But Will They Ever Sleep?

Devices and video games are so prevalent that some kids can’t imagine a day (or sadly an hour) without them. When we were traveling in the Cook Islands, we met a woman who works with addicts and some of her main clients now are parents of screen-addicted kids. Some of the gnarliest rage moments she’s heard of have come from kids whose parents have blocked them from screen time.

We don’t have cell phones, so we never have to get asked to borrow our phones. We allow one hour a month of video game time because we see how it changes the flow of a day – even just an hour per child changes their interests, their vibe, and their interactions. No way do I want every weekend to begin with screen time as the tone-setter. Never do I want it a part of every single day! Sure, you say, they may rebel someday and want to go overboard. (As some people knee-jerk say.) But I’d rather their neuropathways of these first 18 years be built in the areas of ingenuity, creativity, and play. It’s way too easy to ruin a good brain on a daily screen addiction.

One friend of my son’s has no idea what to do after half an hour of playing at our house. He knows video games aren’t an option, so he begs to go to the library to play them there. When we decline, he bides his time until he finally gets to go home to his screen. In the meantime, my son has no idea how to entertain him. Even play isn’t easy for the boy anymore. The only thing that’s interesting and easy is screen time. Thankfully, that isn’t the case with the other kids so far, but I’m scared for him. I hope he’s not already done for.

Unfortunately, once they are our older son’s age, so many kids are so steeped in screen time that they live at the library after school and in the summer because that’s where the computers and WiFi are. There’s one boy his age who is there on a computer every single time I go in the library. The boy needs a job! (Working for his grandfather doing outside labor!) How thankful I am that my son has three! Sometimes, as my son learned of his peers, they are up routinely until 3 AM, right alongside their parents on screens.

This is the most crazy thing, in my opinion – well, aside from parents not parenting kids or themselves – the lack of sleep. We think sleep is expendable. It’s not. All of the important things of the body need long, deep, restful sleep to continue functioning properly. Not short sleep or sleep continuously punctuated by little dings and quick texts. The twenty-somethings of today were the tweens of yesterday who reveled in the modern age’s new phone technology. Some of them slept with their phones on their pillows. But they didn’t ever really sleep.

When consistent sleep doesn’t happen, breakdown does. Memory, sight, digestion, balance, confidence, and optimism go right away. I know! Two weeks ago I happened upon a Shutterfly deal that I’d never seen before. I stayed up five nights in a row until 1:30 AM making two family photo albums that I had fallen behind on. I could get each one for $20 instead of $100, so I was motivated to get them done. Then I made an album for each of my siblings of our recent sibling reunion trip to New Orleans. It’s silly, really – exchanging health for a deal. Even though I saved over $500 by staying up late and making the album deadline, my body hasn’t quite caught up. Neither has my vision; nor my memory. If I were to do that all the time, would they ever restore at all?

Now imagine kids, whose bodies are growing. If they aren’t going to bed until 2 or 3 AM routinely, they’re gonna be toast. Zombified. Brain dead, unmotivated, wiped out before they ever reach adulthood.

But here’s what I wonder…

When kids these days go to college and finally have complete freedom, will they ever sleep? No one will be there to tell them to go to bed. Screens will keep them sucked in. Will they only crash when everything around them has too? Grades, bills, life potential?

There is already enough to worry about when kids go off to college – drinking, drugs, sex, pornography, pregnancy. But sleep. Wow. I’m not sure you can recover from four years without sleep. What am I saying? Some kids’ parents will write their college essays for them because they’ll already be in a 10-year sleep deficit to begin with.

That sleep thing really scares me. And I was already scared enough by the other stuff! No one ever seems to think about sleep’s importance. I know a few parents who don’t know how to help their kids’ problems with listlessness, depression, and near-suicide. They’d laugh off the idea of sleep lack. It’s so seemingly insignificant.

Think about a world 30 years from now. We already know our technology will be out there, our population will be too, and our food may be sparse. What will humans be like? Dare I say the world will be run by the ones who get sleep, and the rest will be drooling? That is, until the artificial intelligence takes over us all anyway…

You see how sleep deprivation has stolen my optimism?

Well, have a happy day!

Photo by Meredith Griffith