Parenting Is Futile

Why it's still worth the effort and how might you save a life and never realize.

Most of the effort you put into parenting will ultimately be a waste of time.

For decades, parents pour most of their conscious energy into setting their children up for success. You guide them through the game of life, teaching your kids rules and instilling good values. However, many of the choices that shape their lives and determine their outcomes will happen beyond the reaches of your influence.

Across the decades though, could one or two things you say or do still end up drastically altering their path?

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A Brief Summary Of Parenting (Graeme’s Version)

The early years are a game of 'keep it alive’. Pure survival and helping your child understand how to gradually take over those duties. Eat food (not polystyrene). Drink water (not dirty bathwater). Sleep settles the mind. Poo goes in the toilet. Don’t throw yourself down stairs. Sharp things hurt and are dangerous.

Then school begins. They begin to exist and stay alive without you hovering at their back. Have fun! But be good. Follow the rules. Be kind to others. You want academic success for them, but balance avoiding applying the pressure of expectation. They’re still so young, after all.

Nothing leans on the fast-forward button of life more than having kids so before you know it, you’ve got a teenager on your hands. You can now apply all the pressure you like about school because they will say they don’t care what you think anyway (even if they do). Their identity is forming and they need you more than ever as they navigate that through the emotional maelstrom of puberty, yet they actively push you away because you’re not cool any more. They swing from outrageous rudeness to deeply vulnerable sensitivity at the drop of a hat and you need to have the appropriate safety net ready for both.

The tides of independence lap ever more strongly on their shores. Soon it will be high school. Then driving. Then *poof*. Missing them for a day at school will turn into missing them for a semester at college.

It’s clear to see that your influence on the paths your children take diminishes throughout this journey. At the same time, the impacts of the choices they make become more critical and longer-lasting. After all, if careers were decided while you were still enjoying splashing around them in the bath, the world would be full of astronauts, truck drivers and ballerinas.

This is a scary thing to be confronted with. It plays into a viral stat doing the rounds this year:

By the time your child is twelve, you’ve spent 75% of the time with them that you’ll ever spend. By the time they’re eighteen, 90% of your time is done.

I’ve spent a while going back and forth on this with my friend, Josh. It forces us to confront a sobering reality but have both wondered (especially me with both my kids older than 12) if it’s an exaggeration for effect. We’ve both pondered what a mathematical proof might look like (especially Josh as a former mathlete). If either of us gets around to firing up Google Sheets and taking it on in the name of veracity, I’ll be sure to share it.

All of that said, how much better would I feel if I found out I’m only a paltry 65% done with my time with my 12-year-old? Other factors on the shelf for discussion:

• If we accept the purpose of the time is ‘making a difference’ rather than ‘absolute hours’ then do we need an influence coefficient as the kids get older?

• (Trigger: morbidity). Do we need to borrow actuarial models of life expectancy to factor in our likely dates of death? What if I ride a lot of helicopters or juggle knives? (I don’t, btw.)

• If bath-time wishes of a career as a pilot are becoming sticky, does we need a ‘geographical proximity coefficient? (After all, yours truly disappeared to a different continent somewhat out of the blue 9 years ago.)

In me, at least, the search for precision and my questioning of the model belies a desire to escape the uncomfortable inevitably of the message. The sands of time and influence are always running out, no matter how you frame your coefficients and assumptions.

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Terrifying Lessons From Euphoria

During COVID, I happened upon a series on HBO that rocked my perspectives on parenting.

Euphoria, winner of 9 Emmy awards, follows a group of high school students as they navigate love and friendships in a world of drugs, sex, trauma and social media.

Now, it’s been a long time since I’ve been in high school so I didn’t think I’d be target market but I gave it a try. The show begins sharply, thrusting you into Zendaya’s frankly stunning portrayal of addiction as Rue Bennett and the increasingly desperate steps her mother is taking to save her from it. There are some pretty messed up parents on this show, but Rue’s mom is not one of them. Dedicated, loving, willing to sacrifice anything for Rue.

The show centers around the high schoolers, throwing their lives and bodies around with careless abandon. However, the story of each character is set in motion and originated in some way by their parents.

So how did Rue, the main protagonist, end up like this? As a young teen, she sat and watched as cancer slowly took her father. Desperate to cope with her pain and grief as he suffered, she dipped into her dad’s oxycodone and the path was irrecoverably set. No bad dogs, a horrible tragedy, one bottle of pills left unattended by a nurse and thus began an experience that no parent would want for their child.

Least of all Rue’s mom, for whom there had been no realistic chance of stopping this. All the organic baby food, tummy time, positive reinforcement, manners, academic support and love - washed away in one moment.

Without giving away too many spoilers, consider this. Your dad has a secret gay NSFW self-filmed movie collection which he keeps very well protected from you. Mom suspects this is a thing but would rather not know so turns a blind eye. Dad denies his true self to protect the home and family he built to support you. You use your near-adult computer skills to hack and sneak your way into finding and watching it. Whose fault is it that you subsequently become a sexually aggressive psycho?

Each episode in Series 1 covers a different character and the influence of their parents. Some of them are wantonly selfish and careless, for sure, but in most cases they are thoroughly well-intended recognizable archetypes of many parents you probably know, who have suffered some combination of the unfortunate events that life throws at people without their choosing.

Two uncomfortable truths for me:

• Even if you get it all right, life will expose them to circumstances and people who make it very easy for them to make bad choices, or be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Life is unfair sometimes and you can’t do anything about that. You can’t protect them from everything.

• You can do your best as a parent, but one wrong move under intense pressure from life’s rollercoaster can trigger a spiral of events that has devastating impacts on your kids.

You must always give it everything and stack the deck in their favor and prepare them to make the best choices at all times. It might make all the difference, even if you never know that it did.

I do my best as a parent but can see that I regularly get it wrong. So scary. Load up HBO and watch Euphoria if you dare.

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A World Full Of Cheap Dopamine Addiction Traps

Let’s return to the happy path and assume that you keep your child free of opioids and abusive relationships. The dangers of the online world feature heavily in Euphoria too.

Say you’re able to have great relationships with them and pass on all of your hard-won wisdom of how to be a successful kid. There’s nothing better than saving your child from a mistake or a situation which tortured your existence when you were younger. However, the world is changing at such a rapid rate these days. Dating apps were never a mainstream thing until I was married. Social media and even mobile phones were not something I had to contend with until adulthood.

So how can you watch out for your offspring when they are navigating waters that you never had to sail in?

1. Learn The Ropes

You might never fully understand an experience you’re not immersed in but getting a better understanding of it can position you so much better to help. How can you decide whether to let them download Discord if you don’t know what’s on there any how people use it?

Learning the basics of the platforms your child uses. This could involve reading articles, watching tutorials, or even creating accounts on these platforms yourself. Understanding how these platforms work, what kind of interactions they facilitate, and what their privacy settings are can help you better comprehend the digital environment your child is navigating.

2. Open Dialogue

Maintain an open line of communication with your child about their online activities. Ask them to show you their favorite apps and how they use them. This not only helps you understand the technology but also encourages your child to discuss their online experiences, including any problems they encounter. If it’s a social platform, download it yourself and connect with them. Regular conversations can make it easier for them to come to you with concerns or questions.

3. Set Boundaries and Monitor

Together with your child, set reasonable boundaries for technology use that align with your family’s values. This might include limits on screen time, rules about which platforms are appropriate, and expectations about behavior online. Use parental controls if necessary, but also respect their privacy and foster trust. Monitoring doesn’t mean spying; it’s about ensuring they're using technology safely and responsibly.

As we’ve already learned, you have to undertake all of this knowing that it cannot possibly prevent all harm that might be out there lurking online. But if you want to give them the best possible chance, these are a pretty good start.

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Becoming a parent is incredibly difficult and is one of the biggest perspective shifts you will ever experience.

You go into it with everything you’ve got, aspiring to be a perfect role model. You will never feel like you’re doing a good enough job, and you know that your guidance can’t and won’t be the answer to every situation.

Yet you never stop giving because you know that one moment of care in a tough spot may make all the difference. That one decision you might create to call for help when they’re stuck could be critical, even if it’s not you that they call. And as with all risk mitigation, you may never get the satisfaction of knowing the amazing impact it’s had. That’s why we keep trying, no matter what.

That’s sacrifice. That’s love. That’s parenting.