How’d you get older teen to break video game addiction

[Anonymous]

At 17, you don’t have much choice. How are his grades? Does he have friends? Unless it is severely affecting his functioning, I’ll leave it alone. That ship has sailed.

If he is not functioning due to his video game addiction, I’ll look for a residential facility similar to a drug addiction facility.

[Anonymous]

All this talk about grades makes me cringe.

Grade inflation and lax grading policies have made grades completely fake. A kid can have all As/Bs and be literally several grade levels below a peer at a nearby private prep school. A kid can have all As/Bs and bomb the SAT and bomb their AP exams. A kid can have all As/Bs and have zero self-discipline because the teachers let them turn in things late, have retakes, and turn in half-assed rubbish for 100% scores.

Fact: Over 50% of *all* American 12th graders have an A average GPA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All this talk about grades makes me cringe.

Grade inflation and lax grading policies have made grades completely fake. A kid can have all As/Bs and be literally several grade levels below a peer at a nearby private prep school. A kid can have all As/Bs and bomb the SAT and bomb their AP exams. A kid can have all As/Bs and have zero self-discipline because the teachers let them turn in things late, have retakes, and turn in half-assed rubbish for 100% scores.

Fact: Over 50% of *all* American 12th graders have an A average GPA.

All the easier and more important to have As. If you can’t even get As with such lax requirements then something is wrong.

[Anonymous]

Honestly, I'd say give it time. I also have a DS 17 and was quite worried about how much he was playing, especially over the last 18 months, but with school starting again and other social activitites it's started to even out, and he's realizing he's got to focus on future planning. At 17 I'm not policing his activities - he'll be out of the house soon and if you're still doing that at 17 there's a good chance you'll still be doing it at 25 while he's living in your basement! Instead of punishing him or taking things away, maybe try engaging him in other activities. Don't just 'sign him up' (again, he should have autonomy at this point) but ask him to do things with you (Top Golf, go for a run, whatever you're into), point out interesting things he might be interested in (I saw that the investment club at your school is meeting next week...) get him engagemed with research on his future (researching college applications, gap year options, summer internshipgs). Or, encourage him to get a job. Unless you've totally failed (and I don't think you have) he'll figure it out - gaming is just an easy fall back to spend time and pretty soon other activities will take over.