Parents If you could give yourself 1 piece of advice

[Empowered]

I would tell my first day of tiny team self the following:

Your child does not need a leotard for every day of the month. They actually can be worn multiple times, in a week, and it will not affect her gymnastics at all.

Of course I probably would have ignored myself and promptly bought 3 new leotards just to spite myself.

 

[Quadqueen]

I would tell my first day of tiny team self the following:

Your child does not need a leotard for every day of the month. They actually can be worn multiple times, in a week, and it will not affect her gymnastics at all.

Of course I probably would have ignored myself and promptly bought 3 new leotards just to spite myself.

haha...I still go through phases where I'm addicted to buying leos!!

 

[mouey77]

I would have used the jedi mind trick to convince my daughter she really, really liked the inexpensive sport of soccer ;o)

It is only inexpensive until they decide they want to do club level/select. Sigh.

Love this thread!!

 

[skschlag]

run..run far away.....keep running.

No really, as long as D loves it, we love it. I think the one piece of advice I keep giving myself now is to not listen to CGM who keep telling me my son is too old. To remember that each gymnast has their own journey, and we are just guides along the way. and cheerleaders, and chaffeuers, and banks, and cooks...well, you get the point!

 

[wgymmom]

I would have told myself to move DD to a competitive gym much sooner than I did. I didn't move her until she was 9. She could have easily done old L4 at 7 or so. It just seems like she's on a tight timeline to make it to college gymnastics.

 

[gymmiemom]

We are also relatively new to gymnastics...we have one year of competing under our belts. So far my only regret is that we lived somewhere else. But I have no control over the fact that there is only 1 gym in our town and the next closest one is an hour away and its not fabulous either by any means. It frustrates me that we don't have "options." DD is 7 and of course dreams of competing in college. I know deep down that it probably (of course anything CAN happen, but the probablity is slim) won't happen because of our location.

I was lucky to have found CB early on when we joined team a year ago. All you wonderful people have helped my avoid some seriously CGM moments and hours of stressing. So thank you for that!

 

[JMACAZ]

Let the Coach be the Coach, I will be the Mom. Tell my girls after every practice and meet that I watch a part of "I love to watch you do gymnastics"

 

[pt coach]

I am a coach and thought it would be great to have my daughter be on team...now I wish I had introduced her to swimming, or diving, or soccer or something else I know nothing about. My mantra now to keep myself from trying to fix her during practice (when I am not actually coaching her group) is "that will not help..." I say it over and over...

 

[GymBeeMom]

To recognize that a CGM potentially exists in all of us and that we must find a way to show genuine caring in the gym, the gym lobby, and in our private conversations with others. CGM types are usually just crazy loving moms doing the best they can at any given moment, and that we can talk bad and think bad about them or befriend them and help them step away from the cliff. I have grown to really love and appreciate the women that I once believed were CGMs.

 

[juststartingout]

I guess I have 2. One would be to start my kids earlier the other would be to have started my daughter in the more competitive gym. Don't get me wrong it's not like I want or expect her to be elite but she has had to relearn so many skills and has wasted so much time. My daughter is still young (7yo) and has caught up to her peers who have been doing gymnastics since they were in diapers but it wasn't easy. Technique is something they learned along the way in nibbles and she had to learn it all in such a short amount of time. They learned to vault by doing drills along the way from preschool till now, when she came in and was put right in developmental she had to just start trying to throw the vault that these girls had years to get. My daughters gym has a main gym and then 2 satellite gyms, my daughter started in the satellite gym and was there for quite a while. This location was more of a rec gym location with only 1 beam, 1 low bar (no high bar), and a tiny tiny floor that was used for floor work and vault (not even proper running room). They also did not enforce form much at all. When I finally moved her because she was in a group with 12 and up girls she had so much to clean up and learn. She had never even done leaps up until that point. Needless to say I was annoyed with myself. Now I have a 5yo who has just started and yes I should have started her earlier too but emotionally she wasn't ready. She tried it about a year ago and didn't seem ready I probably should have tried a little longer but I just didn't want to deal with it at the time. So now at 5 she is already having to play catch up.

 

[mylittlemiss]

With my first I wish I had known how much time it takes to get some skills when fear is involved. She had a lot of fears, but has grown and learned to manage them. Perhaps without gymnastics, this would not have happened. She's now a diver and is doing well. I never pushed her too hard back in the days of gymnastics, but I had a lot of personal anxiety, which looking back, wasn't really necessary. She just needed time. Now, with my second gymnast, she's had little to no fear almost her whole journey so far. It's a whole other situation!!

 

[JoyAvenueMom]

I wish I had understood the difference in "getting a skill" and "performing a skill correctly" and how much time there may be be between the two.

 

[amphomma]

Wow, I'm loving reading these, and am so glad all over again that I found this site. Whether my Little A sticks with gymnastics into adulthood or this is her final year, it's already been a blast. I have no regrets yet, but my little one just turned 4 yesterday and is in a 4/5 year-old "future flippers" class. I am savoring all of the advice I read here and hoping she keeps finding so much joy in using her apparent talent! Thanks to everyone who contributes to this forum!

 

[seoulmama]

Marathon not sprint - Marathon not sprint....and not all kids who start early move faster....hindsight always 20-20.... "IT'S NOT ABOUT ME, ITS' NOT ABOUT ME...."

Amen, I second this! My dd has been involved in gymnastics, at the same gym, since she was 18 months old-put on the pre-team when she was 5. She is now 10 and a level 5-I think her journey is exactly as it should be. She LOVES her team, some of them have been together since the pre-team, we remind her that this is a journey to enjoy-not just worry about getting to the next level, she can only control her own actions-she can't worry about how everyone else is doing. She is finally starting to see that this year-and I think that's a huge life lesson. And the most important thing-this journey is NOT about me! She needs to control it and take ownership of it-I'm not in the gym working my tail off!

 

[rjb123]

Never underestimate her. Determination and hard work overcome a lot! Don't worry about where she places- she cares more about how she performs than what color the medal.