20岁的心脏40岁 —— 告别熬夜的自救

As far as I can remember, I've always been a night owl. Even in middle school I would stay up very late. I would feel completely at ease doing my homework in bed, with light music on. I found comfort in keeping myself awake when everyone else had gone to bed, and I loved the silence of the night. My parents urged me to get out of this so-called unhealthy habit, but their repeated requests fell on deaf ears.

Fast forward to my first year of college. I still loved the night and would stay up until unruly hours for no apparent reason, chatting online and watching videos. When I finally started to study, I would race through the assigned work, often well past midnight. My roommates would tell me to go to bed and get up early the following morning to do it instead. Get up early to do my homework? No way! I would never do that.

Then, one day last term, I did exactly that. Bent over my laptop while sitting on the bed in the corner of my room, I suddenly felt a pounding headache, and had to lie down. Unable to keep my eyes open, I decided I had no choice but to finish my homework the next morning. I woke up at 6am. Hardly had I written half a page when I felt a sharp pain in my chest.

At the school clinic, a doctor, with a serious expression on his face, handed me a medical report. 'You're 20, but your heart is 40!' he said. A cold wave went through me. I realized that years of living as a late-night person had turned my heart into an overworked engine.