What parents need to know about keeping children from quitting youth sports

Recently, I read an article written by Asia Mape for the website I Love to Watch you Play entitled “My Daughter Quit Sports and, This Is What Youth Sports Parents Need to Know.”  This was one of the best articles that I have read on this subject as it was written by a parent about her child (with her child’s permission) and she gives good suggestions as to what parents should do to keep their children involved in youth sports and not have them quit.  The reason this article intrigued me are the points made by Ms. Mape are based in “reality”  and her personal experience and she is not spouting some “theory” given by an “expert in the field.”

            Ms. Mape explains how her daughter, who played and fell in love with water polo, one day told her parents that she no longer wanted to play the sport.  After being told that her daughter no longer wanted to play she, (Ms. Mape) wondered what went wrong.  She states in the article that not only is the child invested in a youth sport, but so is the family.  She states, “your child and your family sacrifice hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars, you are carpool mom extraordinaire, you make special game day muffins, many of your friends are the parents from the team, and you have already made a college recruiting video.  You are so invested; in fact, you’re on the board of the club team.  This is me. And then, poof, one day, they quit. It’s gone in a flash. And you’re left wondering what it was all for, where we did go wrong, and why didn’t I do something about her unhappiness sooner.”  This is what I have been writing about for the last two years, parents get so caught up in their children’s youth sports endeavors that they lose focus on the what their child should be doing, playing a sport, having fun, and learning a skill.

            Ms. Mape developed a list of the top five things that parents need to know, and she hopes that by sharing what happened with her and her daughter, “others might learn from my mistakes and get it right, or at least more right.”  The list is as follows:

·      We didn’t listen

·      Don’t treat them like mini adults

·      Support vs. pressure

·      It’s a marathon, not a sprit

·      Stop nagging them about “effort”

Like most lists that I post, all of the points are common sense; however, too many times we, as parents, get too caught up in wanting our children to succeed so we forget that they are just KIDS.  Ms. Mape states that her daughter was giving hints that she no longer wanted to play, but she was not listening to what her daughter was saying because she (Ms. Mape) stated that “I had an agenda and didn’t give her enough encouragement about her own dreams and passions early on.”  I have been writing for a while now about how adults are turning youth athletes into “mini professionals” and professionalizing youth sports.  More and more travel/select/elite teams are being formed and kids are traveling the country at younger and younger ages to play in multiple day tournaments all because travel organizations are encouraging parents to have children specialize in a sport at an early age in the hopes that they can get that elusive college scholarship.  Ms. Mape stated that she would take her children to the park to play her favorite sport, basketball, only to “spend the time at the park correcting their form” and having her children call her “fun sucker.”  She stated that “she wanted them to get better all the time, and they just wanted to have fun, laugh and run around and play a little basketball.”  Ms. Mape advises that parents should “stop videotaping practices and instead of doing private practices, take them to the park and let them laugh and giggle and keep things light.”  Finally, Ms. Mape advises that parents need to let their children be children and that they should be able to “miss a practice, miss a tournament or club season.”  She further stated that she knows “many kids who took time away from their sports and came back renewed and reinvigorated and even better player because of it.”

            Ms. Mape writes that she has no idea how far that her daughter would have gone playing water polo, but she said that “their relationship improved, and most importantly, she is happier and less stressed” since quitting.  In my time coaching I saw quite a few strained relationships between children and their parents because the child no longer wanted to play a sport while the parent insisted that they continue to play.  Most of the time the issue was the child not being able to express how they felt to their parents, and they did not want to disappoint them, so they just continued to play the sport leading to strained relationships and eventually the child quitting the sport.  I wish that more parents would step back, like Ms. Mape did, to see what’s happening with their child and allow their children to make the decisions that affect their lives.