difficult child and Organized Sports and My Parents - a vent - sort of

[iloveturtles]

We just came home from our afternoon of football. difficult child plays in a very low key league, once a week practice and then 1 hour of practice before the 1 hour game. It is supposed to be fun and instructional equal play.

Well today certainly wasn't equal play for difficult child. I think he got about 10 minutes maybe 12 out of the hour. There are only 11 boys on the team and 8 on the field at a time. I did mention something the guy who runs the program. I actually asked him if the equal play should be the same as last season, since we moved up a level. He said it was and said he would send out a generic email to all the coaches.

What I am most ticked about is my parents. They were putting the blame on difficult child. Saying if he was more excited about playing then he would play. Well, difficult child hardly shows any emotion. He is pretty flat most of the time. It is just who he is. I said it is the coaches responsibility to rotate the boys no matter the "excitement" level of the boy. Especially with difficult child not being in the game he won't be engaged in the game.

Not certain how to go about this. It was the first game hopefully the coaches will get better.

Thanks for listening.

 

[lmf64]

It is the coach's responsibility to make sure each kid is out on the field for an equal amount of time, no matter how well the kid plays or how happy the kid appears to be there.
It's cool that your son can do team sports. My son absolutely cannot do team sports. We tried football, basketball, hockey, and baseball. By the second practice I was pulling my hair out and the volunteer coaches were way out of their realm. He did scouts all the way up to planning his eagle project and then dropped it because of mental health issues though. He is now back in tae kwon do after a 4 years hiatus and is perfectly okay with starting over with a white belt since he's changing senseis and dojos. His old one basically allowed him to level up each term as long as he tried. His new one is private so if he's not working on his skills he won't test well and his sensei will not belt him. But that's okay, it's time he had to work to get something. He doesn't do classes at school due to his severe lds, so he's never taken a test (or at least not the same one everyone else has to pass)

 

[iloveturtles]

Thank you for validating what I was thinking.

The speed of the game at the new level will take some adjusting for difficult child. He process very slowly.

We will see how it goes.

Thanks,

A

 

[svengandhi]

lmf -

I don't know how old your son is but are you aware that scouts with special needs can get till age 21 to do their Eagle project but it has to be approved before they are 18.

None of my boys really did well with team sports, even the non-difficult children. Almost former difficult child now plays on the chess team, but it's a "team" where everyone plays individually (6 boards with each player on his own game). We've tried soccer, baseball and basketball; football is not a big thing here and I personally detest it so my boys never were even signed up for that. There was no interest in lacrosse or ice hockey. Some kids are not sports kids.

 

[lmf64]

Yes I did know he could still be working on his eagle project, but he doesn't want to anymore. I was his pack leader in cubs and ass. troop master in boys. We had a lot of trouble with some kids in scouts when he was in boys and he got burned out by it. His troop leader was great with him and was very proactive in dealing with heading off trouble when he could but the boys had their own way of getting to him.

 

[Fran]

Seems the coaching is minor compared to grandparents being negative. Have a talk with grandparents about them being the child's advocate instead of a critic.
difficult child already knows he is a bit of a fish out of water so wouldn't it be better to know his parents and grandparents are there to support him?

My difficult child was a disaster on every team sport we tried. He was hyperactive, hyperverbal, had no clue what the purpose was of any of the games and his executive function issues all came together to make him a walking nightmare for any coach and both of his parents. He still won't do anything physical including walking on the treadmill.

If a child has no interest in being like everyone else then sports holds no allure.