Avoiding the "Skating Parent Trap"

[Sk8tmum]

Easy survival tool for skating parents: buy an iPod or MP3 player, stick the earphones in your ears, and shut out all of the other parents' comments, discussions etc. Your stress level will drop; if you get books on tapes, you'll enjoy some new literature; and you won't be caught up in much of the general nuttiness of skating parents. 

[FigureSpins]

My current students have the most wonderful parents who get along well and work together.  I have absolutely no complaints other than not having enough ice time to accommodate everyone's varied schedules.  (Everyone wanted Wednesday afternoons this year, lol.)  It's different because my students are recreational skaters and that's what their parents want.  I'm okay with that, too, since it eliminates a lot of the more stressful parts of skating.

One parent brings a blanket and she knits or reads while her daughter skates.  She invites others to share the warm seat and chit-chats, but somehow, she always keeps it positive and upbeat.  She has a gift for turning a conversation from a whine to a cheery chat.  I love sitting with her, lol. 

A few parent work out in our rink's upstairs fitness center or they go outside for a power walk.  Some do drop-off/pick-up, but they always make time to stop and chat a little with the other parents and with me.  I do a lot of my seasonal planning for their kids' lessons based on those quick little chats.

My kids like it when I don't watch them every minute that they're on the ice.  I usually do my coaching paperwork while they're doing synchro, which is good because I can address my skating parents' questions about schedules and payments.  If I need more information on a lesson or check, I can step over the front desk and ask them to please check things out.  

[Sk8tmum]

Never compare your kid to any other; celebrate their achievements (quietly, though, do NOT shriek to everybody in the world about how wonderful your precious darling is, so amazing, so much better ... etc etc etc - that creates stress for other parents, and you will get a reputation as a SKATING MOM or DAD); support their goals, and enjoy what your own kid achieves, whether it be more or less than other skaters.

[amice]

I do talk to other parents, but try hard to find the ones that talk about things other than skating. 

Another thing to try to do is to take an interest in the other kids and enjoy their accomplishments too.  It can actually help when your own child is in a rut, instead of becoming over focused on your own child, you can watch elsewhere to see someone else progressing.  (like a watched pot never boils)  Of course, it helps if the other children you follow are not at the same level as yours...   Anyway, it also makes competitions more fun, you and your skater have kids you recognize to watch and cheer for, with the added benefit of giving your child a sense of belonging to something outside of their peer group at school.

... and the rink is always a good place to catch up on your reading.

[TheAquarian]

The whole parent discussion isn't quite relevant to me  personally because I am an adult skater, although at my rink I've only seen one parent that seemed to boarder on non-social/nutty/obsessed, the rest seem quite friendly and sit around talking to whoever happens to be around be they adult skaters, coaches, or each other. To be honest as a fairly new adult skater,  I've been surprised that there's been ANY communication between me and the kids or their parents, but sure enough.

The main reason I replied to this thread though is that I have a question about Skating Parents...  How come so few seem to skate themselves?  Of all the skating parents (not including the ones that are also coaches),  I only ever see one on the ice doing things for herself or with her kids.    It just seems like if both the parent and the "kid" enjoy or appreciate skating (I use kid because I don't think of the older 'kids' as children anymore),   both of them being on the ice could serve as a bonding experience of sorts even if the kid is off doing lessons for part or all of a given session.

[Sierra]

The main reason I replied to this thread though is that I have a question about Skating Parents...  How come so few seem to skate themselves? 

I'd like to know myself. My mom was the only parent skater in the rink for a long time, until another began taking LTS recently (she has a hockey boy.) I've seen one of the mothers skate if she brings family visitors to skate, and she can get around the rink pretty well but does not have her own skates.

But since my mom skates in public and does not take LTS, I have to take time out of my practice to teach her. So it's a trade-off- I get to skate a 1.75 hour practice session, but I have to help Mom which turns it into a 1.5 hour session.

I've never encountered a mean-spirited or gossipy mom. My mom talks to many of them, but not as often as the other moms do.

[Sk8tmum]

Well, in our area, the cost of joining a club for skating is quite high - thus, many parents don't join "the club" as such, but, I would say that most do go skating for pleasure with their kids. Not surprisingly, it drops off in the teenage years, about the same time that going "to the movies with my MOM? like, that's so LAME" becomes a consideration 

I would love to go and learn to skate, and to skate with mine more, but, never really learned how, and it would take me years to get to the session qualification level they skate at - and my doctor does discourage the activity due to joint problems and a couple of other things, however, we do hang out together in the gym for "off-ice" training. My kids, as teenagers and younger, have on occasion taken me out for a spin- it's fun, but, we do a lot of other things together and it's not the "most fun" we have together.  And, for us - we never encouraged our kids to choose activities that "we" did and enjoyed, we encouraged them to go out and find what they themselves wanted to do, which is why I have, for example, a tiny violinist and ballerina, instead of, say, a photographer or a fencer ...

[sleepyhead]

I've done a public skate with DD and had lots of fun.
I'd love to skate myself, but the budget is very tight and I don't have hobbies because I'd rather my children have a chance to enjoy as many activities as possible. It's just an automatic parent response to deny yourself little pleasures because there's so much more pleasure in watching your child enjoy something. Hope I don't seem martyrish because I don't feel it one bit.
I love the rink parents/carers at DD's rink. You must all be going to the wrong one!!