<p>My first post here. Thought I could get some advice from wise parents on this board.</p>
<p>My S starts combined BS/MD program this Fall. When he said he would really like to hang loose this Summer, I agreed wholeheartedly. He had really burnt himself out each Summer in HS either with doc-shadowing, or taking Summer courses at Columbia, and then at Harvard.</p>
<p>This Summer has just barely begun…and I am really beginning to worry about the hours he has spent simply playing videogames. It’s only been 2 full days at home and if he continues this way, I am really afraid that he will be completely obsessed and immersed in this mind-numbing activity the entire Summer.</p>
<p>When I mentioned to him that he ought to mix other activities such as BB, tennis, reading, movies, he says I am trying to run his life.</p>
<p>How do I get him to see that getting overobsessed with videogames will not help him get a good start in College? How can I let him hang loose without getting consumed by this electronic quasi world.</p>
<p>Any advice from some of you wise and experienced parents would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>With it only having been two full days of your son’s summer video game obsession, I don’t think I’d borrow trouble at this point. </p>
<p>Our oldest son is taking a very challenging curriculum at an elite school, and when he comes home for breaks, we support his doing whatever it takes for him to unwind and “regroup.” A kid as driven as your son or mine simply cannot be going full force 24/7/52, or he’s going to burn out.</p>
<p>Our “intellectual” son LOVES video games also. He doesn’t play them when he’s in the midst of a school semester, but when he comes home to chill, it’s something that he enjoys as a mindless pasttime, and we MORE than realize that he needs some “mindless” pasttimes.</p>
<p>To me, videogames become a problem when they take over the life of the gamer and become the <em>only</em> thing that the kid cares about. That is very obviously not the case for your son as he seems to be a highly accomplished young man. Banning or severely limiting something only serves to make it more enticing. A kid as driven as your son won’t stay obsessed in this sort of activity to the exclusion of everything else for long!</p>
<p>My suggestion? Don’t say anything, and let time works its magic. I’m sure you’ll see your son engaging in all sorts of interesting and fun summer activities soon!</p>
<p>I’d like to hang loose too. But a job, wife, business, 2 kids & associated school loans, plus a mortgage and the general necesities of living tend to get in the way.</p>
<p>Give him a week. If it goes beyond that, I’d give him a to do list of minor stuff he can do to offset the general mess kids leave while living at home.</p>
<p>If that doesn’t get done, I’d suggest killing the circuit breaker for the video game. </p>
<p>If he is astute enough to find the dead breaker, I’d give him another week. </p>
<p>After that, I’d cut the power cord, and the controller cords, and suggest he make himself useful.</p>
<p>Just my $.02, but I find idleness annoying.</p>
<p>Son comes home from college and spends 12 hr. shifts on one particular computer game until he gets it out of his system. He’s fine.</p>
<p>He does not take it to school with him. That would spell disaster.</p>
<p>They play a ton of smash brothers at college…mindless, numbing group fun. I don’t get it but they love it. It’s social silly and competitive. Okay for chilling out.</p>
<p>I’d be worried if it went on for over a week steady.</p>
<p>I agree with those who don’t think you need to step in right yet. Mother of Son here, so like others who have spoken, have been in at least somewhat similar situations.</p>
<p>This is how we handled it when DS was only about 13-14-15 and we thought he was beginning to overdo computer gaming. We told him we didn’t want to have to entertain the idea of monitoring his computer use, setting time limits on how much time he could spend on it each day. But that we <em>would</em> do both of the above if we didn’t see him creating his own balance (exactly the kind of activities you want to see back in the mix). It worked. He set his own balance of time with friends, his music, sports, outdoor activities etc. and dialed back the RPG.</p>
<p>Don’t know if this would work with an 18 year old (or older), as you don’t necessarily have the same clout and parental controls. The key is, I believe, acknowledging that it is his life, that you actually don’t want to run it and know that he can handle creating his own balance. So if you can come up with a short dialog that he might buy into along those lines, it might help.</p>
<p>I don’t care about the mind numbing video gaming as much as the stuff that seems to accompany it- </p>
<p>Lots of glazed-eyed kids sitting around a darkened room eating me out of house and home, leaving crumbs, cups, bowls and plates of half eaten, sticky goopy food all over the place, taking off shoes, socks, and shirts and dumping them in the family room, sitting on the furniture in their wet baggies, leaving damp towels and wetness for me to sit in later that day, lolling around listening to the phone ring and ring and ring even though they’re only four feet away while I’m in the shower because they’re too lazy to go pick it up, using up all the ICE and never replacing any, and worst of all, forgetting to switch the cable back over before exitting, leaving me to figure out how to get the damn TV back on the way it was, which takes a cable technician to figure out with all the remotes connected to who-knows-what.</p>
<p>I agree with the other posts, just let it go.</p>
<p>I have been where you are and it does seem obsessive-but finally the game ends. It is a good break for some kids. I used to sit and watch sometimes because I’m interested and discovered how much chatter was going on with the online gaming.</p>
<p>John graduated on a Monday. The following Monday was his birthday. For a solid week he did nothing but play “Source Forts.” This last Tuesday, his mother and I began harassing him mercilessly. Today, he landed a job and he starts Monday. Problem solved!</p>
<p>Years ago, my husband was laid off from a company he’d founded and built to 150 employees. His group was disbanded after the company was acquired, and he asked to be laid off as well.</p>
<p>Then he spent the next six weeks playing computer games non stop. Seriously; he slept about 4 hours a night and spent the rest of the time on MY computer. After he wrote the company president about a bug he’d found (“when you get to a billion points, it rolls to zero”), they asked him to test a bunch of games they were introducing. He did that, and he also started a second career. Once he’d spent enough time being braindead.</p>
<p>Ten years after that, he quit his high-powered job (to deal with his non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma) and the next thing I knew he was spending ten to twelve hours every day on bicycling. Now we run a bike business.</p>
<p>I think any kid who is about to spend 8 years of his life immersed in a BS/MD program can spend LOTS of time playing video games. Give him time to let his brain recover from the work of high school. Really.</p>
<p>I notice that my sons use gaming to decompress or to ready themselves for a big transistion.</p>
<p>Many years ago, one of my friends lost her young son to daily drug use–acid in fact. She told me she longed for the days when he ‘used’ the computer. I took those words on board.</p>
<p>However, I don’t stop yapping at mine. My sons know that I think they use gaming as a form of ‘numbing’. They know that ‘numb’ isn’t the best way to go through life–especially an exciting bit like age 18. I push them to drop the gaming for socializing. Then I follow up with praise and comments about the happy moods that follow socializing–vs the ‘numb’ moods that follow gaming. In my experience, these are good topics to articulate to boys.</p>
<p>Don’t worry though–they do catch on when the get to uni and the girls roll over their eyes at the nerds who do nothing but sit in front of the computer.</p>
Yes. When my aforementioned S appeared to be headed for our notion of the tipping point of too much time with RPG, we talked it over with our hs social worker. A true gem. This was also her take on things - not for every kid, but for a lot of kids including mine. That there are a lot worse things for teens to resort to - drugs, alcohol… And that the computer can actually be a healthy avoidance mechanism for high school teens, as an alternative to the undesirable party scenes that are the focus of some of their peers.</p>
<p>I don’t totally buy it. I’d rather there be no drugs, no drink and no mega-hours with the screen and mouse. But it is a point worth considering.</p>
<p>The high points of ocmputer use in my son’s lives were the most difficult social years, the years with the most peer pressure–ages 13 to 16–and the most parental conflict. By the age of 18, they were both casual users. The 21 year old would rather read a book now. Both would rather see friends and girlfriends.</p>
<p>Any addictive behavior can be disturbing and disruptive to a normal lifestyle. I’ve seen kids who hole themselves up for days/weeks playing video games and are quite anti-social. NOT healthy.
I’ve seen kids (hell, I think I HAVE kids) who go out and party, drink, occasionally. Probably brag about it like a lot of college students do. But they’re not addicts, or alcoholics.</p>
<p>There is a balance in everything, no matter what it is. You need to be able to socialize and you need to be thoughtful. You need to meditate, be alone, regenerize in your own way. Whatever it takes, whether it’s walking along a seashore, running cross country, playing video games, playing the piano…</p>
<p>I’d try to make sure that he’s more or less weaned off the video games by the end of the summer. And don’t let him take the video game contraption off to school in the fall. BS/MD programs are demanding, and he won’t want to blow it right out of the chute.</p>
<p>We have a friends whose eldest son, a good student, went off for his freshman year a good university and got heavily into video games while he was there. He ended up spending pretty much all his time in his dorm room doing nothing but playing video games. Needless to say he was eventually turned out of school for failing all his classes.</p>
<p>After taking a couple of gap years there is talk he might be allowed back in this fall on some kind of probation. Hopefully he is cured of his addiction.</p>
<p>We used to worry about our 2 sons and their excessive game use. Seemed like every time they got a new game, they would spend hours a day on it, only breaking to eat and go to the bathroom. At first we restricted their time, but that just seemed to lead to sneaking around (waking up at 2 am to play until 6 am). Finally I said play all you want - it took less than 2 weeks and they both found other things to do. Now when they get a new game, they play non-stop for maybe 3-4 days and then the “mystique” is over. </p>
<p>WOW was a tough one. We had to actually cancel the subscription. S now says that one was addictive and he won’t be taking it to college.</p>
That’s the beauty of unfettered youth…<em>sigh</em></p>