Parent Weirdness

[Anonymous]

What's the sport, OP?

Some team sports, like basketball, have private coaches. These are closely-guarded secrets!

[Anonymous]

on the flip side, there are parents who are very indiscrete as well as talk a bunch of sh!t that ends up having to be a conversation with a coach that doesnt always end well for players and maybe even parents.

[Anonymous]

The parents on my kids’ hockey teams do this (we are not in DC). My kids are on high level teams and people do everything they can to give their kid an edge. I’ve found that people won’t share info if they think your kid is better than theirs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Competitiveness. Many parents in this area are ultra competitive and live vicariously through their kids.

x10000

Parents like that think it is their DCs "golden ticket" to Harvard. They are wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they see your kid as competition they will not share info. I have seen parents agree to a carpool and not pick kids up. So the kid will miss practice and/or games.

Sometimes parents do not carpool, because the kids don't get along that particular week.

[Anonymous]

Its probably either the parent is crazy, child isn't good, or they want their child to experience playing against different children than the ones they do 3 times a week already.

[Anonymous]

This is hard. For small group training, the level of the other kids makes a huge difference. We always share information about trainers for private coaching, but I have avoided sharing info about a small group training that my kid does --- he's the smallest and youngest kid there but was invited to the group because he can keep up (the other kids are headed to play for D1 college programs in the next year or two, DS is a sophomore). The trainer would not be happy if I brought a random kid who is not close to that level to the small group workout, even though he would be willing to help the kid in a different context.

DS was part of another group that was anchored by one super athletic, older kid who will likewise play in college. There were two other upperclassmen and DS. Over time, the trainer added some kids who couldn't play AT ALL (like wouldn't make high school JV) and DS and the other kids left because it started being of no value. I felt bad (I think the trainer wanted DS to be the new anchor guy), but DS was literally running circles around those kids and getting frustrated. I realize that's probably to some extent how the previous anchor kid felt, and that it was of limited value for him to play against DS (especially at first), but the new kids weren't even in shape, so DS had to wait a long time for them to finish gasping between drills. Often these kids would drop out also, so by the end the group of five or six would be DS and one other kid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am trying to figure out if I am being sensitive or if some parents of dc's former teammates are being uber competitive. They aren't being forthcoming about what their dc's are doing in regards to the sport and seem reluctant to share with me information about where they are playing, what extra training they may be doing, etc. To be honest, I am not certain if it is competitiveness or jealousy at this point. Why wouldn't people want to share what they are doing or get weird if I try to get my dc involved too?

You mean you've explicitly asked them and they won't tell you or that you know they are doing something but they are being sneaky about it and not revealing everything they are doing? B is common, A is less common and very weird. A weird parent at DC's school organized extra training for the kids she thought had "talent" and left everyone else out. When people would ask the parents in the training what they were doing on Wednesdays they would hedge. Finally someone admitted to a few people what happened and how certain kids were hand-picked by weird mom and they didn't want everyone else to feel left out. Yes, OP, it's weird. A lot of parents rolled their eyes at this lady.

[Anonymous]

Wth do they need to share what they are doing with their kid with you? Wtf? Leave them alone and do your own research.

People don't willingly volunteer and advertise everything they are doing to the team---because then people like you that already annoy the sh*t out of us at practices and games will show up with 20 of your other friends.

[Anonymous]

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would assume that means your child is not as good a player as their child and the presence of your child at their extra training session would bring down the overall quality.

I'm going to suggest it could just as easily be the opposite, and the defensive reactions in this thread lend credence to my hypothesis.

These parents may view your kid as competition. If their own DCs can go off to this secretive private training, maybe they can stay ahead of your kid and anyone else who tries out.

The idea that your kid is going to "drag down" an extra training session seems ridiculous. Why would your kid even be at the SAME extra training session? Do private trainers just do one session each week, no matter how many kids are interested?

So the most likely scenarios to me would be:

1. They're trying to keep your kids from catching up to or surpassing their own kids.

2. They're just jerks.

In an ideal world, your child will go to a different club next year at a higher level with more supportive parents who share information. The "do your own research" idea is garbage -- soooo many parents think they've "done their own research," and they've been misled by a couple of people. Or they think their own experience applies to everyone else. (I read an entire Kindle mini-book on that subject last night -- it was pretty good in terms of sharing the author's experience, but there was little attempt to account for anyone ELSE's experience.)

Share information, folks. There are so many coaches out there spreading a lot of crap. The more parents talk, the less these coaches can con you.

I so disagree. Some people like to do their own thing without everyone in the County showing up. We live in a very 'FOMO, keeping up with the Joneses County...people running around trying to find out what everyone else is doing.' It's stressful. We like our kids (2 years apart) to train together away from all of these competitive freaks.

Also, we really love our trainer and have a very personal relationship. I wouldn't wish some of these people on him. That said, a few very close friends know what we are doing and we do trade info with them. They happen not to be the same year as my kid.

I do a lot, LOT of research and watching, etc. I often find the tiny, obscure niches, etc. I really don't feel the need to exchange this info. with people I don't care about. Frankly, 95% of travel parents are annoying as hell.

[Anonymous]

Why are they former teammates? Did you leave for a new team? Are you now seen as competition? Maybe they don't want it to get out that their kids are training for 2 days per week w/ Gustav at Power Strength & Conditioning to the opposing team.

[Anonymous]

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would assume that means your child is not as good a player as their child and the presence of your child at their extra training session would bring down the overall quality.

I'm going to suggest it could just as easily be the opposite, and the defensive reactions in this thread lend credence to my hypothesis.

These parents may view your kid as competition. If their own DCs can go off to this secretive private training, maybe they can stay ahead of your kid and anyone else who tries out.

The idea that your kid is going to "drag down" an extra training session seems ridiculous. Why would your kid even be at the SAME extra training session? Do private trainers just do one session each week, no matter how many kids are interested?

So the most likely scenarios to me would be:

1. They're trying to keep your kids from catching up to or surpassing their own kids.

2. They're just jerks.

In an ideal world, your child will go to a different club next year at a higher level with more supportive parents who share information. The "do your own research" idea is garbage -- soooo many parents think they've "done their own research," and they've been misled by a couple of people. Or they think their own experience applies to everyone else. (I read an entire Kindle mini-book on that subject last night -- it was pretty good in terms of sharing the author's experience, but there was little attempt to account for anyone ELSE's experience.)

Share information, folks. There are so many coaches out there spreading a lot of crap. The more parents talk, the less these coaches can con you.

I so disagree. Some people like to do their own thing without everyone in the County showing up. We live in a very 'FOMO, keeping up with the Joneses County...people running around trying to find out what everyone else is doing.' It's stressful. We like our kids (2 years apart) to train together away from all of these competitive freaks.

Also, we really love our trainer and have a very personal relationship. I wouldn't wish some of these people on him. That said, a few very close friends know what we are doing and we do trade info with them. They happen not to be the same year as my kid.

I do a lot, LOT of research and watching, etc. I often find the tiny, obscure niches, etc. I really don't feel the need to exchange this info. with people I don't care about. Frankly, 95% of travel parents are annoying as hell.

So how does it affect you if your DC trains with this trainer from 6 to 7 p.m., and the next person's DC trains with him from 7 to 8?

You are the kind of person that invites all 28 3rd graders to a birthday party. We choose to invite a small group of close friends.

I don’t understand why I am supposed to share information with people I make sure to put my chair 30 yards away because they are annoying, competitive Type A freaks.

Newsflash: kids’ teams change drastically over the years and these kids won’t even be playing together in the future. I only care about my kid’s development, not yours. Capiche?

Btw, I can feeling you getting worked up because you want to know where I’m taking my kids...

[Anonymous]

Op, who knows why they are acting like that. I have a neighbor who is like that, our kids are on different teams, one boy and one girl but hers is older so I’ve asked her about training and stuff to get advice and she acts like she’s guarding top secret info and won’t share. Whatever, I can use google and talk to people who don’t have a pole up their ass.

[Anonymous]

As some others have suggested, I think you need to consider that this is really an issue regarding your behavior. If someone stated that you stress them out, why would they want to spend any more time with you than necessary? Especially if you have experienced this with more than one parent. Who is the common denominator?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As some others have suggested, I think you need to consider that this is really an issue regarding your behavior. If someone stated that you stress them out, why would they want to spend any more time with you than necessary? Especially if you have experienced this with more than one parent. Who is the common denominator?

Agreed. Why is OP so concerned with what other families are doing? He/she should get together with RantingSoccerDad. I think there’s a reason they aren’t invited.