Yuen: In the age of 'sharenting,' can we balance the need for connection and our kids' privacy?

My private Instagram account is, let's face it, a curated gallery of my adorable children. I post kid content there because I never did get around to putting together that baby book, and this app has replaced the old-fashioned family album.

It warms my heart when I scroll through these photos from vacations and soccer games, even as I'm yelling in real life at my kids, in the spirit of the classic bedtime book, "Go the F**k to Sleep."

But my older son, who's 10, is now conscious of what images may or may not be circulated. When I snap a picture of him, sometimes he asks who I'll be sharing it with. Or he preemptively asks me to not send it around. His awareness underscores an obvious truth: Today's kids have far less privacy than their parents.

For all the heartburn that parents have about kids not setting boundaries on social media, sometimes it's the parent who is undermining their privacy. "Posting about our kids can be hard to resist," Devorah Heitner writes in her new book, "Growing Up in Public: Coming of Age in a Digital World." "But these tech habits can get us into trouble."

Heitner, who lives in the Chicago area and has a doctorate in media, technology and society from Northwestern University, says that every post we produce makes a statement about our values. She spoke to me about the phenomenon of "sharenting" and how to stop overdoing it.

So, why are parents posting about their kids?
We want connection, and we want to make the labor of parenting visible — especially mothers, because so much of what we do for our kids is invisible labor. If I'm posting about my kids' ice-skating competition, I'm also posting about the way I drive him or her to practice at 5 in the morning. It's validation. It's also a celebration. And there's competitive pressure; other people post about their kids, so it can feel like "If I don't post, does that mean I don't love them as much?"

Don't parents need support? Isn't it human nature to share?
I'm especially sympathetic to that desire for community. The concept of the nuclear family and parenting isolates us, so sometimes we share more heartfelt posts about the challenges. But those posts can compromise our kids' privacy, and there may be other ways to get that community, whether it's in person, going for a walk with your best friend, or calling a sibling.

Parents lecture to their kids about oversharing on social media, yet do it themselves. Why the disconnect?
We really do think in the moment, and we think of our children as extensions of ourselves, especially when they're babies and toddlers. But if I post that picture of my fourth-grader in his PJs, he might get teased by his classmates, even if I think it's a cute and innocuous picture. I have to remember that some of my friends are his friends' parents. We find these domestic scenes so heartwarming, and we don't think that maybe that's not the impression he wants to give to other kids on the school bus.

And yet, these apps have become de facto family albums.
When my kid was little, I posted pictures of him on Facebook. And he was recognized on the streets of Minneapolis when we came up to the May Day Parade. He was recognized by a family friend who he'd never met. He has an unusual first and last name, and the person said it on the street. He turned around, and he felt very disconcerted. He was 8 years old, recognized by someone he didn't know. I realized I'm making my kid more public than he wants to be. I don't want Meta to be my family album. Mark Zuckerberg doesn't get a piece of this.

So what advice do you have for being part of the 21st century?
The most important thing we can do is get our kids' consent, and that sets them up for establishing boundaries. I write about sexting in the book. If we're asking our kids' permission and they have the right to say "no," then if somebody later asks them for a topless picture, they will feel confident in being like, "nope." And it's not just sexting. You want your kid to be empowered to set that boundary, and home is a good place to cultivate that.

What if your child asks you to post a picture of them on social media?
For that kid, I would still be careful. What if your kid is grooving out to some explicit lyrics and they just don't get it? Would I post that video, or would I just keep it in the family? It's not that it's shameful. She might just feel like, "I just did these great moves, post it!" And you might be like, "I'm going to show Grandma instead."

What if you have made mistakes, or your kid asks you to take down content?
There's no real reason not to take it down. You got the joy of sharing it in the moment. Just take it down if that's what your kid wants. I feel that's a very respectful thing to do, and it gives them a sense of safety, and that they can trust you.

I don't think people should spend a lot of time feeling terrible about the past. They should just try to think about how they're going to be more thoughtful in the future.