Parents must vigilantly block the terrifying videos out there

EVERYDAY in my clinic I meet some wonderful children who are scared to be by themselves. Maybe they have nightmares and are scared to sleep in their own beds. Or too scared to sit in the lounge by themselves. Why? This is the first question I ask. Generally their concerned parent says they do not know, they just started to worry or panic many months ago.

Hoping it would simply disappear just as quickly as it started they waited and waited. The condition, however, continued.

The first question I ask children is what it is they dream about, or worry about, or are scared of happening.

They often describe in graphic detail a character, a scene in which they are hurt or a fear of someone breaking in and stealing them. After we have worked through this we talk about where they might have seen something similar?

They have always seen something – whether it be on YouTube, the internet, the TV, a computer game or perhaps heard a kid tell a scary story.

I could name the current handful of disturbing videos, games, themes that are working their way around primary schools now.

“What’s the big deal?” parents often ask me. Or they say: “My child knows what they are allowed to watch. I trust them.” Well, it’s not about trust … often it’s about what they accidentally watched. It’s about what someone else told them or what they played in a game.

Should they stop visiting their friends? Well, sometimes you certainly want to be picky about where they go, it is also about equipping them with the skills to say “Hmm, let’s go outside and kick a ball” when the game their friend wants them to play is obviously MA rated and they are in primary school.

It’s about censoring and knowing what books they are buying from the book club. Five Nights at Freddy’s is not suitable for any child in primary school, no matter what they say.

It’s not even suitable to talk about or certainly not to take to school. Have you heard them talk about Five Nights at Freddys and then find they are too scared to have a shower or walk down your hallway?

Then it’s time to educate yourself. It’s about children who disappear, are eaten and hidden in robots with graphic detail about decomposing bodies, it’s about children surviving the night before they are taken, it’s about parents not being able to see the kidnappers.

You need to censor this from you child.

You need to have parental controls enacted on all your devices to stop this content popping up in your child’s innocent watching of some funny YouTube videos. Because once they have seen it they cannot then unsee it and then they cannot be by themselves.

These are issues our parents did not have to worry about or act as censors.

You, however, must do so for the emotional safety of your children.

Please don’t just assume they will be all right and know what they are doing.

Once I point this out to parents, and I do daily, they are quite shocked and surprised the affect the video is having on their child’s emotional wellbeing and how they could have prevented it.