By Sakshi Deshmukh
There are roughly a hundred crows outside my window, staring straight through me like they know something I don鈥檛. A textbook case of nighttime anxiety dressed up as something far more sinister. I stand frozen on the other side of the glass. Then they break in. They circle. They scream. They peck at my head. I wake up. It鈥檚 4:09 AM.
This wasn鈥檛 a one-off. My dreams had grown jagged, absurd, increasingly vivid. That viral video of a crow chasing a dog? My brain repurposed it into a horror sequence. 鈥淚t鈥檚 called the day residue effect,鈥 explains Dr Vivek Barun, a neurologist and epilepsy specialist at Artemis Hospital. 鈥淭he content we are exposed to before bed often shows up in our dreams.鈥
After I quit my full-time job in April, my routine dissolved. I stopped sleeping well. My nights became a carousel of Reddit rabbit holes, sea monster theories and ganji chudail videos. I鈥檇 stay up late, wake up unrested and carry a head full of racing thoughts, especially at night.
My therapist asked me to log my daily routine and a pattern emerged: the doomscrolling spiked first thing in the morning and just before bed. That鈥檚 when she pointed out that what I’m consuming right before sleep might be the problem. I was bringing nighttime anxiety into bed and wondering why I couldn鈥檛 rest.
Trying to cut screen time didn鈥檛 work. I鈥檇 want to log off Instagram, then find myself just one reel away from learning about a haunted palace in Rajasthan. The modern-day Chakravyuh is the infinite scroll. You think you鈥檝e escaped, then you鈥檙e pulled back in by a recommended video about ghost towns in Himachal.
Then I stumbled onto a YouTube vlog where Aaliyah Kashyap casually mentioned she鈥檇 started watching children鈥檚 shows before bed and it helped her sleep. No preachy, prolonged routine. No blue light sermon. Just… cartoons. I was intrigued.
Ruchi Ruuhi, therapist and counselling psychologist, explained how slower narratives create a sense of temporal spaciousness, signalling the body to slow down. 鈥淭his helps activate the parasympathetic nervous system, lowers the heart rate and prepares the body for rest,鈥 she said.
So that following night, I cued up an 11-minute episode of Oswald, the blue octopus with the bowler hat who once ruled my pre-school TV time. I also made a rule: no phone after 12:30 a.m.
I was tempted to speed it up. Oswald is slow. But I let it play. I stuck with it for a week and started to notice the difference. My dreams softened, I was falling asleep faster and waking up less anxious.
鈥淚t鈥檚 like a bedtime story for adults,鈥 said Dr Barun. He recommends it to patients with racing thoughts. 鈥淚t turns your device from a source of stimulation into something that slows you down.鈥
The science agrees. A Frontiers in Psychiatry study found that bedtime screen use increases the risk of insomnia by 59% and cuts sleep time by 24 minutes. Another study linked social media use to nightmares. The algorithm doesn鈥檛 rest and neither do we.
Ruuhi explained why it鈥檚 hard to stop. Every reel or meme gives a small dopamine hit, creating a constant cycle of novelty that’s hard to break. At night, when we鈥檙e tired and our self-control is low, we鈥檙e even more likely to give in, even when we know it鈥檚 not good for us.
Dr Barun added that too much screen time delays melatonin release. 鈥淲hen the mind is constantly absorbing new information, we struggle with poor focus, low motivation, emotional burnout and even anxiety,鈥 he said. 鈥淭here鈥檚 no time left for reflection.鈥
By the end of the third week, my nighttime anxiety had eased and I was sleeping better. My social media usage dropped by nearly 35%. I woke up feeling more rested and able to start my day without that lingering mental fog.
Dr Anjalika Atrey, consultant psychiatrist at CritiCare Asia Multi-speciality hospital, says sleep issues have become almost routine. The problem, she explains, is that work emails, social media and the news don鈥檛 stay in their lane, they follow us into bed.
And that鈥檚 the thing. Most of us won鈥檛 log off forever and start churning butter by candlelight. The detox dream sounds nice. But by Sunday night, we want to watch something. The point is not whether you鈥檙e watching. It鈥檚 what you鈥檙e watching.
What helped me wasn鈥檛 a mindfullness app or a supplement. It was Oswald singing about bananas and ice cream that got me to unwind and slow down.
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