TELL ME ABOUT IT

Dear Carolyn: My grandsons, 6 and 9, are addicted to video games. If they’re not playing them, they’re asking when they can. If I cut them off, they ask to go home, where limits are not usually enforced. There’s one exception: They love to swim, as do I. They belong to a beautiful neighborhood pool, but their mom has told me I can’t take them there except at her invitation, and I’m not allowed to ask or take them to my own club pool. She and her husband say I’m not respecting their boundaries but I feel like I’ve been hogtied. Can you suggest a solution?

– Hogtied

Hogtied: “No.” It’s timeless.

No to video games past the allotted time, and no to their going home to play them.

Then what will the boys do?

Complain, push, mope. But if you stand pleasantly firm on your pleasant “no” of conviction, eventually they will get the message.

I’ve stuck to your part in this alone, because the answer there is universal and up to you, but there’s room for discussion with the kids’ parents, too. Ask for a sit-down, say you pushed against the pool ban not to challenge their boundaries, but because it’s the one thing you know of that gets the boys off screens without a fight. (Right?) So it was desperation, not disrespect.

Then ask for their help in figuring out alternatives. Can they suggest other things the kids enjoy when screen time is up? Parks, hobbies, games, sports? Is there something these parents have wanted the kids to try, learn, attend that you could help make happen? Is there a reason for the pool restriction?

Short version: Present yourself as an eager deputy in rearing these children on the parents’ terms – a deputy who needs maybe an idea or two for getting the job done without outsourcing to PlayStation.