There it is, staring at me from the screen of my phone in all its glowing gory glory. My parental good intentions foundering on the shoals of my son’s carelessness. My failure and shame there for all the world to see.

What am I seeing? Pictures of my kids mooning the camera, holding a beer or kissing a girl? All three?? No, it’s worse than all that. What it is, in fact, is the Instagram account belonging to Son #2, aged twelve. My son’s dirty little secret, its existence uncovered by accident during a conversation in the car. I can still see the stricken look on my son’s face as he realized he’d let the cat out of the bag. I recall my admirable self-control of not immediately grounding him FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE so that I could keep him talking and obtain more details of his transgression. There is nothing sneakier than a mother trying to wheedle a full confession out of her naughty child – the local police could take lessons from the craftiness of parents interrogating their children. Meanwhile, my heart was breaking at all the rules broken, my heavy-handed “thou shalt not” lectures completely ignored.

On my cellphone I stare stunned at the unholy trinity of identity theft faux pas: his full name, the name of his school and his photo. Each one a bad idea, but taken together the prefect confection of making it easy to identify and locate him. He’s too young for a credit rating, but just the right age for an online predator. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad if his family name were Smith, Garcia or Wong, but his relatively unusual name makes him easy to identify.

I am further dismayed at what I am seeing before my disbelieving eyes, as he isn’t even legally allowed to have an account before the age of thirteen. So obviously he has lied – about exactly the wrong information! The death blow is that he was to consult me before setting up such an account. For every action there is an equal and opposite infraction. This time he has knocked it out of the park!

Each year my children’s schools have brought in social media expert Paul Davis (follow him on Facebook to get regular updates) who specializes in issues of children and social media use and abuse. He speaks to the kids by day and the parents by night. I have gone to see his presentations on several occasions because the world of social media is ever changing and the issues he discusses and real-life stories he shares are so deeply concerning to me as a parent. The aftermath of these presentations has led to many serious conversations with my kids and rule changes at home. And yet, despite his cautionary tales and my efforts to protect my children, it has become apparent that the need to belong and fit in with one’s friends will outweigh any adult’s well-intentioned advice. I worry constantly about what is going on in online group chats, gaming conversations, and YouTube and Reddit threads, not to mention Instagram or Snapchat.

For my part, I have spent years protecting my children’s identity. Even with my carefully cultivated circle of friends on Facebook, I have never posted photos or the full names of my children. I have been such a mama bear about this rule that my friends know to ask before posting anything about my kids. When asked, I have usually refused. Anything to protect my kids from Google’s infallible memory. All undone in less than a minute by my own treasonous child.

Son #1 has learned this lesson of protecting his privacy all too well. Once recently when, as a favour, I permitted a photographer friend to post an anonymous image of him with his brother on her website, he got angry with me for not consulting him. He was right and I felt guilty. But when I announced on Facebook, as a proud mama is wont to do, that his poem was going to be published by the Toronto Public Library and he again told me off, I quite reasonably responded that once the poem was published it wouldn’t be private anymore anyway!!

But then later I discovered to my dismay that he had truly taken the privacy thing to heart. I found out that he had been submitting and publishing science articles through a blog site, all unbeknownst to me. By the time I found out, the site had ceased to publish and apparently been “removed” from the internet. But I guess I’ll never know for sure. In any event, this was most definitely NOT the form of privacy I was asking him to pursue. The rule I forgot to mention is the exception to the rule – namely, that mothers are allowed and need to be included!

As for Son #2 and his Instagram account, he has since removed his family name from the site and made his account private. It was likely a case of too little, too late. But I certainly hope that a lesson was learned and more caution and consultation will be applied in future.

So now after these social media misadventures (no doubt with more to come), I must wonder what next bigger, uglier hurdle lies ahead. Have all my lectures about drugs, alcohol and sex gone equally unheard? But then I console myself with this cheering thought – perhaps if I monitor my son’s Instagram account, I will find out. …