What's happened to young people? Can parents give me insight.

[EveningSpread]

I work in Higher Education, and I'm increasingly worried about young people.

So far this year, I've encountered more students than usual who:

• say they are unable to attend classes due to anxiety
• who are afraid of being in classes
• who won't speak when spoken to by staff or other students
• who say they find getting on a bus and getting to class to overwhelming
• who find the thought of doing their work so stressful that they can't cope
• who don't come to classes due to family parties / their hamster dying / waking up late (to name the reasons I've had just this morning) and expect you to fix what they've missed - in other words, who seem totally immature and unprepared for life (a different problem to the other things above, perhaps)

Obviously we express sympathy, reassure, and explain that they need to access the help that will enable them to function - to enjoy life, succeed on their degree, and get a job afterwards. (So the wellbeing services, and their GP.) Often the reassurance really helps. But equally a lot of these students don't cope at University. I'm sure this problem is exacerbated by the fact that I work in an institution that attracts students from postcodes with multiple indices of deprivation.

Part of me hopes that mental health issues are sometimes exaggerated or even an excuse, as an increasingly large percentage of my students seem essentially afraid to leave the house -- which would be much worse than them just trying it on/being a bit lazy! It's great that we have a language to talk about mental health now, but it's hard to know how/when to tell people that (a) they are responsible for improving their own mental health so they can function in the world, and (b) experiencing some mild discomfort and difficulty, such as being nervous around new people, is normal and crucial to development.

But I'm left wondering: how are parents coping with their young people if these are the miserable lives they're living? If they're not going to classes, are scared to leave the house, and can't function?

So AIBU, or is this problem getting worse? What can parents of roughly 16-20 year olds tell me? Are we still dealing with the legacies of COVID? What's the word on the street among young people about mental health these days?

I would also add a very controlling culture in schools, especially secondary schools, and not much natural opportunity to build self reliance and resilience, create their own things by themselves - in other words enjoy self-direction.

Excellent point. Also a point made much further upthread about the very 'curated' environments we have our children in from very young. The UK seems to have a culture of hyper-supervising young children and turning every interaction and activity into an opportunity for narrowly conceptualised academic learning - I was astonished when visiting relatives in the UK (from the EU country I now live in) when my older two were small and taking them to a playground where the play equipment had word puzzles on it Then there are all the 'extension activity' questions and tasks at the back of currently published editions of children's books. What about just reading them and engaging with them on your own terms? Then at 11 these children are thrown into a world of (of secondary school) with almost equal levels of supervision, but with the emphasis on conformity and being contained. Detentions for forgetting your pen, minute scrutiny of what they're wearing, walking between lessons in efficient silence. And then we expect self-efficacy, intrinsic motivation, self-direction?

@EveningSpread i agree that this is a pretty accurate summary. But please don’t forget the impact of smartphones and algorithms on this generation.
Thank you for taking the time to ask this question and read the many replies. Is there scope to take this further?

I think a lot of people jump to blame Covid but it's not just that. The trend towards filling up every second of a child's time has been getting worse over the past 15 years or so. It's really good for developing minds (well, anyone's mind) to be left alone to think and work things out. Once children aren't at risk of hurting themselves/trashing the place they don't need to be supervised all the time, especially not in their own homes. They need space and free time.

Attitudes to risk also seem to have changed massively. We all know that children are at more risk from those they live with than strangers, but for some reason it seems much more unusual these days for children to be allowed to take the bus alone, make their own way to school or meet up with friends unsupervised until what seems like quite an advanced age compared to my 90s childhood. I was allowed to go to the leisure centre with a friend from about 10, and to go to the corner shop or cycle round the block from about 8.

Also, I think that these days, children and young people's media input is too specific. When we were growing up, most people had to watch what their parents were watching, and would read the newspapers and magazines they bought. It just gave a broader exposure to the world in general. Now, people can choose to be exposed only to things they seek out. This leads to a narrow worldview and a lack of general knowledge.

I agree so much with you OP

I think young people are and always have been hyper aware of the performative nature of their environments. The emphasis on results, appearances, is very performative. If you don't perform to a certain level the sense of not achieving can have a detrimental effect on mental well being. Feeling that you belong is also important to a 15 or 20 year old, lacking that feeling also has a detrimental effect.

Also I think spending time outside fixes a lot of things.

You are right, but it is not entirely a new phenomenon. I was at university in the 80s and quite a few of us used our first year of higher education to basically do our growing up. There is certainly an argument for making a 'gap year' compulsory, i.e. not admitting anyone to University until they can prove they have spent a year doing something constructive and looking after themselves.

Yes - as I mentioned upthread, this is something some other countries do much better. Much less helicoptering and much more freedom.

I thought of something else this morning - it's been alluded to already with regard to secondary schools - people often say that private schools instil confidence in their pupils? Do they? Or is it just that state schools more or less systematically dismantle it with a view to pushing all the pegs into round holes, whichever shape they are?

Probably shouldn’t address the hamster can of worms but here goes: sorry! I just meant that it seems a strange thing to tell your lecturer who you barely know - a bit young, if you see what I mean.

OK, this is probably going to introduce some scorn, but I'll stand by it.
If you have a cat or dog, say, their lifespans are usually long. In some cases, you also need to make a decision to put them to sleep, so they don't suffer badly. They can be trained and a relationship with them is quite reciprocal.

I agree with the pp who has said that as a student or someone working full time in a rental place, a cat or dog is also a pretty unlikely thing to be able to look after (you might want one but these life elements will mean you can't).

I have had both hamsters and gerbils. They are dependent on you. They can become quite tame but still with instincts to run away or be very afraid of you at bottom. They have short lives. When they die, they can hang on ferociously and be obviously and vocally suffering. It's on you to handle the remains and the dismantling of cage, bedding, etc. Vets cannot do very much and taking the animal there could add stress to the things that could kill it.

I have had to have a cat put down (a long time ago) and was horribly sad but thought it the lesser evil, was reasonably stable about it. Now I have had to watch and hear small pets die too, seen evidence of them bleeding on their cage floor, attempted to get a vet to treat them, and been in pieces on the point of death because it wasn't something I had any capacity to alleviate at all. It is knowledge that I (and now my teenager) have most certainly taken with me afterwards.

So I say it's not 'young' - I think it is part of the 'helpless' part of emotional adult resilience that is gained through something horrible.

The ones at sixth form and university now did at least have some screen-free time early in their lives. My son didn't get a smartphone or xbox until he was 14.

But younger kids have had screens from the word go.

I know we had TV time but it was a lot less intense.

If I was going to give one piece of advice to any parent of a younger child now, it would be: don't get a games console.

I am autistic but didn't realise until recently. When I went to my senior (boarding) school 50 years ago I was terrified of everything. Classes, teachers, other girls, mealtimes, being away from home, getting things wrong, everything. I was there for 7 years but just got on with everything. I didn't have a choice.

I am not saying that was good, I am also not saying that COVID lockdown didn't have an effect. But I do think that giving things names, allowing and acknowledging certain behaviours, recognising very valid thoughts and feelings does mean that we are going to see more of them. I didn't have a choice, if that is the right word, which it probably isn't.

Now I am much older I have given myself permission and recognise my very real fears and feelings. I can still deal with doing things that I am afraid of and really don't want to do, but I have given myself permission not to do them if I don't want to. Young people haven't been brought up not to have a choice about things, I think.

I think some of it is to do with lockdowns etc. I also think though that sth TikTok, social media, influencers …. There is an echo chamber where so many young people are pretty much being told they have anxiety/OCD/ADHD/depression, gender confusion when they actually don’t. Please know I’m I no way undermining the people that do, I’m 50 and I’m a shit show so trust me I’m not undermining, what I’m saying is that it’s become so pushed upon young people that they have anxiety etc. also if you look at the internet/socials- everyone is supposed to be journalling, having morning routines, counting macros, working on their shadow sides, doing xyz at the gym, every time they pick up a guitar or try and learn a new sport or hobby there are a million people online doing it better or telling them to do it differently, everywhere they look their peers online seem to be in lavish homes, traveling to Goa, owning so much stuff… but they’re also supposed to be meditating as well and saving the planet and being told constantly that they’re a useless generation. So many people self harming who wouldn’t even have known self harming was a thing - yes awareness is amazing but it’s almost as if it was deliberately introduced to people via TikTok, YouTube etc …. Normal living isn’t enough, they don’t realise it’s ok to have issues and problems and that we all do. Plus… they can’t go anywhere and fuck up without it being caught on someone’s bloody camera phone and posted on whatever. Then there’s online dating, too many options… social media and content creators who are getting they’re thoughts and ideas handed to them destabilise and overwhelm our young folk, I couldn’t survive it, I honesty don’t think I could survive it myself. They’re not allowed to be ordinary. I feel really sorry for them all. Everyone knows about everything now. It’s not just the local university you go to…. You’re supposed to chose from and compete everywhere and anywhere. Everyone can see what the holiday they’ve booked is going to look like because a million people have already videoed it, they’re supposed to be so emotionally mature, they get shamed by virtue signallers if they say anythng that isn’t ‘right’ so may young folk trying to work on their attachment styles and all sorts and it’s great that all this information is available but good Lord it’s a lot! It’s an awful lot. They’re overwhelmed with it all in my opinion. It’s awful.

I agree with parents needing to constantly entertain children, which never happened when I was young.
My friend and her husband have literally spent pretty much every day of the summer holidays on days out, activities, holidays etc with their young kids. It must have cost them a small fortune. It used to be a couple of great days out during the holidays, but the rest of the time was either entertaining yourself at home or out with your friends on bikes or just general playing out.

Ive noticed that kids now often need constant stimulation or they are ‘bored’. It does kids good to learn to entertain themselves.

^So much this. All of it.

So how do we counter this as parents? Even if you don't allow access to SM until 16, they will hear about it at school from their friends or access it once they do have a smart phone. What are the things parents can do to ground children and teens in reality.

To keep children and teens grounded

I wish I knew. I really do, I’m 50 and even I have been sucked into it at times. I can’t say too much but I have experience someone trying self harm literally because they saw it so often and thought it might be an answer and they’d just never have done it otherwise … I was scared to post all of that but I believe in my heart it’s true and I don’t know what the answer is at all. I feel, not to be conspiracy minded but it almost feels deliberate … it almost feels like deliberate attempts to destabilise or harm this generation, I don’t know. I know my son is nearly 20, he’s successful by pretty much all standards and I’m really not but I tried my best for him. He’s not a big social media follower and he’s a pretty normal guy and even he is anxious, overthinking life, looking into attachment styles, trying to quiet the chatter in his head, reading books about being productive, it’s all a mess! I have no clue what the answer js because it’s gone so far now that it doesn’t even fall on us as parents anymore, it’s like, this is the world now. And it’s not good. It’s too much. It’s heartbreaking to me, I wish sometimes the internet would just cease to exist, I know that’s not the answer either but everyone is just so bombarded! I remember years ago you have a magazine showing you how to make a face mask with an avocado and one workout to do it just simple things. Now it’s every single option of every single thing and you need to read it all, know it all, be it all… I truly do not believe people can survive this world the way it is anymore. It’s awful. Nothing must feel like an achievement anymore because there are a billion videos and posts about people who done that ages ago and better than you … it’s no wonder they feel no motivation because what’s the point if everyone else is already doing it better etc…oh it’s so so complicated but it’s heartbreaking seeing how it’s all playing out

Can society realistically exclude children from social media and screen technologies. Should we not instead be equipping parents with the skills to manage responsible use? As part of putting improving parenting skills back on the political agenda.

Should we also be taking a stand to improve the safety of outdoor spaces? - encouraging LTNs and Play Streets, start putting pedestrians before cars in urban areas.

I feel as if social media/ influence etc already has them no matter what we do … Even if not when they’re younger … I feel like it still all gets in their heads one way or another… even in outdoor spaces, we want them to be safe so they have a phone … then no one can actually be free to be daft or someone will be filming it etc … it’s such a mess. It’s such a mess.

The trouble is that even if individual families restrict access to sm, their children's peers are all influenced and zombified by it. They will never have a peer group, friends or potential partners that not influenced and damaged by the shite online, whether on sm, news, porn, the dark web or unsavoury coms on snapchat. It really is permeating the collective unconscious.

@HolidayAtNight I hope some others read your post as carefully as I did. It really resonated with me. My partner and I were astounded at some of the ways our nieces and nephew were brought up (19, 22 and 25 now). We put it down to ‘things are done differently now, we’re probably just stuck in our own generational attitudes’.

Every moment was scheduled with activities that one or both parents drove them too, stayed to watch, got involved with. Every evening’s food, TV, games were organised to what the children wanted. Every day out was ‘child centred’.

None of these kids are excelling at adult life now, they continue to live at home (one at university, two working from home). They don’t travel, they don’t have boyfriends/girlfriends. One neice loves to sing and tried joining a choir but there was an argument that mum got all stuck into ‘because they wouldn’t accommodate her anxiety and banned the therapy dog’ (I love dogs, this dog barks a LOT and bites men including my partner several times).

It’s all just so….dull.

It’s sad that kids are thinking this. We (and they) have no real idea what the future holds in terms of the economy and the outlook could be much more positive in a decade’s time.

the80sweregreat · Yesterday 13:04

My late mum lived through the blitz aged 14/15.
She was told once ' you look terrified '
Nobody told her that was a pretty natural reaction though. (Her mum and dad were hard nuts though)”

My mum was born in Wandsworth in October 1939 and stayed there (bombed out twice) through the entire war. Her dad, WWI veteran, was a fire warden during the blitz.
She and her mum were evacuated to Durham but stayed only a few weeks because granny was so worried about mum’s much older, adult sisters still in London, one a clippy on the buses, one a secretary at the ministry of defence and the youngest, 15, working in Selfridges.
To mum, it was normality, all she’d ever known. Her older sisters (all gone now) used to talk about the incredible sense of all being in it together and community, people genuinely helped each other out. When young people socialised at dances, etc. it was on another level because they were all living with the very real prospect of this being their last day. That, for many, was incredibly liberating.
That was the difference, I believe, between the traumas of war and the traumas of Covid, the strong sense of togetherness.
Isolation is the very worst thing you can do to young people in their formative years.

Covid makes me think of all the insipid rich invalids in Victorian novels, who've always been kept in with a governess but no other children.

I think what most people have said is true re: the state of society/the economy and how that disproportionately affects the younger generations. Equally of course as society has become more embracing of mental health discourse you will get some younger people using this to their advantage as a kind of cop out to avoid doing things that are uncomfortable or that they would prefer not to do. It's a tricky issue because how do you deal with that? Getting stricter or telling them/forcing them to toughen up is unfair on those who were forced to do that despite having very real undiagnosed/unaccommodated neurodiversity (which causes trauma, btw). I suppose having stricter policies enforced for all of those without legitimate exemption (e.g. a diagnosis) would work. Equally we have to honour the reality of their anxiety - young people growing up 30 - 70 years ago didn't have anywhere near as much to deal with in terms of precarity, insecurity, poor prospects, global disaster - is it any wonder they're struggling to live with ease? So perhaps rather than blaming the young people we should look more structurally and place the blame there.

Do you think @MrsSkylerWhite that isolation is not just about what happened during the covid lockdowns? It’s how we closet away children and young people, wrap them in stifling protective blankets, curate their friendships (and falling outs), model to them that other people can’t be trusted. ‘Stay home, stay safe’ has been a thing for a long time before Covid came along and it’s a date of mind not just a physical lockdown.