Parents Daughter with mental block on bars

[bayleesmom]

Hi there! First time post, so bear with me!

My daughter is P1 Argo (Canadian) at the very beginning of her competitive "career". She watched a teammate break her elbow badly a month ago after jumping from low to high and landing badly after she swung off the high bar. Since then, my DD has only managed to do the jump a few times, not nearly consistent enough for her coaches. She jumps and hits her hands on wrists on the bar but does not grab it! She was given an ultimatum to catch the bar or not compete in her first competition. I can understand her coaches frustration, she went from being fairly consistent to failing every single practice. She was a mess of anxiety and didn't catch the bar at all that practice, or any following thus far (except on one open gym day, when she was working with an older gymnast instead of her coach). Her coaches have tried everything they can think of. I've tried rewards for catching the bar, visualization, stepping WAY back and just being supportive mom and waiting for her to "get over it". DD is not sleeping well, not eating well, really withdrawn, having a hard time focusing at school, and is generally not herself. Last week our head coach drilled DD on the bars while her team was conditioning. I happened to be standing outside the gym and heard the yelling. DD was made to leave early that night, hysterically crying. Her coach decided she would train with the precompetitive girls this week, to see if seeing her team practice without her would motivate her. DD wound up sick in bed for two days and missed her practice yesterday, I wonder how much of her illness was fuelled by anxiety.

My daughter loves this sport. She defines herself by it. It's hard for me to see her struggle with her own mind at such a young age.

She starts to see a sports psychologist (he prefers to be called a mental coach) next week for some insight on this. I'd like to be able to let her do this in her own time but I'm afraid that they will drop her all together if she doesn't manage something soon.

I realize that this type of post has probably has been posted a million times, but does anyone have any suggestions about what else we can do? If anything it feels good to vent to a group who may understand my frustration. As a mom, I just hope that my children can succeed and meet their goals, but I've never had to deal with something quite like this before. Thanks in advance

 

[kaloss]

My daughter is dealing with the same situation right now. I posted yesterday and had received lots of support and amazing advice from lots of parents and coaches. The main point seems to be to remove any and all pressure and give her space to work it out on her terms. My thread, if interested in reading is titled "7year old with mental block" (or along those lines)

 

[LizzieLac]

I am so sorry your DD is going through this, but I just have to say:

It has only been a month, my goodness, why do these coaches think that these young children are not affected by seeing these accidents? Tell the coach(es) to back off the skill that causing all of this anxiety - PERIOD! She needs time to put what she saw in the past. Not sure if anyway has addressed this calmly and matter of factly, but she needs to be told in a caring way that sometimes accidents happen, but that her teammate is going to heal and be just fine.

Not sure how old she is but yelling in response to a fear is just stupid regardless of how old a gymnast is. This behavior only makes the anxiety worse.

Everyone needs to back off the skill - don't even talk about it. Let her not attempt it for a few weeks. She needs some peace.

 

[Deleted member 14190]

This may seem off topic but ,,,
Have they taught her how to fall? Typically teaching a kid how to pull her hands in and land on her back, (instead of putting her arm out), helps to build confidence. Teaching them to roll to the back also helps, in case they catch feet on low bar during a squat on. We do our best to teach all our kids both of these, to lessen the injuries. We still have accidents but they are much less.

 

[bayleesmom]

This may seem off topic but ,,,
Have they taught her how to fall? Typically teaching a kid how to pull her hands in and land on her back, (instead of putting her arm out), helps to build confidence. Teaching them to roll to the back also helps, in case they catch feet on low bar during a squat on. We do our best to teach all our kids both of these, to lessen the injuries. We still have accidents but they are much less.

They do teach the girls about falling. When she was precompetitive they would drop them from the high bar to a portapit (our gym has no foam pits) so they could learn what to do with their body to be safe.

 

[bayleesmom]

I am so sorry your DD is going through this, but I just have to say:

It has only been a month, my goodness, why do these coaches think that these young children are not affected by seeing these accidents? Tell the coach(es) to back off the skill that causing all of this anxiety - PERIOD! She needs time to put what she saw in the past. Not sure if anyway has addressed this calmly and matter of factly, but she needs to be told in a caring way that sometimes accidents happen, but that her teammate is going to heal and be just fine.

Not sure how old she is but yelling in response to a fear is just stupid regardless of how old a gymnast is. This behavior only makes the anxiety worse.

Everyone needs to back off the skill - don't even talk about it. Let her not attempt it for a few weeks. She needs some peace.

I agree completely with this! I am hesitant to tell anyone to back off because I know these coaches don't take criticism well. I'm hoping to come up with a careful way to say it without making things worse for my daughter. I feel like the gym should be a more constructive place. It used to be great, as long as she was performing well she didn't get picked on so much.

And she just turned 9 (to answer that question). One year rec, invited to precompetitive team last year after the gyms summer camp, trained 12 hours per week as a precompet and now 16-18 hours per week as P1, starting this past July.

 

[Deleted member 14190]

I would consider this a balk, some kids just fear grabbing and peeling off. I would put the low bar up and put a floor bar in front of it and have her jump from the floor bar to the low bar. Then lowly bar to high bar with the bars on a super narrow setting.

 

[Deleted member 14190]

Sorry meant to say wouldn't consider this a balk!

 

[profmom]

Same advice here as the other thread. The pressure needs to come off. It needs to come off from the coaches and from you. This is not an immediate crisis that has to be resolved quickly for fear of dire consequences. It is a minor, common bump in the road on the way to optional gymnastics, and it's completely unsurprising to see this issue given the accident. It would be completely unsurprising if more than one girl in that workout group were to be having this trouble!

What you can do: first and foremost, stop treating this as a crisis or emergency. I understand that you are responding to your daughter's level of anxiety, and that looks like a crisis to you. She is upset that she doesn't have the skill and you want to fix the upset by helping her get the skill. But the more you focus on helping her get the skill, the more importance the skill takes on in her mind -- "gosh, if my parents are willing to move heaven and earth to help me figure out how to jump to the high bar, it must be a big deal! But I still can't do it!" I understand completely that this is not your intent, but this is what happens.

Instead, tell her and show her that while you're confident she'll work through this, given enough time, you personally don't have any investment in her getting this or any other gymnastics skill. Dial down the stakes and dial down the pressure for her. So they may scratch her at a meet. Disappointing to be sure, but it's one meet. Let her know that she'll survive to compete another day, and visibly stop worrying about it so that she has the space to do so as well.

The other thing is to talk to the coaches and find out what the . . . they are thinking. Are they really planning consequences like kicking her off the team if she can't work through this quickly? Or is it more that they are trying to take the pressure off by having her switch groups temporarily and not have to worry about getting it for the first meet? You say:

I feel like the gym should be a more constructive place. It used to be great, as long as she was performing well she didn't get picked on so much.

Whoa. This isn't the last time she'll struggle with a skill. If their MO is to pick on lower level gymnasts when they are struggling, I would be very concerned.

As for how to approach them, my advice from the other thread holds here. Come to them not as an expert on gymnastics but as an expert on your daughter's psychology and motivations. Try to figure out if they are lowering or raising the stakes on this -- sometimes if a kid is struggling, s/he will misperceive what is going on. But if they are really pushing her, it needs to stop if she hopes to move on in the sport.

 

[bayleesmom]

Same advice here as the other thread. The pressure needs to come off. It needs to come off from the coaches and from you. This is not an immediate crisis that has to be resolved quickly for fear of dire consequences. It is a minor, common bump in the road on the way to optional gymnastics, and it's completely unsurprising to see this issue given the accident. It would be completely unsurprising if more than one girl in that workout group were to be having this trouble!

What you can do: first and foremost, stop treating this as a crisis or emergency. I understand that you are responding to your daughter's level of anxiety, and that looks like a crisis to you. She is upset that she doesn't have the skill and you want to fix the upset by helping her get the skill. But the more you focus on helping her get the skill, the more importance the skill takes on in her mind -- "gosh, if my parents are willing to move heaven and earth to help me figure out how to jump to the high bar, it must be a big deal! But I still can't do it!" I understand completely that this is not your intent, but this is what happens.

Instead, tell her and show her that while you're confident she'll work through this, given enough time, you personally don't have any investment in her getting this or any other gymnastics skill. Dial down the stakes and dial down the pressure for her. So they may scratch her at a meet. Disappointing to be sure, but it's one meet. Let her know that she'll survive to compete another day, and visibly stop worrying about it so that she has the space to do so as well.

The other thing is to talk to the coaches and find out what the . . . they are thinking. Are they really planning consequences like kicking her off the team if she can't work through this quickly? Or is it more that they are trying to take the pressure off by having her switch groups temporarily and not have to worry about getting it for the first meet? You say:



Whoa. This isn't the last time she'll struggle with a skill. If their MO is to pick on lower level gymnasts when they are struggling, I would be very concerned.

As for how to approach them, my advice from the other thread holds here. Come to them not as an expert on gymnastics but as an expert on your daughter's psychology and motivations. Try to figure out if they are lowering or raising the stakes on this -- sometimes if a kid is struggling, s/he will misperceive what is going on. But if they are really pushing her, it needs to stop if she hopes to move on in the sport.

THANK YOU! This really puts things into perspective for me! My defense was always that I would move heaven and earth to help her, but I can see now how that could make it worse. I want to be as supportive to her as I possibly can be, and if that means backing off maybe it would be best. Thank you so much for this perspective. She has practice tonight and I'm going to talk with her coaches to see exactly what their plan for her is. And take all pressure off completely

 

[B&M's mom]

As a Mom who has made pretty much every mistake in the book when it comes to fear issues, try talking to your daughter about what she wants you to do. After pushing my daughter to work through issues, we finally had a talk where she told me what she needed from me. Not surprisingly, it was exactly what other parents and coaches have said here, to back off and let her deal with it in the gym. Now my only question after practice is "how was it?" Usual answer is "good". If she wants to discuss something she knows she can but I won't pry. She has also told me that she doesn't want me at certain meets as its too stressful for her just knowing that I'm in the building. While I'd rather be there, I respect her wishes as it's her sport. I will say it's much harder not doing anything then trying to move heaven and earth to help.

 

[Gymsanity]

Fell on deaf ears in the other thread, but will say it again so as to not be remiss. Young child sees close friend/teammate get hurt with painful/disfiguring injury=PTSD. Please look up the signs of childhood PTSD, and I believe you will see your daughter fits right in. I'm glad to hear she will be seeing a 'mental coach', and will be anxious to hear what they say.
As for the way her coaches are handling it, I've just completed a 20 study of my own and come to the conclusion that 7 out of 10 gymnastic coaches suck..........
Good luck to you and your daughter.

 

[bayleesmom]

Fell on deaf ears in the other thread, but will say it again so as to not be remiss. Young child sees close friend/teammate get hurt with painful/disfiguring injury=PTSD. Please look up the signs of childhood PTSD, and I believe you will see your daughter fits right in. I'm glad to hear she will be seeing a 'mental coach', and will be anxious to hear what they say.
As for the way her coaches are handling it, I've just completed a 20 study of my own and come to the conclusion that 7 out of 10 gymnastic coaches suck..........
Good luck to you and your daughter.

It's not falling on deaf ears here!
When I contacted the sports psychologist he said that he was 100% positive it was PTSD. He recommended a great book that has really helped me to understand PTSD especially in relation to gymnastics. Despite all of the "back off" talk, we'll still be seeing him next week. Seeing a psychologist does not mean there is something wrong with her, but that we are providing her with the tools to overcome this fear and future fears. I think everyone could use a little professional insight sometimes

 

[Gymsanity]

^Wish I could 'like' more than once!^

 

[profmom]

I think the PTSD issue is separate from the gym losing skills issue and it makes sense to me to deal with that. Hope she can work through it quickly and successfully.

 

[LizzieLac]

It's not falling on deaf ears here!
When I contacted the sports psychologist he said that he was 100% positive it was PTSD. He recommended a great book that has really helped me to understand PTSD especially in relation to gymnastics. Despite all of the "back off" talk, we'll still be seeing him next week. Seeing a psychologist does not mean there is something wrong with her, but that we are providing her with the tools to overcome this fear and future fears. I think everyone could use a little professional insight sometimes

Would you mind sharing the name of the book? Thanks!

 

[bayleesmom]

 

[profmom]

If I were you, I'd make it really clear to the psychologist that your interest is in addressing potential PTSD, not in helping her get the skill. Again, you don't want to make her feel like getting the skill is the real issue.

I hope I'm not coming off as too pushy or soapboxy on this. I am coming from a place of having made mistakes that I hope to prevent others from making.

 

[bayleesmom]

I totally agree and appreciate your insight. In my conversations with him, he has said that he helps to identify the sources of anxiety and help give her the tools to undo their influence and to set up her up to deal with the same sort of thing in the future with ease. It's not necessarily to deal with one skill, but for her self esteem in general (which couple definitely use a little fluffing up after this last month!). Perhaps I jumped the gun on this, blame it on being new to the competitive side of this sport (or any sport really, before this it was dance lessons, swimming, soccer etc, neither of which she loved so much or struggled with) and living my life essentially to help my kids succeed in any way that I am able! It's a learning process, and I am so grateful I now have all of your help and input to help me along!

 

[bayleesmom]

She did it tonight! She was with the precompetitive girls, but she made the most of it! I stayed away from the gym completely, and we had a chat on the way about how proud I am of her, no matter what. She is so happy, she practically floated out of the gym. We aren't sure what they have planned for her tomorrow but I'm quite sure that she will be fine. Today was a nice little boost that will hopefully keep her going in the right direction. I'm just so darn happy for her, and she is now sleeping soundly, feeling on top of the world