by Mj Ferruzza

Created on: December 07, 2008

There is something to seeing your kid coming up to bat. Seeing them jump up and down warming their legs before stepping on the soccer pitch. Seeing them get set in position ready to explode off the stand by the pool or the starting line on the track. It is a special feeling of anxiousness, fear, excitement, joy and tension all rolled into one. There is quite a different feeling when that same parent wants to take their support to the next step.

There will always be fathers who want to coach. Mothers who believe they have a better strategy or game plan. But unless they are wearing the whistle and have dedicated themselves to the concept of team and fairness, they can cause a lot of trouble and derisiveness otherwise. I am going to outline 10 of the problems and traps most parents fall into with youth in sports:
The problems:
1. Trying to live through their children. ~ The past will always be the past. But the future belongs to the youth. It is one thing dusting off the old trophy case and reliving the would have beens/could have beens, there is another trying to incorporate your "celebrated" career into theirs. They follow the adage, the older I get the better I was. Let it go!
2. The stress of driving kids to practices and games and believing officials and other parents are undermining your sacrifices. ~Most parents are going through the same thing, if they seem to be at ease with the process, they have either planned it out better or they have lessened its priority to their lives. They are obviously not bleeding for the sport.
3. The costs involved. ~ Sports, gymnastics, dance are all expensive. Most parents want the most bang from their bucks and demand that participation equivocates into the costs involved.
4. Treating the sport as something personal instead of just being a game. ~ Some parents use the sport their child plays as a grudge match against a foe, another parent, the child or even themselves. Again, let it go!
5. Parents seeking scholarship opportunities through the child's participation in sport. ~ Parents seeking payback for the time involved, sometimes disregarding the talent involved.
6. Long held grudges when a player from the same or opposing team is seen to get better privileges. ~ Animosity is best buried deep.
7. Coaches who do not dictate what parental participation entails. ~ Most difficulties can be offset with a phone call, a newsletter or an email stating the obvious. Leagues should help with all of this.
8. Parents who do not take for consideration

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