Comforting my DS

[Nicole1976]

Today at a school sports day my son was chosen at random to do the 1500 metres race, before he went to the start line he told me that he was worried and he didn't want to do it because he is a slow runner, I told him it would be fine and he headed of to the start line. As I expected :( my son did very badly in the race, as he came onto the final 100 metre stretch he was in last place and had been lapped by all 29 of the other boys in the race(who were now finished) he looked very red faced and breathless and was only doing a slow jogging pace now. The girls race had started by this point and they were about to pass him, desperate not t be overtaken by the girls he tried to speed up- and fell flat on his face in the attempt- one of the girls took pity on him and helped him up, fare this he continued at walking pace to the finish line, with tears in his eyes and all of the boys laughing at him.

He has been very upset since then and is saying that he doesn't want to go to school tomorrow and that he feels embarrassed and self conscious.
How can I comfort him and try to make him feel better about himself ?

Oh man that is pants. It's nice to hear he was helped though. I don't really have much recent practical experience, but I would generally say if he was willing to laugh at himself, anyone doing the same would find themselves laughing with him and not at him, which might get boring quite quickly.

No one can be good at everything, so he has two choices here - practise to improve or just leave it and focus on things he prefers or has more aptitude for. He shouldn't wallow.

How is he regarded generally? I hate the fickleness of teasing and bullying when it centres on perceptions of weakness; I can't help thinking that if he hadn't given a shit and done some theatrical 'yeah! I finished !' type gesture at the end, then people wouldn't have been nearly so inclined to rib him. Easier said than done though. I hope he feels better soon.

Actually in answer to your last - he finished. He could have skulked off when the lapping started, but he saw it through. Don't know if he was being forced to by the teachers, but if not then that's something to be proud of.

How old is he?

Could he go with the answer 'you may run faster but I got picked up by a girl' - in a pretent I got a date way?

If he is younger just remind him not everyone is good at everything and he would do better in other competitions - academic, musical etc

Also with bullying name calling my mum always said 'names are like presents of you don't want it you return it so it belongs to them.' it my head it ment they had called themselves 'poo head' so I could laugh at that rather than retaliate.

So sorry I don't have a good suggestion, all I can say is that I once fell flat on my face during school sports day when I hit the last hurdle and went flying in the 100m hurdles. I was going to lose anyway. The only thing that stopped me being totally humiliated at the time was mild concussion. Everyone laughed about it, but of course it was old news in no time at all. My advice to him would be to try to shrug it off in good nature - act, as of course it will hurt - but if the only response the class clowns get is "uh huh" and a good natured shrug, they'll move onto another topic pretty fast. Big hug for your ds.