How do I get more energy?

How old are you?

It’s not really surprising that you’re tired if your in the latter years of high school and doing 3–5 hours of tennis a day. How much sleep do you get?

The things you need to do are to make sure you get quality and consistent sleep each night. So go to bed at a fairly consistent time. No screen time in the hour or so before bed. No phone, no laptop. Just read a book or do something calming.

Eat healthy food. Make sure your diet is giving you all the energy you need. Don’t drink lots of soft drinks. Avoid caffeine. It might make you feel more awake initially, but it’s not very healthy for you.

Do you eat red meat? Could you be anaemic? Are you female? Do you have periods? If the answer is yes you do, are they normal or heavy? If you’re having heavy periods that can make you anaemic and you’ll feel tired.

@Earthbound_Misfit I am in high school. I’m not doing any tennis yet, since the tennis season has not started yet, but I still get really tired. I get about 5–7 hours of sleep…. The amount differs every night.
Thank you for the advice. The “consistent amount of sleep” part really helped. I’ll start doing that from now on and setting a schedule.

A guy I worked with who taught yoga in his spare time swore by spirulina. So I took it for about a month. And holy shit did that stuff make me feel great and give me a ton of extra energy.

The problem is it was the worst tasting thing I have ever put in my mouth. Spirulina burps are the worst.

It wasn’t worth it. But it might be worth it for you.

And they sell pills that aren’t nearly as effective as the powder you can buy at whole food stores.I got the powder and mixed it in with a glass of OJ and it was fucking nasty. But it gave me a ton of energy.

That’s not enough sleep at your age. You need more sleep. You are sleep deprived. Teenagers need about 9 hours sleep a night. Apart from all that study. You need energy to grow and to keep developing. Read this link about adolescents and their sleep. It’s really important that you go to bed at a consistent time and try to go to sleep and sleep well for about 9 hours.

Make sure you don’t eat late at night. As I’ve said don’t play on your computer or phone before you go to sleep, it affects your ability to sleep. Make your bedroom a sleep zone (I know that’s not likely and that your room is your cave!). But do try to make it a place where you can relax and go to sleep. Don’t have so many blankets on your bed that you’re too hot or too few so that you’re cold. Think about having a bath before bed so you’ll sleep better. Drink milk before you go to sleep, it can help you relax.

Good luck! You need all that energy to do well and once you start exercising and playing tennis, making sure you take care of yourself will be extra important.

Why do you play tennis? Seems like it would be better to get in some extra sleep so you can focus on your studies.

@johnpowell Yes, this was what I used to think as well…. I still have some doubts about playing when I could focus on my studies or sleep. But, tennis is a big part of my life, and especially in my junior year, I want to do the things I love the most, so I am trying to balance everything out.

That’s a lot of tennis. Cutting it back a little so you can get some rest is sure to help. Feel better soon.

Like @Earthbound_Misfit says, you need sleep.

You also need to eat a good, hearty, energy breakfast like granola and yoghurt, then a light lunch of soup and a small sandwich. Then you need to eat a complete dinner at night. Don’t worry about too many carbs or calories with all the tennis you’re playing.

You’re probably working on a deficit at this time which will cause chronic fatigue. Signs of caloric deficit are head aches, fatigue, weight loss and sometimes dizzy spells.

You need the good breakfast to get you through a light lunch until dinner. Without it, you will run out of steam. You need the light lunch to prevent you from falling asleep in the afternoon. Digesting takes energy.

Drink water continuously throughout the day. Water enables nutrients to be metabolized and sent to the proper places, thus more energy.

You need to oxygenize your blood before breakfast and after lunch. This means a short run, or deep breathing exercizes.

You’re way too young to be complaining of fatigue. You might want to see a doctor. You might have contracted a subtle systemic infection.

My daughter is in high school and she gets 9 hours of sleep a night. That’s what you need. And yes, she does sports.

What I do is to switch my days and nights. I stay up all night and go to my appointment and then sleep all day. That way I’m not groggy in the morning. Nothing is good on TV when I sleep.

5–7 hours of sleep? Not enough. Is that because you have trouble sleeping longer, or because you go to sleep late and wake up early because of your schedule? If it’s just a schedule thing then you have to give yourself more time to sleep whether it be during the night or a nap in the middle of the day. For most of my young adult years I needed 9 hours of sleep, when I was a teen sometimes more. That’s typical for teens.

If you are unable to stay asleep then you might talk to your doctor about it and he can run some tests like thyroid, but my guess is you simply aren’t giving yourself enough sleep time since you say it’s hard to wake up in the morning. That to me means your trouble is not falling asleep or staying asleep, and not some sort of medical issue.

Sleep is very important. Take it seriously. It affects your physical health, your concentration, your mood, and your safety, just to name a few things.

Things to know. Typically people go through all stages of sleep in an hour and a half. If you can plan a nap for 1.5 or 3 hours to catch up on sleep it will be more healing. Being able to “finish” a nap should help you feel rested. Interrupting a nap in certain parts of the sleep cycle can feel as awful as that morning alarm.

The general consensus now is you can catch up on weekends and with naps, but if you push off catching up for weeks damage is already done. You can’t completely catch up on sleep if you deprive yourself for an extended period.