I’m probably addicted to the internet. I try to cut back, but it seems after a while, I’m back spending a few hours going down the wormhole that is Wikipedia or playing a game online with my 3DS or watching absurd amounts of YouTube videos. Unfortunately, all of it has been affecting my sleep.

I have been having trouble falling asleep, sleeping in, and waking up feeling rested. I heard from a senior my freshman year “pick two: academics, social life, and sleep”, but I never really subscribed to that. I thought that I could manage my time pretty well, to the point where I could pick all three. So I started looking at sleep aids on my Target runs, with setting alarms further away from my bed and even getting an app that forces you to walk around before it shuts off.

While all of those helped, it didn’t address the root cause: I was using my phone and laptop far later than I should.

I began doing some research on this and found an article from Ohio State University. About 530 students (ages 18-34) used their devices an average of 46.6 minutes a night. I feel like I spend more than that. The researchers found that using computers and various other devices were all positively associated with insomnia. You sleep a lot worse the more you use your phones before bed.

OK, so why? The study had a few ideas, but I wasn’t sure which was more impactful than the others. Using media makes it harder for the brain to slow down, meaning you aren’t as tired, meaning you won’t fall asleep quick. It might just be using your devices means you’re not sleeping, so it’s a simple time thing. Use your stuff less and you have more time to sleep. Or it could be the bright light that comes from these devices that make it so hard to sleep. Our bodies fall into rhythms after a while. We wake up around a certain time, feel tired at another, and fall asleep around others. While this rhythm is unique for everybody, it’s generally been dictated by the sun for most of human history. By introducing more light into the night, we’re affecting our body’s natural rhythm, and it doesn’t know what to do.

The answer, regardless of the cause, is simple: don’t use your phone so much before bed! Reading physical sheets of paper, doing homework, or talking with friends is ok, but having your laptop blaring bright lights at you isn’t the best option.

Of course, there are times when you have to just crank out a paper, and that’s kind of understandable. But do that in the library or some other study space. If you need sleep, you need darkness and quiet, which computers don’t do very well.

What experts recommend is to have a grace period before you sleep where you don’t use a device if you can. Thirty minutes to an hour seemed to work for most people, but you may need more or less. You can also take what I’m saying with a bit of salt. I’m many things, but a doctor is not one of them. If you’re going to bed just fine immediately after writing a paper in the dark, I can’t really judge you. Just know that I’m going to try this.