Teenage Life Overload

Students say finding balance difficult

Juniors Alyssa Rosales and Destiny Mojica struggle with balancing school, work and extracurriculars.

Lilianna Trujillo, Reporter
November 12, 2021

The summer was easier. And then school started, and suddenly juniors Destiny Mojica and Alyssa Rosales said balancing their time was impossible. Relationships were hard. School was hard. Work was hard. 

Figuring that out has been a struggle. 

“I’ve been working at Raising Canes for about three months,” Alyssa said. “It’s been hard because of the scheduled hours that they give me because it’s like a restaurant that closes late.” 

Alyssa said staying late messes with her sleep schedule which affects her schoolwork. 

“I have had problems at school because I can’t ever manage to keep my grades up,” Alyssa said. “If I didn’t work, I would have time at home to actually do my schoolwork. On the days that I do my homework I just want to rest but I can’t.” 

Destiny said working a job is pretty easy for her, especially since she’s not in any extracurriculars during school. 

 “I work at Raising Canes and the schedule is pretty flexible,” Destiny said. “I’m glad I’m just not in any extracurriculars because I think that would make things a lot harder.”  

Alyssa said her schedule is busier now that she’s in soccer and that has made things more difficult. 

“I’m doing soccer, and it’s hard,” Alyssa said. “It’s a lot of work in there too. I believe once soccer season starts for school, I won’t be able to see my boyfriend ’til after it ends because of my scheduled games and me having to do work.” 

Alyssa said her schedule is hard because being in a relationship and being able to spend time with her boyfriend means juggling even more time. 

“We don’t have time to do anything together,” Alyssa said. “For Halloween we were wanting to do something, but I got scheduled to work.” 

Destiny said she wishes she were working fewer hours because it’d be better for her since she wakes up early for school. 

“Working during school is fine but I think I’d be fine if I was working regular hours, instead of closing,” Destiny said. “We’re low on staff so I close every week and we close late so it’s kind of hard.” 

Destiny said she has a lot of work to do that affects her sleep schedule. 

“My schedule has been tough because there has been a lot of homework,” Destiny said. “After school I go straight to work and don’t get off until 1:30, so I try to do as much as I can, but I’m really tired but I try and squeeze it in.” 

Destiny said it can be overwhelming because of her schedule and how it has affected her. 

“I have felt overwhelmed since around the beginning of school,” Destiny said. “My job had given me a lot of hours and it was pushing me behind on my schoolwork, so I was not doing really good in school for the first 6 weeks.”  

Destiny said everything changed when school started. 

“The time from when I worked in the summer is different, because after school, I have a lot of homework and sometimes I do my schoolwork during my breaks at work.” Destiny said. “I’m always late on turning projects and schoolwork in. I have been going to tutoring after school though.” 

Alyssa believes that because her schedule is so busy it has started to make her overwhelmed and now makes her question herself. 

“I’m overwhelmed all the time, mainly because my mom told me if I was failing, she would make me quit my job and make me quit soccer and just focus on doing my schoolwork,” Alyssa said. “There’s just a lot going on in my head because all I think about is how I’m going to fail at everything or that I’m going to fail at life because everyone else is managing it and I’m over here struggling.” 

Alyssa said she’s working in order to save up for a car in order to get to school, work and soccer and to help with her social anxiety. 

“Getting this job was me trying to get rid of my social anxiety because I could not go into a gas station and pay for gas by myself,” Alyssa said. “It was literally the hardest thing ever, and then getting this job opened all these doors.” 

Destiny said her job is important to her too. 

“The main reason I got this job was because I was tired of asking my mom for money,” Destiny said. “And I’m just trying to have enough money to just live life.” 

Alyssa said she’s asked for fewer hours especially after she came back to work after quarantined for a false positive COVID test. 

“I’ve requested less hours and it seemed like they got mad at me, and my manager started making me do extra work especially when I came back after the two weeks I was quarantined,” Alyssa said. “It feels as if they’re putting more pressure on me to where it feels like I’m going to break down” 

Alyssa said she realizes that she only went to work because of the peer pressure of her friends working. Now she says it’s good to wait to get a job unless you’re ready to make the commitment. 

“I should’ve waited until I was ready to get my job not when others were,” Alyssa said. “It’s good to wait because everyone else who has a job is probably stressing themselves.”