Totally agree
The people I’m staying with at the moment have 3 of their grandkids boarding with them for various reasons.
The two “youngest” at 15 and 16, their parents are from out bush and working away, leaving them here to be supervised and “closer” to school,… which is still a daily 200klm pick up and drop off for the Grandparents 5 days a week
The 3rd at 20 years old has been sent here by his parents in Esperance, a small town 700klm away, to allow him more opportunities to find work here closer to the metro region.
It’s a huge shock to me to see three kids this age who are living on a farm property with plenty of room to run, shoot, ride motorbikes, horses etc and plenty of other places to explore and enjoy… and yet NEVER see them outside of their rooms let alone outside doing stuff
My kids growing up on our property were outside at sunrise and back at sunset, only coming back to the house for a drink of water or lunch, always on the go doing anything that their imaginations bought up.
The three kids here don’t have any imaginations, find it very difficult to engage in a conversation with anyone, including their own family, and are generally unhealthy in both mind and body with “mental and emotional issues”.
Pretty sad to see this happening to young kids, and makes me very grateful of how I brought my kids up with limited access to phones/computers/games etc and not allowing them to lock themselves away in a room away from everyone.
Hard to believe that the 20 year old boy is the same age as my Daughter and “can’t find a job” … which is going to happen if he never leaves his room 24/7
He met my Daughter and couldn’t believe she has been working since she was 15 and is now quite a big name in the WA Music Industry and Hospitality management scene…at exactly the same age as him and already 5 years of work experience under her belt.
I’ve been pushing him to get out more and have finally convinced him to apply for the ADF, which he’s currently going through the physical/medical assessment stage, so have my fingers crossed that he gets through, as will completely change his life around for the better.
If he misses out on this, he’s being sent back to Esperance and I can see his future go down the plug hole with it as well
Limiting kids time spent on electronics and encouraging getting outside playing and socialising more might seem like a hard task at the time… but it’s for the benefit of the rest of their lives and their ability to survive as adults in this shit fight we call life!
I dread to think how their kids will turn out in the following generation, but from the way it’s going, there’s not going to be many of them considering the lack of social interactions between the opposite sex and the ability to communicate or form relationships