Move your phone before you reach for a supplement
Okay. New module — "Pills, Trackers, and 3am." First one, and I want to start here because I think this is the thing most people do backwards.
Here's the thing. When sleep gets bad, the instinct is to go buy something. Melatonin gummies, a magnesium powder, one of those "sleep blend" teas with eleven ingredients on the label. I'm not saying those are scams. Some of them probably help some people. But I think most folks reach for a pill before they've done the free stuff that actually works better.
My opinion, and it's a little contrarian I know: most people don't need a supplement, they need to move their phone.
The actual worst change I made myself
I mentioned this in the wind-down module, kind of in passing, but it deserves its own spot. My worst stretch of sleep in the last couple years was a week where I told myself I was "winding down" by reading in bed on my phone until midnight. Kindle app, articles, whatever. Felt virtuous. Not scrolling social media, just reading.
I fact-checked my own excuse eventually — actually sat down and asked myself, is this actually winding me down, or is it just a screen in a different font. It was the problem. The light, the alerts that sneak in even when you're "just reading," the way one article turns into four. Moved the phone to charge in the kitchen. Hardest change I made, honestly. Harder than the wine, harder than the bath. I missed it like a habit, because it was one.
What to actually do, starting tonight
This is the whole lesson, really, so let's make it concrete.
- Get a cheap alarm clock. Actual clock, battery or plug-in, doesn't matter. This is step one because it removes your excuse for needing the phone in the room at all.
- Charge your phone outside the bedroom. Kitchen counter, hallway, wherever. Not on the nightstand, not under the pillow, not "on silent, but close by just in case." If someone needs to reach you overnight for a real emergency, most phones let you set exceptions for specific numbers — look that up once and you're covered.
- Set a cutoff time, not a rule you'll white-knuckle, just a target. An hour before bed is a good starting point. Some nights you'll blow past it. Fine. You're testing, not failing a class.
- Notice what you reach for instead. This is where it gets interesting. A book. Actual boredom. Talking to Todd, if he's around and awake, which — separate topic.
None of this requires you to spend a dollar. That's kind of the point.
Before you buy anything
If you still want to try a supplement after doing the phone thing for two weeks, no worries at all, go ahead. I'm not the supplement police. I just think you should do the free experiment first, because it's usually bigger than people expect, and it tells you something a pill can't — whether your problem was chemical or just... habit and light.
The notebook
I keep a little notebook for this stuff. Same one I use for genealogy hunches, actually, which amuses me — same brain, different mystery. Every sleep change I've tried goes in there, one line, plus whether it helped. Blackout curtains: helped, a lot. Wine cut out: helped, annoyingly. Smart ring: interesting, didn't fix anything. Phone out of the room: helped more than almost anything else on the list.
Half of what's in that notebook didn't pan out. That's fine, that's the method. You're not trying to get it right on the first guess. You're testing one thing, watching what happens for a week, writing it down, and keeping what works. That's genuinely the whole system. Everything else is just details.
So for this module, before we get into what trackers are actually good for (spoiler: curiosity, not fixing) and what I think about melatonin specifically, I want you to start your own version of that notebook. Doesn't have to be fancy. A note on your phone works, ironically, as long as the phone itself isn't in the bedroom anymore.
Before next time: move your phone charger out of your bedroom for one week and jot down, each morning, whether you noticed a difference. That's it, that's the whole assignment.