To say that the next generation is primarily screwed in terms of resilience

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And WTF do we do about it?

Obviously many young people are wonderfully resilient but the overall trend I’ve seen in my line of work (behavioural education) is that there are vast, and I mean VAST numbers of young adults who cannot leave the house, come into a classroom, look someone in the eye, make a phone call, speak infront of the class (if they make it in), cry when pronouns are wrong (daily occurrence), take responsibility to revise/get a job/learn to drive.

What is going to happen to these humans in the future?

I have noticed that a lot of my peers forget what they themselves were like when young. The way they put it they were confident, free of anxiety etc etc but this is not how I remember it. I myself was anxious about all sorts when I was young - even though I didn’t spend crucial years of my young life in a COVID lockdown. I didn’t miss years of my education as a result of this and still fucked up my a levels. But I was young at a time when the universities might still take you on because they saw your potential so I got into my first choice uni. I did not enter uni knowing I would leave in debt.

My peers all remember themselves as model students but as my memory serves they were always skipping classes and didn’t get their homework in on time. Many had MH issues which went undiagnosed and were seen as eccentricity.

no doubt the generation before us thought we were flaky compared to them and the generation before them had lived through a war so must have thought we were all lacking in resilience.

The youngsters today will one day be regaling their offspring with endless tales about how they survived the pandemic.

I wish olders would leave young people alone.

I'm slightly older than the generation that you are talking about but I have struggled with MH issues.
In my case, every major life event feels like it has been overshadowed by world crisis (perhaps just made worse by increased awareness due to 24 hour news).

• I graduated in the 2008 recession, in a STEM subject, previously no issues with graduates getting jobs and found myself unemployed for >6 months which was soul destroying. Lots of my peers equally struggled for months, some years to get jobs.
• I retrained and worked in healthcare- COVID hit and I was redeployed, in the first few days onto a respiratory assessment unit seeing all patients with respiratory symptoms in only a paper mask and knowing little about what we were facing. While most people were sat at home doing puzzles and gardening I was phoning families to tell them their loved ones were dying.
• I was due to get married in 2020- Cancelled, when we were finally able to reschedule we had to dramatically reduce numbers. My dad was only able to walk me down the aisle because we got married outside.
• The day after I had my first baby Russia invaded Ukraine- completely rocked my world bringing a new baby into the world as war came to Europe.
• We've finally been able to get our first house and our 5 year fixed mortgage is coming to an end this year- we've had friends whose mortgages have increased by £700/month and I'm not sure how we are going to cope.

So, yeah, I am (understandably!) very anxious and have had so many bad experiences that I feel like I spend my life on the edge now! I don't blame the younger generations for feeling anxious. They are being bombarded with social media and the news, they have no hopes for getting onto the property ladder or retiring at a reasonable age.

Ultimately, there will be a war and/or fallout from climate change to focus minds.

I work with lots of lovely and very resilient young people. There is hope!

I don't know about resilient, but I think a lot of young people are less self-reliant than my generation.

I was born in the early/mid-1970s and I don't think my parents once drove me to a friend's house for a playdate and there were no holiday clubs to entertain us. From the age of five or six I was walking or cycling a mile or more to friends' houses, and walking/cycling back in the dark. A couple of years later if it was the school holidays I left the house after breakfast and my parents didn't see me until supper time. I was allowed to watch childrens TV from 4pm to 5.30pm and on Saturday mornings until 12pm and that was it. Otherwise I watched whatever my parents were watching. Until I was a teenager I listened to my dad's country and western and my mum's Andrew Lloyd Webber music as much as my own generation's pop music, because that was all that was played in the house and I didn't have any alternative. If I wanted something I did odd-jobs to earn the money, by the time I was 11 I had a paper round, and from 15 I worked evenings and weekends in a supermarket. When I was doing homework I headed to the local library to do actual research from actual books, and goodness knows how out of date most of those were, but it didn't matter because the skill was doing the work to find things out. At 19 I was living away from my family in a foreign country and teaching English as a foreign language to adults. I am not complaining, but apart from feeding me and clothing me, I was pretty much self-reliant. That set me up as a grafter which has remained with me for the rest of my life.

But the world has changed. Now my DCs and their friends seem to be driven everywhere, spend too much of their time on their phones and screens and don't seem to need to compromise as much, so many of them never learn to. In the holidays the only way to get them away from technology is to drive them to a football or hockey camp. The idea of throwing them out of the house for the day, which was common when I was young, is unheard of. Too many have no concept of having to work to find something out, they just Google it. I am not saying life is necessarily easier for them, because they have to cope with huge stresses of the digital age that I never had to - nobody cared what I looked like or what I wore - but I don't think a lot of them are equipped to deal with life in the real world in the same way. I think a lot of them will be in for a shock.

This is a huge generalisation I agree, and I am sure there are many kids that are self-sufficient, but I think that the number that are not is higher than it used to be. But then the world is also a different place. In a bizarre way, while my kids are more reliant on me than I was on my parents, I am also more reliant on them to help me with technology than my parents were on me.

@Ramalangadingdong not my memory at all! I did not skip classes, some did. I remember being anxious about all kind of things and pretty down at times. Which is why I think this is normal and not something to label mental health problems. Doing things you are not used to doing is scary. When bad things happen it is normal to feel very sad.

Do you, I don’t. Where I work neurodiversity has a stigma and parents have to be persuaded to even approach a diagnosis let alone label their child unnecessarily with it .

“Actually boundaries, strategies, involvement, accountability, responsibility and engagement by the parent would help the child ( who is not neurodiverse, except in their parents eyes).”

Really now. I was that parent. Dismissed. As mothers of neurodiverse girls often are. I did all that and it was hugely damaging.One seriously mentally ill teen later she has 3x nhs neurodiversity diagnoses and an EHCP. I was right.

There are always wars over resources. Wars in the future will be over resources that are scarce because of climate change.

Yes, I've been part of the meetings at the Child Development Clinic, between professionals and parents where the diagnosis, is made, using all of the reports and assessment over time.

Working with families, those that support with strategies to help their child (diagnosed or not) are those with children whose outcomes are more positive.

I work with teenagers daily and had the same thought today. They really lack resilience and I worry a lot about how many will cope in the real world.

@Hereyoume did you serve in the forces, or are you from a long serving family?
I agree that it's terrible that the WC aren't encouraging their sons to be collateral damage for a government that certainly doesn't protect their interests. We are told that we shouldn't have more than two children, expect any housing not even decent housing, working rights or even livable wages.
I live in a deprived area of Liverpool, I'm not seeing a lack of resilience. Thinking about how we had to pussy foot, cajole and bend to men of the past, there wasn't much resilience in them going on.

The Digital Revolution!

A change in society more rapid and wide-reaching than anything that has gone before.
We've seen massive alterations in how we communicate, socialise, work, learn and relax. Is it any surprise that there have been consequences? Look at the screen time of, say, your average 14 year old. What would have that time been spent on 20 years ago?

We have amplification of ideas and opinions. Validation without criticism or discussion. Unchecked opinions that shock or amuse can be expressed anonymously. Pair that with extreme scrutiny and wall-to-wall existential displays powered my algorithms designed to create addictive behaviours. Pornography and other distractions available on the same platform and devices as those mandated by schools, colleges and employers. .

Sure, information at your fingertips. Used properly that's a valuable tool. Time saving devices and automated processing, great. But what are we losing? We are not equipped to deal with this speed of change and I believe that mental health in young people is one of the many casualties.

In years to come, GCSE students will be using the last 20 years as a case study for their history, psychology or sociology exams. If exams still exist...

That is your generational take on it. When I was young I would have loved more empathy and support while dealing with anxiety invoking life events that ow are normal to me because I am grown but which felt monumental and impossible when I was young and facing them for the first time in my young adult life.

Why are you talking about strategies. Strategies for what? Who are you to lecture? There is no one size fits all with autism. Previously you were dismissing worried parents as using neurodiversity as an excuse. It’s hugely offensive.

As someone who had Christian Palestinan relatives in Gaza I'm not quite convinced that "strong, bold and fiesty lack of people pleasing" is to be reccomended but then I think you knew that when you posted this

I'm slightly freaked by the amount of disbelief and assumption of bad faith by other poster to the OP. FWIW, when I grew up in the 80s and I was not aware of any deaths/ suicides in my circle. My 20-something DS has lost quite a few friends - one query murder (official finding not clear), suicide and drug accident. I know lots of youngsters who are not in education, training or work. They just don't go out.

Strategies. Common parlance between professionals and with parents.

https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/strategies-and-interventions

That’s not resilience it’s social skills. And yes I’m sure there’s a decline in social skills due to use of screen / social media rocketing the past 20 years.

Been teaching for about 15 years and honestly thinking of giving it up not just because of the demands of the job but the kids are increasingly apathetic. And the kids and their enthusiasm and pride in their learning has always been what kept me going.

Now, it just feels like some kids not matter how much you give them, their first response is "I can't, I don't get it, I'm confused" and when I asked to see what they have done so far, nothing. Some don't even try to give it a go. Not because they aren't capable, they simply want an adult to do it with them. Encouraging these kinds of kids just to try; takes so much time away from kids who actually do need help. Never do any homework, or partake in interventions to help them improve because they can't be bothered and parents 'can't make them do it.'
Despite 'not getting it' they consistently whisper, play with pens and purposefully try to distract others and are then are offended when you tell them off, deny it and huff or sulk.

They are the same kind of kids who fall apart when things don't go their way on the playground. Take up lots of adult time to sort out and assist in restorative conversation and resolve it only to go home and tell parents their very biased side of the story and 'no one cared.'
Of course parents come in all guns blazing leading to more wasted adult time. Only for the whole thing to begin again in a week or two.

I just can't go on like this. It's so draining on the rest of the class and the adults and they do just suck all the joy out of it and I think I am finally ready to leave.

@Ramalangadingdong where am I saying children and young people should not have support?
Support is fine, we all need it. Does not make it mental health problems though.

It’s convenient to ignore the raging alcoholism in the men (and women) of previous generations and the predominantly women who only coped with “mother’s little helper aka diazepam”.

Another parent with no control over their children ?

@Tahinii lots of people were in desperately unhappy or abusive marriages with no way out.

I work with teenagers and I am surprised on the daily as to how many problems they involve adults in. Things like minor friendship fallouts that I would expect they could navigate themselves by secondary school they can’t do without adult input.

Have you read your own link?

We fundamentally believe that all support should:

• be person-centred and promote autistic people’s dignity
• keep people safe, healthy and happy
• enable autistic people to do the things they love
• never try and make someone "less autistic"
• never use punishment.