Cindy Lopez: There’s a lot of talk right now about AI and the way kids access and use technology. It’s in daily life through entertainment and even in places like school. At Children’s Health Council, we believe technology can be a force for good in the communities that support and educate kids. And families are a child’s first support system, with educators there right alongside with them. So that’s why we created Ellis. Ellis is a chat-based resource for educators that provides evidence-aligned guidance, drawn from trusted expertise. And we use AI to surface that guidance quickly. Over the past year, our team at CHC has worked thoughtfully behind the scenes to build Ellis in a way that supports educators who support your children. So, when teachers encounter challenging moments, whether a student is struggling with focus, anxiety, behavior, or learning differences, they can describe what they’re seeing and receive meaningful guidance in one place. Grounded in over 70 years of CHC experience, Ellis helps educators respond with clarity and consistency, so students receive thoughtful study support from their teachers. You can learn more at askellis.org or find the link in our show notes to share with your favorite teacher.

Welcome. My name is Cindy Lopez, the host of this CHC podcast, Voices of Compassion. We hope you find a little courage, feel connected and experience compassion every time you listen.

In this candid conversation, two high schoolers from CHC’s Teen Collaborative talk with guest host, Natalie Tamburello, our CHC Community Engagement Manager, about what it’s really like to navigate mental health and our culture today. They speak openly about burnout and therapy and family dynamics, identity, and the emotional weight many teens carry managing mental health under the pressures of academics and social comparison and the constant push to perform, and they also talk about what they really need from the adults in their lives. Big hint, if you’re a parent of a teen, listening beats problem solving. So whether you’re a parent or a teen, this episode offers honest perspective and practical insight on building better communication across generations. 

The CHC Teen Collaborative brings together high schoolers from six youth-focused organizations to lead mental health change in their communities. The organizations include Aim Youth Mental Health, allcove, Bring Change to Mind, Challenge Success, My Digital TAT2, Safe Space, and the Taarika Foundation.

Natalie Tamburello: I’m Natalie Tamburello, and I’m excited to guest host today’s episode discussing the generational differences of mental health from the perspective of two teens from our CHC Teen Collaborative.

Welcome, Cailey and Brian. Can you each take a minute to tell our listeners a little bit more about yourselves and why this topic is important to you?

Cailey: Hi everyone. My name is Cailey. I am a senior at Palo Alto High School, and I am here representing My Digital TAT2 on the CHC Teen Collaborative. In school I’m in Varsity cheer. I’m a captain. I’m also doing varsity track right now because it’s springtime, and I’m editor in chief of my school student travel magazine. And I’m here today because I have a lot of experience with stress and mental health, especially attending a really competitive high school. You know, it’s located in Palo Alto near Stanford, and I constantly know the feeling of knowing like you might be falling behind or not good enough.

Brian: Hi everyone. My name is Brian. I’m a senior at Lynbrook High School, which is also a really competitive high school here in the Bay Area. I think most recently it was deemed one of the top 10 high schools in California, so it’s a lot of pressure to keep up with the academics. Some fun facts about me is that most recently I can’t stop talking about books and movies. And I have a dream of reading a book a day, but I’m currently close to one every other day. Something else really definitive about me is that I’m really anti-social media and video games. Just, I think, trying to go against the grain here with modern trends, and why I’m here today is that after taking part in many mental health initiatives, it’s become really evident that a non-zero amount of it comes from unhealthy and contentious family relationships. So, that’s something that I hope to focus on today, and I’m really glad to have the opportunity to talk about some of my own experiences and my peers experiences as well. So, thank you.

Natalie Tamburello: Brian, I have to ask, as a non-reader, how long are these books that you’re reading every other day?

Brian: Usually about like 300 to 400 pages.

Natalie Tamburello: That’s a lot of reading.

Brian: Yeah, I also audiobook quite a bit, and with that I’m able to do pretty much like one for one as in like one book a day, which has been really helping me get through the day because I think sometimes just the act of finishing the book is pretty inspirational and pretty motivating.

Natalie Tamburello: Yeah, I love that. So, I’ll start with the first question, which seems like a simple question, but I think it’s actually probably pretty complicated, is what does mental health mean to you?

Brian: Yeah, so I think to me literally it means what we’re dealing with internally. So it’s just kind of like a check-in with our psychological state. So a lot of the times mental health shows up as depression, anxiety, personality disorders, and so much more as we know. And these experiences aren’t nearly talked enough and taken seriously enough, which is one major issue, especially among youth in the Bay. And I mean that because in the Bay, we have this kind of notion that we want to be as productive as possible. I mean, we’re surrounded by all these like big tech people. The expectations are high, the academics are kind of crazy. And so, there’s really no room left for mental health issues. And in building this culture, we’re squashing out like our own needs. And I think that’s something that we really need to address and we really need to start normalizing the fact that sometimes we all just need a little bit of help. And more recently for me it has meant like burnout. And even though I’m in my senior year of high school, I’ve tried piling on more things just because I was a bit bored, but in doing so, I think I feel a little bit stuck sometimes in that I pile on too much. And so I’ve been reading more about burnout. I’ve been sleeping more, and so also checking in with those around you, checking in with yourself for sure.

Cailey: Do you think reading about burnout has like really helped you?

Brian: Yeah, I would say so. Burnout isn’t talked about pretty much at all at school, and so it’s important that you build your own knowledge, and it’s important that you try to do something yourself because I think that I’ve tried to sleep more. I’ve tried to journal more, but learning a bit about it has really helped as well.

Cailey: I completely agree with you. I think that mental health means how you talk to yourself or how you calm yourself down when you’re experiencing lots of pressure, lots of expectations. You might be going through disappointments or experiencing comparison. You know, as I said before, attending high school in the Bay Area is really difficult because even though we’re in all of these extracurriculars, even though we’re spending time trying to do things that we love to kind of balance that, it still makes us feel that we’re not good enough because we’re not doing this, this, this, this. But I think that over time, through my experiences and just maturing, I’ve learned that it’s okay not to be perfect. It’s okay not stressing myself out with so many things, like I know how much I can take.

Natalie Tamburello: So, what do you think that older generations have gotten right about coping with mental health challenges, and what do you think that they’ve gotten wrong? What feels outdated?

Cailey: Yeah, so both sets of my grandparents are actually immigrants from the Philippines, and I think that what they’ve learned is that even when things get hard, they have to just keep going and that grit is just something I personally admire, but I think that what is outdated is the idea that you should not be talking to people when you’re struggling. I’ve actually had multiple discussions with my mom about this and she told me that my grandmother, her mom, actually like instilled the idea in her that if you asked to go see a psychiatrist or go to therapy, my grandma would tell her, no, that’s only for crazy people and to me that was just like appalling. But when I talked about it with my mom, she was just like, yeah, that’s why I raise you and your brother to be open with me and to be able to talk with me because especially in this day and age, it’s just completely different. And she’s been instilling these values in us that I really much value, and I’m super close with her. I think that those ideas have allowed me to be able to feel comfortable confiding in her about everything that’s going on in my life. And I think honestly, I’d be really lost if I didn’t have that sort of relationship with her.

Brian: That’s awesome. And as for my answer, I think I definitely agree with that. There’s this really unhealthy culture that we’ve built up, and we’ve been really doing our best to rewind, , and I think one issue that I’ve been sensing recently is that there’s this notion of like a one size fits all answer. And I think that’s really a bad thing to think about considering that it really depends largely on who we’re speaking to, and what we’re talking about. And I think sometimes too, the older generations can be a little bit entitled, especially as a teenager nowadays, I mean, we know that teenagers have the capacity to think intellectually, maybe not on the same like emotional level, but I think that a lot of times if you’re just brushing off teenagers as though their behavior is part of teenage angst, or you’re saying that you know it’s hormones, you’re not really taking a deep look in the situation and you’re essentially saying that, let’s ignore this and let’s move on. And I think that’s something that has been really harmful and really hurtful for me specifically.  And so being a little bit more understanding within the context of teenagers lives, that would really help us.

Natalie Tamburello: Can you explain, not a one size fits all? Can you explain that a little bit more?

Brian: Maybe what I meant by that was that parents or older generations are like projecting on what they want the youth to do as an extension of what they wanted to do. And I think that’s such a big issue here in the Bay Area because I guess like the rich want to stay rich. And so I think one thing that’s appeared really commonly in my youth, and this has been very, very stereotyped is that there’s the big three. You have to go down business, law, some sort of medicine. And I think that’s really hurtful to teenagers’ mental health, especially if they’re not interested in these big three at all, and particularly this has shown through burnout. A lot of my friends are saying like, “Oh, I really want to go down STEM. I really want to go to do medicine.” But then I ask them, what’s motivating them? And they say money. And I think that’s like a huge issue. You’re going to burn out right away. That’s what I mean by one size fits all and our parents should not be pressing these ideas onto their kids because it’s well intentioned, but it’s definitely harmful.

Natalie Tamburello: As I’m listening to both of you talk, what’s interesting is that you talk about how different it is today versus their experience and Cailey, you talked about your grandparents being immigrants, the difficulties are very different, but they’re still valid. And I think that there’s a hard difference between the generations is that immigrant parents, my grandparents are immigrants as well. They feel like, well, my life was a lot harder than yours is right now. And so therefore you shouldn’t have the mental health challenges that maybe I had, but I suppressed, but your life is hard and it’s just in a different way, and the stress is different.

Cailey: My grandparents for example, it was really hard for them to come over here. They would come to the US, but they would leave my mom and her siblings in the Philippines, like it was just a really difficult experience. And I think that when at least I try to tell them like, oh, I’ve been struggling with this, they’re like, well, you didn’t have to go through this, this, this, this, this. And it’s like I’m still struggling, maybe it’s not as severe as that, but don’t downplay or don’t undermine my experiences.

Natalie Tamburello: Right, this is exactly what Brian was saying too, if it’s invalidating because of different experiences like immigration, maybe it’s, oh, you’re a teenager and every teenager goes through this, every teenager has anxiety and really downplaying that experience. I hear that. So, what do you think teens get right about mental health today and what do you think teens sometimes get wrong?

Brian: I have to start by saying that we’ve been doing a lot better with mental health recently in that there has been a greater push to get these resources out there and that some teens nowadays are doing really great initiatives, and I’m so proud of them, and I think that’s a really, really good thing. That’s great work. But I think something else that has appeared, more specifically within my area, and I think this is more of like a privileged area issue, is that more recently people have been trying to build their profile, trying to build their resume, and I think in doing so, not a lot of these initiatives that they’re doing are very authentic. And that’s an issue. Like, if you’re doing this mental health project and you don’t have a good reason why you’re doing it beyond just slapping it on your resume, I think that’s a huge issue. People should be doing things based off of wanting to do real good, real impact. And within the Bay Area specifically, I’ve been seeing among a lot of the youth that a lot of this is not truly authentic. And that’s something that maybe they don’t get quite right, but we’re still heading in that direction of, I think this is pretty good. And I want to say that I think our generation is doing good promoting the issues that come with mental health and building awareness around that. So for sure keep that up.

Cailey: Yeah, I completely agree. I think that more teens, especially around the Bay Area have been joining teen initiatives like me and Brian, for example. When I was in My Digital TAT2 meetings, there would be like 20 or so kids. And I just found it so amazing that this many kids are trying to make a difference in the world, trying to spread awareness about mental health. And I think this has helped us normalize therapy, for example. I think that if we go around saying, “Oh, I have to go to therapy for this,” it’s not like we would judge them, maybe how the older generation would. I think we’ve also normalized checking in on friends if they might not be acting how they normally do. And also using language that validates feelings. I feel like teens as compared to the older generation, we’re all about listening. We’re all about trying to validate the other person and what they’re going through, rather than just, let’s find a solution to this. You need to do this, this, this, this, this. And just trying to get the conversation done as soon as possible. We’re really prioritizing listening, and I think that’s really amazing. Sometimes we may feel compared from our parents or from our grandparents and also from our friends, we might feel the pressure to always be open. Like, you might be constantly asked, “Are you okay? Are you okay? Are you okay?,” when you’re not ready to talk about something, maybe you’re just genuinely not okay. So, that might be an issue, but also to just combat that, you could just be like, “I really don’t want to talk about this right now.” I can talk about this on a later day, but I’m not in the right head space right now or something like that.

Natalie Tamburello: It’s interesting because I think that the way that I’ll say older generations, so let’s say millennial and older, compensate for their mental health challenges that they’re going through is by solving it. They’re like, well, if I solve it, it’ll go away and then I can move on. And I think what’s great about your generation that they’ve learned is to sit in your emotion and feel it, and it’s okay to feel it rather than solving it. And that’s very different and I think hard for a lot of parents and grandparents to sit in that emotion and really feel it and not immediately try to solve. And so they’re trying to pass that toolkit onto you is like, well, for me, I felt like if I just kept working or if I kept moving, that I didn’t have to think about my problems. And so they’re trying to pass that information onto you. It’s a very different strategy.

Cailey: Also, especially when you try to make decisions, when your emotions are heightened and you’re actually going through something, you might make an irrational one and then regret it in the future. So, like for me, it’s always better for me to just sit in my emotions, try to figure out what the best solution for me is, try to talk to people who can help me, things like that. Because I don’t want to do something that I might regret later.

Natalie Tamburello: Right. And it’s kind of like what Brian was saying is that I guess a symptom of that could be piling on more, or doing stuff just for the sake of doing it, not because you actually feel like you value it or that it’s interesting to you, but it looks good on your college application or something like that and then it leads to burnout.

So, do you feel like it’s easier or harder for teens to ask for help now than it was for previous generations? 

Cailey: I think it’s definitely easier, especially like as I said, mental health awareness is increasing. So, like for example, at Paly we have something called, The Wellness Center, and it’s basically in a taller building, kind of isolated from the rest of the classrooms. And it includes really calming things, we have puzzles, we have tea, we have these bean bags that you can just nap on if you need to. And there’s licensed professional therapists there if you want to schedule a meeting or if you just need somebody to talk to. And they also provide opportunities during free periods for example, if you just want to come in, learn how to do things, like we had the neuroscience club come in and teach us how to make a brain. And we learned about things around that. So, I think that was really cool.

Most recently there was actually a suicide at Paly, I think now that we’re considered a cluster school, but there was some students that were able to get a petition signed. I think it was like around 4,000 other students to implement guards at our train crossing, because we have a CalTrain that runs right behind our school. That was really amazing, like everybody was reposting, sign this petition, please sign this petition. And we were actually able to do it in a short amount of time. And this is just a wonderful example of how teens are able to ask for help because we’re trying to stop the suicides. We’re trying to help, and we were actually able to do it, and I think that was just amazing. However, as Brian and I have both been talking about, we may feel like from the older generation we’re going to feel judged and misunderstood, so we go to our friends for help, and I think adults just need to help us through that. But in general, I think it is easier for teens to ask for help from previous generations.

Brian: I definitely second that. I want to go a little bit into the suicide that happened about a month ago. And I want to bring up like even though we’re within the Bay Area and a lot of the mental health problems do come up because of academics, I think this specific one was because of their LGBTQ+ identity. That’s something that we really need to talk about today. And it should be an evergreen topic. School has been a lot of pressure, I think for me and a lot of my peers personally, but not nearly enough do people try to understand these different identities. And I think by people, I mean, our peers, our teachers are fine and our school staff are fine, but a lot of the times it’s parental perspectives as well. I think considering the fact that a lot of the Bay Area people are immigrants. They’re going to hold a little bit more traditional values, or at least like stereotypically. And I think that’s something that is very rough on the young generation today as we’re seeing the LGBTQ+ identity numbers rise – that’s something that we need to be a little bit more open and careful about because if we’re not, it can lead to another suicide. And I think we just need to be a little bit more conscious about that.

But going back to the question of whether or not it’s easier for teens to ask for help, I think for sure. Adding onto what I said earlier, a lot of schools are getting increased funding and getting increased funding means you’re getting more resources, more staffers, a wellness center like Cailey’s school and different mental health resources even at the county level. We have the 988, which is The National Suicide Prevention and Crisis Intervention Hotline if you ever need help. And we have multiple things like Trans Life, allcove, which is the center I’m representing today. There’s tons of local resources, but it’s whether or not we use them. And even just getting these resources out there have helped remove part of the stigma, and showed that these are real issues that we do need to talk about that do happen to people and that might happen to you.

Mike Navarrete: CHC’s Voices of Compassion podcast is made possible by the generosity of people like you. To learn more about supporting CHC, go to chconline.org/donate. Also make sure to follow us on social media for more inspiring and educational content from CHC.

Natalie Tamburello: You both touched on the importance of having a space to talk about things. So Brian, talking about allcove and other organizations, CHC is one of those organizations, and then Cailey talking about having a wellness center in school. I think we underestimate the value of like actually holding a space to talk about this kind of stuff. Not just having a school counselor or teacher reach out to you occasionally, but having a space dedicated for mental health discussions. 

Cailey: Yeah on the topic of that, my school provides these hall passes basically. And if you go up to your teacher and ask, “Hey, can I go to the wellness center?” I think they’re obligated to not ask you what’s going on because they understand that you might not want to talk to them, and I think that just having the opportunity to speak with somebody one-on-one who’s not your counselor because your counselor is typically booked and busy with meetings with other counselors and other students – just having designated people there to help you specifically with mental health is just a giant step to promote awareness.

Natalie Tamburello: How does school shape your mental health right now? So, pressure, workload, competition, social dynamics, maybe you can give some examples of what that looks like.

Brian: One of the things that came up for my mental health last year was that I was so burnt out after my junior year in high school. I think I stacked on like pretty much everything that I could. I was taking six AP classes on top of four other college courses. I was doing piano, I was committing to a varsity badminton team. I was doing research labs. I was traveling across the entire Bay for certain extracurriculars activities. And that was so exhausting for both me and my parent. And I think that’s something that really did not do my mental health well because I would come home and it would be like 12 and I’d be like, okay, well I have a stack of homework. Let me just do a quick caffeine shot. So that’s what I did pretty much every single day. I would work myself to the bone until 4 am and then go to sleep and then wake up at 8 am and do it all over again. And so, exhaustion on top of not having a break, and on top of, I can’t get out of this situation because I have to do this. I think all those things compiled together into just this big festering wound in me, and I think that it turned out to be a really, really bad burnout, and from there, some of the things I’ve done was definitely pull back on schoolwork – that has helped me the most. Right now I am taking only four classes, which has been amazing. I’m reading so much, so that has made me feel so much happier. Another thing about me is that as a pretty extroverted person, I think having the right amount of socialization was a very precise thing I needed to manage. For my junior year, even though I had a lot of different extracurriculars, I stacked them in a way that was specifically so that I could get enough socialization throughout my day. That has really helped me push through even through all the burnout and stuff. So, school definitely does have a huge impact on my mental health, and it is something that I have been really trying to like peck at for the past three years.

Natalie Tamburello: Brian, can you talk a little bit about the signs that you felt, or maybe now retrospectively, that were leading to burnout. What did you notice?

Brian: I can talk about personal feeling that I read about in like this book called,  HBR Guide to Being More Productive. I actually just finished it, but they talked about burnout and they said that, and I quote, it was like, “I know my responsibilities. I know what I have to do, but I just don’t care.” And I think that’s really interesting and really accurate. For me, around second semester, I was just so exhausted – I had no motivation to work, and I just didn’t want to do it anymore. I was so ready to just like skip school, skip work, just to sleep in because I felt that was what I needed at the moment. I think that’s a really big calling as to saying, you need to stop. You really need to work your schedule out here. You need to fix something, and that was the biggest indicator for me.

Natalie Tamburello: Yeah. And Cailey, I’ve definitely heard from other Palo Alto kids like bragging about how little sleep they get, and that’s just very interesting thing to brag about, but that tells you how pervasive it is.

Cailey:  It’s almost like a competition of who can get the least amount of sleep because who’s going to be doing the most amount of work? How much work did you do last night? This is not something that we need to be bragging about. It’s just not great. Completely similar to Brian, I was completely burned out last year. I was in two varsity sports and there would be weeks where I would be coming from track meets, in the afternoon, leaving school early to have my parents drive me back to my school. And like having to cheer at basketball games and then having to come home at like 10-11 PM and do homework. So, just like Brian. But yeah, it was really difficult, especially junior year with college apps, academics, APs, honors, sports, trying to also maintain a social life was like basically impossible. And I think that what the older generation doesn’t see with school is that when you’re so burnt out from these things and you come home and you just want to relax, all they see is you doom scrolling on your phone. And I know that a lot of teens struggle with doom scrolling, but it’s also our way to relax and especially when we’re home and our parents don’t see that we’re working so hard in school. And scrolling is just all we do. It’s like a kick in the face almost.

Natalie Tamburello: Do you feel like social media helps mental health? Is it supportive? Is it stressful? Is it both?

Cailey: I feel like it can be looked at in two different lights. It’s a platform where you can openly talk about mental health and it creates spaces for groups to be able to connect. That’s like the main purpose that social media should be used for. However, it can intensify competition. I think that seeing videos of people doing a lot more than you, people doing this, this, this, this, this will just make you feel that you’re not good enough. So, it can make you feel productive to a point, but if you go further, you’re just going to see them as competition and more comparing yourself. And I think to combat this, you should make an algorithm for yourself that has the right balance of productivity. So maybe you might have some fun, me videos and not just productivity videos, if that makes sense. Because like, I personally watch vlogs of people’s routines and productivity to get me motivated. But I think that just too much of that is just harmful. But regarding generational differences with social media, they didn’t grow up with the app. They grew up like reading magazines, watching TV, all that. So I don’t think they understand the complexities of it and they just see it as a waste of time. And they might get mad, like I said, when they see their kids relaxing, but I think social media is a great output; it’s just find a community that you can fit into and just talk about mental health if needed.

Natalie Tamburello: Yeah, I think the millennial equivalent is watching the news versus watching reality TV. You’re trying to just make yourself feel better. And by watching people do ridiculous things on TV, you get to just zone out versus if you’re listening to the news all the time, you’re going to get really stressed. I think the problem, what’s hard, is that it’s an appendage. Your phone’s basically an appendage, whereas a TV you can turn off or walk away from. So, that’s what parents get concerned about when they see you guys scrolling all the time. There’s no divide. 

Brian: Yeah, something I want to talk about before I jump into the social media question is that our schools are really privileged, and we live in a very privileged area. So having a therapist and psychologist and counselors to talk to, I think that is something that has been really great overall. And I want to say that schools aren’t necessarily a bad thing. I know that a lot of the culture has been impacting our mental health, especially as Bay Area students, but it can also be a really, safe place, a safe haven for a lot of people. Just recently finishing a book about trauma and a lot of like juvenile justice relating things, a lot of the times schools and these professionals, they are the first person that you reach out to for help and are the most readily available resources that you have. So, I think that definitely while the culture can be really impacting, a lot of their systems are there to help us. And so for sure there are goods and bads about school.

And then in terms of social media, I definitely agree with what Cailey has mentioned and something else that I want to add on to about what you mentioned was that the reality TV versus the phone. And I think that’s something that I’ve been really pecking at as someone who has a really bad social media addiction. And one of the things I definitely noticed was that our forms of entertainment, the ones that are especially among the youth nowadays, typically don’t have like ends to them. And I think that’s really harming because, you know, you could be watching like five seasons of a TV show, but there’ll be an ending episode. But, if you’re on social media, you’re going to scroll infinitely. You’re going to scroll until you’re going to realize it’s like 9 pm and you’ve done no work. And all that guilt is stacking on you, but the fact that our entertainment is increasingly built as something that is to drive engagement, to drive profits, I think that is really harmful to kids – especially because we don’t really know what to do yet. And if we’re being taught that social media is the standard or is the platform to go to and that you’re getting addicted to it, I think you’re driving this culture that having something like this is okay, and it’s definitely not.

And something that is really especially unnerving about the situation is that there’s really nothing that we can do about it, but we can try. These big tech companies, these social media companies are these really big interest groups, and I think we’re just no match on an individual level. But, for sure we need to be a lot more conscious about the negative effects of social media.

Natalie Tamburello: Yeah, as millennials call that last episode a show hole because you get this like huge dopamine drop of, “Oh the show’s over. I’m so sad. What do I do now? And I don’t have a next show.” But maybe that’s beneficial is getting that reprieve and feeling that downer moment of not having the show anymore. But Brian, are you on social media or you were talking earlier about how you’re very anti-social media, so I’m curious if you’ve just completely unplugged.

Brian: So I have recently completely unplugged, which has been great, but I think before I’ve had a really big love-hate relationship with social media. I often cite that and it’s kind of a joke, but it’s also how serious that I think my Instagram videos are the funniest thing on earth, but that also it’s been affecting a lot of my work-life balance, and also just how I get work done throughout the day. And so when New Year’s came around, I just said, out with social media. So, I deleted my account, and specifically I deleted my Instagram account. I’ve turned off history and recommendations on YouTube. I’ve tried to silence my notifications a lot more, and I think that’s one of the best decisions that I’ll never regret.

Natalie Tamburello: Yeah, you don’t feel like you’re missing out?

Brian: No, I don’t. Coming from a person that is pretty anti-trend already, I’m anti a lot of things and one of the things that I don’t believe in is trends. Like I think they’re a waste of time. And so ditching social media was one, it was a huge step, but also it didn’t really change much in my life other than opening a huge hole of free time. And I think that has been really helpful for me overall. So, I definitely recommend it if you already have a love-hate relationship with social media. And I would just say like, throw it out the window.

Natalie Tamburello: I do think this is a big generational difference and something that you both are living through right now. How has AI impacted your mental health?

Brian: Most recently I’ve been writing about it a lot just because I’m involved in multiple different publications, and one of the things I can’t get out of my head is AI. And I think this is because I’ve been reading a lot about it. And two, I’ve been listening about it a lot. I’ve most recently been reading about Jensen Huang’s biography, and I’ve been reading articles about our latest AI deals and back when I was on Instagram, I was seeing things like AI slop on my feed; it has been really impacting my mental health specifically because I think that it’s going to take over our jobs. And in that way it’s kind of destructive in that it doesn’t give you as much freedom as you might want in what you want to do as a career. And as a high schooler right now that doesn’t know exactly what they want to do or is interested in CS and AI at all, that’s been particularly harmful to my mental health because I feel like now there’s even more of a pressure to go down one single lane or else you might not survive.

Cailey: From my experience. I’ve seen videos on social media of people going to AI and treating it almost like a therapist. They’ll put in whatever situation they’re in and then ask for advice. I don’t know if this is because they don’t feel comfortable going to somebody to talk to them, but I assume it’s because AI is like obviously computed so that its responses are based off of what humans would actually say. And they’ll go to AI to validate their feelings because obviously AI is not going to disagree with them. There’s so many resources and people that you can talk to, but you’re going to a robot who’s not going to be able to help you as much as you probably need.

Brian: It can be comforting in the short-term for sure. Like if you’re not ready to talk to someone and you don’t want to bring it up with anyone in real life because you might think it might damage your reputation or something, I think AI could be a place to start, but definitely be really careful about the way you engage with it and check in with yourself every now and then and make sure it’s not something that you chronically turn to because it can be destructive in the long term. I think that if you’re only talking to AI and you’re not building those emotional capacities and also social capacities to really have a discussion about your mental health, then you’re also destroying yourself in the meantime. So, I would say be really careful with it.

Natalie Tamburello: Well, speaking of human support, let’s talk about the experience of what support feels like from adults usually in your life, and what do you wish it looked like?

Brian: So one of the things that happens to me quite a bit is I’ve been getting the same response, like Cailey mentioned earlier, it’s just a very, very standard, “Are you okay?” Or, you know, “Ah, do you want a hug?” And I think that for smaller situations, that’s definitely really helpful. But when it gets a little bit more intense, that’s not what you want to hear. So, I think that when it gets more intense, you want ears, you want people to listen, you want solutions. And sometimes people aren’t in the right headspace to provide that, or other times they don’t want to deal with it. Something personally I think that has been really hurtful that my parents sometimes say to me is that, “Life is just unfair.” And that is almost like the worst response you can give because you’re saying that there’s no solution to your problem, there’s nothing we can do, just move on, get over it. Like definitely, that’s going to help. And obviously that’s not. That’s really harmful and you’re basically saying that the person that you’re talking to, their feelings are invalid, their situation is invalid, and so we’re just going to skip over it. And I think that’s really harmful. 

And another thing that’s come up that I mentioned earlier was citing a teenager’s emotion as like hormones or teenage angst, that does the same thing as “life is unfair” in that it casts aside their emotional turmoil. So, be careful with that.

Cailey: Yeah, so I’ve kind of had a bit of a different situation because my parents are more open with mental health, like I talked about my grandma and how my mom has been raising my brother and I to be very open with her and be able to confide with her and things like that. But yeah, I agree with Brian that adults in general should be trying to help more rather than just finding straight solutions. I’ve had personal situations where like I’ve confided in teachers, for example. I got really close to my teacher because I’ve had them for almost all my years in high school, and I was going through something and I felt like I could talk to them and they were actually really helpful and they even walked me to my car and made sure that I was going to get home safe and things like that. So, I think being able to form these connections with adults that you trust. Obviously that stems from them understanding mental health in the first place, but I think the fact that they care and they’re not just trying to find direct solutions is really helpful.

Brian: To add on to that, what I said earlier is definitely not a generalization. And what Cailey and I both have talked about and I think you should take away from this, is that parents have such a big influence over your mental health and how you treat mental health. And so you should take this as seriously as you can.

And another thing that this makes me think of is that also I believe having some sort of trusted adult that you can fall onto is something that is really emotionally and developmentally important. After reading a book about trauma and how some kids have grown up with not a single person around them that can be loving to them or that they can trust and I think having a connection like that or building that connection right off the bat for your child could just be one of the most important things ever. So, I just want to put that out there.

Natalie Tamburello: So, what do you think gets in the way of teens being honest with parents or guardians about mental health?

Cailey: I think that what prevents them from confiding in them is the fear that they’re just going to be like, “No, you’re fine. Don’t worry about it.” They’re not going to help you, or as Brian said, they might just give you a short-term relief, but then you’re still going to be grappling with the situation. As I said earlier with my grandma, this might still be a generational thing where some parents may not believe in mental health or on the flip side, they might see you going to them as something more extreme, like they might think that there’s actually something worse happening with you, then there actually is, but in reality, you just need to talk to them about something.

Natalie Tamburello: So, it’s not a measured response, it’s either dismissal or escalation.

Cailey: Too much. Yeah. But also like we as teenagers, we might not always have the words to explain how we feel. So, we might just want to take time and form the words in our head that we want. But in general, I think that it’s just helpful for parents and guardians to be able to listen without prioritizing quick solutions.

Brian: Cailey, you’ve hit all the important points. Something else that might be honestly a good thing is that we’ve been getting so many more resources that personally I’ve been turning to people that aren’t my parents. And that has been really helpful sometimes because even though my parents have a little bit more of I think a toxic mentality with mental health, it’s definitely important to talk to them and getting some sort of outside perspective and specifically like a perspective from someone who is outside of your family, I think has been really helpful for my mental health.

And also another thing, if you have siblings, talking to your sibling about your mental health issues could be a really important thing. And that’s one thing I definitely see stopping me from talking to my parents because my brother and I’s struggles are very specific to our family maybe and that could be for you out there as well, and I think definitely talking to your sibling or having someone to talk to that can relate to your situation will help you, for sure.

Natalie Tamburello: Yeah, there’s a lot of research about having like an aunt or having someone slightly outside of your family that your kid trusts is very important. So, I’m glad you called that out, Brian.

If you could coach adults in one skill to have these kind of conversations, what would it be?

Brian: I want to say first off, I’m not a mental health expert. I am a mental health advocate, but I want you to be conscious that my advice might not be entirely sound, but speaking from personal experience, never dismiss someone’s emotions or situation as though it is something that is less, something that you shouldn’t prioritize. I think that’s happened in so many different ways. Like, for example, you might say, “It’s not that deep,” and I think, it could be that deep and so definitely don’t dismiss those feelings. Another thing is, I would also try to be a lifelong learner with mental health issues and mental health in general, just because it is always changing within society’s context in that what mental health or the different issues causing mental health today might not be the same as it was in 1960s, especially right after a World War. So, be really careful about how you approach a conversation with mental health and then also try to do your best to stack up the knowledge around this.

Cailey: I kind of already talked about how I think parents and guardians should respond to these conversations, but just to recap, they should be listening and be asking open-ended questions and actually trying to understand what their kid is going through is the most impactful thing that they can do, and just them staying calm and accepting that their kid is going through something and their kid is comfortable in confiding with them, it’s not a bad thing at all. So, I think they should take it as a positive and just try to respond to that.

Natalie Tamburello: So as a wrap up, I just want to see if either of you, Brian or Cailey, have any last words of advice for our listeners?

Brian: There are so many resources out there, just reach out, we’re here to help you. I think nowadays because we have seen the issues that come with mental health, we understand mental health a lot more. We’re stacking up on the resources, and definitely make use of that or definitely make use of your environment to help you and to help you better your mental health. So, I just want to say that you’re not alone. We’re here for you, so please reach out.

Cailey: Yeah, pretty much the same exact thing as Brian, we’re all here to help you. For parents specifically, trust in your child that asking for help means that your child is actually trying to navigate through these issues and it’s not a bad thing. We’re all here for you.

Brian: Yeah. And this is not specific to just teens. If you’re an adult and you’re really struggling to talk to your child, please reach out as well. Society is here for you. We’re here to help you. It’s not an uncommon thing to not be able to talk to your kid. And personally, within my family, both my brother and I have gone through some serious communication issues with our mom and so it is actually even developmentally healthy to go through some of these things, so for sure reach out.

Natalie Tamburello: As both of you said, there’s resources available to parents and to teens. Just as a reminder to our listeners, CHC has a lot of programs. We have free resources online in addition to our podcast, including our resource library. We also have parent support groups to help parents navigate some of these issues, and then also groups for school counselors and learning specialists as well.

So, if you’re in need of additional support, you can learn more about other services at chconline.org. And then also all the organizations that are involved in our CHC teen collaborative – so you can look online at those organizations, including allcove and My Digital TAT2. Well, thank you for both joining.

Brian: Thank you so much. It was such an honor to be here today.

Cailey: Thank you.

Cindy Lopez: Visit us online at podcasts.chconline.org. Make sure to subscribe to Voices of Compassion so you never miss an episode, and we’d love it if you’d leave us a rating and review. Have a question? Send us an email or a voice memo at [email protected]. We’re here for you when you need us.