Tia Stokes initially went viral by spreading positivity while undergoing chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia (AML), but she's retained her social media following by sharing broader content about her life
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She regularly tells her followers — which total at over 1 million on Instagram and 2.6 million on TikTok — about her life as a parent, including her rule about not allowing her five kids to have cell phones
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Stokes, 40, tells PEOPLE that she made the decision to protect their childhoods, but she acknowledges that it was a fairly "controversial" decision since they already have their own social media pages
Tia Stokesis a cancer survivor, a dancer, a content creator and an overall advocate for hope and positivity, but most importantly, she's a mom. And just as she does in her many other roles, Stokes does parenting her own way.
The mother of fiveinitially went viralwhile undergoing chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Despite the toll it took on her body, she danced every day of her treatment. The ritual earned Stokes, 40, a following of over 1 millionInstagramfollowers and 2.6 million onTikTok.
Today, she's five years into remission and officially considered an AML survivor, and her social media presence has evolved to focus on broader lifestyle content in addition to her recovery. Stokes regularly posts about raising her children, whose ages range between 6 and 17 years old, and she maintains one household rule that continues to pique viewers' interests:the kids don't have cell phones.
Stokes tells PEOPLE she knows it's perceived as somewhat of a "controversial" decision, especially since she's the first to acknowledge their lives are already heavily documented online. Plus, her children even have pages of their own, though Stokes says she runs their personal accounts, and her sons, who play competitive sports, appreciate having a place to post their highlight reels for future recruiting opportunities.
"They all have little platforms. They're not heavily growing — we're not trying to grow them, if that makes sense," says Stokes of her kids' social media activity. "But when I post family stuff, I'll just collaborate [with their accounts] on the picture. So then as they get older, if they want it later, they can have it. If they want to use it as a resume."
Ultimately, she and her husband, Andy, chose not to give their kids phones to preserve what they see as the most precious part of childhood. "You only get the gift of just living radical freedom like this for 18 years, really," Stokes notes.
Adults are often burdened by the pressure to respond to texts, calls and emails no matter where or what they are doing. Stokes makes the point that as a kid, there's simply less need to be reachable all the time. If the kids really want to contact someone, they are allowed to make calls and send texts using their parents' phones.
"It's not so much as our kids having access to the world, but the world having access to our kids," she says. "We've explained this to our kids, 'Trust me, bro, you're not going to get these moments back. As soon as we give you that phone, it's going to be colleges, it's going to be teachers, it's going to be a job, it's going to be friends.' I mean, us as adults, we're just consumed by people wanting something."
Stokes remembers that the kids did slightly push back when they were first told they weren't getting phones, and they cited the fact that all of their friends had devices of their own. "But literally now they don't even want a phone," Stokes says of her kids. "They don't even ask for it. They don't even care."
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Her eldest son, Major, is allotted 15 minutes per day to check his social media page, where he usually receives messages from his friends. But Stokes says that when she first started giving him phone access, he also became more critical of himself as an athlete. She noticed that after Major saw other kids' highlight reels online, he developed a tendency to compare that content to his own abilities.
"He was saying, 'Oh my gosh, so-and-so got this award. Why didn't I get invited? I've got to be as big as him. Oh, I've got to be as strong as him,'" Stokes says of the 17-year-old. "I saw that confidence start to shift, going down within his life and within just sports."
Finally, she told him she didn't think social media was the best thing for his mental health, and Major agreed. Stokes said her son had noticed the change, too.
Stokes says, "I finally told him, I said, 'Major, I think I'm not going to let you get on as much, buddy ... I think it's just a good idea just to be here. Just do your thing, focus onyoursports, focus on school.'"
She's regularly asked if she worries about her kids falling behind socially, but she says their lack of cell phones hasn't set the kids apart. "I mean, my kids are popular. I'm not trying to boast or anything like that. They're very well-liked, they're athletics, they're athletes, they are thriving where they're at," Stokes says.
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Her decision to restrict that screen time pays off when she gets messages from their teachers, who compliment the way Stokes' kids participate in class and make meaningful contributions to conversations. However, nothing feels as rewarding as when the kids notice the difference themselves.
"They go out with their friends, and everybody's on their phone," she says. "[My kids] are just sitting there like, 'Anybody want to talk to us?'"
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Tia Stokes initially went viral by spreading positivity while undergoing chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia (AML), but she's r...
