Parents of Young Gymansts Have No Shame

[zls44]

So I'm watching Aaron Brown, and hes doing a story on a group of seven year olds training very VERY hard in gymnastics in Allentown, PA.

This group was one of many groups that was training for a program in which young gymnasts compete and the top ones are selected to be tracked until they are old enough to compete in the Olympics.

This one poor girl was targeted, and they showed her, to nobody's knowledge, not even her own, doing a vault, and other things, with an ankle broken in two places and a partially torn ligament.

Her mother: "When she was younger, she had a very low tolerence for pain. And I told her 'you know what, gymnasts get hurt, and you're going to have to learn to suck it up.'"

Now, my gag reflex was off the page.

NO! YOU DONT LEARN TO SUCK IT UP! YOU LET IT HEAL! S*IT HAPPENS! YOURE SEVEN! THE OLYMPICS ARENT TOMORROW! YOU LET IT GET BETTER!

So the girl is on crutches...but her GOOD OL' parents are gonna drive her hours away to do train for the tracking program.

In the car, suprise suprise, the ankle swells. The girl grimaces but says nothing.

Her father, from the front seat, says:

"What do we do when we get hurt?"

The poor little girl utters "suck it up".

So she tries out, we see other young girls crying and bawling over mistakes, she can't do everything due to her ankle, and she just misses the cut.

But afterwards, her and her team are having fun as kids, eating pizza.

The correspondant asks them if they want to go to the Olympics, with the parents there.

She says no.

Later on, her mom says "I know she wants to go to the Olympics".

NO! NO YOU DONT! YOURE IN DENIAL!!!!

And another parent says "Oh, this is great, it provides great structure and discipline."

Thats cr@p. As George Carlin says, kids dont need discipline. THEY NEED DAYDREAMING! THEY NEED TO BE KIDS!

This is why parents should need licenses.

[indigo32]

1. sick

why do we allow this? It's crazy.

[SoCalDem]

2. Sickening, isn't it..??

and for the boys it's sports.:(

Kids cannot do activities just because they like to play.. :(

[Valerie5555]

3. At least my mom and dad had me partake in skiing lessons for the FUN of

it and exercise and not for GOING FOR THE GOLD or anything like that.

[tsipple]

4. How Very Jon Benet Ramsey

I don't know where to begin.

[tjdee]

5. Parents living vicariously through their children...

This reminds me of the pageant thing they had on HBO...
The mother was a waitress and I think got a second job just so she could buy pageant dresses,etc.

And the mother told this story that the girl wanted her to not work, and that her reply had been "If I don't work, we can't do the pageants" and supposedly the girl understood. Here's the kicker: This mother told the story to talk about how much *she* was sacrificing for the pageants!

If you saw this girl, she looked not happy. Meanwhile, this mother is chain smoking, the other kid was in juvenile hall, etc. etc. She wants her daughter to make the big time, and that's the only way she can think of for her to do it.

It's sad. Lots of times it's about the parents' wants/needs/regrets and not whether the kid has fun or even wants to do it. It's sad.

[jiacinto]

6. This is horrible

Here is another story. At my alma matter the local ballet group would rent out the college facilities during the summer. Anyway they were all so tiny and thin. My friend was there with me one summer and she was using the laundry room in the student union building. Some of the girls were there doing their laundry too. Anyway she overheard these little girls--no more than maybe 8 or 9--talking about "calories". I also heard from the local delivery guy that those girls ordered a lot from his pizza place. Which leads me to think that they were probably purging a lot.

I agree with you. Stories like the one above are indeed sad.

[fizzana]

7. This is why I took my daughter out of gymnastics

She was really good but there was no way I was going to put her through anything like that.

That kid with the broken ankle and the torn ligament is going to suffer later in life for this. Young bodies are fragile and they can't do any sports if they have any injuries, It's insane.

[jiacinto]

9. And aren't their bones still developing?

So the damage might be irreversible.

[fizzana]

14. Yes - it's easy to inflict permanent damage.

My daughter is now on a track team instead and the coaches absolutely insist that no kid does any weight training or anything that causes stress on their bones until they are 15 or 16.

Unfortunately gymnastics demands that athletes reach their peak at 13-16 yrs. The sport (although I sometimes hesitate to call it that) makes the body do completely unnatural things and no good can come of this in the long run. At least most other sports involve doing fairly normal activities like throwing, running and jumping.

[Valerie5555]

8. Holy kaka

This got me to thinking of a book I remembered looking through or "Little Girls In Pretty Boxes" or something like that about how young skaters and gymnasts had the potential for getting hurt in their respective sports and stuff.


Scary and sick or :scared: and :puke:

[SyracuseDemocrat]

10. Terrible

Just let kids be kids, they shouldn't worry about being Olympic gold medalists.

[donco6]

11. And that's NOT child abuse?

Sickening.

[dsc]

12. Of all the reasons I am blessed to be my Dad's son

the way he handled my lack of interest in and talent for sports is one of the top ones. My dad was both majorly talented at and majorly into sports. I am the opposite. He let me quit sports at age 9 and I never heard a word about it again. I am so glad he wasn't like these stage parent monsters you posted about. I wish these kids could be removed.

[Valerie5555]

13. Went to a dog show last weekend and if a poor show dog / puppy still had

to go through its paces in the show ring despite being SICK or INJURED, the dog/ puppy should be DISQUALIFIED and the SPCA called.