Why Your Teen Asks If Life Is Really Worth Living (And What To Do Next)
I was scraping leftover penne pasta into the compost bin Tuesday night, counter sticky with tomato sauce, when my 16-year-old Lila, leaning against the fridge with one sock slouched around her ankle, looked up from her TikTok and asked, “Do people really find life worth living?”
I almost dropped the bowl. I’d already had a long day: two back-to-back parent meetings at my high school counseling job, a flat tire on the way home, and a forgotten load of laundry that had mildewed in the washer. My first instinct was to blurt out the automatic reply: Of course it is! What a silly question. But I’d heard that exact question three times in the last month from students in my office, so I bit that back, wiped my hands on my sweatpants, and said, “That’s a big question. What made you ask that tonight?”
She said her For You Page has been full of people talking about how everyone’s just faking it. You grow up, go into debt for college, get a job you don’t like, pay bills until you die. No one actually enjoys it, they just pretend. She and her friends had talked about it at lunch the day before, and no one could name a single thing that makes all the stress worth it.
I thought of Javi, the 10th grader who’d skipped PE to sit on my lumpy office couch two weeks prior and asked the same thing. He told me his mom works two jobs to pay their rent, and he never sees her sit down for more than 10 minutes. She says it’s all for him and his little sister, but Javi said he’d rather have a smaller apartment and more movie nights with her than whatever “this” is. He couldn’t see the point of spending your whole life exhausted just to get by.
Most of the time when kids ask this question, they’re not actively suicidal – though that’s always the first thing to check, and I’ll get to that. What they’re really doing is testing the waters. They’re noticing that adult life is often boring, hard, and unfair, and they’re asking if anyone else sees that too. The worst thing we can do is rush to fix the question with empty reassurance. When we say “Of course life is worth it! Look at all your blessings!” we’re telling them their honest observation is wrong, and they’ll shut down after that.
The first concrete step I always recommend, no matter if it’s your kid or a student in your class, is a straightforward safety check. After they ask, once you’ve let them talk a minute, just say, “Are you feeling like you want to hurt yourself right now?” It doesn’t put the idea in their head, it just gives you clear next steps. If the answer is yes, you stop everything and call their doctor or a local crisis line. If the answer is no, like it was for Lila and Javi, you can keep talking honestly.
I sat down on the kitchen floor next to Lila that night and told her the truth, not the polished happy-parent version I used to give. I said some days I don’t think it’s worth it. Last week, when our water heater broke at 10pm and we slept on the couch because the basement floor was flooded, and I spent three hours on hold with insurance the next day, I thought, This is what all this work is for? To fix broken things and pay for them? I don’t wake up every day feeling overjoyed to be alive. That’s just not how it works for most people.
Then I told her what I tell every kid who asks me that question: life being worth living doesn’t hinge on one big thing, like a dream job or a perfect family or a huge house. It’s just a bunch of tiny, unremarkable things that add up. For me, it’s the way our old beagle greets me at the door like I’ve been gone for years even if I just ran to get the mail. It’s the lemonade I make in summer that’s just sweet enough, that we drink on the porch after mowing the lawn. It’s when Lila texts me a dumb meme during third period that makes me snort laugh in the middle of a staff meeting. Those are the things that get you through the bad days.
This isn’t just advice for big talks, either. You can weave this into everyday life without fanfare. Stop performing constant happiness for your kids. If you had a bad day at work, say you had a bad day at work. You don’t have to pretend everything is great all the time to set a good example. It’s okay for them to see that some days suck, and that’s normal. Second, point out those tiny good things in passing, not just when there’s a crisis. If you’re driving to school and the maple leaves look bright orange in the sun, say that. If the taco truck down the street gives you extra guac, mention it. It doesn’t have to be a lesson, just a casual observation. Third, don’t pressure them to find some grand purpose. So many kids are told they have to change the world or land their dream job by 22, and that’s exhausting. It’s okay if their favorite thing is rewatching old SpongeBob episodes or collecting pressed rocks or playing Minecraft with their friends. That’s enough.
After we talked that night, we pulled vanilla ice cream out of the freezer and watched a 2000s rom-com Lila had seen a dozen times. She didn’t walk away from the conversation suddenly convinced life is 100% worth living every single day, and I didn’t expect her to. Last Saturday, we were driving to get groceries, and a flock of waddling ducks stopped traffic to cross the road. Lila laughed and said, “Ducks are so dumb. I love them. That alone kind of makes life worth it, right?” I said yeah, that’s exactly it.
I still have days where I wonder the same thing. I still get that question from a student every few weeks. We don’t have to have a perfect answer. We just have to not shut the question down.
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