before my son was born i made a decision: i would not post photos of my pregnancy and i would not post photos of him as a child without his consent.

as a millennial i realized something people in my family never had to think about... because i'm the first generation of parents raising a child INSIDE the internet.

my parents never had to think about a digital footprint. my baby photos exist in physical albums and the only people who saw them were family members sitting next to us turning the pages.

nothing from my childhood existed online before i had the ability to decide what i wanted to share about myself, but now today many children aren't given that option. some kids have hundreds of photos online before they can speak or understand privacy.

there is a word for this now called "sharenting", the habit of parents posting large amounts of photos, videos, and personal information about their children online.

for many people it feels normal. social media turned life into a public timeline of pregnancy announcements, baby showers, birth stories among other daily updates. even intimate moments like a child's first smile, steps or words.

but i kept coming back to one question.... whose story is it? is it mine to share, or does it belong to the person whose living it?

obviously children can't consent to being posted online yet. they don't understand what it means for an image to circulate for decades. or who might see it, download it, archive it, or use it in ways no parent would intend.

once an image enters the internet it leaves your control.

another thing that shapes behavior online is the way social media platforms reward certain types of posts. it's clear that major life events perform better: engagement announcements. weddings. pregnancy reveals. birth announcements.

these moments trigger emotion. people comment more. people share more. the algorithm pushes them further. everyone knows this, even if they don’t say it out loud. a normal photo of your lunch might get a few likes. a newborn photo will get hundreds. sometimes thousands.

that creates pressure. not always direct pressure from other people, but pressure built into the structure of the platform itself. the internet rewards visibility, and major personal milestones are some of the strongest engagement signals there are.

so documenting these moments publicly starts to feel expected... but is engagement a good reason to build a permanent digital archive of a child’s life? these are little PEOPLE, not pets or belongings.

this conversation has also changed for me because of how much more visible child exploitation has become online.

the exposure of networks connected to people like jeffrey epstein made something impossible to deny: there are adults who harm children and collect images of children...and the internet has made access to those images easier than at any other point in history.

research into online child exploitation consistently shows that the majority of people consuming sexualized images of minors are adult men.

parents usually post photos with good intentions. they want to share joy with friends and family. but intention doesn't control where those images end up unfortunately.

another layer to this conversation now is artificial intelligence, because today an image doesn't even have to stay the image you posted.

ai tools can manipulate photos. faces can be extracted. bodies can be altered. images can be remixed into things that never existed in the original photograph.

a normal photo of a child playing outside or sitting on the couch can be taken and turned into something disturbing by someone with the right tools.

that possibility alone makes me question why any parent would feel obligated to post their child online at all?

social media has turned everyday life into content. pregnancy photoshoots. newborn photoshoots. curated moments of family life.

it can start to feel like parenting itself needs to be performed in public, but just because many people share their children online doesn't mean every parent has to.

my child still has plenty photos but they live in private folders and albums that family members can hold in their hands. those memories exist but they simply don't belong to the public internet.

one day my child will will decide how much of himself he wants to share. when that moment comes, i want the decision to belong to him. not to me, social media or an algorithm that rewards exposure.

millennial parents stand in a strange position because we grew up with childhoods that were mostly offline but now we're raising children inside systems that record EVERYTHING.

someone has to decide where the boundaries are and this is mine.

before my son was born i made a decision: i would not post photos of my pregnancy and i would not post photos of him as a child without his consent.

as a millennial i realized something people in my family never had to think about... because i'm the first generation of parents raising a child INSIDE the internet.

my parents never had to think about a digital footprint. my baby photos exist in physical albums and the only people who saw them were family members sitting next to us turning the pages.

nothing from my childhood existed online before i had the ability to decide what i wanted to share about myself, but now today many children aren't given that option. some kids have hundreds of photos online before they can speak or understand privacy.

there is a word for this now called "sharenting", the habit of parents posting large amounts of photos, videos, and personal information about their children online.

for many people it feels normal. social media turned life into a public timeline of pregnancy announcements, baby showers, birth stories among other daily updates. even intimate moments like a child's first smile, steps or words.

but i kept coming back to one question.... whose story is it? is it mine to share, or does it belong to the person whose living it?

obviously children can't consent to being posted online yet. they don't understand what it means for an image to circulate for decades. or who might see it, download it, archive it, or use it in ways no parent would intend.

once an image enters the internet it leaves your control.

another thing that shapes behavior online is the way social media platforms reward certain types of posts. it's clear that major life events perform better: engagement announcements. weddings. pregnancy reveals. birth announcements.

these moments trigger emotion. people comment more. people share more. the algorithm pushes them further. everyone knows this, even if they don’t say it out loud. a normal photo of your lunch might get a few likes. a newborn photo will get hundreds. sometimes thousands.

that creates pressure. not always direct pressure from other people, but pressure built into the structure of the platform itself. the internet rewards visibility, and major personal milestones are some of the strongest engagement signals there are.

so documenting these moments publicly starts to feel expected... but is engagement a good reason to build a permanent digital archive of a child’s life? these are little PEOPLE, not pets or belongings.

this conversation has also changed for me because of how much more visible child exploitation has become online.

the exposure of networks connected to people like jeffrey epstein made something impossible to deny: there are adults who harm children and collect images of children...and the internet has made access to those images easier than at any other point in history.

research into online child exploitation consistently shows that the majority of people consuming sexualized images of minors are adult men.

parents usually post photos with good intentions. they want to share joy with friends and family. but intention doesn't control where those images end up unfortunately.

another layer to this conversation now is artificial intelligence, because today an image doesn't even have to stay the image you posted.

ai tools can manipulate photos. faces can be extracted. bodies can be altered. images can be remixed into things that never existed in the original photograph.

a normal photo of a child playing outside or sitting on the couch can be taken and turned into something disturbing by someone with the right tools.

that possibility alone makes me question why any parent would feel obligated to post their child online at all?

social media has turned everyday life into content. pregnancy photoshoots. newborn photoshoots. curated moments of family life.

it can start to feel like parenting itself needs to be performed in public, but just because many people share their children online doesn't mean every parent has to.

my child still has plenty photos but they live in private folders and albums that family members can hold in their hands. those memories exist but they simply don't belong to the public internet.

one day my child will will decide how much of himself he wants to share. when that moment comes, i want the decision to belong to him. not to me, social media or an algorithm that rewards exposure.

millennial parents stand in a strange position because we grew up with childhoods that were mostly offline but now we're raising children inside systems that record EVERYTHING.

someone has to decide where the boundaries are and this is mine.