Being a football parent has been quite taxing. I’m lucky enough to have the flexibility to duck out during the week to fetch my daughter after practice—which happens twice a week, assuming the schedule actually holds. But considering how fickle the school calendar can be, there have been plenty of instances already this year where my wife and I have had to reshuffle our work schedules to accommodate sudden changes announced the night before.
Then there are the tournament days. As corporate slaves, we only have the weekends to recharge, but most of our Saturdays have now been usurped by football.
You see, you don’t just go to games and sit on the bleachers. Tournament days are full-on operations that must be handled with military precision. Fortunately, we’ve amassed enough gear and mental checklists that we can now get away with prepping the night before. On any given day, we lug around:
- Folding chairs and large umbrellas.
- A large cooler filled with ice packs and fluids.
- A med kit, sunscreen, cooling sprays, and her nebulizer.
- Recovery snacks, lunch, and “heavy” snacks.
- A change of clothes and two sets of shoes (turf and firm ground), plus sandals to give her feet a rest after the game.
- Towels in case of a downpour.
The kid even has her own mini-cooler, tumbler, and a bag with emergency medication for the sidelines. We fit all of this into a folding cart that we deploy the moment we hit the venue.
Then there’s the energy required to deal with the social front. Believe it or not, I’m the extrovert in the family. But while I get energized by groups, I often… well, I hate people. It takes a conscious effort to be polite and display the required social graces. We’re fortunate that our fellow parents on the team are mostly okay, but given the social strata of the this particular football crowd, it’s a pretty much expected that a certain percentage will be assholes.
You can hear some of them not cheering, but berating and insulting kids. You can even spot some of them a mile away: the dads in fraternity golf shirts with popped collars, arms crossed, mouthing off some “weird flex” loud enough to cut through the cheers.
My waifu and I often wonder where this journey is taking us. We have no grand aspirations; we’ve resigned ourselves to the fact that she isn’t a “natural” athlete. She doesn’t display enough interest to do drills on her own time, despite the gear I’ve bought for us to use at the village park.
Unfortunately, a skills gap is emerging. Half the team is enrolled in “outside clubs”—supplemental programs that offer more touches and more competition. It’s impossible to ignore the low-key pressure. Sometimes, the “Have you considered an outside club?” feels less like a tip and more like a passive-aggressive way of saying, “Your kid is holding the team back.” The kid’s teammates notice that gap, too. There are moments in-game where teammates express disappointment when she turns the ball over or isn’t fast enough to chase an opponent. Often, they won’t even pass to her even when she’s wide open.
The silver lining is her coach, who is supportive and acknowledges her effort. Recently, the coach had no choice but to field her because the team wasn’t at full strength. For the longest time, my daughter was comfortable as a substitute, but lately, she’s actually been starting matches. Coach doesn’t shout at her much and takes time to explain to her what she’s doing wrong.
I have to give it to her: she has the “football IQ” going for her. She knows the formation and follows instructions well. She just lacks the athleticism and the confidence that comes with technical mastery—things that can’t be developed in a twice-a-week school program. They require repetitions on her own time. But rather than pick up the ball, she prefers chatting and playing online games with classmates. It’s her coping mechanism as an only child; she craves that clique, something she hasn’t quite found with the team yet.
What are we to do? She says she likes football. She takes pride in knowing the sport and, frankly, she likes the winning—they’ve been on a streak since she joined. As a millennial parent struggling to “do better” than the previous generation, I’m drawn to give her every bit of support.
I constantly question the “how.” I want her to love the game I love. I want her to understand that “team” is a verb. But I also want her to have a childhood. How do you balance gentle parenting with the tough love required for athletic discipline?
- The Goal: Appreciation of sportsmanship, resilience, and a solid work ethic.
- The Risk: Pushing so hard she grows to hate the smell of freshly cut grass.
I’m not much of a risk-taker. I only have one kid and one chance not to muck this parenting thing up. Yeah, Saturdays are a slog, but she wakes up tired and smiling on Sundays. I guess, for now, that’s a win.