Apple Watch stopping iPhone media playback when raised to wake

Apple Watch stopping iPhone media playback when raised to wake — when the Apple Watch screen activates from sleep state, and I have Autolaunch disabled, handoff disabled, I have to go as far as disabling the watch Bluetooth (which isn’t ever something I have had to do before). I also have airdrop disabled, anything that can cause the watch to connect — so

steps to reproduce:

raise the watch to wake while using an iPhone to play YouTube/Twitch/Apple Music/any media playback in active screen OR inactive screen mode.

it is horrible. This has to be an iOS 18 bug. I have AirPods Pro 2 and iPhone 14 Pro Max and an Apple Watch Series 8. I often wear it, have iPhone play media like news etc, AirPods in while I do my work. Never had this issue before ios18.

I don’t need any Apple people to tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about, I’ve worked with all tech, and had or used Apple technology for 25 years.

I’ve followed all troubleshooting videos and forum answers. I shut off/ reset the watch, re-paired (Bluetooth) the AirPods, restart the phone etc. this is so frustrating.

the only thing which can possibly resolve this is yet again re-pairing, resetting and I am not doing this. This is a bug.

the only resolution is to not use the watch. Which means next time I need a smart watch it won’t be an Apple.