Motherhood - Too Much Sports

Today's young athlete may as well forget about having a summer vacation. Sports are no longer seasonal as children reach middle school. Baseball, basketball, and football don't just overlap for a week or two anymore; instead they multiply and spawn until each sport has to be practiced all year long.

The idiocy actually began a month before school was out. The high school basketball coach held "open gym" sessions for those that wanted to participate. I place "open gym" in italics because this is suppose to be a voluntary time and it's not. The coach also included weightlifting to these sessions. Wait a second since when is it healthy for 13 and 14 year old boys to weightlift? While the sessions met three times per week, my son chose to go to only one. I was glad of it since he was suffering from school burn out anyhow. The coach and teammates didn't see it that way though. He was ridiculed face to face and pressured through texts to make each and every session. Voluntary my foot!

Once school dismissed for the summer the pressures increased ten fold. He came home on the last

day of school with a schedule for summer basketball practices. June was filled to it's brim. But let's not stop there lest we forget football. Ever Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday included weightlifting at 7:00 am until 9:30 am. All voluntary of course. Just for a minute let me say that these hours put a huge cramp in my summer break too. Once again he  chooses to not go and once again he is badgered, nagged and belittled for not going. Even his best friend was giving him lots of grief for not showing up. My son has told me that football is very different in the way kids treat each other. That they are hostile, demeaning, and pushy. I suspect in his sophomore year, when I let him choose a sport to give up if he chooses, it will be football for those reasons. Not for lack of love of the game, but for the bullying behind the scenes. Anyhow, finally I put my foot down and declared that he must take a staycation for the first two weeks of summer. Didn't solve the problem really, instead of them badgering hiim, I now had coaches pestering and pressuring me to let him attend. We held firm. The third week of break he began weightlifting and conditioning for football and luckily found that he lwas not only ready for it but loved it too.

He still hasn't went to basketball no matter how aggressively the coach panders. In a group text with the coach and would be players he actually stated that come time for games (in 5 months) it would show who got to play. One of the boys was brave enough to text out that he already weightlifted in the mornings and didn't feel that his body should be put through more punishment. Others also told him not only were they doing that but had baseball as well. Heaven forbid we have a real baseball season. The coaches response was negative and dismissive. Thankfully he wasn't standing in front of me when I read his texts.

I believe as many college and professional coaches do, that every sport / activity that a child participates in makes them better for the other sports. No one sport should monopolize a kid's time at this age. So I will stick to my guns, reinforcing the idea of taking a break.