Sports Anxiety

[emma1]

I am adjusting supplements, so when my daughter started acting edgy during the "lazy days of summer" I immediately thought it was one of the supplements or the combo of them. However, I now believe I have figured out that the cause is most likely the fact that my daughter is working out for soccer daily and she has a new coach who is critical and yells at my daughter frequently.

 

She is in high school, and I know that talking to the school or the coach is just simply not an option. Another mom tried that earlier this year -- her sweet (and talented!) daughter ended up sitting the bench almost all season. The school explicitly said that they would "not interfere with the coaching process" and basically told the mom she was over-stepping.

 

My daughter believes she is being singled out (which may not be true) -- but I know that the coach is being verbally critical in front of the entire team. My daughter handles it during practices, but then falls apart at home.

 

She loves the sport -- so the situation "is what it is" -- I can't change it (can't change the program; can't get my daughter to quit). Any suggestions for helping my daughter cope? This goes on all summer!

[faith]

Emma,

the only thought I have to cope with this type of coach, is that maybe her and another friend on the team could sort of have a little inside joke on how many times each of them could get yelled at, sorta like a little contest. Then they will just look to each other and have a little internal laugh on how silly the coach sounds always yelling. I think she has to find a way to not take it personally, and look at it like a flaw of the coach. I'm sure she is doing her best anyway and enjoys the game and will not change that just because the coach is a yeller. I try to tell my son that we can't always control how others behave. Good luck.

 

Faith

[guy123]

I played hockey when I was in school and for what it's worth, I had horrible Sports Anxiety (I guess you could call it that) in that I was sick to my stomach before every game. It was probably just nerves, as I'm very high strung. Of course once I was at the game it was all gone and I was ready to rock.

 

What year is she in high school? If she in a senior I would encourage her to get "senioritis" about her sport and just have fun and stop caring. Exceptions to this would be if she plans to continue to play this sport in college and needs a letter of recommendation or something from her current coach. What sport is it, btw?

 

Does she do any other extra-curricular activities? My sister was in a similar situation in high school; she was captain of the Drill Team (think like dancing/gymnastics team), and in like 50 other clubs, and she loved them all, but she would come home and lose it from all the added stress. I think in her situation it was just an issue of too much stress and not a specific coach problem or anything, altho I remember she did clash with some other girls on the drill team (basically my sister was awesome but some other girls were jealous that she was captain and they were not, and they were trying to "influence" her behavior as captain). So in the end, she ended up quitting most of the clubs she was in and just focusing on one or two things that she liked the best. I'm not sure how applicable this is to your daughter's situation as it seems kind of different, but I thought it might be useful.

 

Maybe the coach is just a "screamer." My band director was like that. It was alarming at first and freaked some kids out, but then we just stopped caring because where a normal person would say like "Hey, flutes, you missed your entrance again; it's one, two, three AND and THEN you come in. Ok let's try again" he might be like "DAMMIT! What did we practice last time? You better not embarrass me at the concert next week!" A couple times that was followed up by a "oh, you think that's funny? Get the ###### out, then!" Well that sounds lame when I type it out, but the point is the coach just might suck at communicating and "screaming" or being an ###### might just be his "way."

 

And if he makes team members sit out because their parents talk to him, it sounds like he has passive aggressive issues or something.

 

Maybe talk to all the other parents on the team and organize a strike or something

 

btw you're a totally cool mom for coming online to try and find ways to help your daughter

 

edit - I see that this forum replaces profanity with ####s. Hehe.

[JennyC]

Oh Faith that is a wonderful suggestion, I could agree with you more!!