Parents Gaining confidence

[Gymmomintraining]

My daughter is repeating level 4 and my hope for her this season is to gain confidence in herself and just let go. I don't know how to help her with this. She is shy and quiet, and I really wish she could see herself through my eyes. I think she is amazing. She is a kind teammate and so hard working. her coach tells her she is the strongest tumbler on the team. Any advice?

 

[2gymkids]

I have no advice other than you're pretty much describing my daughter, who is also repeating level 4 this year. I have the same hopes for her (as do her coaches!). We've had a couple of good conversations about her challenging year last year and about how hard she had to work to overcome the challenges, and while I don't think she understands how amazing I think she is, I think she felt good about what I said. I hope both of our DDs have a great season.

 

[Deleted member 18037]

She can see herself through your eyes. Show her videos. Of when she first started to now. Point out things that were once hard and now she does well.

Are there any upper level kids who are strong and repeated? Point them out. Meet scores find a couple of gymmies who have respected and improved, show her the improvement.

Last 2 things.

Keep the focus off the level (as advised by our coaches). Focus on the skills. In the interest of full disclosure hard to do especially in compulsories. But it really is about getting good solid skills. Scores matter as a matter of hopefully showing improvement. But really keep her focused on getting stronger and more solid. Conditioning goals and skill goals. The rest follows.

Lastly, time, time and more time.

We can't fix it for them. We can only be a safe place to fall. Have the conversations with her that you want her to have with herself. Keep her focused on what she can do. And not what she can't change.

She is learning patience and perseverance. Awesome life lessons.

 

[mommyof1]

My kid went through a long crisis of confidence in L3. As parents, the only thing we ever did that actually seemed to help was to take her to open gym a couple of times (at her request) so she could work on certain skills with zero pressure and regain some confidence, but know your kid before you try this. Otherwise we just kept praising her for sportsmanship and being a great teammate, listened to a lot of venting and complaining, and waited for her to figure things out for herself.

If your daughter is uptraining so she can continue to learn fun new skills while having competitive success repeating L4, her confidence may soar. This was the case for my kid when she repeated L3.

My daughter finds this video inspirational:

 

[momstrong]

My kid went through a long crisis of confidence in L3. As parents, the only thing we ever did that actually seemed to help was to take her to open gym a couple of times (at her request) so she could work on certain skills with zero pressure and regain some confidence, but know your kid before you try this. Otherwise we just kept praising her for sportsmanship and being a great teammate, listened to a lot of venting and complaining, and waited for her to figure things out for herself.

If your daughter is uptraining so she can continue to learn fun new skills while having competitive success repeating L4, her confidence may soar. This was the case for my kid when she repeated L3.

My daughter finds this video inspirational:

Thank you for this video. I think my dd will love it. She is a brand new, but oldest (10) on the lvl 3 team and is having some confidence issues with her ROBH on the mats. She was able to do it in rec and in acro dance this past spring on the floor there, but for some reason the mats are scaring her. There have been tears in class and she has been balking (spelling). Our meet season is starting on 9/15, so feeling anxious for her. But am being very supportive.

 

[BachFlyer]

^^that video made me cry

 

[Deleted member 18037]

Love that video. I think they forget how far they come in the moment sometimes. Don't we all.

 

[mommyof1]

^^that video made me cry

Dust always gets in my eyes when they bring out her parents at the end.

 

[John]

That video does stir up the dust.

 

[NY Dad]

Dust here too.

 

[NY Dad]

Dust here too.

Oops, didn't mean to post that twice and I can't figure out how to delete second post.

 

[RTT2]

Oh, that video! :sniff:

 

[cab68]

I just love that video! So inspirational!

 

[aspiringymnastmom]

I love that video! Thanks for posting!

Mine is repeating L3 for the same reason. She up-trained all summer and has most of the L4 skills. She is set up to have a very good L3 & L4 hopefully!

 

[Gymmomintraining]

Thank you all! Great advice. And that video!! A tear jerker for sure. I'm trying to just focus on all she has improved on since last year and how proud we are of her. I just wish she could find the switch to turn on wanting to be a leader and not so much the follower and showing more confidence as her skills are great. But I do know she is still so young and to just keep encouraging her.

 

[Gymmom0824]

Just keep teaching her to believe in herself! I wish the best of luck of luck these season and I hope she shines out there!!

 

[mommyof1]

I just wish she could find the switch to turn on wanting to be a leader and not so much the follower and showing more confidence as her skills are great. But I do know she is still so young and to just keep encouraging her.

One thing that seemed to help with my kid was separating leadership from skills. We talked a lot about what it meant to be a leader during her repeat year, focusing on setting a good example with her work ethic, behavior, and sportsmanship, as well as encouraging and supporting her first-year teammates. We told her over and over again that leadership was not about skills or scores but about how she treated others and conducted herself. We went out of our way to praise her when we saw her demonstrating leadership, and her coaches recognized her for it too. This recognition helped build her confidence, which in turn helped her to perform better.

 

[Gymmomintraining]

Update- her season is almost over and the last meet she did amazing and for the first time ever, she won AA for her age group and had the 2nd highest AA in the whole meet! The smile on her face brought me to tears. I was so thrilled to see her confidence shine through!

 

[Krisztina10]

Update- her season is almost over and the last meet she did amazing and for the first time ever, she won AA for her age group and had the 2nd highest AA in the whole meet! The smile on her face brought me to tears. I was so thrilled to see her confidence shine through!

So happy to hear this about your daughter. Mine is in the same boat, though her season just started. Repeating level 4 after a season filled with injuries and illness. One of the injuries came back 2 months ago - just when she was finally in a great place again. She's been out of vault and modifying training on other events. At her first meet this weekend she scored lower on two events than at her first meet last year...though she did improve on bars (her beam score was .9 lower than last year). This was supposed to be her "dominate and build confidence season." Alas, we are definitely not there. She under performed for use - I am guessing nerves after a rough season? I don't know. I wish she could just reach her potential at practice and get at least close to that same performance at the meets. I have tears in my eyes writing this. I feel like she can't catch a break. And I don't know how to help her. I want to give her tools to be excited and "go for it" at meets - she holds back for sure - but I don't want to get it in her head that meets matter and make her more nervous. I tell her what happens in practice matters and meets are random. She's always under performed at meets but this time was by far the worst. I'm worried that now that she's 10 her awareness is only going to make the problem worse. Any advice would be great.