Youth athletics are steadily growing more and more intense, and pressure filled. Gone are the days of sports simply being about fun and morale building. Now at younger ages it matters what team kids are on, how much exposure they’re getting, and the level of competition they compete within. This can be due to several reasons, but some include the trickle-down effect of roster-limits at the NCAA level and NIL deals being available. This creates a financial and emotional burden for parents to be able to match the rising expectations of childhood competition.
Operating within this realm of high-pressure and high-stakes competition, it’s easy for parents to also get caught up in the desire to be the best. Outcomes of competition don’t just matter to the athlete when the stakes feel this high, they also matter to the parent involved. This creates a tricky dynamic between parent and child, where the parent needs to learn how to manage their own emotions and approach the athlete differently to ensure that support remains at the forefront.
A realistic truth is that parents get multiple of their own needs met through their child’s sports experience. It’s incredibly hard to make friends as an adult, so these environments often give the gift of friendship, as well as potentially fulfilling the parents’ own competitive drive. For parents, it’s important to do your own internal recognition of why this sport and your child’s performance matters to you.There might be some difficult truths within that processing, such as feeling like there’s an impact on your own worth and appearance as it relates to your child’s performance. When we acknowledge our own drives and motivations within sport, we can manage them better. On competition day, it can be helpful to remind yourself that this sport is for your child and practice distress tolerance skills such as deep breathing to manage any feelings you may hold.
It’s also important to let the child lead the charge about how much to care about the sport. I like to offer a comparison that the child is the acrobat on the tightrope and the parents are the safety net below, ready to hold and support them no matter the outcome.Being an athlete takes an incredible amount of bravery because there’s a risk of failure every time one competes, so offering unrelenting support makes that risk a little more manageable.
Showcasing support can look like asking the athlete what their goals are, asking them how they feel about their performance (rather than making an assumption based on your own feelings), and how much they want to talk about it. After a competition, the athlete may want to have space to process on their own and it’s important to give them that autonomy and practice of managing their own feelings—this is important for the parent too!
As it comes to communication, it can be helpful to set firm expectations and boundaries around how much sport is discussed. At a young age, it’s very easy for athletes to associate performance with identity, so by only discussing sport occasionally, we allow the child to know that we see them as more than just an athlete. This also encourages both parent and child to build lives outside of athletics and to know that these outside hobbies or interests are just as important! Celebrating more than just outcomes is also a great communication cue. We can compliment the resilience an athlete has, a great showing of teamwork, or even how we see the child manage failure. When things beyond performance are highlighted by the parent, the athlete can also begin to see that there is more to sport than just achievements.
As noted above, youth sports are a major financial responsibility. A standard that is important to maintain is that the athlete should not be shamed for this responsibility. There are ways to hold conversations about commitment to sport and the financial side, but when the athlete is shamed for how much their sport costs, it just creates a toxic relationship between the athlete, their sport,and their parents.
Parents take on a massive, supportive role when their child becomes involved in sports.Being able to take care of your own emotions and identity is paramount for continuing to show unconditional love for your youth athlete. Utilizing some of these communication tips can help bolster a relationship and help your child see the love you’re unconditionally offering.
To Learn More:
Call: 331-457-2020
Email: sports@growwellnessgroup.com
Website: https://www.growwellnessgroup.com/
