Losing my Teen to the Screen

So today I wanted to bring a question that came up in the good inside community, and here it is. I gave my kid a phone, and now I wish I could take it back. Everything I was worried about happened. My kid is distracted in the home. They're not doing their homework. They're getting worse grades. It's hard to manage all the different things they ask about. Hard to stay abreast of the things I'm supposed to be making decisions on. I don't know what's happening there. They're getting in some trouble socially. So many things are happening, and yet taking it away seems impossible. And then the question was, if you give your kid a phone and you want to take it back, can you? And how. I'm Dr. Becky, and this is good inside. So today you'll be hearing from me and my producer Jesse, as we wanted to talk about this exact topic. How do you give your kid a phone? What if you feel like you lose your kid to the phone? How do you make decisions that you know your kid is going to be really upset about? How do you make decisions that maybe you yourself have conflict about? We're gonna get into some of this right now.

So, Becky, what's an early sign or what are signs that you know your kid is ready for a phone? Let's start there.

That's a great question. And I wish I had some, like, bullets, you know, right away that were completely definitive. And I don't know if it's so definitive, but I'll just, you know, I'll share what comes to mind. I think one sign that your kid is ready to have a phone is that your kid has some ability to proceed with tasks independently, that they can kind of take care of their homework. The clearing of the plate, the tasks around the house, the chores without constant nagging and reminding and conflict and. And the reason I put that toward the top of the list is as soon as there's a phone in their hands, as soon as they have a device, all of those things are gonna be harder. It's gonna be harder for them to remember to clear their dishes from the table because they see their phone maybe on the other side of the kitchen, you're going to have to establish rules around where the phone goes when your kid is doing their homework. So if homework routines aren't already somewhat established, you don't want to be fighting both of those battles at once. So I think that's one thing is just assessing where is my kid developmentally and kind of being able to go through certain tasks Independently and without a lot of conflict and nagging with me. Number two, I think part of giving our kid a phone, a big part of it is, is asking ourselves, what is the reason why I wanna give my kid this phone? What is the need they have? And there's no right or wrong answer here. But it might be, I want my kid to be able to get in touch with me when they go to soccer practice. Okay? It might be my kid feels left out and all of their friends are now texting each other and they don't have a phone. But asking yourself why you want your kid to have a phone will really inform, like the version of a phone you give your kid. And I don't mean version like, which, you know, is that the latest version of the iPhone, but the version meaning, is it an iPhone, is it a flip phone, is it an iPhone that has basically no more capacities on it than being able to call and text you? Because this whole thing was about communicating with you in the first place. And I think that's also really important. The third thing I would say is, do me and my kid have a way to talk through tricky situations? Like have we established ways together to manage TV time, to manage homework rules, to manage sleepover rules, to manage what time they go to sleep? There are going to be so many points of conflict that come up around your kid having a phone that if we say at the baseline, yeah, me and my kid tend to have big blow ups about almost anything they want. And I say no to that, is not a good time to introduce a phone. The next thing I would say, and this is more about a parent than a kid, I think before we give our kid a phone, we have to ask ourselves, do I give myself permission to change the guidelines around this phone, to change the apps that are on this phone, to change the parental settings that are on this phone, to even change the fact that my kid has a phone at any moment. And the reason I think that is so important is if you picture a pilot on a plane and all of a sudden there's immense turbulence, you would want your pilot to give themselves permission to change flight path. Like, there's new information, it's very turbulent. And if your pilot was so steadfast to saying, well, this is what I'm doing, that would be really scary. I would actually say I would hope my pilot would never take flight unless they gave themselves permission to change paths to ensure the safety of the passengers whenever they had information that indicated that would be a good decision. And if a pilot couldn't say that on the ground. I'd say, please don't be my pilot. Please do not take flight. I think that's the exact same thing. And so, interestingly, Jesse, I feel like we're actually talking about maybe fewer things just about our kid and actually many more things around the whole family system.

What I'm experiencing or what people write in about a lot is like, my kid doesn't necessarily understand how to engage socially. So kids don't really talk on the phone anymore. They text each other. That's sort of what happens. And then it quickly escalates to a group chat to so many people being in this group chat. And then it becomes an entire sixth grade conversation or what have you. What guidance should we be giving our kids on text etiquette and what they should be sharing and not sharing? And what do you think we should be setting up as expectations as they learn how to navigate texting?

Such a good question. Something I think a lot about with my older one. And again, the setup of this question, the assumptions we all have, I feel like it puts us parents in a really hard situation because I'm gonna get into text etiquette. Cause I do think that really matters. But really we're living in this world where a lot of us are giving our kids phones before they're really developmentally capable of using those phones. Well, and, you know, I'm not a historian, but it makes me think about when kids used to be able to buy cigarettes that was not good for them. And it's a good thing that now we have policy that says this is too serious of an issue to place in the hands of parents. And kids are just simply not allowed legally to buy cigarettes. Right. And we're not at that place with phones. It's just kind of a free for all. And so I just want to say I feel for every parent struggling with this, and there's no parent who feels great about it. There's not, I don't know, one parent who's like, I'm just crushing the way I'm managing social media or phones or devices. And so I think we're left with very imperfect, less than ideal options. So maybe, you know, I'm gonna put exactly when we give our kid a phone to the side for now, but let's say my kid has his phone and they're not sophisticated at understanding how to talk to people. What should be said, what what should not be said. And sometimes they're big things, sometimes they're small things. Like a friend asks you do you wanna hang out tomorrow? And you just find out, like, my kid never even responded. Like, that's just not nice. Right? And sometimes it's bigger things where, oh, my goodness, they're on a text chain with five kids and four of the kids are being so mean to this other kid. Maybe it's screenshotting something that was not meant for public consumption and putting it on that group text. Maybe it's the fact that kids these days seem to be always videoing each other doing things that really never needed to be memorialized for anyone and sending that to the group chat. Maybe they're emailing it through their school email server and all of a sudden the school could intervene. Right? There's so many things. So I can just say, for me, for my older kid, when he started using iMessage before, we were very upfront with him, kind of our number one job is to keep you safe. And we think about your access to iMessage on an iPad or it's on a phone. Either way, similar to how we think about your room. We would never let you lock your room to the point that we can never go in there. That doesn't mean we're always snooping around your room. In fact, we are not. And part of our job as parents and we feel like keeping you safe is at any point, we could look around your room. Right? And not from the place of trying to get you in trouble, but from the place of protecting you. And that's how we think about what's happening on iMessage. So want to be up front? This is something we'll be looking at. We've used apps, you know, in the past, too, that can flag certain words or bullying. Right. Trying to kind of get more help. But we are very upfront that we would be looking at these so we could intervene from a place of, hey, I just want to let you know, I saw this. You're young. You might not know this. When a friend asks you, hey, do you want to hang out on Friday? Whether you want to or you don't, you can or you can't, it's important to get back to someone. It's kind of like if I stood in front of you saying, hey, do you want to get ice cream? And you just didn't say anything. I remember my son being like, oh, yeah, that would be kind of weird. Yeah, right? And, like, I think one of the things we do as parents that I want to encourage parents to avoid is we see something we don't like in a text and we go into punitive mode. How can you do that? You should know not to do that. You have to write back to someone. How could you be saying these mean things? But if we think about it from the perspective of my kid has access to a vice that they're not developmentally capable of making good decisions for. They're just not. And they don't have the skills. So if we're in this situation, that's imperfect. Part of my job is to teach my kid the skills. And so I need to come at this from the place of their coach. I'm on their same team, and that's how I think then kids actually do learn and actually improve their kind of texting etiquette behavior.

Sort of. On that same vein, what do you think the responsibility of, as the parent who is, you know, occasionally going into the room, occasionally checking the texts and sees something that your kid didn't say, but you know, maybe some other kid said, who's friends with your kid, Is that a responsibility where you talk to your own child about like, hey, this is not a kind of thing that we say. When do you think it rises us to the level of like, do I text another parent? Like, hey, you should check your chats. Yeah, your kids chats.

One of the things that is baked into these moments and we don't talk about enough is my ability, let's say, to talk to my 12 year old or my 16 year old about something happening in their life or something I saw on social media or something I saw in their text has so much to do also with like the history of our relationship to that moment. And so again, I think that's why giving our kids a device, we have to ask ourself, what is the status of my relationship with my kid right now? Because if I am gonna give them a device and I am gonna tell them I'm gonna look at some things to keep them safe, well, how effective I can be in talking to them about it isn't just about that one moment. It's like, in general, do we have a close, connected relationship where my kid in general feels respected by me and does think that I have their best interest at heart, that I'm not trying to catch them, I'm trying to protect them. So I think that I just, I can't overstate that enough that that matters so much. I think I would think about what I would do in that situation. Not that unlike a not digital situation. Like if I was, I don't know, out somewhere and I saw my son and his group of friends at a restaurant, and I saw some kids doing something that was like, really not okay. Would I tell their parent? Probably depends on a lot of factors, right? It probably depends on how egregious it was. Probably depends on me as a person. I could tell you. Me, I have happened to be friendly with a lot of the kind of parents that my kids are friends with. And I feel like we do tend to have the type of relationship where we know we kind of like each other's kids. We think they're good kids, we know they're imperfect kids. And that sets a foundation for us saying to each other, hey, if you do see stuff like, we want to know, we want that information. That's not always so easy, you know, in other relationships. Sometimes I just ask myself, like, is this something I would wanna know? As a parent, I think that's what probably compels me to say things more often than others, because I know for me, I would want the information. I really would. I always feel like we can't help our kids if we don't have access to information, which goes back to why having information about what they're doing in their digital life is really the only way we can help them. I don't recommend looking at your kid's device and not having already established with them that you're going to do that, because then that leaves you in the situation of thinking, okay, well, what do I do? If you've already established that, you can say to your, you know, your kid, hey, I saw this was happening on this text chain. I just want to talk about it. I was wondering, what did you think about that? I would start there. I think it's so easy to start with our judgment. That was really awful, right? Or you should have said this. But start just by connecting to your kid. Maybe assume that they also had a reaction to it or feelings about it. Maybe they didn't, but assume they did. So you can approach them with almost a little more respect. What do you think about that? And I think when we approach our kids in that way, they're a little bit more willing to talk to us. And you can also add, you're not in trouble. I'm not snatching this device away. But these are the types of moments that are really tricky and are actually just really important that you have an adult to talk through them with. And let's just think about this together.

I feel like there's a lot to explore here and we could keep going, but I'm going to ask you one More question. I feel like you're not going to.

Like it.

But it's sort of this idea of having a piece of technology. A phone, an iPad, a watch, whatever it is that you have. It's often the thing that's most coveted in a household. It's the thing the kid really wanted. And as your kids get older, there get to be a certain point where it's hard to say, if you don't this, then this. But now with this watch that exists in our household, I now have this thing where I can say, hey, I'm gonna take your watch. And it works. I'm very curious how that sits with you because it's the first time in years I've actually had something that could be. That is a real consequence. I mean, something that she actually really cares about. And it feels bad.

So my first thing I wanna say is I just wanna validate that when you do have something as a parent, that when you threaten to take it away, your kid just stops in their tracks and they're like, no, no, fine, I'll clean my room. Fine, I'll start my homework, or whatever it is. I just wanna validate. That really does feel amazing as a parent. It really does. It feels powerful. You're like, finally, my kid is listening to me. And so I understand the temptation of it. Of course, I've said that stuff myself to my own kids. And there's not much else in parenting that gives you this, like, immediate change that is so gratifying. So just want to put that out there. The thing about it that I would say is on the other side, besides the gratification is okay. So when might you say that to your daughter? Like, I'm gonna take away your watch.

When she won't get up for school.

When she won't get up for school.

Yeah.

And she has her watch on her.

It's in her room, charging. Yes.

Got it. So to me, what I would think there is just, okay, well, what's the real issue here? Like, I guess I could keep saying I'm gonna take away your phone or take away your watch, but I don't think that's just a. Kind of a random threat we make. It's probably not that connected to the actual issue. So I don't know, is my kid going to bed too late or do I need to teach my kid how to use an alarm and start to become a little more responsible? So it's not so many kids don't get out of bed in the morning. Actually related just to this, like, Awful power struggle with the parent. Like, it's just someone to push against. And in some level, they feel controlled. And so they get kind of control back by staying in bed, even though it's completely counter to, like, what we want from our older kids. So I'd ask parents, like, what is the actual issue? Is my kid not starting their homework? Well, are they not starting their homework because they're on their phone? Then I understand then the phone is getting in the way. Are they not starting their homework because they feel like mat and they feel insecure about themselves? And then whether I take away their phone or not? I guess, yes, it might be there's a gratification moment, but that actually has nothing to do with the problem. The other thing I've learned from teens, and this is I've learned them from this, from teens themselves, from working with them in private practice, is the more a parent would threaten taking away something that was of great value, a kid just kind of learned to be, like, sneakier. They're like, well, I can't have that happen. And so I just kind of need to sneak around a little more or make sure. Sure I kind of don't get caught. It's not necessarily make sure I don't do the thing that pisses off my parent, but I just don't want to get caught. And so I think that that's, you know, an important factor too. Now, where I thought you were going, and I think I want to make sure I get in here, is sometimes our kids aren't getting out of bed and getting ready for the bus in time because they're on their watch or they're on their phone, or my kid isn't starting their homework because they're on their phone, or my kid isn't doing their homework because they're sitting at their desk in their room on their phone. This is where I feel like we. We have to flex our parental authority. And I mean that in, like, a sturdy authority, not a scary authority. And we have to set boundaries around this. So I think, of course, this is harder to establish after the fact than it is if you've started this way. It's why I think the way we give our kids phones, literally the process, the steps we take, matter so much more to say about that. Another time. But still, after the fact, if something isn't working, it's actually very disconcerting to a kid to kind of have a parent allow for that to keep happening.

Right.

So kids kind of know, yeah, my grades are slipping, and I'm not doing my homework well because I'm on TikTok, like literally on my desk the whole time, or my snap is going off and so I was half studying for history and then I got to speak because my phone is pinging. On some level, they know my phone should not be in my room when I study. Our teenagers will not make that decision for themselves. They will not. They're just not developmentally capable of it. They're too oriented toward, you know, that gratification and what they want in the moment, not what's best for them long term. But they do know it. And they do know when their parents kind of like, aren't protecting them. They kind of know when us parents, we're just not doing our job because we want our kid to do our hard job for us. Like, we're kind of crossing our fingers. Like we say to our kids, you really shouldn't have your phone in your room when you study. And I'm not trying to say. It's easy to say to a 16 year old, you cannot have it. But you can say to a 16 year old in a calm moment, hey, listen, like, you have your phone. You love your TikTok. You love your snap. Get it? Get it. I'm a pragmatist. I'm not planning right now of taking any of that away from you. I don't want to. You're also a smart kid and I know you care about your work and I know you care about putting your best effort forward. And I think both of us just kind of know when your phone's in your room. It's not a matter of willpower. It's not like you're not trying to study. Nobody in the world could get anything that's hard done when they have their device right next to them. And so I wanna talk about this with you and I wanna work with you. And this is not like a threat. This is not like a. If you take your phone in your room Again, I'm taking TikTok away from you for a week. I don't wanna go there because I respect you too much. I do think we can come up with something together where we take a break from your phone and it's out of your room when you're doing your homework. And we see how that goes for a week. What do you think? You know, is your 16 year old gonna say something snarky? They might, but I think it's important that we hold hope that when we approach it like that, they might not. And they might work with us in that way. Then when the moment comes, let me be clear, that is not a conversation to have. And then to expect your kid to just do that, it is important. You're in the house or there's another adult in the house or someone or you establish, okay, so when you get in your house, you're gonna put your shoes here and then the phone has to go in this box or out. I will take it. I will put it in my room. We still have to help our kids. Not because they're bad, just because again, these devices are made to capture our attention. But I think when you really work with your kid in that way, you don't have to threaten taking it away. You can work with them to just help make good decisions.

All right, we'll try to channel you going forward.

Well, permission every once in a while to have that, you know, powerful moment, that change in your kid's face. But it's probably not the best long term strategy.

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