By Kolin Kriner
As kids we learned about vampires — mythical entities that feast on the essence of living. However, as I have grown older I’ve realized that the true vampire of our day and age is social media.
According to the American Psychological Association, the average teen spends 4.8 hours a day utilizing apps such as YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. Additionally, 41% of teens who use social media the most had very poor mental health, in comparison to only 23% of people who used it the least.
This alone is just the tip of social media’s teeth. Where the draining of one’s life comes heavier into play is bedrotting.
Health.com explains that bedrotting is the act of staying in bed for long periods of time, or all day. Where this ties into social media is what people are doing as they “rot:” scroll.
Laying in bed and swiping fingers across their screen, Gen Z has taken to this practice as a way for long-term self-care, when the reality of it is that it can only hold some benefit in the short term.
Courtney DeAngelis, PsyD, a psychologist at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, explained to Health.com that it can aid in easing stress as fundamentally it is a form of relaxation.
Where it starts absorbing your life, however, is the negative side effects of the practice.
According to Sleep Review Magazine, bedrotting can cause “withdrawal from social activities, changes in sleeping or eating patterns, irritability or expressions of sadness or isolation.”
Additionally, the act feeds into screen addiction, as people spend their time while bedrotting binging social media feeds.
Once your life force has been sucked from you as you spend your day scrolling, avoiding responsibility, you start to become a vampire yourself — at least in terms of sleep anyways.
“When people lounge in their bed, their brains may associate their bed with things other than sleep,” DeAngelis said. “If you’re doing things like working or watching a show, it can take longer to quiet the mind and drift off to sleep.”
We are essentially becoming creatures of the night. Eyes glued to our screens, we mess up our brain function resulting in issues with sleep. This is also in part with the fact that screen time suppresses our melatonin.
According to Ruth Hamilton at Tom’s Guide, research has suggested that staring at a screen a couple hours before bed time can throw off melatonin production, reduce REM sleep and cause people to feel groggy in the morning.
Taking time to get self care doesn’t make someone a monster, but how they go about it can make them have a semblance of being one. Live life to the fullest and don’t let the modern vampire suck you dry.
