Episode 70: Is my kid going to be an outcast if I limit the digital things?

Concerns for singling out our kids by being THAT mom that limits their time on digital things, is a real & common concern. Listen in for help navigating this! 

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Full Transcription:

Speaker 1 (00:00):

So, if you decide to be that mom and not give your kids all of the digital things, or maybe start with a dumb smartphone or watch, or you limit their social media, is your kiddo going to be an outcast? Have you thought that I certainly did. Let me share with you some of my insight as someone who went ahead and gave all of the things to start not having a clue, that's what we're going to talk about today.

Speaker 2 (00:32):

Welcome to your source for tips, tools, and support to help you be that mom that is tuned in and proactive for yourself, your family, and for the wild ride of raising kids in this digital age, inspired by a mother's love with a relatable real life. Proud to be that mom flair. This is the bead that mom movement with your host, Dolly Denson. Holy moly check.

Speaker 1 (00:58):

If you were a mom that is looking to give your kiddo a phone, but you don't want to open up the world of the smartphone to them yet, check out the pinwheel phone. The pinwheel phone is the latest and greatest for dumb smartphones. It gives you absolute control over what they do and who they can contact, and we'll help them to develop healthy habits around using a phone, check out pinwheel@pennwell.com use code be that mom 10 for a discount. So I saw this discussion or this question on one of the, or in one of the parenting groups that I'm in on one of the social media apps. And it got me to thinking about it took me back. It took me back to when I first gave my kids smartphones and I truly was clueless. Now my first one, my oldest one, she's now in her early twenties.

Speaker 1 (01:50):

And there wasn't a smartphone. When, you know, when she got to middle school age, what was that middle school age she would have been, or would it have been around? What is middle school age? Usually about 11. So that was around 2009. So I think that's when smartphones were first starting, but that is not the first phone that she got. She first got like a little flip phone or something similar to that barely had texting capability. It definitely no internet capability and social media. And I think Facebook was the thing, like my space and things like that were a thing before that, but I never got into those things, but Facebook was a thing, but it certainly wasn't something that was accessible by her phone, by the second in the third born getting to middle school age, which is when I gave him these things.

Speaker 1 (02:37):

These things were a thing. And my thought then was I wanted them to have it because I wanted, you know, it's, it's fun. It's a way to connect. You know, Instagram at the time was what I thought was just like looking at pictures and maybe connecting with a few friends. So really clueless to the potential of these things. Now, initially when these things started, I don't think were to the nature degree that they are now in terms of predators, in terms of all of the things that are out there, like advertising to our kids, trying to get at our kids and then the drug dealers on Snapchat in all the different things that we have to worry about. Now, back then, these things were not as prevalent and as much of a thing, but I still was clueless. I thought the only threat that my kids had was maybe some weirdo trying to get in touch with them in Shirley.

Speaker 1 (03:30):

They would let me know that otherwise they're just there to keep in touch with their friends. That's what I thought. And I thought, you know, I want to give this to them. Um, you know, it's like a good thing. I want them to have this. I want them to be able to stay in touch with their friends and then bonus. I can know where they're at and I can keep in touch with them. Right. So I went ahead and gave all the things. I had no boundaries. I had no restrictions on anything at that time, there was no dumb smartphone. There was no tick talk watch, or a gizmo watch. There was no relay go device. There was no bark. There was nothing to monitor. There was nothing. Okay. So gave all of the things, didn't worry about it. Didn't take the phone up at night.

Speaker 1 (04:08):

Didn't do any of the things. Now, some parents may be like, well, I did that too. And my kids are fine. I honestly think that this is a very fluid thing. And it depends on the child and the situation such as their peer group and, you know, multiple different things that will create the influence on them. But I do think that no matter the child, if they are given the digital things connected to all of the things, curiosity is a natural childhood thing, right? All of them are curious bottom line, no debate. All kids are curious because that is a natural childhood state to be curious, to learn, to discover, you know, all of that. And then the other thing that is a non-negotiable among all the kids is that they are in development, developing their self-esteem, developing their beliefs, developing their interest in things that is a non- negotiable something all kids are doing because it's a natural childhood development thing.

Speaker 1 (05:08):

Right? So if we've got that, those two things, no matter if your child's upbringing who their peers are, what their influences are, what you allow, the digital things, the social media, all of that does influence them. It does. And there are some things that will be more obvious as influencing them, such as a predator, trying to get in touch with them, such as you know, them sending a provocative picture to someone, you know, all the different things that kids do when they stay connected on social media, whether it's a predator or just a peer, but the most insidious thing. And the reason why I encourage you to quote on quote, make your kid an outcast in the sense, which I don't think they are an outcast. And I will elaborate on that in a second, but the influence of these things is insidious and it becomes ingrained and intertwined in their beliefs and their thoughts to themselves and what they do in life.

Speaker 1 (06:05):

And it's hard to like basically peel apart what that influence was and where it was because it's influenced them. It's influenced them enough to where it's become part of their belief. And maybe it was meant to be that way. You know, maybe those are their beliefs in all of that. But I do think that there is a somewhat not ideal influence or force that gets placed upon our kids. If they are given all of these things without guidance, without monitoring, without you putting their floaties on. So to speak as if you're teaching them how to swim bottom line. When, before the digital age came along, we had our kids and basically kind of like a cocoon. They went out into the world when they went to school and, you know, they had certain things that they did in school, but they weren't interconnected to every kid on campus.

Speaker 1 (06:54):

Plus every other campus that you can think of, you know, maybe you took them to church or some form of worship. And they were in a, what I call Sunday school class. So they saw some other kids, you know, there's those kids, parents, you know, the Sunday school teachers, family, that type of thing. So you kind of had control over how they were influenced, but now we have taken basically a deep blue sea of the wide huge world and given them access to all of that. And it's not all bad, there's lots of good things about it. If it wasn't for all of the digital things we have, we wouldn't have been able to stay connected as much as we did during the pandemic. I made this podcast during the pandemic. I launched it right as this pandemic was starting. So it's been an amazing way for me to still get into people's ears and to reach them.

Speaker 1 (07:42):

And then as last year progressed, despite the censorship and all of the things that are have been happening on social media, I have still been able to reach things. So I'm not saying that the digital world is a bad thing, but I'm seeing that in the hands of our kids, they don't need to have access to anything and everything in the world. And when it comes to like being an outcast among their friends, what we need to encourage is for more parents to have this approach to where it is normalized for our kids to not have smartphones at the age of nine, 10, or 11, it is normalized for kids to not be on social media in a soap box of mine with social media. Now is I believe that it is probably created by the predators, because if you look at some of the stuff that has happened over the last six months, if someone has a certain topic that they want to talk about, if that topic goes against the grain of what the overlords of these social media apps want, or don't want to be discussed, it is immediately labeled and sometimes deleted, but yet they can't catch all the predators that are reaching out to our kids.

Speaker 1 (08:48):

They can't catch the drug dealers that are reaching out to our kids on Snapchat. The mom that I mentioned in a, a few months ago, where her son got fentanyl laced, drugs, or a pill that he was taking, and he didn't know it was laced with fentanyl and it killed him. She couldn't get access to the messages that he had on Snapchat because Snapchat had them locked down and apple had it locked down to where she couldn't even get into his phone. Cause she didn't know that his passcode into his phone. She didn't know his passwords to his different social media apps. If they can shut down certain narratives and certain things that are said, but they can't shut down these things. It makes me wonder who is controlling these apps. So my whole point is whether you want your kid to be an outcast or not, you need to look at the bigger picture and think about what kind of outcasts do you want them to be.

Speaker 1 (09:35):

And it's our responsibility as parents to guide our kids. And this is another portion of where we need to provide guidance. And another side of that story is that we cannot control everything and your kid is going to go, you know, if you go to a regular public school or they ride a bus, there's going to be other kids on there that their parents aren't aware of the dangers in the influences or don't care. And they are going to expose our kids to things. So it's out there. It's going to be out there and there's no way to keep your kid completely from it. But my point is, we need to normalize being more proactive in this space. We need to normalize making these social media apps and companies and the makers of the smartphones, be more accountable for putting parental controls and safety monitoring on needs devices.

Speaker 1 (10:25):

I know they're not made for kids, so maybe they don't need to be in the hands of kids until we can get those sorts of things in place. And that's why the pinwheel phone and the gab phone are such amazing things. Listen to my episode, 33 and 38 about pinwheel and about the tick talk watch, there's also the relay go device that you can use. It's like a walkie-talkie thing. There's the gab phone, which doesn't have as much controls and much ways to monitor who they're talking to, but it's still a step up from a smartphone. So all of these things that we have now are ways for us to still give an introduction to our kids, for these things, but not give them access to the world. So I think the moral of the story of what I'm trying to say here, and maybe I'm becoming repetitive, but me as a parent sitting on the other side, almost on the other side of raising three kids, two of them are still teenagers.

Speaker 1 (11:19):

I can see the influence of this because I did all the wrong things and not necessarily all wrong. They're doing beautifully. Now. They are adjusting and stuff like that. But I do think that I made their growing up years harder because I wasn't aware. And I can now see a maturity in them at older ages that I think that's the more appropriate time to give access to more of the things. But when that maturity level isn't there, you're going to get more curiosity, curiosity, more exploration, more not knowing something could be dangerous. You know, the mindset of, uh, of a teen that doesn't quite grasp ramifications of certain actions, sending things out into the world that you can't take back all of those things. So when it comes to your kiddo, being an outcast, I had that same thought and I went down the road of a hope and a prayer and not much else.

Speaker 1 (12:13):

And so I'm here to say it is such a blessing and a gift right now for you to have so many options for this. So explore the different options and choose to make your kid an outcast in the sense that you are guiding them in their development. And I guarantee you, it will pay off in the future. You may get pushed back. You likely will get pushed back. You likely will be told that they are the only kid that doesn't have this or that. But at the end of the day, you are the parent that is guiding them through this world. It is a dangerous and unpredictable world. The influence on them is also unpredictable and insidious. And so you are going to take a proactive stance. And I think you just have to communicate that with them, let them know that you promise them that you love them, and you were doing this in the best interest and someday they will understand.

Speaker 1 (13:03):

Okay. So I hope that was helpful in the sense that it is hard. I've been there and no one wants to be an outcast, but if we can push towards educating more parents about the influences, share my podcast with them, share the resources with them, and let's make it a normal thing for them to not have a smartphone and access to all the social media apps. Let's make it a normal thing that they are walking around with a dumb smartphone and that they can keep in touch by texting. If you have a pinwheel phone, you can control who they are contacting and when they're contacting them. So you can make sure that they have healthy sleep and a healthy routine at home, and that they still have their childhood discovery and all of those things. Okay. So again, I hope this was helpful for you. Please reach out to me. If you have any questions, comments you want to tell me about your own experience, please dip down into the show notes by just scrolling up on this episode, to get some of my freebie download resources, as well as some of the other things that I mentioned in all of my episodes, and I will chat with you next time.

Speaker 2 (14:08):

Thanks for tuning in being that mom isn't easy, but together we can be that mom's strong. Don't forget to leave a review, connect on social and join Dolly's free community till next time either 

Speaker 1 (14:22):

Before you go, I want to just give you a heads up on something. When things have been hardest in my role as a mom, the thing that was so very helpful for me was having a routine to take care of myself each day. I know that this whole thing around raising kids in a digital world is so very overwhelming. But if you have a place where you are taking care of yourself every single day with a simple routine that works despite where you are or what your schedule is, you will be able to be more present for your family and handle all of the ups and downs of this most amazing role that we could ever play in this world. So connect with me and let's get you connected to fitness and nutrition tools made by experts that will help you simplify this and then connect you with my fit club community that will support you, guide you and give you momentum and motivation to show up every day, take care of yourself first so that you could be better present for our digital native kids.