Great to hear! That's a wonderful achievement. Honestly, it's the same for me with YouTube, except that it didn't result in less watching; it was watching for the sake of having something in front of me. I've found content that used to excite me is now boring. Or, I've found myself thinking, "Man, suddenly I just don't care about this topic anymore." - that topic usually being something dumb anyway. So, rather than turn it off, I would often look for something else to watch, even if deep down I wasn't interested in the content. It feels like a rut and you know you've got to get out, but once you're in it can be difficult to extricate yourself.
There are still certain people I want to watch because it feels like abandoning a friend; it's a place of comfort. I know that's para-social in nature, but it's hard not to experience the emotions of disentanglement.
It's the same with podcasts. You hear familiar voices constantly in the background, then suddenly it's quiet, like you've silenced a friend. I still don't know if I'll ever be able to consume podcasts in moderation. Maybe I'll need to use the screen time limiter, as that seems to work well when my wife has the password. There's no bypassing it when we use that method, so if I limited to 2 hours a day or something, it might work. But for now, I think I need to take a break and give my mind a rest.
The podcast issue is incredibly isolating, because I don't meet many people who believe you can consume them to excess. I have one friend who experienced a similar phenomenon, going so far as to listen to them to help him fall asleep (I was doing the same). Other than him, people will say, "Oh, but they're so informative! I really love listening to them." I understand their sentiment and I don't think they mean to be dismissive. Perhaps they have no conception of just how much I was listening to them. Maybe then they might say it is too much. Plus, I tend to listen less to educational things and more those that would entertain me or make me laugh.
I've tried to get to the root of it, and while I don't have a definitive answer, my thought is that it is a conglomeration of a few factors: it must fill a social gap in my life when I'm feeling isolated and need to hear someone's voice; it keeps me from confronting negative thoughts and sitting with myself; it fulfills a need to be constantly entertained; it provides background noise in a way that is somehow different from standard white noise.
I don't necessarily have to pick a dominant theme; all should be addressed. I do have friends and I actually socialize a decent amount for living out in the sticks. But maybe I am more lonely than I think? Or maybe I have a higher need to socialize than I am allowing myself? I do value my alone time, so in the end it might be mostly the fear of confronting my thoughts.
Thanks! Right now we're focused on the machine. It seems I have almost no obstructive incidents (i.e., your tongue falling back into your throat, your neck being too heavy for your windpipe, etc.). All of mine are central, which is basically your nervous system forgets to tell you to breathe. I don't know why it happens, but I've awakened before because I felt like I was holding my breath. That's what actually got me to see the sleep doctor. I described to them that sometimes I was conscious of breathing in and then not breathing back out, not like I was choking but rather just "forgetting" to exhale. I still don't understand why this happens, but we are trying to get the incidents to 5 or below on average per hour. Some people say these central incidents are more common when starting out. Honestly, as long as a solution works and I can sleep better, that's all I care about...
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FDRx7 ·