I cannot stand watching my child do dance /shows !

[5490t]

Now I know what I put my parents through when I was a kid (which they also agree with ) and how mind numbingly boring it was for them to endure. My 12 year old regularly shows me dances /songs/ shows anything drama she's created with her self/ her siblings god it's so mind numbing to sit and entertain.
I know I'm being unreasonable but nope can't stand that part of parenting anyone else with me ?

But maybe the rugby is the universe's karma for all the "shows" I made my parents endure. My cousin would storm off half way through as we always made her be the "square" character and we were the cool ones with leg warmers and pretend cigarettes.

YABU, DDs are terrific dancers and I always enjoyed watching them. Still do, DD1 still dances at university.

Mine have done this from being small- generally instigated by the older one. They tend to go like this:

stage 1: practicing and playing together relatively nicely

stage 2: youngest child has enough of being bossed around- world war 3 breaks out

stage 3: tears and negotiation. An abridged version of the show is agreed upon with child no.1 promising not to be bossy and child 2 agreeing to take part.

stage 4:Show commences. First song goes well. However, it generally falls apart by song 3. child no.2 is doing it under duress, child no.1 is upset that the vision hasn’t been realised.

Stage 5. Child no.2 gives up. Child no.1 cries because she’s ruined the show. We console child 1 and say it was wonderful as it was.

Then rinse and repeat a few weeks later.

My DD was having a piano lesson and she played a beautiful piece. She was about 13 and I was sitting behind her and her teacher. I let the music take me and tears rolled down my face, which was fine until they both stared at me with worried looks. Whoops. It was a moment that I will cherish forever.

My DD2 got one of those books - “1000 jokes for 9 year olds”

Oh my - that was painful.

I’m delighted to read this! I felt really sad for all those sweet children proudly creating their performances, for parents who were too bored to watch them.

You need to suggest hairdressing / barbers or spa treatment to them, you’re the customer, very relaxing!

Oh don't even. I work in the arts industry.I've taught performance. I take my children to all sorts of performance programs. I watch as many of their shows as I can. I take them to a huge variety of different medium of performance. We talk about the shows they are in and the shows we see.

But honestly watching not very good dance for multiple hours is tedious. As least at swim meet at least I can chat with other parents as well as watch the swimming.

Oh I don’t mind that at all!

I didn’t like imaginary play when they were little, as it was so endless.

Now I find it hard to sit through the swimming galas, but I enjoy all the performance stuff.

Primary school {‘ musical evenings ‘ were the worst. 2 hours watching other kids murder a violin or perform on other instruments, non of which had been learned in school. Then two minutes of Hot Cross Buns screeched on a recorder by one of mine, in a large class group. Cruel and unusual punishment and should have been banned.

Exactly!

That’s wonderful. I’m so glad she made it xx

I love this when they do this! One of the enjoyable bits of parenting. Now if they ask me to play some game where you make the teddies talk or the like - argh. Hate it.

I’d rather do that than imaginary play 😭

Mine did a spa for me once. Started out petty well- they’d put meditation music on, got me to lie down and put cucumber in my eyes and put a face mask on. They then decided to try their version of a massage and it was like being attacked by some crazy ninjas. It bloody hurt but I had two of them sitting on me so couldn’t actually get them off me easily.

@5490t ... Arf! There is another side to this, though, which is possibly worse. I was a shy child and my mother pushed me into performing in public <shudder>, in everything from the Infants' School nativity to the "Junior Orchestra", aged 11. I didn't want to do it and (most of all) I really didn't want her there in the front row.

At least you're a grown-up and have some sort of choice!

Even worse I had a friend’s kid who would come to ours and insist on us watching her “shows”. Her mum was most put out that my teenage boys weren’t interested. She was known in our house as “that annoying kid”.

I absolutely love watching my girls dance and show my there routines for the show I love watching the others to I like seeing what they could be with the dance school when there older

Lol I’m not sure watching professional performers is quite comparable…

👏🏼 👏🏼 this ⬆️

Where and how do you think the professionals started? You can’t have one without the other.

My council offer group ensembles for every child instrumentalist. After the first show I thought it must be excruciating to be a parent of an older child who could actually play having to sit through the "open strings" violin ensemble. A Dad of a more senior musician who I knew told me it wasn't. Now I've got a kid who can play quite well, I've realised he was right, there's something quite cute about seeing the progression from the squeeky beginners to the competent middle grades, through the older secondary school kids right up to the virtuosos who might well have professional. musicianship in their future.

It is all stuff they've trained for a practiced, with some direction and an ending. Not the same as interminable shows that are made up on the spot at home and go on for ever. Me and my cousins did gymnastics "shows". My kids and their cousins have the decency to script a play. I've coached them to always plan their ending!

Our oldest has never participated in them but dd15, ds11 and dd11 have over the years made some fucking hilarious productions on a private YouTube channel that they would randomly screen share whilst we were watching the weather etc 😁that have been fucking shit really but seeing them so serious is brilliant., I want to keep these videos forever. Actual live performances, I have no time for either tbf

I remember the shows, it came somewhere after dinosaurs and at around the same time as making potions! After mine was grown up i used to sometimes pick up a friend's child from school who was very keen on shows, they wrote them and we had to perform them together. I really got into it and enjoyed bigging up my part. But that is very different from going thorough it every day

🤣🤣🤣🤣 lol
Ours was an hour at least once a week, badgered to help, buy things, donate things, go to other events. As for the show itself, come at 4pm, plaster your child in make up, glitter, complicated hairstyle, glitter, hairspray, dance/break/dance til 11pm. Get home put exhausted child to bed, wake up child for school, plastered in glitter. We did one show, that was enough!