To ask what is this?

[EpitomeofEpiphany]

I decided to leave my phone in my bag so I'm not constantly checking it when I went to a playground with my toddler.

There's a few people there that I chat to but I wouldn't say friends as I don't see them outside of the group. I do have a satisfying social life though.

Anytime that I'm not directly interacting with my toddler or chatting to someone my chest is tight and I feel uncomfortable. I struggled to pin point what was bothering me.

Is this social anxiety? Just anxiety? Phone withdrawal symptoms? ND trait? Just normal life?

How long per day do you spend on your phone? There's usually a 'screen time' counter somewhere in settings - if you're clocking up 5+ hours a day of screen time it could be withdrawal.

I've got a friend who's similar - he looks (and feels) genuinely uncomfortable if he's not either directly engaged in an activity or on his phone.

When I did my training one of the skills we learnt was therapeutic use of silence, and we all found it surprisingly uncomfortable to sit with a patient in silence if that’s what they needed. I think we often feel uncomfortable if we’re not filling the silence or doing something productive. I found that this got easier the more I did it, and it doesn’t bother me at all anymore. Mindfulness exercises could be helpful for getting used to just being present in the moment. I think it’s great that you’re wanting to be more engaged and looking at your phone less, we could all benefit from that! My advice would be to acknowledge the feelings you have without judgement, try to sit with them and keep practicing - it’s totally normal to feel a bit unsettled when you’re trying something unfamiliar.

@Deathbyfluffy thank you. I just checked my usage, I average 5 hours per day. I feel quite sick realising that. It seems so unhealthy. Some of that is reading on my kindle app on my phone but that's only about 40 mins a day. I need to drastically cut down.

@Jadeywithababy thanks for that. I love mindfulness.