Comment by mistersquid | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mistersquid | Hacker News Reader

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The author, Madeleine Morley, of this very well-written article seems to be working against her own best interest as far as sleep goes.

Quoting:

> I’ve always required television to get to sleep, and I’m not a good sleeper.

> Why watch the same thing if there was all this newness to explore? My nighttime viewing hours grew later and later.

> For those of us who used television as a sleep aid, we now seem to be facing a new phenomenon.

> All these streamlined UX features mean that when I’m tucked in bed in the dark, I barely need to think about what to watch when I’m trying to get myself to sleep.

I understand the idea of television as a sleep aid. I used to use music in the same way. But I don't think the Netflix UI is as great a contributor to Morley's issues with sleep as much as her sleep hygiene which uses "television as a sleep aid", an oxymoron at best.

I used to do this as a kid. In my family everyone was watching a television at almost all times when we were home. Naturally it was there when we would go to bed.

I recognized this was a terrible pattern. I began shutting off the tv when I was going to bed. Eventually I moved the television out of my bedroom.

This is learned behavior and it can be unlearned. There's one simple solution to the problem posed in this article. Get the tv out of your room; it's not doing anything positive for you and I'm fairly certain you won't crave to have it back once it's gone.

I heard an anecdote that there's a Feng Shui ritual to exorcise the demon that harms sleep.

They perform the ritual and then take the TV out of the room.

As someone who used to regularly fall asleep to TV, it wasn't just a learned behavior. I have a very overactive mind without stimulus it tends to get to work, but with something like TV sitcoms I'm not particularly interested in my mind empties and lets me get into a sleep mode. Despite not having a TV in the bedroom for years I still have issues if I try to go lay in bed right away, so it may not be so simple for OP

What I've learned helps me is watching TV / listening to music while laying on the couch, and moving into the bedroom with a dim light once I feel myself drifting. Still, I often fall asleep next to the TV, but its better than tossing and turning half the time until I have to take melatonin to force my body to fall asleep

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