Parents Dealing with fear - mine not my gymnasts!

[Trixiebelle]

Wow. How to get over MY fear of DD doing gymnastics? She is l7 now and the skills seem to have so much more risk than last year. Today she had a fall from her giant, I wasn't there to see it, but from what she and my husband have t old me it could have been very ugly. Her coach saw her hands were off and was there to catch her but I am terrified. I know it will only get worse as she moves along and I am reaching a point where I no longer want her doing this. I've read the stories of lovely young athletes who have been paralyzed from bar falls and I keep asking myself if this is worth the risk.

Any other parents feeling like this? Any stats or info that could help assuage my fears? And for the record, she is not fearful, well, except for her giant now!

 

[ARKGYMMOM]

I can't give you any stats on gym injuries but I am going to try to help you rationalize your fear.

I know what happened was scary however it sounds like your daughter was in good hands. She was in a controlled envionment with obviously a very attentive coach. I think it is natural for parents to fear things for their children but mostly so that we will keep an eye open to the coach that has his back turned when something happens.

I am quite sure that there are a lot of child athletic parents from different sports that have the same fear issues (ie. football, baseball.....) They all have thier drawbacks for chance of injury.

I would assume that your daughter arriving by car everyday to the gym could be just as detrimental to her health. You say she is fearless, please don't teach her to be fearful. I am a true believer that fear can be more detrimental to the athlete than practicing their sport.

Good luck to you and your DD. Hope my perspective helps a little.

 

[flipper's fan]

ARKGYMMOM has it right. And compared to other sports, the serious injury rate for gymnastics is quite low. I believe hockey takes the prize for the most concussions.
I try not to read about other people's catasrophic injuries because I know they make me irrational and fearful.
My Dd is a level 8 gymnast who also plays soccer. All of her injuries which have required trips to the doctor are from soccer, believe it or not.

 

[Playgrounders]

This is exactly why I stopped watching "Law & Order: SVU." There came a point where I didn't want to let DD out of the house!

But seriously, I totally understand your fears. I get scared just watching DD walk on the beam, never mind a ROBHS. But I also know that (a) these are my fears, that (b) I cannot show my fears to DD lest she get all scared herself and become hesitant during practices resulting in injury which would have perpetuated my fears, (c) this is the inherent risk of having children talented in any form of athletics. Well, except maybe curling. There's no injury in curling, unless you slip and fall into one of those brooms.

I joke! Really what I meant to say is that these talented and hard-working kids tend to go for it, full-out, fearless and joyous, which is part of the reason they're so damned good.

My solution? To stop watching practices. I drop off and leave, come back and pick up. I can barely watch the meets! But that's just me. I wish you the best of luck in how you're handling your situation.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

put your fears to rest. and without listing a bunch of statistics, gymnastics is the safest of all sports due to the controlled and supervised environment in which we all work. and the coaches and trainers are all neurotic/obsessive compulsive about safety. and if it helps more, out of 60 activities for minors that emergency rooms track in their database, gymnastics is 48th on that list for reported trips to the emergency rooms across the country. cheer is now #1.

now rationally and logically, when you think about all the kids that do gymnastics in the US (over 3 million in several organizations) and how many repetitions are being performed every second by all these kids on a daily basis...if gymnastics were dangerous...it would be all over the news on a daily and consistent basis.

 

[putri]

I know how you feel. Dd is just starting but I do worry about her. But, life is full of ups and downs. Sometimes the down, like injuries, might not be as bad as it seems. I read about that paralyzed girl and see seems like a really positive person. I truly hope she gets better but I think if she doesn't, she'll be one of those people who's going to be on the front page of the Time magazine racing with her wheelchair, smiling and be the favourite of thousands of kids (and adults) who lost some bodily function at birth or later on in life. Most of the time one learns many good lessons out of a 'bad' event. I'll still worry but I will never show it and just take it one day at a time

 

[niklum]

From a parent's perspective, I feel for you. I have a daughter and I've been her coach her entire life. You have no control when your daughter is out there flipping through the air and your stomach twists in knots when you think about it going bad. Your natural instinct is to protect her and run catch her when you see her falling. From a coach's perspective, that's what we're trained to do. We constantly think about safety and there are so many safety trainings that we voluntarily go through to ensure our gymnasts' safety. In all of my years coaching (20 so far), I've had more gymnasts miss practice due to non-gymnastics-related injuries than gymnastics-related.