Even for parents that you know… Putting children in sports at ann early age does not mean they’ll enjoy it and stay with it.
I let my children try a variety of sports. For both - gymnastics lasted two years. Soccer for five years. Swimming on and off for eight years. Wrestling on and off.
My oldest did wrestling and tennis in high school. He regretted not sticking with wrestling when he was younger, he participated for two years in elementary and then took a four year break before joining the HS team as a sophomore. He picked up tennis in high school having done nothing more than play around at the neighborhood tennis court. He didn’t make varsity in either sport.
My youngest has been swimming on and off since he was six. He made the team as a freshman. But is likely going to get cut as a sophomore. He also joined tennis as a freshman, and like his brother didn’t do anything more than just play around at the neighborhood tennis court.

I completely agree with this. Even if you do start young, it might be the wrong sport for your child. Parents who lucked out and started early in a sport that's the right fit can be so smug. I wish there were better ways to try a few sports without committing the team and money to a full season if it doesn't work out.

My younger daughter tried lacrosse at 7 (apparently that's already "late"). She began disliking it because the team got super competitive and stopped being fun after just one year. Now she's trying another sport at 9 and is again considered behind.

My 12yo daughter does several activities including summer swim team, but I was told she needs year-round swim lessons to make swim team worth it! It's exhausting.

My husband and I have talked about this -- we were both raised really working class and were fortunate to be able to raise our kids upper middle class, but there's a lot of knowledge that we didn't have about how these things work. There's a steep learning curve when you change social classes and honestly it takes a couple of generations to fully move up, I think. I remember getting a call from the rec center about the swim lessons I had put my three year old in. I was informed that she was less advanced than the other three year olds and that she was "holding the class back". Private lessons were suggested -- for a three year old! Which I thought was nuts until I overheard one of those King Pin dads talking about how his kids all started with private swim lessons at age 2 because that was apparently really important. We lived in a house that overlooked an elementary school playground and I used to hear one nutso dad out there every night coaching his kid with t-ball and yelling at him. Sometimes I wonder what ever happened to that dad and his kids. I wonder if they became great athletes or if they're like "Oh my god, that guy was nuts. I'm so glad I moved far away to Wyoming" or whatever.

Search any sport you want and look at adult leagues. Most have them. I wasn’t athletic as a kid but am looking forward to playing casually in some in retirement. I only got interested in volleyball when my own kid started playing.

troll

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in an Asian household that didn’t care about sports, so I was never exposed to them. I didn’t even know things like lacrosse or wrestling were sports until I was like halfway through high school, and it was too late at that point. And it is so frustrating because I will never get the opportunity to play sports ever again. I don’t know how I was supposed to know about this earlier when I was a tiny kid

I started my favorite sport in my thirties.

And what secretive sport is that

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You can still do it you bum

You can’t do high school sports when you aren’t a high school student

True! And OP will have missed out on the American experience. This is part of the reason why Americans care about more than academic success. There is a huge social development piece that goes along with sports - competing with the people you are competing against- just like the workplace.

Exactly. Sports are a big part of the American school culture, and it sucks so many are left out of it

What sucks is that so many people believe that if you don’t play sports there is something wrong with you.

Anonymous wrote:Join District Wrestling- it’s for adults. My husband just started at 50!

Do they wear costumes? Are there storylines? Is he a heel or a hero? That sounds so fun!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did you not see all the other kids playing or see all the sign up opportunities or have any friends that played?

No because my parents never let me socialize with anyone else

You have bigger problems than sports participation, then. Are you in therapy?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a bummer, OP, but honestly this aspect of youth sports is a reason not to pursue them at a high level. It gets more competitive every year, people have kids specializing earlier and earlier, some people will pour endless amounts of money into coaching and equipment and camps and anything they can find to give their kid a leg up.

If you have to choose between starting a sport at age 4 and spending tens of thousands of dollars on it and shaping your entire family's life around it for years, or just not playing high school sport.... I kind of feel like the smart play is to skip it and do other things. You can play rec sports, and it is totally possible to take up a sport as a teenager and play it well enough to do it socially and for physical fitness as an adult, and that's good enough.

Learn to play sports like basketball, tennis, and golf, which adults play casually to make friends and network professionally. Other that that, don't worry about it.

But I wish I played on a high school team. It’s a unique experience that is very different just from playing something recreationally

Can you run? My niece didn't have any sports experience prior to hs and ended up able to run x-country and track on not only her high school teams but at a Div 1 uni as well.

I hear you. I'm sorry.

I was never told that I needed a foreign language for college applications.

As a parent, I didn’t know this either until middle school. It’s too late to pick up a sport by then unless you are truly gifted as an athlete. Sadly sports are no longer fun at all.

if you can’t play, the sport asked to be the team manager and that looks good for leadership on your college résumé as well!

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in an Asian household that didn’t care about sports, so I was never exposed to them. I didn’t even know things like lacrosse or wrestling were sports until I was like halfway through high school, and it was too late at that point. And it is so frustrating because I will never get the opportunity to play sports ever again. I don’t know how I was supposed to know about this earlier when I was a tiny kid

I started my favorite sport in my thirties.

Join a class at the gym, and join an adult rec league.

More efficient exercise, let me get you out of your provincial neighborhood