American Psychological Association’s 2013 Stress in America Survey, which studied the habits of 1,000 teen-aged adolescents and 2,000 adults, shows that teens are in fact more susceptible to stress than grown ups; on a 10-point scale, adults leveled up to 5.1 whereas teens landed on 5.8 during the school year and 4.6 during the summer. Over a third of teens reported that stress contributed to their lack of sleep, a third admitted that stress caused their frequent depressed feeling, and a quarter said that stress leads them to skip meals.

Being a teenager is tough. Here is how a couple of student from AHS deal with their stress. Willa Moen, sophomore at AHS, tells how she deals with her stress: “I cried continuously [during Finals Week]. I work out or do some sort of physical activity to get rid of stress.” Marcello Romano says he turns to the stars: “how do I relax? Astronomy.” Junior Joseph Yaconelli kept the explanation of his stress-free remedy short and sweet: “video games, music, and thinking about cats.”

The important things to remember about stress are these: stress is your body and your mind rising to a challenge- don’t let stress get the best of you, find an activity that releases your stress, and eat healthy and regularly!