The Secret Habit of Many Twitter Addicts: Do You Do It?

I’m definitely a Twitter addict. I’ve been on Twitter regularly since March of 2009, and I’ve sent over 51,000 tweets. That may sound like a lot to you, but I’ve got my sights set on a bigger goal. My friend @HilzFuld (who has sent over 57,000 tweets) and I are in a contest to see who can send 100,000 tweets first. It may be a silly goal, but to me, fun goofy goals in life are important to have too, just like the big goals. He is convinced that he will win, but I’ll show him! *wink*

Almost all Twitter addicts have some habits that he or she might consider embarrassing when talking to people that don’t understand Twitter. For example, the way we check our replies and DMs during the day like fanatics, the way we freak out when Twitter is down, and how frustrated we get when that dang fail whale wears out his welcome.

However, there is one Twitter addict habit, which I have, that I didn’t realize until recently that many other people have too… Here is my confession – I sleep with my phone under my pillow every night. Not only that, I almost never sleep an entire night through without waking up and checking my tweets, my replies and my DMs at least two or three times. Sometimes I even wake up, tweet for an hour or so, and then go back to sleep.

You can point your finger at me and call me weird (which I am); however, according to recent studies, lots of people do this! Whether it’s to check Twitter, send texts, wait for a midnight phone call or use their cell phone as an alarm clock in the morning, more and more people are sleeping with their phones. When I asked a few of my close Twitter friends about this, they almost all reluctantly admitted it. One friend told me she not only sleeps with her phone, but her laptop open and ready also.

So, what does this mean? Does it mean we are all going to eventually die from brain cancer because of the radiation we are allowing into our heads? Does it mean we should put our phones away at night and focus more on our sleep so we can be healthier? Does it mean we have pathetic social lives because we cuddle with our phones instead of a human being?

I don’t know. I prefer to think of it as just part of my life. Although my grandmother (and possibly my mother) would tell me to seek therapy because it’s a crazy habit, I don’t really see anything wrong with it. The only downside I see to it is that, according to this article on Geek Sugar, sleeping with a phone can “lead to poor sleep, irritability and anxiety.”

I like being plugged in all the time, and I can’t imagine it any other way. So… truth time, do you sleep with your phone too? If you do, this article called “Do You Sleep with Your Cell Phone? Most Americans Do” might make you feel a little better about it. The Pew Research Center released these numbers below based on a study they conducted in 2010. It’s interesting to see these stats, although, keep in mind this is only based on cell phone users in the States. I’d like to see what these numbers are worldwide.

Image Credit: [Marko Tomicic / Shutterstock] [Sergey Peterman / Shutterstock] [Jose AS Reyes / Shutterstock]