Five Factors of Keeping Healthy in College

Falling behind in School

While no awards are given for having perfect attendance in college, missing class can have serious repercussions. In “The Dropout Dilemma,” Jonathon Whitbourne illustrates that “High school students spend so much time stressing over getting into college—studying countless hours for standardized tests, traveling to visit campuses, laboring over every word in their admission essay,” but students fail to realize how missing one day can affect an exam, which can affect overall self-esteem.¹

One of the major primers of missing class is illness, something so simple that it happens to everyone. Just a week ago, I was sent home by my bosses because of an illness that I could not pass to the students and professors I work with while tutoring. Not only did I miss what the students went over in class, but I missed my own class, making me fall behind not only in my schooling but work.

Keeping Illness at Bay

We all get sick. The question we all need to ask is when. The best way to prevent illness is, indeed, to prevent illness. Here are five factors that when acknowledge, can affect our inter-semester health.

Washing Hands

Students that are sick tend to let things slip past them, which can include something as simple s washing their hands. Whether healthy, sick, or indifferent, washing hands prevents the spread of germs. All it takes is one touch of a door handle, handrail, library book, or desk and a touch to the face, and students will be infected, to use a term sounding more so in the zombie direction.

Eating Healthy

Bring a breakfast, lunch, or dinner (if not and). You’ll need it.

Campus food is expensive. We all know that. But the calories, sugars, and contents also influence more than our wallet, and by buying that burger or pizza slice, you’re allowing your body to degrade from the lack of nutrition.

On Thursdays, fourteen hour days starting at nine in the morning, I eat a bowl of oatmeal, bring a PB & J sandwich for lunch, and treat myself to dinner at an on-campus Carl’s Jr. It’s one long day around hundreds of students, tons of junk food, and more importantly—it’s only one day.

Now, I’m sitting in a leather chair and robe, grasping a tissue box against my diaphragm.

Again, bring soup and use a microwave, eat a salad, or stop by a market for a healthy sandwich. Your body—and grades—will thank you.

Sleep

Five friends of mine are enrolled in several courses together, all Literature. Each class assigns a new portion of some novel, collection, newspaper, or poetry, all due on the same day. As it sounds, each one is clinging to her sanity. If I were to ask each student what affects them and their grades most, it would be the lack of sleep.

While students argue that the last four hours of studying are what get them to passing grades, the decline of sleep does not allow the human body to recover and rest like it should. Add caffeine to the mix, and sleep becomes part of the imagination.

I’ve been told eight hours are key to a healthy lifestyle. Seven, eight, take your pick. What matters most is giving the body some shut-down time. Gamers know best when it’s time to give their computers and systems a rest, and it should follow that the body gets the same treatment.

Exercise

Sitting at a laptop all day is a common thing for young students of this generation; the internet has become a force that can’t be ignored. But exercise, whether it be taking the stairs instead of the elevator, swimming for an hour, or lifting weights for the sports team, cannot be ignored as well.

Sometimes, food options tend to be limited, but exercise can always be added in some way. As youthful individuals, we should take the time to use our bodies for our benefit.

Doctor’s Visits

It comes down to keeping in tune with one’s body. Appointments with your local physician will help one stay aware of his or her progress on healthy living. Also, immunizations will help prevent any major illnesses, such as the flu, STDs, and more from coming into your system.

Obama-care, the newest addition to the United States, requires that all individuals have some form of health care to create a stronger, healthier nation.

We now have the ability to visit a health practitioner. No longer do students have to stress over costs, trying to stay healthy and keep themselves out of weekly instant Ramen meals. The US is giving the nation its promise that each person will have his health accounted for.

Big or small, health issues will always be a concern, but by visiting your doctor and keeping health on the mind, you can be on the right path to staying healthy amongst throughout most of college.

Notes:

1. Whitbourne, Jonathan. “The Dropout Dilemma.” Careers & Colleges 22.4 (2002): 26. Academic Search Premier. Web. 12 Apr. 2014.