Transcript
Speaker: Hello, you're listening to Outnumber the Podcast, episode 130, Screen Time Detox. We have talked extensively about kids and smartphones, kids and screen time, and today we're talking about how to get that screen time out of their lives if you've noticed some addictive behaviors. This episode is supported by Gab Wireless, our favorite kid -friendly cell phone that offers just calls, texts, and music. No internet, no games, and no other distractions, but it looks just like a smartphone. Click the link in the show notes to get 30 % off your next Gab phone.
Speaker: Hello and welcome to Outnumbered the Podcast. I'm Audrey. And I'm Bonnie. We are experienced moms to a combined total of 19 children. In our weekly episodes, we explore relatable topics using our perspectives of humor and chaos. Tune in for advice and encouragement to gain more joy in your parenting journey.
Speaker: Welcome back friends. We are on episode 130 and we're excited you're here with us because we're going to be talking about the dreaded screen time detox, which is something that Audrey and I have had to do before in the past many times. As a side note, we already have an episode all about screen time for kids. It's episode 110. So just a little while ago we did that one. And that one is a great one to just learn all the things about, you know, how to kind of structure your house around
Speaker: these ever elusive addictive screens, but today we're gonna talk about what happens when the screens need to be taken away for a little bit. So I kind of have a funny mom moments about related to screen time. So we went to our detox and then I wrote down on a piece of paper, no, I typed out our new guidelines for screen time and I posted them on the wall right next to the laptop computer in the homeschool room and set them up and talked through them with my kids.
Speaker: Great. All seems fine. So I come in there a couple of days later and I'm looking at my sign and it's been graffitied. And of course, nobody's going to pass up to deface the rules. They're like, oh yeah, it must have been the baby, except he can't form letters. And there was very distinctive graffiti letters on it.
Speaker: uh what what did it say i'd tell you but then you'd have to edit that part out that's so funny because as we know kids love their screens and when mom and dad try to take them away they get a little cranky but we're gonna talk about that how to make it as painless as possible um basically we're breaking it down into the what the why and the how of the screen time detox
Speaker: And then how and how slash if to reintroduce screens in a healthy way. So you may decide to just keep it that way for a while because you love the detox so much. But if you decide that you need to bring them back into your life, we can talk about the best way to do that. All right. So starting with the what, what is a detox, a screen detox? Well, detox means to abstain from or rid the body of toxic or unhealthy substances.
Speaker: And we have noticed that screens used in an unhealthy manner or even an excessive manner can be toxic, both to the mind and physically. I have noticed my kids, not just because they're sitting and not moving around, but like some I function things, kind of some headaches. So there's lots of ways that even using screens in a healthy way, we need to back off and do a reset.
Speaker: Ooh, that's interesting. I'm really glad you added that physically part because we always think of them as a kind of a mind altering thing, you know, makes your kid bored or, you know, sucks them in mentally. But yeah, there are physical effects as well. An interesting side note is I have a daughter who deals with migraines occasionally. And my first, you know, when she first started complaining of pain, I wanted to just distract her. And so she asked to watch a movie. So I let her and then only upon, you know, some experience and a little bit of research did we realize that
Speaker: screen time actually really exacerbates migraines. And so what she needed was to lie down in a quiet, dark room and not be stimulated at all physically through her rivals. And they went away much quicker. And I thought, oops, that distraction was actually making things worse.
Speaker: Oh, poor thing. Yeah, I definitely, um, I have one that's kind of prone to migraines too. And definitely that's one thing we avoid, um, when he's got a migraine or feels one coming on is absolutely no screens, even like his schoolwork. Like we'll just, we'll catch up on that another day. Just stay away from screens. Right. Right.
Speaker: Yeah, so this includes witnessing our kids consuming toxic content online. So anything that's against our value system, right? Pornography, cyberbullying, et cetera. Or when they're spending excessive and unhealthy amounts of time, like you mentioned, on entertainment. Or when we start to see addictive behaviors. So a couple examples of addictive behaviors would be choosing screen time over interacting with friends and family. If over and over they're choosing screens over a human being, that can be a warning sign.
Speaker: talking about screens excessively. So my children have gotten to the point in the past where all they talk about is a specific game that they like or a specific movie or something. And I'm like, okay, that seems to have taken over your life, right? Withdrawing from others, their grades or sports or other performances start to slip. You start to notice more poor behavior, all kinds of things.
Speaker: That is so true. It's like, I think oftentimes, or there's this common thought out there that like there's, their world is being broadened because they're interacting with all these different things. But really what I've noticed is that their life becomes about three inches by six inches big, and it really does get narrowed down. And that's like their entire focus is on this tiny three by six inch black box. And.
Speaker: Yeah, so anything else is just not even part of their world except what's involved with that little square rectangular box. So definitely when I see a narrowing instead of a broadening, then that's a warning sign to me.
Speaker: All right. So moving on to the why we've seen that when the screen usage becomes out of control or some of these behaviors that we've just been mentioning, um, it's time for a detox. So specifically a couple other ones that I've noticed in my kids is just begging for screen time. Like they have an inability to think creatively. They literally cannot think of something else to do. It's, um, they, that's all they want. Their world is that narrow or they're, they're fighting over screens like
Speaker: It's my turn to do Spanish. No, it's my turn to do Spanish. Fighting is an automatic, yeah. Mom takes it away. Or maybe they're listless. They can't get up off the couch and move, even if the screen isn't in their hand. It's like it's sucking energy from them or something. They're bored. They can't think of anything to do. Or another thing I've noticed, even in my youngest kids, is nightmares.
Speaker: maybe seen something on an older sibling screen or suddenly some ideas have been planted in their head and they'll be in my bed at three o 'clock in the morning with nightmares. That is definitely a sign that we need to head the detox road, down the detox road. Right. When mom and dad sleep gets interrupted, that's the last drop. Yep. You're not sick. What are you doing here? Okay. Time to take screens away because I need my sleep.
Speaker: Yeah, and just a side note here, when we say excessive screen usage, obviously that word is very subjective. What one child can handle may be way different from another child's and what one family or set of parents is comfortable with may be much different from another family's. Generally, for us personally, I know I mentioned this on the Screen Time episode, we generally only allow screens for entertainment on Saturdays.
Speaker: And only if they're doing chores and behaving appropriately, sometimes we skip it all together. But if it starts to slip into our weekdays or any of these behaviors that you've mentioned, um, like when mom's on survival times. So like we've had quite a bit of this the last six months, last trimester of pregnancy in the first and the fourth trimester of new baby. Um, then it's time to pull back because we kind of loosen the reins too much, you know, kind of like if you give a inch, you, they take a mile, they take like 10 miles with screens. So that's when we know a detox is in order.
Speaker: Yeah, that's so true. I think I had talked about this a little bit in our episode on screen time for kids. They are actually designed to make kids addicted and to draw them in. And there's so much that's appealing about it. But again, yeah, I think I mentioned also this in our episode on screen time that our limit is if you're under 10 years old,
Speaker: zero screen time. I'm like, my youngest kids rarely need to do a detox because they get so little screen time. That's awesome. Yeah. Just because I can't handle it. Like I was so much, as I said in that episode, I really don't think that they're missing out on anything by not being on screens. And so
Speaker: if in 10 years, I mean, you know how quick kids are. When they get it in their hand, they're going to learn it like within a week. So I don't think they're going to have, plus all the technology they're quote unquote missing out on now is going to be like obsolete by the time they need to use it for college or something. Yeah. My toddler has never been given screen time. You know, like I've never handed him a phone and said, here, do something with it. And he knows how to use it just from picking it up and messing with stuff. I'm like, Hey, hands off.
Speaker: I know a lot of times I have to figure out how to stop or undo something, you know, one of my little kids has picked up a phone and they've got something going on. Like my seven year old had the emergency, you know, how unlock screen you can call it, emergency 911. And I had to figure out how to actually do that so I could show him how not to do that. So what a detox does, it's sort of a hard reset for our kids brains. They can use their,
Speaker: imagination better. They can engage with people on a real, like real people in the real world. They perform better in school and sports and just life. Hello. Their life grows bigger than that little three by six inch rectangle. This is true.
Speaker: I've noticed that my kids are kinder, more creative, like you said. They don't talk about being bored ever when they're not on screens and they have kind of even an additional light about them after a detox. Isn't that interesting? They're just more innocent kids. They want to play outside and they want to do fun things and they're mischievous and they get into trouble, sure, but that's what kids do instead of just being little zombies. Yeah.
Speaker: So now we're going to move on to number three, the how to do this detox. So, uh, what we do is we have a bit of a family meeting. We discussed the problems we've been seeing. Hey, we've noticed some fighting. Hey, we've noticed. Now this is for like a longer term. If you choose to just say, Hey, we're not going to do screens for this week. It might not have to be this big hoopla, but when we do it for like a month or more, um, we kind of sit down and talk to everybody. So it's not a big surprise. We, like I said, we, we mentioned the problems we've been seeing. And then we say that mom and dad have decided to do the screen detox.
Speaker: Yeah, so of course that means mom and dad have had a meeting beforehand. Right, right, right, right. And they're both fully united on this because kids, they can figure out if dad's not quite on board or if mom's not quite on board, they can sense what did one of our past guests say? They can smell weakness. So true.
Speaker: Uh, so choose your parameters, what screens are available. There are some things that, well, we don't do, um, really screen school in the summer very much, but what screens are available for what types of usage and then everything else is a no. Um, so this in our house would just be like schoolwork is a yes, everything else is a no. And I, I've been heard to say, don't even ask. The answer is no, please don't waste my and your time by asking.
Speaker: Yes, exactly. Exactly. But like you actually have to be firm on that. Yeah. Which is my weakness sometimes. They wear me down, stinkers. Okay, so what did you talk looks like for our family as we cut out any screen based games, YouTube, movies, television shows, and anything that pretends to be learning, but is actually entertainment. So we've talked about this, I think, in the other episode as well. My kids are allowed to
Speaker: For example, do actual math problems on a math curriculum online?
Speaker: but they can't play math facts, which is like a little spaceship shooting the stars as they add up addition and subtraction because that is just sucks them in just like a game. Once they do their math, they rarely ask to just stay on for hours at a time. They're like ready to go out and play, right? And the only exception is we will do an occasional movie together as a family during a detox. And I will say that if you're going to do something like this, the simpler the rules that you have, the easier they are to implement. So if you start saying things like, all right,
Speaker: Kids 12 and up can have an hour and a half on every other Saturday. You're never going to remember. It's going to be annoying. So it's best just to cut it all out and go from there. It's easier to add it back in little by little than to take more away. And like Audrey mentioned, they will ask over and over and over and over for exceptions, especially the first few days or weeks. But if you hold strong, they'll stop.
Speaker: Yep, be prepared for them to whine and cry. Just think of it like they're going through a detox from something they were addicted to. Yeah, they're having withdrawal, poor things. So depending on how addicted to screens your kid has been, they may have a greater level of withdrawal from this. You'll get some additional fighting.
Speaker: Maybe lots of I'm bored, maybe temper tantrums, just basically all the kid versions of detoxing. And it just really makes you question why you let them have it in the first place and how much you want to let them have it again in the future. Right, right, right. And for us personally, I've noticed it takes my kids a full week, sometimes seven to 10 days of zero screens for them to finally get their imaginations back.
Speaker: finally want to go outside and do things, finally they stop coming to me. Because you have to think how much manpower and time and effort and money goes into these games and movies to keep people staring at a box for hours at a time. Like that requires a lot of thought and a lot of money, a lot of effort. So once that is taken away, it puts the burden back on their brain to entertain themselves and to stretch and grow and read and learn. And it's just, it requires more work of the brain that hasn't been
Speaker: required of them for a while. So it takes a little while. Sometimes at the start, I will give them a few ideas to fuel their creativity. Like if I know a screen detox is happening or it's going to happen soon, then I might buy a couple extra boxes of sidewalk chalk or a new sprinkler head or something. And hey, these are some options. But I most definitely don't. I try to avoid the temptation to make it easy on them. Like, well, we're going to plan this and then we're going to plan this. Nope. Just back to use your imaginations and figure it out.
Speaker: Oh, you're a nice mom. I'm not quite that nice. I have a bored jar. You're bored. Great. Don't you something out of the jar? And it says like, you know, wash the walls in the living room and Oh yeah. My older kids, for sure. They get the jobs when they're bored. Clean behind the toilet and the upstairs bathroom. Yeah. All right. So you've done the detox and it's time you've decided to get maybe a little bit of re -imple, re -implementation. Put it back in a little bit.
Speaker: Well, actually you might be like me and decide that life is so great without it that you want to keep this new screen feed lifestyle permanently, uh, under a certain age. Um, I know that this is basically my rule for my youngest kids. And I don't know. It just makes my life so much easier. And I just don't think they're missing out. But, um, more likely you'll decide you want to bring the screens back at the end and have limits. So I was going to read my actual.
Speaker: Um, paper that I wrote up this last time when we did one. Yeah. The one, the ungrapheated one. Cause I have it printed out again. Um, so our rules were no devices in the bedrooms period. End of discussion device usage only between 8 AM and 8 PM. Um, because I, that is because I have seen a lot of research that shows it takes three hours for your brain to shut off after observing blue light. So you might be asleep, but your brain is not resting yet.
Speaker: And then devices stay on the landing strip. That's an area right inside our door where they charge or mom's desk when they're not in use so that they're, well, this is just convenient so that they're not lost, but also they're not being hidden. And then the rule for the device. So to use a device, there's four things. Number one, ask your parents permission. Number two, explain what you will be doing with that device. Number three, estimate how long it will take you to do this Spanish.
Speaker: practice that you think you need to do. And then number four, have a plan for what to do when you're finished. So that gets them, and I set this up because it gets them pink thinking beyond the device. Okay, I'm going to do Spanish for 20 minutes, and then I'm going to go outside and I'm going to, you know, clean out the rabbit cage that needs cleaned out. And then I'm going to play with my little sister. And it also gives me, you know, with the Ask Parents permission, it also gives me the ability to say, actually, you could clean the rabbit cage first, and then you come in and do your
Speaker: 20 minutes on Spanish and then go play with your sister. That's a great rule and I'm going to go ahead and switch it up for you there. Yeah, that's perfect. In fact, that reminds me of the article we quoted in our other episode 110. It's an article from Medium about a father who did a screen detox and how he re -implemented them. And that's exactly what he said is that he said they always made a plan for what they were going to do afterwards. In fact, they even had a visualization practice where they imagined shutting the iPad off, going outside and playing in the sprinkler or whatever.
Speaker: And he said it was mind blowing how much difference it made that the kids were very mindful on their screens and then very, it was much easier for them to shut it down and move on. Love that.
Speaker: Um, and then, you know, have the kids be involved with this as well. When you're ready to re implement, sit down with everyone and decide where you want to go from here. Uh, share again, the behaviors you noticed before and the changes you've seen. Cause sometimes kids can't notice that, right? You might want to say, Hey, did you notice that so -and -so was always begging for screens before we did this. And now he plays with his friend every single day outside for hours. Isn't that amazing? So awesome. Um, talk about the benefits and then you can decide together. If, when, how, uh, screens will be a part of your life.
Speaker: So communicate with them that this is not a one -time thing. It might happen again. If things get out of hand again, and it probably will because like we're saying, they're designed to be addictive. And so you're probably going to notice as their parent, you have the responsibility to notice if they're getting addicted or needing a detox again and tell them.
Speaker: we will probably be doing a detox again in the future, not as a punishment, but as a way to help us do a cleanse and clean our systems and get all healthy and invigorated again, because this is the way, like we can't go back as much as I wish we could. Sometimes we can't go back to the time and era before there were screens. They will be a part of our kids' future. I mean, just look at the past two years and everybody had to use screens to continue working, you know, Zoom calls and school and everything.
Speaker: They're not going away, but we need to teach, we have the responsibility to teach our kids how to be healthy in their use of them. Right. And I think, I thought that just occurred to me too, is that it's important to make sure your kids understand the value of healthy screens, right? You can say things like, aren't you so grateful that we have the opportunity to FaceTime grandma, even though she lives across the country. It's amazing. Isn't it fantastic that we got to stay on top of our schoolwork, even when schools were shut down?
Speaker: you know, et cetera, et cetera. And then to balance those healthy behaviors with maybe less healthy behaviors, right? If they're into games or movies or whatever else, you know, how can we balance the healthy and the unhealthy usage, moderate then healthy, and then make sure we have plenty of outdoor time as well. And when we talk about this like a toxic substance, it makes me think of like binging junk food, right? Like when's the last time you had a holiday weekend? Oh, I don't know, Memorial Day?
Speaker: or we just ate a bunch of garbage all weekend and then come Monday or Tuesday in this case, I just really needed a salad. So it's kind of like the detox is kind of like your kid's brains needing the vegetables, right? So you give them the boredom and the outdoor time, the ability to use your imagination, interact socially, see the world through their own eyes instead of the eyes of the screen. That's giving your kid a salad after a whole bunch of garbage. So, you know, think about it that way.
Speaker: All right. So now we want to, most of what we have said applies to kids. It's going to vary by your house, but for most of what we've said so far applies to kids at our house. This is under 15 and under 14 and under basically before they have their own device. Um, so, and, and we give our kids devices when, when they are, when they have a job or when they have a driver's license, they'll be away from us. And then it's kind of like a safety thing.
Speaker: So, now let's talk about screen time detox and older kids. Because these are the kids that we have given tools, hopefully you parents have been giving your older kids tools to be able to observe and notice their own
Speaker: screen time usage and when they might need to do a detox themselves. And so we're going to try a little bit to address things that we see in our older kids and how we try to gently help them through that. Right. You know, one thing I wanted to mention right up front is that an addiction by its very nature is pleasurable, right? So it's not very often that someone who is addicted to something will readily admit it.
Speaker: because we all know that an addiction is bad, right? It's excessive usage or an unhealthy usage of something that is not healthy or toxic or whatever. And yet a child who is addicted to screens is probably less likely to say, you know what? I feel a little bit addicted this week. I'm just going to shut my computer down.
Speaker: Usually, they have to rely on some outside sources. Now, what we're trying to teach is that self -moderation, right? So that when they turn 18 and leave the home, they can do that just like we adults try to do that. But it's a struggle for a 40 -year -old too, right? But as they learn that, we have to be able to step in. So that's probably my first thought is don't be afraid to step in with your 15, 16, 17 -year -old and say, hmm, let's evaluate your behaviors. But instead of like the 10 -year -old, you just snatch the phone away. You can sit down and say, let's take a look at your screen time usage. What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker: How have you been feeling? Would you like less time? How do you think you'd feel if you had less time? You know, just make them a partner with you, but to help them be that voice of reason. Yeah, definitely. Respect there. As you know, we have a couple episodes about teenagers, too. So respect there coming into adulthood and at the same time still stand by the rules and boundaries that you have in your own home, especially because they're being an example to the younger kids.
Speaker: And, and depend on your younger kids dragging it up before you. Well, you let so -and -so have a phone at this age. Yeah. But you know, it's all right to say, you know what? That was what we tried and we are not feeling like that worked very well. So we're going to be trying something different with you. Right. So I had three, three thoughts that, um, ways to help these older kids. Um, when maybe we notice something going wrong. Number one, you guys love it when I say this is look at yourself.
Speaker: What's your own screen time usage? How are you modeling screen time usage to your kids? What addicted behaviors do you notice in yourself? Look at yourself, et cetera. Is your device, your screen, more important than them, anyone else? When you have a conversation and a text comes in, how do you respond? Which gets your first attention. So lots and lots and lots of ways to look at yourself first.
Speaker: Um, number two, um, let them figure it out and it's hard to watch and see, but this is again, um, respecting their coming into adulthood and their adulthood. And you just have to, like, we don't walk around telling people at the grocery store. We knew when we noticed them pushing the cart with one hand in their face and a screen and the other hand, we don't tell them what they're doing wrong and that they're addicted. No.
Speaker: Like just let them figure it out themselves and it's hard to watch, but we can't learn lessons for our kids. We have to let them learn. So my third and most preferred way is to work through it with them gently, kindly, as you would a friend or a sibling or someone, another adult in your life. So say, you know, I noticed that when I have had, you know,
Speaker: my screen time usage popped up and told me I had three hours a day on screen time usage this week and I just kind of felt physically nauseous at the end of each day and I had a hard time thinking and collecting my thoughts and I kind of noticed you've maybe been on screens more than usual too. Are you noticing any of these things in yourself or just kindly come to them? You know, I've noticed some behaviors like you're putting
Speaker: your screen before your family and that that's kind of um you know fill in your thoughts about that and uh then just respectfully ask them to you know suggest a detox if that if you think that's appropriate but again just respecting their you know them as a person and they're they're coming into adulthood and then finding the balance between that and them respecting the rules of your home
Speaker: Ooh, I love all of those. You know, the other day, um, I was on Instagram stories talking about video games, um, because my oldest, uh, has built himself his own computer. So this is the first personal device. Well, it's not a personal device, but it's, it's an electronic device that is owned by one of my children. I haven't let anyone have ownership over a device before this because he's almost 16. And I love that he found, figured out the skills to build his own computer. And he was researching all this stuff and learning how to program it and everything.
Speaker: But now he likes to play games on it and I loathe video games. Like one of my biggest pet peeves. So we were talking about it on stories and so many of you had really, really great input. But I did want to share one thing that a friend mentioned because I thought it was just so beautiful. She said that she made it a point to have a relationship with her child around the thing that he loved online. So he loved games as well. So she would sit down with him and just ask him to explain it to her. And I thought, oh my gosh, that sounds horrible.
Speaker: But she said that it was a beautiful experience where he was able to do something that he loved. And instead of her always nagging him to shut it off and come do the chores, she just sat down and wanted to learn about something that he cared about. And whether she liked it or not, she spent that time with him. And she said then off the screens, he was a different person with her, just kind of a really healthy bond between mother and son. And he still often comments about that years later, how much he enjoyed because he's out of the house now, how much he enjoyed sitting with his mom and explaining
Speaker: how his game worked. And I thought that was just a really beautiful way to look at something that might've been kind of annoying that a teenager did, right? And every child is so different, you're probably gonna know which children have more of the addictive personalities, which ones need a little bit more direction, and which ones can just be left alone to learn their lessons all by themselves. But in the end, they learn them eventually. So that's where we gotta get to, and it's scary, but we can do it.
Speaker: Yep, so my final thoughts are just like, on those ages of kids where I have,
Speaker: control and I feel like I have responsibility to help them grow up a healthy childhood and screens will be a part of their life. I don't think they're missing out when I deprive them and do a detox or just take them away totally. And then those kids that are older, like just finding, like using, it can be an opportunity to work on honing your relationship with them.
Speaker: over just this, this other matter that can be so, um, divisive, you know, screen times and how much usage and all that. And like, take courage guys. We're the first generation parenting children that have portable devices that they can take with them. And it's hard. And, you know, maybe, maybe we'll learn some things that we can pass on and
Speaker: We'll definitely probably have done things that we wish we would have done differently, but just keep trying. As long as you're intentional about it, that's the important part that you're trying to do the right thing and the best thing for you and your family. Yeah, that's right. I want to ditto everything you just said. And then the other thing I want to mention is trust your intuition, right? If you believe something is not right or something is going awry with some screens, ask around until you find some solutions.
Speaker: will refer you back to episode 127 about kids who lie. And there's often dishonesty around screens because they are so addictive and because they can get into trouble on them and then they want to hide it. So protect yourself, protect your family, protect your kids, and trust your mom in tuition.
Speaker: Thanks for listening friends. Click the link in the show notes to subscribe to our email and never miss another episode. Show us some love by leaving a review on iTunes or sharing the podcast with a friend. Thanks for all your support. We'll talk to you next week.
