There is a powerful statement that is frequently being used by teenagers “I don’t even like scrolling anymore… it just feels better than talking.” They are not being rude, or trying to avoid schoolwork. They are just overwhelmed. They are not trying to escape their responsibilities, they are just looking for a place to breathe. The only place they feel heard, or accepted is on a screen, not across the dining table, or in a classroom.
So many of our teenagers are hiding. In the glow of social media. Behind “I’m fine.” Behind sarcasm, side-eyes, silence. Not because they are uninterested in us, their parents and teachers , but because they do not feel understood by us. They have learned that it is safer to mask emotions than to risk being dismissed, misunderstood, or told, “When I was your age…”
It is not that we adults do not care. We do. Desperately. But often, in our desire to protect, guide, or correct, we forget to do the simplest thing: listen, and do not judge.
Recently, during a reflective writing exercise, one of our students from Crawford International School, Rafael, wrote to his future self: “I hope you remember how hard it was to be 17 and scared of being average. I hope you remember how you smiled in public and fell apart in private. Please, future me, don’t make your child feel like they need to earn love.”
Another, Nyambura, penned this: “One day, you’ll be the mum. Just promise you’ll ask, ‘How are you really?’ and then wait for the real answer. Not the polite one.”
These are not attention-seekers. These are young people quietly longing for connection. It is easy to miss these moments when we focus only on performance. But children are not only learners. They are becoming. They are forming identities, negotiating peer pressure, battling self-doubt, and quietly wondering if they are enough.
Sometimes, we mistake rebellion for rudeness, and detachment for disinterest. But let me tell you: I’ve met the “disinterested” ones. They’re often the most thoughtful — just too wounded to risk vulnerability again. When adults react with punishment rather than curiosity, students learn to disappear.
Where do they go?
They hide in plain sight. In long showers. In overly loud music. In hours of YouTube. In watching others live, because they feel frozen in their own stories. In group chats that offer them humour and honesty — things they wish they had at the dinner table. And sometimes, sadly, they hide in perfection. In getting top grades not out of passion, but because it is the only time their parents say, “Well done.”
We must ask ourselves honestly: Do our children feel safer online than at home? Do they feel freer with strangers than with us?
This is not a guilt trip. Parenting is hard. In fact, parenting is the one job we’re thrown into with no formal training, no induction course, no 90-day probation. And teenagers don’t come with user manuals. They come with moods, playlists, hormones, and hard questions like “Why do I exist?” — usually asked at bedtime.
We can learn to pause before reacting. To say, “That sounds tough” instead of “Get over it.” We can unlearn the belief that authority equals distance. We can relearn the beauty of presence — the kind that does not rush to fix, but chooses to sit, breathe and understand.
We will not always say the right things. But our children are not asking for perfect parents. They are asking for honest ones. For ones who say, “I’m learning too.” For ones who can admit, “I didn’t get it right yesterday, but I want to do better today.” The truth is teenagers are listening, watching, waiting for parents to stop performing adulthood and start living it. To take off the masks and meet them, not with lectures, but with listening.
In the words of one final student letter:
“Dear future me, remember — they were not hard to love. You just forgot how to listen.”
By William Mwangi, Careers Advisor & Principal of Senior School, Crawford International School