The last blog post I wrote was on July 13th.
It was also the only blog post I wrote in July.
That’s a new LBPWIAM record for me.
Least Blog Posts Written In A Month.
I seriously underestimated the degree to which July was going to kick my ass.
IT SERIOUSLY KICKED MY ASS.
July 2021 was the most difficult month I’ve experienced since being a parent. And I’m REALLY HAPPY it’s over.
Now that it’s August, things have slowed down BIG TIME. We are done with swimming and done with camp and DONE WITH EVERYTHING until school starts.
I’ve missed writing.
I’ve missed my routines.
I’m so excited to get back into a groove.
And we have a lot of catching up to do.
So I’ll start where I left off, with the last post I wrote.
Number 5 really wanted to qualify for the biggest meet in the state for swimmers under 12 years old.
All of her closest friends on the team had cuts, and she was the only one of them who didn’t.
And she didn’t want to go because she’s super competitive.
She wanted to go because her BFF is one of those girls, and because she loves ALL her friends on the team. She really does. They have a lot of fun together.
They laugh A LOT.
Anyway, Number 5 had her last chance to qualify for this meet (called Age Groups) in the middle of July.
And the week before that meet she really didn’t feel like going to practice one night.
I have been in that situation before.
I have also blown shit off and then really regretted it later when it affected a specific outcome.
So when she asked if she could skip practice I told her this:
How are you going to feel on Sunday night after Regionals is all done if you’ve missed qualifying for Age Groups by like a couple hundredths?
Do you think you won’t care at all?
Or do you think there is a chance you’ll wish you had gone to practice tonight, just to be sure you’d done everything you could do to make it?
It’s totally up to you what you do. You just have to answer both of those questions.
In the end Number 5 went to practice.
I wasn’t going to interject or intervene or try to sway her either way, but I was definitely really glad she ultimately decided to go.
Because when she went to that meet, there wouldn’t be any little shitty voice in her head telling her you should have gone to that practice.
She was confident.
And she did it.
She qualified in two events.
She really couldn’t have cared much less about the events.
It was really all about this…
And I’m so glad she has this experience in her Experience Jar.
Because another day is going to come when Number 5 doesn’t want to do something she knows she really would benefit from doing.
I mean, that’s the biggest challenge for most of us, isn’t it?
Not taking the easy way out?
We do that all the time when we leave a sink full of dishes or we don’t work out or we blow a bunch of money on stupid shit at Target or we stay up way too late because we just don’t want to go to bed.
Most of us adults could use A LOT of help in the doing-shit-I-don’t-feel-like-doing department.
You know how you get better at that?
Practice.
And I’m glad Number 5 is getting some reps in now.
Because when life presents her with more and more challenges as she gets older, having that Experience Jar jam packed full of reminders is gonna serve her really, really well.
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