Is anyone else fed up of football taking over family time??

[ScaredButUnavoidable]

This is kind of light-hearted….. but also a little bit not…

I have two sons and both of their hobbies are football!!!

One son plays for two teams!

Between the two of them, four nights a week are taken up with football training. With travel and training thos requires them being out the house for between 1.5-2 hours. Some nights I go and other nights my DH goes but either way, it’s four nights a week where time together as a family is interrupted and our evenings are rushed.

Then comes the weekend…..and it’s more training and the matches too….

No nice lazy weekend mornings here….

For example one son today had to be up at 6.45am in order to get up and be ready in time to get to the match venue for 8.30am which is over an hours drive away! And they won’t be back until well after lunch time! Meanwhile I’m taking the other son training later on this morning…. and then tomorrow morning they’ve both got matches in the morning, so more early rises and no family time.

Then throw in the weekends where it’s football tournaments which again can be well over an hours drive away and take up the whole entire day!

It’s just endless.

I love the fact they have a hobby and that it’s a physical activity (they are both really fit because of all the sport), and I love that they are a part of a team and they are making good friendships and learning new skills etc etc but I am so fed up with it seeming to dominate all our time 😔

I miss the days where we could have restful evenings and make plans for the weekend without having to always factor in the football. It’s worse with both children doing it as it’s two different schedules we are having to fit around…..well three really seeing as one son plays for two teams.

We did consider asking our oldest son to drop one of his teams, but one of them is an Academy Team and it helps him massively with his skills and will be really beneficial when it comes to applying to college and they have been talking about him getting a part-time age appropriate job role there in a few years too with coaching the younger chikdren etc so we don’t want to take that opportunity away from him.

Nothing can be done really so I’m not looking for any kind of solution, I’m just looking for solidarity from other parents where their children’s love of sports is really, really annoying at times 🤣🤣🤣

I think you need to think of the football as being family time. Time spent in the car on the way to training and games talking about their day, I think I spend a lot more time with my kids travelling to their sport events than some of my friends who’s kids game or if they are not gaming want to be at the skate park with their friends and not at home with me and their siblings. My parents and sisters families come to watch games too which is a good chance to catch up with everyone

Yep same … but it’s not forever and I’m dreading it once it’s all over and they have flown the nest!
One day they won’t want you there!

Try being a coach for one and the other being a coach for the other… we literally pass like ships every day.
age gap between boys so we have this to go for another few years before eldest will likely give up…if he doesn’t, well it’ll continue for a few more years.

tonight it’s a miracle we’re all in and ordered a Chinese before the eldest heads out with his mates and won’t see him again until tomorrow evening due to schedule for the youngest tomorrow!

you’ve also only likely a year or two before your eldest is out all the time on top of the sports schedules and that’s a whole other ball game 😂

On a side note - I’ve made the best of friends with the football mums and we’ve been great friends for 10+ years! Silver linings in the chaos 🥰

Haha my life, except my DH also coaches on both teams and does the clubs fixtures. It’s alllllllllllll I ever hear about! It’s a phase though, nothing lasts. I miss my grass, my greenhouse, my Sundays and weeknights but they will come back to me, and I’ll probably miss the football 🤦🏻‍♀️!

I only have one (11) and I feel your pain, he is the sort of person who can turn his had to any sport and make a good go of it, but having just started secondary it’s been great for making friends and it’s great to see how pleased he is for making the school teams.

I’m glad he’s doing something positive and has hobbies which will hopefully keep him out of too much trouble. That said, I’m also mighty glad he’s given up swimming, I was not loving the 5am starts and sweating for hours at galas having had to pay £5-£10 to watch on top of entry fees.

Football and ex rugby mum here for two boys - go with it, soak it up and before you know it they’ll be grown up -eldest at uni and youngest u18’s football. I remember the days of both playing Sunday and training different days - really isn’t forever though!

Yep, that’s life! My two girls play hockey, netball and football. This morning we were out of the house by 7.30am for a hockey fixture 45 miles away. Home for 12.30pm, eldest had a football match at 2pm. Other daughter has a football match at 10am tomorrow. Monday evening is hockey training, Tuesday football, Wednesday and Thursday netball.

Both my sons play football too so very similar to you OP but I quite like it. They have fantastic teams, coaches, players and other parents so it’s almost like a social gathering as well for DH and I.
I do get the odd weekend though when I’d like a lie in and do secretly celebrate if a match or training is cancelled! But I’m up for work at 5am in the week so getting up at 7am at the weekend is technically a lie in for me.

Season ends in May though and then doesn’t start until September? Yes you’ll have summer tournaments but they’re not every weekend. DS plays football and it’s a huge part of our life, training plus games and tournaments. Yes it’s a lot but we’re good friends with the parents of the other players and we enjoy it. As parents we also help each other out so if one family are doing something one weekend, another will take their son to the game etc. I just think it’s the normal sacrifice of parenting but we still find time to do things as a family. Also, the football is family time? Cheering the kids on, pub lunch after on a Sunday. I think it’s what you make of it.

I’m currently recovering from a hangover as wel had all the team and parents over to ours last night for drinks and a party. We do a lot of stuff socially around football, we love it.

That morning text on a Sunday when it’s been raining cats and dogs all week “unfortunately guys we’ve done a pitch inspection and it’s totally water logged and flooded, game to be rescheduled” 🤣

Just parenting, I have two DCs 13 and 15 and we have something on every day! It is what it is.
However me and DH do make sure we have time separately and together to do our stuff as well.

See it isn’t family time for us as my DH takes one son and I take the other. There is only one night between Mon-Fri where the four of us are home together.

And on Saturday and Sunday it’s the same, he’s out with one son and I’m out with the other.

So we each get one-on-one time with each child (we alternate which child we go with each time), but it’s not family time as a foursome. That is very rare and I miss it.

I totally feel you!
ds1 trains once a week and plays on as Sunday (he also boxes three times a week)

ds2 trains Monday, Wednesday and Friday match Saturday and Sunday.

dd1 netball trains twice a week with two matches on Sunday in two leagues about an hours drive from each other and an hour from our house.

We had an 8.10 meet this morning a 45 min drive away. We have four matches tomorrow. We do split them between us but it’s still a lot.

I’ve spoke to ds2 about reducing his football but at the moment there is no way he wants to. He’s also got trials coming up for school boys team he’s been put forward for. I have no idea where on earth we will fit that in if he gets offered a spot.

@Gothwifedepends on the club. One of our sons plays at a pretty average level and they finish end of June till mid August.
Other son is higher ability and his teams just take a few weeks off and then back training and playing friendlies.

I feel your pain OP. I have three kids. Two sons play football. Guess where I am going tomorrow morning?! If my daughter decides to take up football I think I might top myself...

Why not share with other parents, taking it in turns to go to different places?Then you'd get some time off. And they can do their own washing/cleaning/admin.

She might take up hockey like mine… 2 training sessions plus a match a week (as well as her football training and matches!) Or netball, which is the same. Or swimming, or gymnastics… football isn’t the only time consuming hobby 😭

I think it’s time with her family as a whole that the OP is missing, not time alone.

Absolutely.

I love watching them play, we always go with them to training and to their matches because we enjoy it and want to support them in their hobbies.

But I hate how much time it takes away from us being able to spend as a family unit. We are now always divided.

Neither of my son’s teams have ever stopped over the summer either. They still do their weekly training and although the league finishes they still play friendlies against other teams every weekend too.

Yes that’s the norm here too, there’s no break at all.

That’s not the issue though is it? It’s spending time with the family doing other things. We can’t even squeeze in something like a trip to a theme park! I don’t mind the football but it would be nice to be able to do something different at a weekend sometimes!

Exactly.

I miss the days where we used to wake up on some Sunday mornings, have a nice lazy cup of tea in bed and then go somewhere local for a nice fry-up buffet for a breakfast.

I miss being able to send the boys to their grandparents for a sleepover on a Friday or Saturday night so me and DH can go out together and have some quality time as a couple. Can’t do that anymore seeing as they need to be up at 8am the next morning (if not earlier) for either a game or training.

Like I said I love that they have a hobby but it comes at a big cost on both family time and how much time I get to spend with DH as a couple.

Yep similar. Mini blondes does acro gym 4 times a week.

We are up earlier on a Saturday to go to her class then we get up for school mon to Fri

and as a single parent it all comes down to me to take and pay for it

tho so manage to share travel some days and I take my dd and her bestie and her mum/my friend collects them both

but it eats into after school 3 times and weekend once - but when a comp then extra training /practice and travelling /costs