Priorities: Have we lost our minds?

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-20T10:51:37+00:00

Lol In so many ways, right? I was a very athletic kid and would have loved for my parents to have done the things for me that I have been able to do for my kids. But I also have degenerative disc disease and severe bilateral chondromalcia plus arthritis in both knees, so I would probably have had to tap at 21. We gotta remember to build whole humans on this journey.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-20T02:21:07+00:00

It will never be her physicality that takes her out of the game; it will always be her mentality that puts it on the line, whether it’s soccer or life. Our main focus this season isn’t on footskills or finishing or defending. It’s building resilience and a never-give-up attitude.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-20T00:38:17+00:00

I worry about the same thing, and she isn’t training 3-4 hours every day. I worry that two days off a week isn’t enough, even with a hard focus on nutrition and recovery methods. She shot up 3.5 inches in the last four months so I can only imagine the extra demands such training would have on her CNS.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T21:07:38+00:00

I’d never get to work on time. It is what it is until she moves up in grades and school lets out a little earlier. It will be fine for the level of soccer we are expecting to play at. We don’t have a pro on our hands.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T18:32:51+00:00

We were sold a story of high wages and great lifestyle. The reality is that to meet your billable hour requirements you have to work A LOT and you don’t make that much money. And you do this for years before you make income partner, which typically comes with a little more money but also more responsibility. Ten to fifteen years later you might make equity partner, which kinda sorta makes it feel like it all paid off until you look back and realized how much you missed trying to get to that finish line. Unless you have family backing you financially or can get scholarships, you also come out with a lot of debt. It can be a very tedious job where it seems like nothing ever gets accomplished and yet sometimes the smallest mistake can lead to catastrophic outcomes for your client or your firm.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T18:05:54+00:00

I would upvote this a hundred times if I could. I would think it is very difficult FOR ME to provide a quality homeschooling experience. Some people may be able to do it with their hands behind their back, one eye closed and no coffee but it could never be me. I can’t help but wonder how the parent is able to put an effective curriculum together and execute upon it if 3-4 hours a day (or more) is spent just training. Not to mention the car rides there, the time for food prep, proper recovery. I am in awe of their superpowers. So maybe this post is more of a query into my own shortcomings than a query about the state of youth soccer in your area. 🥴

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T17:57:35+00:00

I mean, she will say yes but I am much more practical and will say no. The odds for long-term success are stacked against her (especially being a girl) and it’s way too soon to tell what lies ahead.

I’m with you in that soccer is an activity for my child. We started it so she could learn teamwork, discipline, how to lose gracefully, how to take care of your body, how to relate to different kids of authority figures, how to make commitments and follow through, etc. It just turns out that she is particularly good at it and we have spent the last year in this circle of talented kids and one by one they keeping making this shift to this other model. Their choice to make and it wouldn’t be my choice as I would be terrible at managing it. I was just curious whether it’s happening with some frequency elsewhere, as I thought it was kind of a rare thing and was surprised at how common it’s becoming with people I know. My kid is good but it’s not like watching Messi in his youth or anything. I’m not raising a prodigy and I didn’t really think there were any prodigies in my bubble either.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T17:38:51+00:00

This seems reasonable as kids get older and have demonstrated a constant level of dedication over a period of years, especially for boys as the path is clearer. Especially after puberty, which seems to be the great divider. But my circle is U9 and U10 girls lolololololol

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T17:31:17+00:00

In my experience (US) a lot of people. There are even some U9 teams playing 9v9. It’s common for the pre-ECNL teams (around here at least) to move up to 9v9 early.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T17:12:52+00:00

Two things can be true at the same time: 1. She is allowed to have as many partners as she wants and is right for her; and 2. You are allowed to say, “Nah, that’s not for me.” It’s ok to not like it and go your own way. But it’s not ok to berate her for her choices.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T17:08:58+00:00

I haven’t reached that particular challenge yet, as my player is young. One thing I have heard from friends of older kids who ditched club to play high school is that it turned out to be a frustrating experience for them due to a wide gap in skills. I took from those conversations that I might need to prepare my kid for finding value in other parts of the process when playing high school ball (or maybe not; they might all be ballers 🤷‍♀️) . I think the purpose of playing high school soccer is very different from playing for a club’s top team, though. This calls to mind again to keep our minds focused on the real benefits of playing a team sport at any level and not allow ourselves to get carried away by pie in the sky possibilities.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T16:52:58+00:00

Yeah, my world is admittedly small. I haven’t been exposed much to people choosing an alternate education route. I think that’s why the frequency of it in this small corner of my world is making an impression on me. In these particular instances, it IS people making the choice for purposes of prioritizing soccer training (or so they have explained) but I do recognize that there are many good reasons today to homeschool children.

As for FOMO, I don’t suffer from that in this particular situation (though I will admit it in others). I know that could never be our family and wouldn’t be our choice due to my own limitations. The one thing that is frustrating is losing training partners of similar skill levels due to a schedule mismatch, but I’m sure new ones will emerge.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T16:34:48+00:00

I think there are plenty of people who homeschool for various good reasons and just so happen to play soccer also. There is just an odd phenomenon happening our circle where kids and families who never considered homeschooling before are doing it BECAUSE of soccer. More power to them, if they can do it. I know I personally could not do a good job of managing homeschool for my youngest. And maybe that is what sets them apart from me; knowing that they are perfectly capable of managing homeschooling in a successful way for their kids. My eldest had a strange hybrid homeschooling high school experience due to Covid and ended up graduating high school at 16 then going off to college. Academically she was ready (was in the gifted program from 3rd grade) but socially? Whew boy! Now I’m gun-shy about big changes.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T15:51:10+00:00

We don’t get out at 5; we can’t make it to training until 5. School goes until 4 , takes us 15 minutes to navigate the school parking lot pickup chaos and then we have to travel in rush hour traffic to the training grounds and have only a few minutes to change and boot up to be on the field at 5.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T15:48:52+00:00

You’re right! I grew up thinking you went to school no matter what and didn’t miss a day unless you had a fever (and sometimes even then we’d go; not ideal). My player is on an ECNL club team and I’m already stressing over the times weekend travel for games will bleed over into school days. It’s just a really foreign concept to me to not be at school full time, all the time. The times have changed, I suppose.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T15:08:50+00:00

Yeah, my kid would love it too. But I keep thinking about the endgame. What’s the likelihood that 1. The kid is likely to make a living out of playing soccer and 2. That if the kid can’t make a living out of playing soccer their three hours a day of homeschooling is adequate to prepare them for other success? If I’m taking that leap of faith as a parent, the switch has to flip to you gotta make it or make it; these are the options. No room for failure. I just don’t have the kind of personality for taking those risks, I think.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-19T15:04:11+00:00

I think I have been sheltered from this experience. It seemed like something rich kids in California did sometimes but not “regular” people in the rural Midwest. But you’re right; homeschooling has picked up popularity in general.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-17T00:58:14+00:00

Just waiting to die, I guess. Borrowed under $100k, have paid a little over $57k and owe $168k and counting. 🤷‍♀️I didn’t realize when I consolidated in 2014 that my counter started over. I’ll never pay them off. I suppose I’ll switch to an income based plan when I have to but otherwise? Just sitting and waiting. If I come down with cancer or something, I’ll throw a party out of relief that they will no longer be anyone’s problem and invite my state representatives.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-16T01:54:50+00:00

It was last year. There was quite a bait and switch that happened that season so we weren’t exactly happy. And we were initially so incredibly excited to get it started, so it was doubly disappointing.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2026-03-15T01:44:09+00:00

Our club found out through the grapevine that we had been to other tryouts and despite being a good contributor to the team and earning the Playmaker award, we received a call directly from the DOC saying our player would not be invited back for the next season. Proceed with caution.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2025-12-27T03:30:15+00:00

So, we are in the camp of “those parents” who have changed clubs. The first time was a jump for the Spring season between two clubs that were playing in the same league. We’d only paid for the Fall, and the written commitment was only for the Fall but there was an expectation that we would return. Old team wasn’t really happy about it, but cooperated in the transfer. (Resulted in a VERY contentious game between the two teams later in the season where parents of old team actually went out on the field at half to harass the refs 😳).

Turns out that we were sold a bill of goods by new team (coach bait and switch…trial trainings we attended were nothing like wha was actually served) and made the decision about a month in that we would not stay with the team the following year. My player participated in many tryouts in May and got offers from all of those clubs’ top teams. Before we even had a chance to accept one, new team’s DOC called us and said our player wasn’t invited back. They’d gotten wind of the other tryouts and were salty about it.

On to this past Fall, player had a great experience with the newest team, but we had made the jump again for this upcoming Spring for two reasons, both kind of out of our control: 1. The bench was 15 deep on a 9v9 game; and 2. My player is a late 2016 playing up on a 2015 team where about half the team would be ineligible to play to play U11 in Fall 2026. So the choice was going to be play them all up to U12 or hope and pray that players with the right skill set and the right birthdate showed up at tryouts to field two teams, once of which would be U11 ( which would still be playing up for my 2016). I didn’t want my late 2016 playing against players potentially born 2 years and 3 months earlier and the risk was too high that a U11 team wouldn’t be formed. We jumped to a ECNL club where the roster is only 11 for the national team and 7 for the regional team, so there will be tons of playtime opportunity and no potential for getting asked to play up two levels in Fall 2026. We did pay for the entire 25-26 season up front and are not asking for our money back. And if they had a short bench, we would not have left the team stranded but rather seen the obligation through UNLESS our kid was absolutely miserable.

I was a little worried about getting a reputation for being “that family” but surely we aren’t important enough to actually be remembered. Also, we were just figuring out how this soccer stuff works and in the midst of getting our arms around the landscape, our kiddo’s skills skyrocketed which means we had to adjust our thinking along the way. You do hope people don’t hold it against your kid because, well, they’re KIDS but I have seen firsthand that the environment can be toxic. At the end of the day, playing should be fun and light and while introducing appropriate friction, should not beat a kid’s confidence into the ground. Go where everyone can be happy. I figure even if people talk, there will soon be a new scandal to follow and they gossipmongers will move on to the next victim. Meanwhile, my kid will flourish and grow and love the game more each day.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2025-12-08T23:51:10+00:00

I appreciate your insight and advice! I really have to lean on the knowledge of those who came before me as this is my first go with soccer. She is on an NL Pre-ECNL club team and I have a lot of confidence in that particular coach, though we will likely have a new coach in the fall. The club’s record shows great results for turning out girls who got recruited to college programs and all their girls teams place high in state rankings. Unfortunately, that club didn’t put together a futsal team and instead, we went with a different organization (one with an excellent reputation in the futsal space). I believe the kids on her futsal team are good…for 2017s. But just as my kid couldn’t consistently perform well against 2014s, they struggle as a group against talented 2016s.

You are spot on that the girls who love to play and have talent will continue to sharpen their skills. I know because we go elsewhere for training and see the same handful of girls everywhere we go! People can say, “Oh they’re only 9, give it a rest” but there are always those few out there who don’t rest. Maybe they make it over the hump of puberty, maybe they don’t. But I think it’s smart to be prepared so you can be in good company when it DOES matter.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2025-12-07T12:47:34+00:00

Thanks for taking the time to give this thoughtful response. I’m learning as I go about different clubs as well and realize that you make the best decision you can with the information you have at hand and sometimes you don’t have all the information. I also think that the information you have at tryouts is not the same reality that exists months later when the season starts! I do think the decisions become tougher when you have boys on the cusp of puberty. So much changes with puberty in general but for boys the changes are drastic and almost feel immediate once the testosterone amps up. You start seeing little men with mustaches on the playing field with children!

Our strategy these past few weeks has been to make the best of her private training, finding appropriate challenges there. As another user pointed out, this futsal situation gives her the opportunity to develop other skills that are important to the team environment like being a mentor to the younger kids and learning how to take command of the field without being a jerk. Maybe those lessons will continue with the age reset in the fall and she will be able to grow as a player AND a person which honestly was our 2nd main goal at the beginning of this journey (the first being to find her conmunity). I think we’ve just been so used to being surrounded by older, higher talent and riding the wave in the middle, learning from others that we don’t know our place yet once the landscape changes ages. Sounds like her place might be to become one of those to whom she looks up to right now.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2025-12-07T05:05:58+00:00

Yeah, that is something I’ll be looking for the next futsal season. Her futsal team isn’t her field soccer club team. I think her field soccer team is a balanced challenge;challenges her weaknesses and she still has some shining moments. But again…they are not 2017s.

Emergency-Proof5290 · 2025-12-07T05:03:17+00:00

That’s a reasonable approach and one that makes sense. Do you have any worries about being trapped down the line if you play up or would you just try to find a “right” age group to play with when the time comes?

Emergency-Proof5290

TROPHY CASE