When my daughter April was little, she and my husband had a bedtime ritual that went on forever, one of those tender, drawn-out dialogues only a child and her dad could create.

Death Readiness Dispatch

November 28, 2025

Hi there,

 

When my daughter April was little, she and my husband had a bedtime ritual that went on forever, one of those tender, drawn-out dialogues only a child and her dad could create.

 

It always started with the same two questions:
“What are you grateful for?”
“What do you have to put away?”

 

Those simple questions taught April to check in with herself, to notice what filled her up and what weighed her down. But kids grow up. Their worlds expand. Their fears get heavier. And suddenly, “What do you have to put away?” shifts. It becomes less about the small worries of childhood and more about the heavy, hidden things teenagers carry— shame, pressure, cyberbullying, predators, and algorithms that pull them in too deep.

 

And here’s the terrifying part of parenting teenagers: You don’t always know what they’re carrying, because they don’t want you to know.

 

Back then, everything April feared could be kept out with a deadbolt. But somewhere along the way, the monsters relocated. They stopped lurking outside in the dark. Now they live inside apps, algorithms, and anonymous accounts.

 

Locked doors don’t protect our kids anymore, because the danger isn’t outside. It’s in their hands.

Why Your Teen’s Brain Can’t Outrun the Algorithm

On a long drive from Nashville to Michigan last week, I binge-listened to all ten episodes of Left to Their Own Devices, a podcast hosted by Ava Smithing. This podcast is unsettling in the way truth often is, not sensational, just brutally honest about what’s already happening in our kids’ digital lives.

 

When Ava’s mental health was pulled under by the Instagram algorithm as a young teenager, she didn’t even have a smartphone. My 14-year-old daughter, April, doesn’t either. She can’t join group chats or send or receive images. But Ava had an iPad. And April has one, too.

 

I can’t keep April away from social media forever. She’ll need to develop the skills to recognize what’s harming her, to manage pressure, and to moderate her own use the same way I have to moderate mine.

 

And that starts with conversations. Real ones, repetitive ones, annoying ones, the kind she’ll roll her eyes at. If your teenager is anything like mine, she already knows everything. Except the things she really doesn’t.

4 Realities Every Parent Needs to Understand

The pressure is constant, curated, and monetized.

Predators are organized and financially motivated adults. Kids often feel trapped and hopeless before they ever reach for help.

They’re engineered to find insecurities and amplify them until they’re overpowering.

It’s not just documents. It’s talking about the hard things before a crisis hits. It’s about protecting our kids in a world very different from the one we grew up in. Because silence is far more dangerous than another awkward conversation with your teen.

Thanks for being here,