It’s My Imagination

Mom vs. Dad

June 14, 2008 on 12:48 pm | In Family | 4 Comments

I took my daughter to pitching practice today so my husband could spend more time with my step-daughter and family.  They leave to go home to California tomorrow and I want him to be able to spend as much time as possible with them.  He usually takes our daughter to meet with her pitching coach, but I offered to step in today.

Our daughter has reached a point where she wasn’t enjoying pitching and was beginning to question her abilities, particularly as a pitcher.  She cringed whenever I would remind her of her scheduled pitching practice and always looked for excuses to cancel.  Today felt different.  She wasn’t really too happy about having to go, but was somewhat chatty on the drive over.

I sat and watched and the pitching coach was very complimentary and even surprised at how well she was throwing today.  I even saw my daughter smiling while she was working with him.  She seemed to be enjoying herself and she was pitching quite well, doing everything the coach told her to do.  She even threw a few curve balls that went right over the plate, exactly as they should, and the coach had just shown her that pitch minutes before.  He was thrilled, my daughter was happy and I felt everything was right with the world.

As we were leaving to head to the car, my daughter mentioned how she felt that she’d done a really good job today and that she hadn’t felt that way in a long time.  She commented that she never feels like she throws good enough for her dad and since he wasn’t there she felt more relaxed.  Interesting.

So, how to I talk to my husband about this?  I want him to continue to support her, but he can be very critical and, while he’s trying to provide constructive criticism, it can be interpreted as negative.   I think I’d like to see him working with her, but he needs to keep his mouth closed.  She knows what she needs to work on, she hears it from her coaches.  She needs him to just put his glove on and catch for her, not instruct her.  He needs to relax and then she will relax.  Now, how do I tell him this?

Tags: fastpitch softball, pitching