Three Reasons My Doctor is Worried About Your Child

When I was at our pediatrician’s office recently with my son, I asked the doctor what her top three concerns are for children today. After a moment’s thought, here’s what she said:

1. Too much time on electronic devices

2. Exposure to inappropriate material online

3. Anxiety and difficulty dealing with normal life

She said she believed the third concern—anxiety and lack of resilience—was tied at least in part to the first two concerns. In other words, children spending too much time on electronic devices and consuming the content they carry has led to increased anxiety and inability to cope in children.

This doctor has been in practice since I had my first baby 24 years ago. She’s seen serious injury, terminal disease, the flu, fevers, and everything in between. I find it fascinating that her top three concerns for children are not disease, physical disorder, infections, car accidents, pandemics, or cancer. Her top three concerns for children are non-medical. Her top three concerns are things are we are doing to ourselves and to our children.

Upcoming Invincible Family Substack posts will dig into these three concerns one by one, and I’ll be offering you specific tools to help your family address these concerns. If you’re not thinking about electronic consumption and its effect on your children, you must.

In the meantime, consider this. My doctor’s top three concerns for children are relational rather than medical. If a child is spending time engaging with a screen, that mean’s he or she is not spending that time engaging with a person. And that is the crux of the problem. We are weaning our children away from us prematurely in ways that lead them to transfer their tender allegiances to games, digital dopamine hits, entertainers, and influencers. In other words, our children’s loyalties and trust are being bestowed on strangers.

Some of these digital strangers are blatant porn promoters which is a significant concern. But the people your children are watching and listening to don’t have to be porn stars in order to be dangerous. Anyone or anything that lures your children away from you and from the principles you strive to teach them can be deeply dangerous.

Of course, similar influences have always existed and the pull between children, their parents, and the outside world is not new. Managing these influences is part of family life. But the game has completely changed, the stakes are higher, the dangers are acute, and the sinister detonation of children’s wellbeing is being accomplished by means that parents themselves often facilitate.

Giving our children phones instead of giving them of ourselves has become the new normal, but it’s not normal at all. It’s time to step up our game.

I’ll see you next week!

Kimberly