To think this isn't normal re DS 12

[Deereemer]

Ds got a tech ban this weekend due to unacceptable behaviour yesterday. The bam is for 3 weeks as things have been getting out of hand with how he has been, increasingly rude, shouty, downright aggressive at times.

He is in his bed crying and i mean wailing because he will miss the new fortnight update. When he stops crying he just stares at the wall and doesn't do anything at. All.

I am worried this is a sign of gaming addiction or depression, i don't know.

Any advice welcomed

3 weeks is not proportionate. He feels he has nothing to lose now ~behaviour likely to get worse. {Professional opinion}

Thanks for calling me (and my DH) failures as parents @EarringsandLipstick. Of course we had given DS clear boundaries re usage. He had broken them and lied about it. We have always had a no devices in bedrooms policy. He had snuck out of his room and taken his laptop out of the kitchen when we were in bed. We’re not permissive, nor are we über strict. The kid was being shown porn by the grubby kids he was hanging out with at school. He has a much clearer understanding of how degrading that is to women and the human trafficking element, etc… Also that most of what is available online is not loving, “relationship sex” but violent, rape fantasy. I asked him to think about the way those kids spoke about girls and women and then think about the fact that I am one and so are his two sisters. His friends were asking for his twin sister’s contact details at the time, and he was reluctant to share for this reason, and I explained that he had a choice to be a man or a mouse. He’s sucked up his punishment at school and home, and has grown up a lot - in all areas, not just this.

It's hard for us as adults who did not grow up with non-stop tech to know how hard this is for children. His behaviour seems quite normal to me, my son would be catatonic if I took his device away for a week, let along three.

I think maybe you do need some new strategies and maybe breaks in the tech use rather than a full on ban for three weeks. We took our son's phone off him yesterday for rudeness etc, and a full on mood. He was so much nicer without it for the rest of the day. But it is truly hard.

I do think losing Fortnite means losing contact with a lot of friends outside of school - and they will probably be talking about it inside school now.
I don't disagree he should lose it for a while, but I'm not sure where the 3 week figure comes from.

@emsworth

3 weeks is not proportionate. He feels he has nothing to lose now ~behaviour likely to get worse. {Professional opinion}

Agreed, or sadly go another way. (Also professional opinion)

It seems as if the ‘that’ll teach him’ brigade have the loudest voice here, though. Sounds like the family are having a really rough time.

This fortnite update is a big deal and there is a massive social element, especially over the last 2 years, to online gaming such as this. I think you need to start talking to your son. 3 weeks is massive, did you gradually get up to that or go straight there? If a punishment isn't giving the desired response it isn't the appropriate punishment

DS is only 6 and so it's quite different but we definitely have a similar reaction to a 24h iPad ban (our iPad use crept up a lot during lockdown and it's hard to pull back).

However I think the iPad ban is good for him. It normally kind of resets his behavior, gets him to spend more time interacting with us and generally makes him a nicer kid. (It would clearly be good to have a bit less generally but he is very keen and works hard to be allowed it).

I hope the 3 weeks break will be good for your DS. In some ways it's unfortunate that it's at an important time in the game for him but it might be good for him to have to handle that.

As an aside I have used discord and it must really depend on the setting because the groups we ran with were just talking about tactics for beating the game.

Three weeks is too long, my 12 year got a ban recently for three days leading up to the weekend. She was annoyed but not devestated.

This kind of behaviour with kids who have tech - and specifically social media and games - taken away is not that unusual - completely disproportionate reactions.

It's amazing after a time of being away from it they become much more like themselves, with better mood regulation among other things. But it does take several weeks to get there, so I wouldn't back off on the 3 weeks myself.

As a kid (and this happened to at least 3 of my friends around the same age too) my Mum used to give me overly harsh punishments for minor things and cut off all my support networks when I really needed them. After a while I just lost all trust and respect for her. The more she punished me the more distant I became, and the more distant I became the angrier and more desperate she became. She eventually became completely unreasonable so I just stopped listening to her altogether, and moved out on my own at age 14.

Hopefully it won’t be such an extreme case for you but PLEASE just get him to counselling and try communicating and helping him learn how to deal with his emotions properly instead of kicking him when he’s down🙏 (I know that wasn’t your intention)

Dear God. I'm far from a perfect parent but I'd recognise I had failed pretty badly if I had to resort to these measures to stop my young child watching adult content that I'd already attempted to block

You are being very naive. Watching porn very commonly starts right around 11 or 12. It's just so easy to get at it, not at all like back in the days when they might happen to find an father's stack of magazines in a shed or something. It's easily accessible and designed to keep users coming back. Boys that age don't have a lot of defenses against that, there is a reason it's the number one money-making part of the internet.

That's a hugely difficult context that you're all living through. It feels like this thread has been used in quite a goady way...but gaming is such an emotive area anyway as it's one of those big parenting guilt things. I think with so many boundaries and consequences it's the way stuff is delivered rather than what you put in place. It's that underlying emotional warmth and whether is a cold, harsh reactive/vindictive punishment, or a firm consequence set with a bit of understanding and love beneath it.
Hopefully he's got the message that speaking to you that way is completely unacceptable.

I’ve read the updates to the thread and it’s worse than I originally thought. The 3 week tech ban punishment is much more draconian than it initially appeared in the context of the boys home life.

The boys father is struggling with addiction, is medicated and living away in supported housing, so the boy is grieving for the loss of his dad.

And the OP admitted that this grief was part of the reason why he told her to “F off out of his room”. The punishment shockingly harsh parenting. The boy need understanding a communication, not having his entire hobby removed and to be ostracised from all his friends (support network) by missing out on the rare game update that is the biggest event in years.

It’s ridiculous for any parent to expect a child struggling with the loss of a parent to living away to behave perfectly all the time and not slip up at all. The word “fuck” coming out a 12yr olds mouth is hardly shocking behaviour for an almost teen. I’m not saying zero consequences or to permit it, but to have a heart and have that discussion with him about why swearing at a family member is wrong and that everyone is going through a tough time, then apology and perhaps an extra chore or something. But a three week ban? It’s so harsh it is counter productive and honestly could tip his MH- already under immense stress from losing his father- into a clearly vulnerable category.

It's a baby tantrum. Just ignore.

@Deereemer

He told me 'get the fuck out of his room'

Incredible that hes getting it back in 3 werks.

Feeding children addictive games makes parenting easier though doesn't it.

That would earn him a further 3 week ban in this house.

Not that my DCs would have been able to access adult only material here in the first place.

I’m a fairly liberal parent but when it comes to rudeness I am strict. I have 2 teenagers (17 & 14) and they would never say that to me. If they did they’d definitely be on a tech ban. If you don’t stop it when it starts you end up with 6ft teenagers shouting in your face. Kids need to respect their parents and tolerating being told to get the f*ck out of their room is not on

@Deereemer sending - what a difficult time you all must be having.

I too am quite shocked at how blase some parents are about tech. It's a massive experiment on kids, to let them have so much access to screens at such a young age. It has a terrible effect on kids' systems, on dopamine, on brain circuitry. It IS addictive, badly so.

And if your son is experiencing a difficult time with his Dad, then he will be seeking out gaming as a way to mask bad feelings. This means he will learn that negative emotions are something to run from, not something to come to terms with and process, which is the healthy way to handle them. You need to try to explain to him that running from negative thoughts is an attractive option, especially when it is something as awful as dealing with a parent with unresolved mental illness, but that he can do it. He CAN cope, he CAN process his feelings, he CAN come to terms with how his father is. That's how we build resilience - not by running away, but by facing the things that upset and frighten us.

Good luck OP.

@EmpressCixi

if the child's dad has addiction issues, then the child is more likely to be prone to addiction himself.

Tech addiction is real, I've had it. The last thing OP's son needs is to cope with his feelings by using tech. He needs to properly process his emotions and not run and hide from them in a computer game.

Proper parenting is where you do the difficult thing for the child's own good, not where you let them develop bad habits for the sake of an easy life.

I feel for.you OP, I do really feel for your son, it must be awful for him experiencing what is happening with his dad. Maybe Fortnite was a much needed distraction to disappear into.

We don't allow Fortnite, we just let.him play one game and it's quite a tame one, though all my son's friends play Fortnite. That's because we are worried about the addictive and behaviour change element. What we do is make sure I always get involved in doing stuff together every day after school and weekends though that really isn't so practical for a lot of families and he does watch YouTube too. 3 weeks if you do allow it sounds like a majorly long time, I wonder if it could be lowered and then time you both spend together doing a new hobby maximised? Sounds like he is struggling a lot and might benefit hugely from that.

[quote nomoremsniceperson]@EmpressCixi

if the child's dad has addiction issues, then the child is more likely to be prone to addiction himself.

Tech addiction is real, I've had it. The last thing OP's son needs is to cope with his feelings by using tech. He needs to properly process his emotions and not run and hide from them in a computer game.

Proper parenting is where you do the difficult thing for the child's own good, not where you let them develop bad habits for the sake of an easy life.[/quote]

1. there is very little evidence that addiction has a genetic component vs socialisation.
2. even if the child were addicted to tech, the OP’s method of 3 week ban as punishment is actually the worst way to deal with a tech addiction in a child. And will not work.

I agree poor parenting is about the easy life. It’s easier for the OP to get angry and impose an OTT punishment than it is to actually connect with her child and support him towards healthy emotions and mental state over the loss of his father in his life as well as healthy boundaries in the use of tech.

@MangyInseam

Dear God. I'm far from a perfect parent but I'd recognise I had failed pretty badly if I had to resort to these measures to stop my young child watching adult content that I'd already attempted to block

You are being very naive. Watching porn very commonly starts right around 11 or 12. It's just so easy to get at it, not at all like back in the days when they might happen to find an father's stack of magazines in a shed or something. It's easily accessible and designed to keep users coming back. Boys that age don't have a lot of defenses against that, there is a reason it's the number one money-making part of the internet.

Not naive. I have a 10 yo & 12 yo boy as well as an older DD.

They do not watch porn. I'm well aware of its availability and when they are older, the challenges around their access to it will increase. At the moment, they have no access to porn or anything else unsuitable and it's something I take very seriously.

Thanks for calling me (and my DH) failures as parents

Apologies Justilou. I didn't mean to imply this. It was a reaction to a child not alone accessing content but deliberately circumventing your agreed rules but I expressed it badly - sorry.

3 weeks! Tbh yeah he was rude but that's pre/teens for ya. To that age gaming can be important so understand the wailing and shit as he's missing out 3 weeks though is ridiculous. I'd have took the controller for a day or two.

I completely understand that you are having a tough time OP. I would be curious on how that has impacted on how proportionate and understanding you are around your DS's needs. You seemed more intent on writing about the evils of tech and gaming and lashing out at 'lazy parents' than talking about how distressed you son is. It sounds like you are directing your rage outwards, at people on the thread who disagree with your reaction and at your DS. Instead of trying to figure out what the actual, underlying issue is and wonder how to deal with his distress. Him weeping and staring at a wall sounds like emotional dysregulation and might be a bit beyond typical parent responses. Just removing the console/game for three weeks isn't going to create long term change is it? Have you asked for help from anyone else?

He is a long way off adulthood, has experienced recent trauma and you seem to be expecting adult behaviour and adult choices from him and punishing his (typical for this developmental stage) reactiveness. You are being quite reactive yourself. Maybe it is fear? Maybe it exhaustion? Maybe it is a lack of understanding about what is important to both of you? I hope you get it sorted out as it sounds very difficult and if it has reached that level of difficulty I think an objective, outside intervention might help?