My 6-year-old hates our phones. He of course wants to play with his iPad or my phone when we’re waiting for food at a restaurant or doing some other “boring” activity, but in general he sees my (and my husband’s) phones as an interruption. When we have our noses buried in our phones for too long he points it out and reminds us to put the phone down.

It’s shown me just how addicted I am to screens, but has also given me hope that perhaps he won’t be in such a rush to get a phone of his own once he’s a teenager. Maybe the frustration of having a parent who clearly needs an iPhone intervention will cause him to spend less time staring at the small screen, in the same way that my dad’s heavy drinking caused me to hold off from alcohol until I was well into adulthood.

Or…maybe it’s all just wishful thinking, and my kid will be clamoring to get his hands on a smart phone by the time he’s 9.