”Screens Are a Drug.” How to Get Your Family Back with Mike McLeod

Mike McLeod is a speech-language pathologist and ADHD executive function specialist who has worked with over 500 families to eliminate screens since 2016. He hosts the ADHD Parenting Podcast and has two books that released in January 2026.

In this conversation, we get into the hard stuff: why screen addiction looks identical to drug addiction, what the withdrawal period actually looks like when you take a phone away, what EdTech has done to education (and how to opt out of school Chromebooks), and why parents need to organize with other families instead of waiting for institutions to fix this.

Timestamps: 0:00 - Introduction

1:00 - Mike's background in ADHD and executive functioning

3:05 - ADHD is really an executive functioning disorder

5:05 - The four pillars of executive functioning

9:55 - How screens stop brain development

12:25 - The youth mental health crisis

14:59 - Suicide rates tripled after the iPhone launched

18:31 - Getting a real ADHD evaluation

20:14 - Screens stole boredom from childhood

26:14 - Why parents keep screens in their kids' lives

29:48 - Four cognitive distortions parents tell themselves

33:40 - What phone withdrawal actually looks like

47:12 - You can't teach a kid to manage an addiction

53:04 - 500 families eliminated screens, zero regrets

58:55 - EdTech is destroying education

63:34 - Life at 18 with vs. without executive function

69:17 - The one thing every parent should do right now

If you're a parent dealing with screen battles at home, you're not alone. Mike has seen this hundreds of times and it does get better: https://www.grownowadhd.com/about/

Check out his new book: https://www.grownowadhd.com/grownow-book/

Family IT Guy helps parents block harmful content, limit screen time, and prevent contact from strangers.

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