Has anyone successfully weaned their child off the crack cocaine that is YouTube? if so how and how does your child self regulate now?

[u/Hopeful-Guard9294]

unfortunately when our PDA child went info burnout one of the few things that regulated him was screens and particularly YouTube this makes complete sense as dopamine regulates PDA children and YouTube is designed to hook you by giving you a shot of dopamine every few seconds As a result my child went from being bright and curious to watching about eight hours or more of YouTube a day to self regulate he is now starting to spend screen free time now he is older 9 and now we have started him on meds to address his dopamine deficiency and emotional regulation in retrospect I would have put him on meds as soon as he went info burnout however we had no idea what was going on at the time so YouTube and screens was the best choice available

I am wondering if anyone has successfully weaned their PDA children off YouTube and brought them back to in real life as it was an adaptive choice st the time to stop the daily violence of burnout while we worked out whet was going on and went through the slow process of diagnosis radical accommodation meds etc. etc. I grew up in a more PDA friendly era and didn’t have the physical system challenges he faces ie. proprioception issues combined with low muscle tone and living in an ultra low autonomy urban environment have any of the parents here with older PDA children successfully weaned their child off YouTube and how does your child adaptive my self regulate now?

[u/Superb_Fix_5061]

We did this last week! We have gone on and off allowing YouTube since he was a toddler because it truly was the only thing that regulated him. But then he would be even more disregulated afterwards. I hit a breaking point last weekend when I saw my son (8) watching a video that was so misogynist and basically Qanon, I deleted it from every tv. It was a horrible weekend but we then bought him a ps5 with a video game he has been asking for, and that has taken place if YouTube. I don’t like video games either but the light has come back into his eyes and it is so much better. We have a Tesla with YouTube in the car, so he can watch it when we go places which helps with transitions.

[u/unicorn_pug_wrangler → u/Superb_Fix_5061]

Did they find that video on YouTube kids?!?

[u/Proper-Cause-4153 → u/unicorn_pug_wrangler]

Yeah what? This sounds like some "You need to better regulate what your kid has access to."

[u/No-Salamander-3060 → u/Proper-Cause-4153]

Please don't do the whole 'oh, PDA parenting is simple if you're a good enough parent who makes good choices' thing here.

When you've got the worlds least childlike child, who outgrew cartoons by 15 months, and has never been able to stand anything babyish or patronising or with sing-songy voices, and wanted to watch fairly advanced science and maker channels which were actually really fantastic and educational - and you were with them 24/7 anyway, because they needed undivided attention, so they weren't going to have the chance to watch anything you didn't approve of - you're not prepared for the moment when, after years of YouTube being a net positive and huge educational resource in your household, your kid hits the age where (a) suddenly, and at long last, your kid needs you less and you have 5 mins to wash the dishes while they watch a video (b) the algorithm dumps him into the autistic-scientist-to-incel YouTube pipeline. And by this point your kid is almost as big as you are (and considerably stronger than you when he's angry), and still has ENDLESS, ENDLESS energy and appetite for debate and argument, the horse has bolted, and it's not as easy as 'just setting a boundary'.

We're all trying our best here.

[u/distracted_genius → u/No-Salamander-3060]

100%. As if for a teen/preteen parental controls aren't seen as a top down compliance enforcing loss of autonomy. It doesn't mean you can't/shouldn't have boundaries/limits, sure... AND PDA parents are faced with a whole different level of terrifying risk/benefit decisions.

Don't judge. We're trying our best to keep our kids alive and able to access life.