My kids are losing some of the best years of their lives to screens, and there is nothing I can do

I hear ya. I literally spend my life toiling overing how to entertaining my kids so they don't sit on screens. My oldest is 15 and LOVES his gaming. I have an app where through my internet company where I shut it off whenever I want. So when I go to bed at 10pm, shut it off...when he gets home from school, off. That way he has to do his homework, chores, and go to bed. I can't monitor him 24/7 but these boys love their damn computer games. He does do sports and very good athlete, but what's that? 2 hours a day...and yes he lingers around to get in his workouts because he's on his games (he's running his long run in the dark rn because he spent ALL day on his games). He's not driving yet so a job is out of the picture. He has lots of interests and grew up without tablets/phones and outside playing so it is all new to me...but it seems the gaming takes precedence. It's one of those things they hopefully grow out of...different times for sure. I do control it the best I can, but I of course I can't control every aspect of it.

Week. Only allowed to use it weekends

Do you mind telling me what app you use? Thank you very much

I teach HS in the inner city and if you think your kids are overusing using their screen time, you have no clue how bad it is in the hood.

They come from homes with maybe 1 parent whose usually over worked and exhausted, so they are up playing games till 3am.

They come to school exhausted and watch tiktok or Netflix all day long.

The schools have completely given up the battle of making phone usage rules because all it does is cause endless fights with students and parents calling in to demand jr gets his phone back.

Teachers also know that is a kids allowed to zone out on their phone there is less disruption for the 3 or 4 who want to learn.

I have yet to have a single parent tell me to monitor and report back if their kid pulls out a phone, seems that battles been lost at home.

Social media and uncontrolled screen time is a completely different animal than we have ever faced in the past.

Now imagine tens of thousands of kids across this country going thru a school year like this. And thats no exaggeration.

this is not wrong. it gets worse

I work in NYC and routinely walk by the migrant camps/hotels that all the people Greg Abbott sent over the last year hang out. Hundreds of illegals sitting and standing around by scooters/smoking etc.

anyways, the kids.....ARE ALL ON TIKTOK/smart phones. EVERY SINGLE ONE. doesnt matter the age. 24/7

no reading book, no creative play....just screens all day long.

My kids are at urban schools that don't allow cell phone use, though some sneak it any way. It works pretty well. The schools just need to shift back to mostly paper homework so that the kids aren't on computers, which we cannot constantly monitor to see that it is hw and not video games or movies they are involved with.

I’m trying to work on the same problem. Mine are in middle school. We do some game nights and movie nights. Have them make dinner. On the weekends we try to do outdoor stuff like kayaking, hiking, or sledding (invite their friends).

Hey that’s great.

I feel like I could have written this post. I never anticipated being here with my kids nor did I ever think I would be a weak parent but here I am. My kid excel at any sport he plays but does zero work outside of practice or games. Anytime we are in our house it is playing fortnite or if I take away the PC he watches fortnite videos on youtube. I take time away but the battle is brutal. I'm at a loss, I know it is destroying him and it is soul sucking for me. Never anticipated throwing in the towel. I only hope is that as he ages he wants to work at sports more--he's nine now.

We try to police it and it's too much. I cant imagine how much other kids play with indifferent parents.

I could have written your post as well. It is a terrible struggle, older kids in particular make it very difficult to keep them away from screens. Others on here mentioned an app that can turn off Wi-Fi or something. Have you worked with that?

Hello. I don’t have any practical advice to give, unfortunately, but you are not alone. Many parents all over the country are dealing with this and similar issues. Millions of teenagers and young adults are retreating into a screen based virtual reality. Most of the time it doesn’t have anything to do with parenting skills. God help us.

My kid was the same way but seemed to have grown out of it. He's still on his phone too much for my wife and me but he's focused on his sport and team, he's studying more than ever and even conversing more with us than ever.

We didn't fight him but tried to keep him motivated to do other activities; somehow that worked.

If your kids have Apple devices you can control it from your phone, just putting devices into downtime. This is what we do for my daughters iPad.

For my son who plays on a PC, I know they have apps that can help but we have Verizon FIOS. With FIOS you can set up schedules by device on the router itself blocking sites or even devices. I have his computer to be blocked from the internet starting at 830pm until 7am. He knows this and I will even set a clock countdown timer for him starting at 730, reminding him at 815 that he only has 15 minutes. The first few nights resulted in epic meltdowns but the last few have gotten better as he knows it simply goes out and nothing is going to be done. The struggle is real and if anyone is reading this with kids who havent started playing fortnite please dont let them start.

its through spectrum...it's free with the service. Its an app they have and I click manage devices and I simply shut off internet on any device I want. I can even set up time limits like pause device from 10pm to 7am and any day I'd like. It's pretty handy when you have teens. I would see if your service offers this as well. It's been so helpful in controlling it and they know they can't get around it. It doesn't work on phones because they can use their data but I do take their phones as well at night.

Maybe talking to them and trying to set some limits could work. But you need to help fill that time with something else they might enjoy doing so that they're not just thinking about how much longer until they can get back on the computer or in front of the TV.

My kid isn't even a year old yet, but we have zero plans on giving her an ipad anytime soon. My sister's kids were given an ipad way too early. I kind of view it as a tool for lazy parents to give their kid so that they're occupied and don't demand their attention. As time goes on, I imagine we'll need to keep some sort of schedule and not allow screens until certain times/days of the week. And again, doing things with the kids away from screens. If I'm sitting at home on a screen, what do I expect them to be doing.

Hi OP, the fact you're even worrying about this shows you're a better parent than the folks who are oblivious. Those parents back in the 70s and 80s were dealing with a much easier set of societal defaults--if they did NOTHING, the default was go outside and play because there was no 24/7 on demand entertainment. The current default is for kids to sit indoors on a screen all day.

Read that again--if a parent does not intervene, the average American kid's life now revolves around staying indoors on a screen unless forced otherwise. Sad but true.

I was a 1980s kid; the only entertainments were a few cartoons after school and Saturday mornings. We had a nintendo but it was limited to 30 minutes per day by parents. Life apart from school was about playing outside in the neighborhood, and sports both organized and pickup. It was glorious and wholesome as all get out. Those days are GONE in many areas.

I'm not here to cast judgement, but to tell you what we've done in our family given society's current damaging default setting: you have to take charge. Kids don't play outside in our city. If we didn't take forceful action, our kids would be on the couch like everyone else.

Our plan for our three boys, ages 15, 13, and 11 has been to control devices they get, set strict limits on screen time, to try to get them so obsessed with sports participation or some other passion that it both devours the hours they would spend on screens and has them passionate about something more than gaming, and lastly to communicate clearly with them WHY we are doing these things.

1. Control devices. You control the money, right? We don't HAVE to buy them iphones, tablets, gaming consoles, etc. Our 15yo has a flip phone, 13yo has an old iphone SE with no data (so it can only call and text), and 11yo has a flip phone he never uses. They have a nintendo switch. We would not allow phones or computers in the bedroom. They honestly have not asked us for smart phones, but they already know the answer would be no.

They can have a smart phone after HS. I'm not worried about them struggling to pick it up socially, my boomer mom figured it out just fine at age 60. I figure by that time, we've saved them from the worst of the early brain damage/attention destruction/addiction, and they'll be legal adults who can do what they want.

2. Set limits on screen time. Our kids get ZERO screen time during the school week until Friday evening. In our house, the 15yo wants youtube and the 13/11yos want the Switch. This is actually not that difficult because they're so busy. They usually wake up at 7 (except for twice a week when the younger two have a 7am practice), out the door at 8 for school, school until 3, sports until 5 or 6, dinner, then homework, then lights out at 9pm. When would they fit in screen time?

On the weekend they have more freedom, but again we try to keep life active enough that they don't have endless hours of screens. If we're free, get out for a huge hike or other family adventure. Our 15yo WOULD watch youtube all day if given the opportunity, and is the least engaged in sports, so it's more of a battle to keep an eye on him and make sure he at least works out once per day. Our younger two are more sports obsessed and are usually out of the home most of the day for training or matches and tournaments. There are plenty of weekends where the kids might play 3 hours of videogames a day, which we tolerate because they're so disciplined otherwise. I think total restriction often leads to rebellion, so we let em play, but within reason. No ten hour days of gaming.

3. Find a passion. This is the most important step. A passion is so vital because they WANT to do the passion instead of gaming or dicking around with buddies in an idle way. It doesn't HAVE to be sports, but I do believe that sports is especially valuable to boys and saving them from the ills of modern society. I would happily support them if their passion was music, another art, coding or other academic/STEM pursuit, or something else like chess. Our house rule is they HAVE to do sports year round, even if they're not passionate about it--for example, if their passion was violin, they would still have to do a sport just for the exercise.

We exposed them to piano, violin, chess, painting--they didn't take to any of them. They have taken to sports, which is fine by me because I love sport. The 15yo does XC and track. He runs 6-7 days per week. He's not especially passionate about it, but he's mature enough to see the value, the camaraderie, the fitness. The younger two play soccer and tennis. They train before and after school Monday, Tuesday OFF, Wednesday afternoon, before and after school Thursday, Friday afternoon, and usually games or tournaments all weekend. They're busy as hell, but they LOVE it, they WANT to be there. I'm not begging them to go to practice or games. One of them is top 20 in the USA at his primary sport and having a blast--how could video games compete with that?

4. Communicate the WHY. We have always talked openly with the kids about these decisions. We talk about how poisonous social media in particular and excess screen time in general have been for youth. We talk about how much it sucks to be dumb, out of shape, with nothing going for you in life if you have no passions. We talk about how fun life is when you're smart, fit, and successful. We talk about my buddies who never got into anything beyond playstation and how their lives turned out (hint: not amazing). We talk about how we don't care what their friends' parents allow, that's not our family. They're old enough now it's already self-perpetuating: they can see it's cool to be the athletic kid pursuing his dreams.

Good luck, OP!

Yep, it's pretty annoying. One of mine outgrew the games and just watches videos having to do with his interests. The other plays games for "relaxation" in college, but is generally sick of being on a screen. Both very active, and good students, but the always on a device thing was pretty obnoxious for a while. I think teaching them how to be "bored" is good.

Brilliant positive k. Thank you for your encouragement and practical ideas. God bless.