Anyone else sick of kids excelling at sport?

[LaMaG]

My DS15 is quite talented at a particular sport and much as I support him I am sick to death at the extent it has taken over our lives. He plays locally but also for a county team so almost every weekend is spent travelling hours away, they never provide team buses. Dh goes to all the matches and no one ever car pools. DS was young when this kicked off and I had babies at home so DH got very involved and I stepped back. But I bring him to training twice a week for this and then he still has club level training and another sport too. He does gym work every day he doesn't have training so I'm constantly working my life around it, I can't even do an evening class. It affects meal times too. I feel guilty for complaining as some people are so passionate about this, I have a colleague who is quite in awe of it and many others tell us how proud we must be. DH says I just don't get it as I don't follow sport but I am proud I just resent how it becomes our whole lives. Its also dealing with the constant drama of losing and anger if he is left on the bench etc. Dh is worse than DS! There is a constant risk he will get dropped and every thing is analysed and obsessed about. Everyone was shouting this morning cos a training top went missing, it's always drama drama drama. Any other frustrated sports mums out there who understand?

It’s very intensive because of training six days a week with some late nights. Whole day sports events most weekend that often involve long drives (car pooling sometimes) physiotherapy every week, homework done whilst training in rest times. It’s exhausting for me but good to see a teen doing something that doesn’t involve screens.

I think sport is very helpful for “real life” as long as it’s not the child’s sole identity. It teaches them to be organised, they learn how to lose well, they learn the relationship between hard work and achievement.

In my med school class there were a number of accomplished athletes, a few at commonwealth games level, one made to the Olympics.

Parents with older children appreciate that a major barrier to getting through school work/study is procrastination. An athletic child is often more likely to utilise their time well.

my 15 year old daughter has given up competitive swimming this year, and I’m grateful, but I don’t consider them wasted years. She is doing better at school now but she was still doing well before, even with the 430 starts.

All the best op

Finding them isn't too hard, it is paying for them that's the challenge! They don't come cheap.

My brother was very good at sports and reached county level at one particular sport and I'm still kind of resentful that none of my hobbies or interests matched up in my parents eyes and I was dragged along to training and competitions every weekend.

One of DDs friends never goes to parties or sleepovers because she always has to be in the swimming pool or travelling to a comp. She enjoys it for now but it's not my idea of a well rounded childhood.

My DC enjoy sports but i will never encourage them to push so hard at one thing to the detriment of their school work, social life, family life and down time as i don't think its at all healthy.

However most of the extra talented sports kids don't become professional sports adults so it will fall back into a casual/weekend hobby pretty soon for most families. I know that when you're in the thick of it you think it will never end but it's all worth it because they'll be the next Andy Murray or whatever but that's probably not the case.

They are two very different ends of the spectrum though? You don't need to spend every spare minute training for one sport to not be reliant on screens for your entertainment.

At the risk of sounding like a stuck record, I feel like childhood and adolescence can be run much more economically by simply growing a spine and taking the devices away as appropriate.

It isn’t sustainable as a society to start going down a road in which avoiding child/adolescent screen addiction requires hour after hour of parental driving/supervision and thousands and thousands of pounds a year.

@twistyizzy 😂Yes I can imagine it easily runs into tens of thousands.

I'm surprised that there's so much focus here on the 'end goal ' of sport rather than the sport itself? So what if all the kids playing football don't make pro or the swimmers don't make the Olympics. They've learnt a huge amount of transferable skills including discipline, hard work, fitness, sacrifice and choices. Giving up at uni doesn't mean it's all wasted.

I agree but I also think you can get these benefits from sports without the parents and siblings having to make huge sacrifices by taking it to this level.

It’s all about balance. You exist too. I limit what I will do and the kids have to work around it. My kids seem to do so sodding much, and the youngest hasn’t started doing stuff yet. If you want to do an evening class once a week do it. If your ds needs a lift to something he can sort it. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to have one night a week that you don’t take him anywhere.

I have a cricketer. Is it terrible that I actually really enjoy it?

Our DS was/is the same (I assume the OP is talking about cricket?) and to be honest we were very happy to support his hobby but clearly it helped that he is an only DC and we had no other DC to consider. The travelling around the country was actually quite interesting, we got to visit all sorts of different areas and watching cricket and having a picnic or making cricket teas is quite a nice way to spend the weekend (I obviously don't have much a social life ). It's added something new to my own life to, I don't think I'd ever watched a game of cricket in my life but now I enjoy following the Ashes. It's a great asset to be part of a sports team, all sorts of other benefits rather than just the sport itself. When our DS went to Uni he immediately joined the cricket club and had a group of ready made friends.
And, hate to say this as it sounds boastful, but I am immensely proud that he was one of only two boys from the State sector who made the County team.

Just to point out... its not the time taking DD to matches and training that can be annoying. Its that her sister is either dragged along too or stays home by herself when their father is away. Its great for one while being detrimental to the other. There's no easy answer really. Its just two evenings and one weekend morning for us. Her grandparents help with the weekend stuff too (Should be another evening but I run a youth club myself that night)

I totally get this. I am very unsporty and have zero interest in sport. My two eldest children from my first marriage are similar and into drama and music. My youngest (now 20) is sport mad. County cricket which was very pressured and time consuming and involved a lot of travel. I mostly stayed out of it and he eventually dropped it as he found it too much - I had to intervene to allow this as DH was very invested in it. Mine is at Uni now and plays first team hockey which he loves and social cricket in the summer. In the end they grow up but it’s tough when it impacts family life.

Slightly different perspective...
I'm not sporty at all. Younger child is very sporty and plays for county team and now national team.
Now 18.
It's almost always been me who takes him to events etc (before he could drive) as my work is more flexible than DH.
It's been an amazing bonding experience for us to be travelling all over the country together. I'm really grateful for it. (He's also been grateful for all my input but he knows that I wouldn't put myself out if he was grumpy or selfish about it.)
The biggest issue for us has been the immense cost but we've always said that he would have to take that on once he goes to uni and he'll have to get a good job to make that happen.
I think it would not have been possible to do all of this had we had younger children as well (unless they happened to be as good as him at the same sport). I suspect we just wouldn't have got into this situation in that case as we probably would not have been willing to sacrifice weekends in the same way.
But I'm glad things have worked as they have.
(Also son is very sensible. He told the national coach he wouldn't be playing during A levels. He limited training himself to what he felt was reasonable alongside revision. He told them that, if they wanted him, they needed to accept that his grades and uni place were more important to him but that he'd repay them after that by putting in the graft. So far that strategy seems to have worked).

You’re right. I was just commenting on my sports mad teen who literally doesn’t have the time for excessive screen use and doesn’t care about this. Friends from school don’t do sport at high level and aren’t on their phones the whole time. I think though that sport does get kids away from social media and it’s importance in their world. My teen cares about how they and team are doing sports wise and about sports in general (tv goes on and looks for sports) but the whole how do I look on social media has no importance. It’s a whole mind set that is strength, resilience, fair play by following the referee judgments, politeness to other teams, strong mind for training, encouraging others, keeping the kit clean and ready. I’m really impressed with the way my teen has such maturity. I think it helps at school and with friendships to have these skills. They say that success in sport is one third the mind focus. It’s also about coping in defeat. Springing back, learning from what happened and supporting others. Sport at any level does kids good. It has to be inclusive of all abilities and disabilities and costs should not be a barrier and help given.

I think people have only focused on the main goal when huge family sacrifice; financial and time, and where the child doesn't get any down time not connected to their hobby. Yes, the benefits and transferable skills can be immense, but you don't need to do 28 (for example) hours +a week to experience that and if you're only coasting along and never likely to 'succeed'

I've been a gym parent and the younger children would change into onesies and night clothes after class (finishing around 9pm) and their younger siblings, not connected to the club, the same. It's a lot of hard work and dedication. Four evenings a week of that then early mornings at weekend. That was at 6/7 years. My other child did minimum one hour rec gym a week and and another hobby.

Like I said, I know of a few examples (a couple personally) of children in dance schools who will obviously never succeed to the top, but every holiday is packed with summer schools and more lessons. They're not allowed downtime. It's more about the parent and their wishes, and in a couple of cases I'd go so far as to say it's borderline abusive. Some have linked Instagram sharing their child's progress and I think some are addicted to any faint likes and praise.

Sport at any level does kids good. It has to be inclusive of all abilities and disabilities and costs should not be a barrier and help given.

I do agree with this. Unfortunately it's difficult to secure funding. The most talented will sometimes receive funding, depending on the field.

I see so many Go fund me appeals for the lesser talented children who haven't been talented enough for the funding. I think that's often unfair on the children, these money request accounts complete with photos of the children. Their privacy has not been considered.

I felt like you did op. However then ds went to university and oh I miss it. His team was a lovely bunch of lads. The dads (mostly dads) were nice guys and as I was the one mostly taking ds I go.friendly with them all. I meet them down town still and they always stop for a chat and I hear how their sons are doing. They too express they miss the weekends at the club.

Not helpful I know.

My younger daughter wanted an eventing career (show jumping/dressage/cross country) and our life was very similar until a few years ago - she was struggling with anxiety and fallen out of love with riding and had a good hard think and decided that actually, she’d rather have riding and horses as a hobby.

I think that she realised that it’s such a tough sport and so few actually make it to the top and are able to make a living from it.

She’s still horse mad, fell back in love with riding and absolutely loves cross country and is still off competing a fair bit but riding is now fun and something she does to get away from
stress and pressure rather than the cause of it. I have to say I was relieved. We had always been supportive, but it was taking its toll on family life.

I don't think it's wrong myself. Though I think you need to prepare for when it ends or a child does not quite make the grade to be a professional, and also you should not be living a dream vicariously.

So in the OPs example the DH response to me is the worst bit.

It sounds like most if your frustrations are actually with your dh. He seems to be overly invested in 1 child to the detriment if your family.

My kids are sporty, but in a non traditional way. 1 has trained as a pe teacher. He plays footie 'with the lads'. 1 has just become a lifeguard at 16. He climbs in his spare time. The other 2 like to walk/run. We never joined clubs, they have chosen to do this by themselves. The 1 who is a lifeguard is really athletic, could have done well, but hated the pressure.

They all get/got themselves to their chosen activities, we decided as parents that clubs wouldn't dominate family life.

With that in mind, op, I'd be encouraging your son to make his own way to as much training as possible. I'd be booking holidays and telling them they are coming. Meal times would be the same for everyone, if he can't make it, he eata at a different time. I'd also be asking husband to back you up on this.

Good luck, and don't worry if you're being unreasonable, sounds like you just want the best for your family as a whole.

A very wise decision, it takes serious money to do it professionally. Like you say, not many make it and it does take over your whole life. I'm actually relieves that DD is a competent but not amazing rider as we pay school fees so just don't have the spare money to support it as anything more than a hobby. Means we get to go to a few comps but on the whole she is happy just pottering around with low level PC. Plus she has time for other hobbies/activities too.

A friend had a DD who was a keen figure skater - not available in our town so they had to drive 20 miles every time; she was doing training sessions at 6am before school and it took over their weekends as well. It was not helpful for their other child either as they were sidelined, inevitably.

Luckily (IMHO) she at some point in her early teens/tweens didn't get chosen for a senior squad (until that point she had been headed for national competitions) and they all decided it wasn't worth it. She can still enjoy ice skating and of course she is really good, but they got their lives back.

My DS is very sporty, so tho he was never chosen for the highest level of sport, I did spend a lot of his school years taking him from match to training, most evenings and at the weekends, for a range of different sports too. I loved watching him play tho and never felt it was an issue. Obvs not to the level of your ds @LaMaG so maybe that's the difference.

His current sport, which he took up seriously just before Covid, did see him make the national team last year. I was very very proud - but the nature of the sport in the UK meant that it wasn't about me driving him somewhere 5 times a week. He had training sessions which involved some organisation by us, but it wasn't even each week so it was fine. He got to play matches internationally and we went to watch - which was amazing and I shall never forget it. So hopefully in the long term it will seem well worth it for you and your DS. Best of luck to you all.