Be himself in Stuff

I don’t have parental controls on any of our phones or computers anymore because I think all my kids are old enough now to either behave or face the consequences for their choices. I do, however, frequently look at the internet search history on the “family laptop” that mostly gets used by Harry and Mercer for school stuff. Almost anything else that isn’t school-related they will do on their phones where I’m well aware they have almost too much privacy.

My rule that their phones don’t go into their bedrooms at night and the fact that I insist on knowing how to unlock their phones helps, but I know they are smart enough to find ways and times to look at things they probably shouldn’t. I realize that curiosity will lead them to all of everything that’s out there eventually anyway, and I’m not completely sure at what age I should just throw my hands up in the air and say it’s fine now. I think they might already be at that age.

My only point in writing this really is to bring up that yesterday I took a glance at the internet history. I know that they know how to delete things so part of me believes anything that’s visible to me in the history is stuff they expect me to check or at least don’t care if I do.

Yesterday after Mercer had been using the laptop all evening, I saw literally hours of him reading up in National Coming Out Day, which (if you didn’t know) was yesterday.

Of course this immediately puts questions in my head. Not worries or concerns, but definitely questions.

The biggest question is for myself: If Mercer wants to come out as something, how do I best make him feel comfortable with doing so? I’m nothing but 100% supportive in all of this, and I think I’ve made that clear by my words and actions, but I hope he’s not feeling too afraid or uncomfortable to be himself.