Did you see what Meta just rolled out?

Hey Friends!

We hope you all had a fantastic Mother’s Day weekend.

It’s that time where things seem to be winding down for the school year. Yes, we know it's only May, but everything is feeling really final right no, especially with our first heading off to university in the fall. Activities are wrapping up. Dance competitions are happening. The "lasts" are stacking up like last team dinners, last carpools, last dances with the friends we've had since the diaper years.

It feels like the whole thing is moving at warp speed. Some days we're sentimental and weepy. Other days we're just trying to get through the week. Both are true, and both are okay.

We're navigating it the way we navigate most big stuff: one small moment at a time. So while our hearts are doing that thing, the digital world keeps doing its thing — and there are two stories from this week we really want to talk to you about.

The AI chatbot warning every parent should hear

This week, the warnings about teens and AI chatbots got a lot louder. A new clinical piece called these chatbots "like drinking salt water" because they feel like they're quenching loneliness while actually making it much worse. A study of more than 300 teens found their AI chatbot use sliding from helpful into addictive, with kids describing it the same way you'd describe an addiction you can't quit. And the Raine family — whose 16-year-old son Adam died last year after months of confiding in ChatGPT — is back in headlines pushing for federal action.

The hardest part for parents is that our kids are not telling us. They're using these bots as therapists, as friends, as romantic partners, as confidants. Common Sense Media found that three in four teens have used AI for companionship. One in five young adults have asked a chatbot for mental health advice. And these bots are designed to agree, to keep the conversation going, to never push back the way a human would.

Here’s what you can do:
Start by asking your kid how they're using AI (We share a link to some conversation starters below). Don’t come at them with judgement. Try curiosity first. The Child Mind Institute keeps repeating this advice for a reason: telling a teen "don't do it" rarely works, but staying curious almost always does. Then do a quick check on their device. If they're using ChatGPT, set up the parental controls. If they're using Character.AI, look at who they've been chatting with.

Our Parents Guide to AI walks through exactly how to set up controls for every platform we know they're on, plus has scripts for the conversations by age group.

Meta's new "insights" feature for parents

Last week, Meta announced that parents using their supervision tools can now see the topics their teen has discussed with Meta AI on Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger over the past week. You'll see categories like School, Health and Wellbeing, Lifestyle. You can drill down a level to see subcategories. Meta says it's giving parents more visibility. They also rolled out conversation starters made with the Cyberbullying Research Center.

Here's where we have to put our skeptical hats on. This announcement landed exactly one month after Meta lost two landmark trials where juries found the company liable for harming children. A Meta whistleblower called this exact pattern out, saying how the company announces a new safety feature, generates thousands of news stories, gives parents the appearance of control. An independent evaluation of Instagram's teen safety features found that 64% of them either don't exist anymore or don't work as advertised. Only 17% work as described. And the Insights tab doesn't show you what your kid actually asked or what Meta AI said, just the topic category. Health and Wellbeing could be fitness questions. It could also be something you'd really want to know about.

Here’s what you can do:
Take advantage and use the new feature. But don't let it replace what actually works. Device-level controls are still the most reliable way to manage what your kid is exposed to and how long they're on. This an ongoing, honest conversations with your kids about what they’re interacting with online. Platform features can change, get rolled back, or just not work the way they're advertised. Your phone's settings often remain intact.

Switching gears, because we have to tell you: we tried at-home spray tans a few weeks ago. Like, fully committed. We bought our own spray gun, our own tanning solution, set up a tent, and just figured it out from YouTube. The vibes were giving two friends in a chemistry lab but make it tan.

Did Cat tan the bottoms of her feet a deep, deep brown? Yes. Yes she did. Did we both look like we'd been on vacation by the morning? Also yes. Would we do it again? Absolutely.

If you're sitting there thinking "I could never”… neither could we, and then we did. Sometimes the silly thing you try with a friend ends up being the best part of the week. Whatever your version of an at-home spray tan is right now, we hope you get to do it.

—Cat & Nat