😍 Jess is wonderful and I'm so glad she was willing to share! Her experience is clearly helping others feel seen ❤❤❤

I'm so glad you found content that helped you feel seen and understand yourself better!

I'm glad this was a helpful resource for you! And I hear you wanting professional help to integrate your new understanding of yourself, but being concerned about engaging with the formal diagnosis world in the current political climate. With or without a formal diagnosis, you deserve to understand yourself and what you need to thrive, fully yourself! I have group calls weekly that are a great space for exploring that integration and a coupon for a free one. And some other free calla coming up monthly, as well as 1 on 1 support. Www.jengerardy.com

I'm so glad you enjoyed it! You're completely right that many other behaviors can be maladaptive, it's not limited to screens! Just as with screens, I can't give you a prescriptive answer about "how much is too much", because this is so individual. Some people do have very deep interests and really enjoy immersing themselves thoroughly in one topic or activity, and that isn't a problem in itself. Showing up with curiosity is a good place to start- lots of "why" questions (for yourself, though depending on the child it may be helpful to ask them about what they're enjoying about something) Why am I concerned about this? What am I feeling? What are the patterns here? Sometimes we realize that the concern is just a social idea of what a child "should" be doing with their time, but that actually you and the child both see no problems. Sometimes, what comes up is that you are the one feeling disconnected- this is common if you don't share the child's deep interest so haven't spent much time with them lately, in which case sometimes the answer is to go into their world rather than trying to make them come out. And sometimes, you might realize that the pattern is that when the child is having a hard time, they turn to a certain activity to avoid the situation. Then the next piece would be to think about whether it's a coping strategy that is in line with your family values or not- for example, when my son feels anxious, he likes to run. If he were feeling the need to cope this way for hours a day, I'd probably start looking at why he's feeling so anxious that he's needing to run for hours. But, given that we're living through a global crisis, and virtually everyone is feeling anxious sometimes, running seems like a fairly healthy way to release that emotion- and after a run he's usually much more able to talk about what's going on and problem solve together. Is that helpful? I can offer more thoughts specific to your situation if you want to set up a 1 on 1 coaching call or join a Healing Story Circle and share more about what you're thinking about. For the 2nd part, the specific tools will depend on what things you want to stop doing, and what's making it hard to do so. Therapy, and other methods of talking through these things like Healing Story Circles and coaching sessions, are basically a way of helping you figure out that part, because depending on what you want to change and why it's not happening, there might be specific practices that might help (like changing where and when you use devices) or it might be more helpful to introduce more adaptive coping strategies, so that there's less temptation to turn toward the device.

@@jengerardy thank you for such a detailed reply, Jen, and lots to think about. It's very generous of you and greatly appreciated.