Mamma Musings

Everyone knows that person (or maybe it’s you) who has all their jewellery shoved into one box. It’s full of tangled up necklace, miss-matched earrings and likely a lot is broken. When properly taken care of, your jewellery can last for many years and stay in the same condition it was when you first bought it. If you invest in beautiful, quality jewellery pieces, you want them to last, so that one day you can pass them on to someone else. 

Use these tips to take care of your jewellery pieces and ensure they stay in tip-top condition. 

1.      Store in a cool, dry place

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Humidity and moisture are the biggest enemies of jewellery. Couple that with heat from either the sun or internal sources and you’ve got a potentially volatile situation for your precious pieces. Over-time heat can degrade certain materials and sunlight can distort colours. Humidity can lead to tarnishing, so keep it in a cool, dry space. 

2.      Keep chalk in your jewellery box

If you have quality silver pieces, like those from Fjewellery.co.uk, store them with a bit of chalk. Chalk is known for its ability to absorb moisture, so it will ensure that your silver stays completely dry. On top of that, it can also filter out chemical residue that could cause damage to your jewellery. Chalk will not cause any damage to your pieces even if some of the dust gets on them. 

3.      Don’t stack it

Stacking jewellery on top of each other is asking for damage. When you pile things up, it can lead to chipping and scratching. Store your jewellery in a way that your pieces aren’t being thrown against each other every time up put something away. Any plated jewellery will easily chip, and even your non-plated items can become scratched. If you’re storing necklaces than they will become tangled and can easily break if you’re piling them all together. Instead, hang your necklaces and get a jewellery box with individual slots for your rings. 

4.      Avoid swimming

Don’t wear your jewellery when you’re swimming. Whether you’re at the beach or in a pool, both contain harmful substances that will damage your jewellery. If you’re at the beach, the saltwater will get into all the nooks and crannies of your jewellery. It can be extremely damaging and hard to clean out. Beyond that, the moisture will encourage tarnishing. If you’re swimming in a pool, you’ll be subjecting your jewellery to chlorine damage and the chemical can wear away at your pieces, making them appear dull. 

5.      Store diamonds on their own

Diamonds are the hardest stone on the planet. Though they might not feel it to the human touch, they are much harder than any other gems. If you have sapphires, emeralds, rubies or any other stones or crystals, make sure you keep them separate. Diamonds can cause severe damage to the surfaces of different gems and scratch gold and silver jewellery. Store your diamonds in their own pouches to keep them from coming into contact with any other pieces in your collection.  

Note: This is a collaborative post

When you become a parent, you may have noticed that both yourself and your partner are lacking in passion, which was perhaps never the case before your child was born. A lack of intimacy can severely impact relationships, but you may not be aware of the cause behind the issue.

Lack of libido affects more than one in five men and an even higher percentage of women. Therefore, it’s a fairly common problem in many relationships. If you’re concerned about either your own or your partner’s libido, it would be worth seeking the help of a professional who could give you the advice you need to get your intimate relationship back on track. Here are some of the most common reasons:

Relationship problems

You may have never considered that your relationship was in any kind of trouble, but if you feel as though you don’t want to be intimate with your other half due to a gradual lack of attraction, then this is often difficult to fix. There may be a vast number of other reasons why your relationship is having difficulties; such as lack of trust, friction with both careers and diverse parenting methods.
You may be in a long-term relationship which has changed dynamically over the years – perhaps you now see your partner in a friendly manner rather than romantically. Likewise, you may have been sleeping in separate beds since your child has been born which can affect your intimacy levels.

Hormones

Less commonly, hormones can cause a lack of interest in sex. Conditions such as hyperprolactinemia can have a negative effect on your sex drive; in which there is a raised level of a substance called prolactin within the blood. Another hormonal problem is suffering from an underactive thyroid. Hormone issues are most commonly associated with women rather than men, meaning that male needs are often overlooked in society when it comes to lack of libido. Ehormones MD offers an HGH therapy clinic, providing human growth hormone injections to reinstall the necessary hormones in the body and help reinforce passion back into your relationship.

Stress and exhaustion

As a parent, you are no stranger to the immense responsibility that comes with taking care of your child, maintaining the home and keeping on top of your work and social relationships. Feeling stressed and overtired can take its toll on your happiness and can even cause a real lack of interest in the things you once loved to do. In these cases, it would be best to speak to your GP on how to move forward; either by taking medication or seeking therapy.

Contraception

Since having your child, you may have started on contraception until you’re ready to conceive again, but with this, often comes the side effect of having a severe lack of interest in intimacy. Be assured that this usually only happens when you are on a new contraceptive method and should start to improve over a few months.

Whether it’s due to a medical condition or psychological factors, there may be underlying factors that caused the lack of intimacy with your partner. For women who have certain health issues, such as vaginismus, vulvodynia, and vaginal atrophy, these conditions oftentimes lead to painful sex. Vaginal dilation therapy using vaginal dilators is a viable treatment option to improve tolerance to penetration, help restore the vaginal opening, and ultimately, treat painful sex.

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Once my second son was born I knew working from home would be really important to me and im delighted my current work/ blog situation allows this to happen. However working from home does have its pro and cons and I knew from the outset setting boundaries would be the most important part as it can be so easily to get consumed by work and end up using every waking minute to log on, check emails etc.

So one year in I though I do a post considering the pros and cons from my own experience:

Pro’s

• I love being able to drop the kids to school/ activities. Yes I probably am that parent who is enthusiastically encouraging from the sidelines!!
• If one of kids is sick etc, im not stressed about organising emergency childcare etc, I can be there.
  

  Pic Credit: Pixabay

• My time is my own – I can work early mornings or late at night but key is to be disciplined. Say you decided to do 5 hours a day…you need to cut it at that otherwise the temptation is for it to drift to much longer days. I can be guilty of “just checking an email” which turns into either a job being done an hour or two can have lapsed.
• Chatting to fellow remote workers/ blog buddies one of the things that crops up most is a better work/life balance which is what I have been striving for, for many years now. I know Laura of Miss LJ Beauty  agrees for her too living in a really remote location makes working from home a no brainer for her. Rachel from Coffee Cake Kids  agrees too being able to attend sports days, school events was a key driver for her in choosing working from home.
• No rush hour traffic!! My bus stop was half way along the route so I never got a seat!! Standing on a jam packed bus is no fun.
• Recently I have seen technology improvement’s such as a messaging platform which enable me to remain close to my customers despite being physically distant from them.

Con’s 

• Ill be honest I miss the camaraderie of the office, the water cooler chat, the coffee break gossip! Lately I have been giving consideration to the use of serviced office spaces local to me while the kids are at school, something like Click Offices Dublin where you can rent either a designated desk or a hot desk space. Great idea for people like me who like to work for themselves but also like the idea of social side of the office. Human interaction can be a deal breaker for some and one of the reason they don’t like the idea of working from home.
• Another con for me is that there is no “down time” the feeling of leaving work behind as you skip out the door at 5.30 on a Friday.
  

  Pic Credit: Pixabay

• A lot of people have asked do I worry more about my mental health being home full time.
• Distractions – coupled with the necessity to be disciplined I find sometimes at home I might say “oh ill just stick on this wash or make the bed” them im back working rather that being more disciplined and getting it done in the hours I had allocated to work.
• Having worked in an office for many years, then working at home for yourself it can be easy to miss the support services such as IT, Facilities etc particularly when things go wrong!!

On balance I love the flexibility of working from home, I feel so much more present in my kids lives and I don’t have the fear of missing plays/ sports days etc, work life balance has vastly improved.

Note: This is a collaborative post

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Taking a course or qualification can help to boost your career and self-esteem. However, how do you focus on your own education when your kids are still in school? Balancing family life with your new commitment to education can be highly fraught. This guide will help you to understand the best ways that you can both gain a qualification for yourself and ensure you can still spend time with your family. 

Take an Online Degree

Online degrees are some of the best options for mature students who want to focus on their family life. This is because you can conduct online degrees from anywhere in the world, ensuring that you do not have to leave your family home or go away for months at a time to complete your qualification. Instead, you will be able to submit your assessments, watch seminars and lectures, and use college resources from the comfort of your own home, leaving you to spend more time with the people you love. For instance, Merrimack College’s online M.Ed. in High School Education can help you to achieve the qualifications you need for teaching without living on campus.  While perhaps not available for online degrees, if you do decide to go college. It can be well worth checking out if any scholarships are available such as those available from Nancy Etz

Look for Childcare Facilities 

If you have a small child and want to be able to take them with you to your lectures and seminars at a physical college, you should also look for childcare facilities on campus. It can be hard to find a babysitter to cover all of your lectures and to ensure that you do not miss out, many college campuses’ have free care facilities for young children, which let you drop them off and pick them up around your degree schedule. 

Find Family-Friendly Accommodation 

If you are going away for your education, you should consider finding college accommodation options that are family-friendly. Rather than having to leave your kids at home, there are many colleges that provide self-catered flats and studio flats for parents. These ensure that you do not have to live in accommodation that is difficult for families, such as shared housing or student flats. 

Have Good Time Management Skills 

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However, one of the major steps that you can take to balance education with your family is to grow your time management skills, allowing you to free up time to spend with your kids. The most effective ways to do this include making a schedule, where you can allot time for both work and play, allowing you to find convenient time blocks within which to do work towards your degree. Having a routine also helps, as this will ensure that you are able to spend a regular amount of time with your kids on a daily basis.

Involve Your Kids

Kids love to be involved in whatever their parents are doing, and this applies to college too. Rather than bar them from your degree activities, why not spend time doing homework together, or let them help you to think of ideas for projects or assessments that you are working on? This will then help to prevent any resentment that your kids feel towards your degree and show them what you are spending time on.

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Every single person in the world has a goal. Whether it’s a big goal or a small one, a goal is a goal. Something to aim for, to feel inspired by, and to spend life trying to achieve is what we need to find our purpose. You should always feel as if your goals matter, and whether you are writing your goals on a bucket list or you are merely noting them down for later in life, you should consider how your goals are going to pan out.

The key is knowing what your personal goals are. Your dreams and ideas are going to be so different from the dreams of others, and you need to be able to own those dreams on for example a dream board and feel like you will be able to achieve something amazing because of them. If you want to be able to move forward in life, keeping an open mind is vital. So, with that in mind, we’ve put together a list of six of the top goals that you could have in life.

Pic Credit: Pexels

Mo’ Money, Fewer Problems

Most people put wealth as a goal, and why not? For some, the addition of a boosted income is one that allows them to live marginally more comfortably than they do right now. You may not want to be a multi-millionaire, but to have enough cash to buy that luxury house for sale or a new car can really make a difference. For some people, more money equals fewer problems because they can finally make ends meet. If money is your goal, you need a plan to build your wealth.

An Exciting New Career

Have you considered that a goal in your life should be to further your career? If you are currently working a job that you hate, you have the power to change that. Not only is a new career going to help you to unlock your wealth goals, but it can help you to move freely around the world and meet new people.

Plenty Of Love

Lastly, your life goals should be topped off with as much love as possible. Whether through family, friendships, or a lifelong partner, having strong, supportive relationships brings joy and fulfilment. For couples in committed relationships, love often means building a future together, which can involve important decisions like where to live and grow as a family. In some cases, this journey involves overcoming legal hurdles to stay in the same country. Well, Marriage Based Green Cards provide a solution, allowing couples to live together legally while pursuing their dreams without immigration barriers in the way.

The Best Education

Some so many people go back to school in later life, and if this is a goal that means something to you, then grab it with two hands. An education is a key to so many new things, and you deserve the very best. Don’t let things stand in your way.

A New House

Property ownership – at home or abroad – is a life goal for most people. The chance to stop spending dead money on rent and move into a house that they’ve worked for is a goal that should be put at the top of the list!

The Chance To Explore

Travel, adventures, exploration. How can there be a vast world out there and no desire to see it? There is so much to see and do – make a second list of all the countries and cities that appeal to you the most!

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To work or not to work? This question is not a question anymore for most of the young mothers worldwide. An unstable economic situation and the modern set of values push women with young children to work almost as much as family men do. 

Data provided by the Office for National Statistics in Britain showed that the number of working mothers has been growing steadily. Over the last 20 years it has reached 71,1% in 2019. In the U.S., the majority of children grow up in families where both parents are employed, either full-time or part-time.

The answer to maintaining a satisfactory work-life balance for a stay-at-home mother can be a “home office”. Many women use it to the full extent. But how can you keep your efficiency on a maximum level, when there are so many distractions around?  

As a mom, you also can worry about writing process of your children so you can appeal to ib extended essay writing service and hire a writer that can help your children write a paper for them.

We’ll tell you! Read on to find helpful productivity tips for the most popular remote occupations.

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1. Find the Right Job 

There are three different types of jobs that you may do from home: full-time, part-time and freelance. 

If you have a toddler or a newborn, it’s better to choose freelance. Even if you have outside help, your child under 3 years old will hardly understand that mama needs to work. Children at that age are constantly craving your attention. 

However, if your child is of kindergarten age or you have a babysitter and a separate nursery, you may try to find a job with fixed hours.

2. Use the Education and Skills You Already Have

You heard a lot of inspiring stories about women who managed to change their occupation or start a business during their maternity leave, right? Be careful: such things happen, but not often. If you have a good education and reliable experience, the best thing you can do is to try and adapt this experience to work-at-home mode. 

Let’s take academic writers as an example. These are highly educated women with MA’s and PhDs who can easily use their skills and deep knowledge to work remotely on a flexible schedule. You can most probably find them here – https://essaypro.com/term-paper.html. You can get a high-class help with your term paper from them, either for yourself or your child. 

3. Choose the Most Popular Remote Professions 

We’ve already mentioned academic writing as a good remote profession. There are several other jobs that are more adaptable to remote job mode than others. The following ones are just the top of the iceberg.

• Freelance journalist/editor;
• Translator;
• Tutor;
• SMM/Content Manager; 
• Sales Manager;
• Programmer/Developer;
• Data scientist;
• Recruiter;
• Project manager. 
  

  Pic Credit: Pixabay

This list can go on, as more and more companies allow their employees to work from a home office. 

What does it have to do with productivity? It’s simple: the better the job you have, the more you get paid for it. Then, your motivation gets higher – and motivation is key to being efficient!

4. Plan Your Schedule Carefully  

This is the most obvious piece of advice, right? But planning your schedule doesn’t mean writing down everything that you WANT to do. It’s about planning only what you HAVE TO do. 

• Reserve time for things like visits to the doctor and to children’s educational activities, then insert the working hours. If you have fixed hours, do vise versa. 

• Find time for relaxation and recreational activities. Include them in your schedule. 

• All these plans should be have to be written down. You can use a calendar, an online planner like Trello or a simple paper daily planner. 

5. Delegate 

Be realistic: doing everything on your own is a dream that is unlikely to come true. Don’t try to be a superwoman and delegate.

• Start with setting your priorities. If you value your time with the child most of all but don’t like cooking too much, use pre-made food or find someone to help you in the kitchen. If you love cooking, but hate cleaning, find a cleaner, and so on. 
• As for finding the money for all the personnel – find a balance. Hire as much help as you can afford – and work as many hours as you really have. 
• There’s also an option to find volunteer help – a father can do more housework than usual sometimes, and grandparents can take their grandchildren for a walk, for example.
• Kindergarten is also a great option for older children.

Don’t worry, everything will be fine. Whereas if you try to be a genius of multitasking, it surely won’t. Multitasking is bad for your brain, remember that. 

6. Use Your Natural Productivity Peaks 

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We all have our productivity peaks during the 24-hour cycle. Ignoring this fact is a bad idea.  Though there’s a lot of advice on starting your day early to reach maximum efficiency, it’s not suitable for everyone. Don’t try to break your natural cycles for fashion. It can result in burnout and health problems.  And if you have no choice but to adapt to your baby’s sleeping schedule, consider postponing work for better times or hiring a sitter. 

7. Forget About Perfectionism 

Last, but not least. And it doesn’t mean that you can do your job with less precision or forget to feed the baby. Just don’t worry too much about not being on schedule to wash the floor or dust the shelves. Set the priorities and do some things really well. All that’s less important can be done less than perfect.

To Sum Up 

Productivity for a mother working at home starts from setting the priorities and making the right choices. Careful planning is a job half done. Remember to be realistic and not try to carry the world upon your shoulders or reinvent yourself during maternity leave. Take only as much work as you can handle.

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Learning to be comfortable in your own skin is a lengthy practice. We can incorporate numerous components into our lives like being healthy and ensuring that we are as happy as we can be, but when we look at ourselves in the mirror, sometimes we don’t like the person staring back at us. We’ve all got issues, especially with our own looks, but we’ve got to remember that we have control over our style and our image. Sometimes we can feel that we have to dress in a certain way, but the key is really about dressing to be the person that you want to be. So what are the ways to do this?

Statement Pieces

It’s something to consider that as you evolve your style that one beautiful statement piece can completely elevate your dress sense. It doesn’t have to be anything complex; it can be a great pair of sneakers or sunglasses to completely change a basic and underwhelming outfit into something that distinguishes you from everybody else. When you are choosing statement pieces, think about items that can change with your style. It’s so easy to go for the trendy items, but when you start to invest in statement pieces that are inherently you, this can dress up any bog-standard outfit.

Be Confident

When you are expanding or downsizing your wardrobe, you must remember that it’s supposed to be a reflection of who you are. It can make you or break you. And as easy as it is to follow the trends and what the fashionistas say you’ve got to think about what a specific outfit says to you. Becoming more like you can be about staying away from the norms. You don’t have to follow the herd, and when you are trying to be courageous with your outfits, it’s about taking that leap. Try something; you might like it!

Be Simple

Simplicity is vital. When fashion dictates that everybody should be wearing leather or suede not only is it expensive to follow these trends, but it’s exhausting! You’ve got to dress for the person that you want to be and live the life that you want. This means that we shouldn’t overthink it but also get into the habit of decluttering. Decluttering your wardrobe is the perfect way of decluttering your life. Going back to basics with neutral coloured clothing and a handful of shoes gives you a far better foundation to build upon.

Plain short-sleeve T-shirts, simple slip-on shoes, classic denim jeans, and solid pieces that can work with multiple outfits are the way forward. A statement piece, such as a denim jacket, a scarf, or sunglasses, can instantly make a simple outfit more stylish.

Get Inspired

Who inspires you? Or maybe there isn’t anybody out there that you take inspiration from. Sometimes we could do with going back to the drawing board to get a few ideas. When you are looking for a way to become unique sometimes, you’ve got to go to the various fashion accounts on Pinterest just to give you a starting point. Getting inspired by other people can give you a new direction to go in, or you may just want to emulate that style but when you are dressing to be who you want to be you’ve got to make sure that you are being true to yourself.

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Gold nuggets are widely considered to be excellent investments for the future, so the short and simple answer to the question as to whether they are a good investment for your family would be yes.  Investing is a minefield and unless its an area you are very familiar while the potential for returns is high so is the potential for huge losses. If you do need the help of an expert there are many of them out there however my advice is if you are investing your hard earned money and don’t personally have the expertise yourself, financial consultants like Jason Vanclef are the way to go.

It is too risky to try to do this without some expert input.  A Financial Consultant is an experienced, trained professional who can help you either personally with investment decision or in the corporate world they can be the ones advising on for example mergers and acquisitions or improving the overall return for a companies shareholders.

Back to gold – which I find totally fascinating….I have pulled together the following at a basic level to help with initial decisions.

How Do You Know What You Are Buying is Original?

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There is only one way to be absolutely sure if a gold nugget you are buying is really genuine and not some man-made, artificial lookalike, and that is that there is a requirement for the nugget/nuggets to have a Certificate of Authenticity from Orocal accompanying them.   Just in case you are not aware, Orocal is the premier name in the natural gold industry, which is why its certificates of authenticity hold the highest value in the business.

As all gold Nuggets by Grant come with the Orocal Certificate of Authenticity, buying from them directly would definitely be a way to make sure that whatever you are buying is genuine and will have actual investment value down the line.

Nuggets By Grant is able to source its gold directly from mines in Alaska, Canada and Australia, mainly due to the close connection Grant has with Orocal, which is another reason why the company has managed to maintain an excellent reputation in the business.

Nuggets By Grant has a very dependable and friendly customer support team, so talk with them first to know what size and kind would be right for you, before investing.

The Grades to Avoid

When you are investing in gold nuggets, it is important that you pay attention to the grade. Common grade and melt grade nuggets are the ones to avoid, even though they are certainly not duplicates.

The problem is that whether the gold price is appreciating or depreciating, the common grade and melt grade nuggets do not fare nearly as well as jewellery-grade or investment grade gold nuggets.

What are Collectible Grade Gold Nuggets?

Aside from the common, melt and jewelry/investment grades, gold nuggets also come in collectable grades, which is an inbetweener grade with variable value.  Collectable grade gold nuggets have slight mineralization from the host rock, which gives it an aesthetic appearance. While they are not as high-value in terms of pure gold price, they do have excellent collectors’ value, setting them only next to jewelry grade nuggets in terms of price.

When you see a gold nugget which is so beautiful, big and rare that it looks like something that should belong to a museum, it probably already is in a museum! If by any chance it’s not a fake, and you can afford one, rest assured that you have landed on a gold mine, in more ways than one.

Museum grade nuggets appreciate both with the value of gold, as well as in their potential collectors’ value, as long as they are authentic of course. Have the nugget lab tested if you are making a significant investment in one though, just to be sure.

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“I should be studying, not asleep…” This is probably what I’m thinking as a student trying to gauge the momentary necessity of sleep versus studying. After getting involved in daily student activities, including co-curricular and socializing, the last thing I want to do is study. However, with a test coming up, I can’t risk a failure. I know how hard my parents worked to get me into that school, especially after getting the school catchment areas explained to me. It was so much sacrifice, how could I let them down?

Facing such a state is typical for students, and many times I will trade the sleep for an extra hour of study when I feel like failure is not an option. Although this is an unlikely piece of advice to students, we need our sleep to be in the right mind to pass exams. This leads us to the question of the day, how is sleep beneficial for students?

1. It Boosts Memory

My brain needs to process all the facts I collect in the day and arrange them accordingly. If I keep taking in information without enough time to process it, a lot is lost. Since this processing happens best at night, I need my sleep to ensure my memory retains important data and sets away irrelevant information.

2. For Better Grades

One of the most significant misconceptions we have is that we need to study hard through the night to get good grades. However, being a top scorer is more about studying smart than studying hard. Many pieces of research now reveal that sleep deprivation affects students significantly, even those with irregular sleep cycles.

As already explained above, good sleep boosts my memory, which leads to better grades. In any case, not everyone understands best when studying at night.

3. It Boosts My Immunity

During sleep, the body releases cytokines, a protein used to fight infections and regulate stress. Cytokine is an immune booster, and if I lack sleep chronically, I reduce its production significantly. This could expose my body to viruses and also increase my stress levels. Being in distress is a lead cause of illnesses today, which adds to the risk of infections I expose myself to.

4. It’s a Mood Booster

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Other than reducing stress, enough sleep improves my general well-being. People who barely sleep will often be highly irritable, sad, or sluggish during the day. This is no shape to study in, and not catering for it early could lead to other mental disorders such as depression and anxiety. Ever realized that sometimes we do not feel like doing anything, but after a nap, we are back to our best mood? Yes, sometimes, all we need is a sound sleep to cure a bad day.

5. Better Behavior Patterns

We need to be in our right minds to make sober decisions. If I am not well-rested, I probably feel too tired to think critically about anything. All I’m thinking about is when I get to rest. College students are not always the best in judgment, and a significant cause of this is their overwhelmed mental space.

By sleeping adequately, I ensure my mind is clear to start a new day. I can comfortably decide when to wake up, get to class and attend to other matters during the day. My mind is clear enough to make mature decisions, leading to better decision patterns.

6. Reduces the Risk of Obesity

A healthy student needs a right mind and a healthy body. Lack of enough sleep is a common cause of obesity, among other factors that expose one to other health risks. Proper sleep provides enough time for food processing at night and good metabolism to keep the body’s fats regulated.

Quality Sleep for Quality Grades

Life forces us to make sacrifices, and the more we grow into adults, the more we come across tough decisions. However, when it comes to sleep and study, learning to balance the two healthily will do students a lot of good. As I commit to improve my sleeping hours, I should also think about my sleep quality. This involves sleep latency, how deep I sleep, and how often I wake up in the middle of the night. All these counts for quality sleep, which leads to quality grades and a happier lifestyle.

Note: This is a collaborative post