The last few weeks have been extremely stressful. I am not going to go into the gory details but any competitive hockey or sports mom can relate. It is that time of year. The politicking has begun and it is time to select next year’s team. Sit back and watch common sense and compassion become a thing of the past and madness make its grand entrance.
But this isn’t a post about how crazy parents get during this time of year or about how stressful it can be to watch your kid’s name get bandied about like livestock up for auction or about how alliances are made and broken or about how this is supposed to be fun or about how most of us forget that, at the core of it all, there is a child. No, this post is about resilience and perspective and life lessons taught by an 11 year-old boy.
My Boy who laughs and loves life charming princesses on our recent Disney Cruise.
For a variety of reasons my son will not be returning to the hockey team he has played with for the last two years. This was a conscious decision my husband and I made after weeks of back-and-forthing. We knew it wasn’t a good fit but we were worried. We were worried about how our son would react when we told him we felt it was time to move on. We know change is hard and scary and we knew the thought of leaving his friends would be tough. So we waited. And we stressed. And we waited some more.
Finally last night we sat down with him to chat. We told him how we felt, explained what we were thinking, reassured him that hockey could be fun again with the right team sharing our “life first” philosophy and how we could find other ways for him to see his pals. I prepared myself for the worst – tears and resistance and disappointment – but what I got instead was a quiet nod and one simple sentence; “I think you are right.”
Wow. WOW. After all of this worry and fear and preparation and he simply agreed?! I couldn’t believe it. I welled up and told him how proud I was of him. We had a frank discussion about his options, he expressed his wish to feel good about himself and have fun with people he liked and respected and his desire to work hard for a team he believed in. My husband and I agreed and he went back to doing what he was doing a few minutes before. Done. Over. Onward and upward.
After he left my husband and I looked at each other and smiled. As my eyes welled up again with pride we exchanged a knowing look. This kid is going to be OK. In fact, he is going to be amazing. You know how I know this? Because he already is! His life will be full. He will take risks. He will fall down. But, he will get back up. He will brush himself off, chalk it up to life experience, learn from it and come out stronger on the other side. His quiet confidence and perspective will see him through.
And my sweet yet strong 11 year-old boy has taught me a thing or two. When these issues come up in my life I need to remember to strip away emotion and ask myself, “why am I doing this anyway?” If I can stay true to that everything will be OK.
The Your Biggest Fan Blog Series is sponsored by Chevrolet. All content is true, based on Jen’s personal experience.