Yesterday I went to a wrestling tournament to watch Jake wrestle. Brad came too and took pictures. Jake took second. I've been at a wrestling tournament 4 out of the last 5 weeks. I plan to be at a wrestling tournament 4 out of the next six weeks. We started the kids in wrestling when Jordan was in 6th grade. Ben was in 2nd grade and Riley was in kindergarten. That was 15 years ago. Of those 15 years, 12 have been spent in the high school; Jordan 4 years, Ben 4 years, Jacob 4 years. I'd count Riley, but he overlapped Ben and Jake...so you can't count that.
The first four years I had a middle school wrestler and two peewee wrestlers. I was overjoyed when we just had middle school and high school wrestling and then finally just high school wrestlers. When my husband enrolled my sons in wrestling I had no idea what I was getting into. I was never around wrestling. It was always during basketball season and I played basketball. Plus, my dad discouraged us (maybe discouraged is an exaggeration) from going to wrestling matches. You have to understand though, he lost talented athletes who played basketball to wrestling because wrestling was THE SPORT for young men in my high school. Every year wrestlers placed at state. In 1991, when I was a sophomore, the team took state. I just had to look that up. Again, I was totally ignorant of wrestling. I didn't know what a fall was, what a takedown was, what a reversal was. I didn't know what back points were, what a half nelson was, what a double leg was. I definitely didn't know the way a mom's heart races before a match of her child or how few win, actually win, in their very last match. No matter if you win all your other matches to get to the first place match there is only one winner and one loser. Duh, Chelsey, you may be saying because in every sport there is always one winner and one loser, it's just that in wrestling it seems so much more....personal. Or maybe it's just that 2nd place in a wrestling tournament is much more disappointing than second place in a track meet, which is the only individual sport I participated in. I went into the sport knowing nothing. I just wanted Jordan to win is all. And he did sometimes and he didn't sometimes. I didn't know what camps to send him to or how to make him better. I didn’t know what my role was as a parent. I just trusted the coaches.
When Jordan entered high school, I couldn't travel to many of his matches because of the little kids and because our dental practice was so small and new that we were working to just survive and put food on the table. I did always go to the local tournaments though and I would hate when I traveled there to watch my kid go two and out. Losing in wrestling is hard. You have to overcome the mental loss more than the actual loss. And you have to be willing to go out there again and take the risk of being beat up again. And, in wrestling, if your team is small, there is no team to absorb the loss. It's all on you. And our team has been small.
Mentors stepped in for my kids....like Josh who drove all of my boys to tournament after tournament after tournament across the states to get them more matches. Or Jeremy and Matt who coached my kids (who were losers at the time) in peewees. They were there consistently and were willing to raise my boys up with their wrestlers. I got to know parents as the years came by. I met the parents in junior high, travelled with them in high school and watched them leave as their child graduated and I still had another boy left to wrestle. I love these friends who sat by my side, their own stomachs tied up in knots as a parent, keeping me from getting in fights with those other aggressive parents. (If you can’t tell, this is said tongue in cheek,because sometimes I was the aggressive parent…Tammy, Kay, Trista, Michelle…iykyk)
More mentors came in...Luke, Finneseth, Silva, Akana, Grizz, Griff, Paul, Moss, and more parents, and suddenly I was one of the ones driving kids across the state to tournaments and camps, teaching others how to get their kid to state.
I have spent a lot of hours with the wrestling program. And now, we are in the final 6 weeks of my last son's wrestling season. 5 weeks if he doesn't go to state. Less if he gets injured. Jordan was unable to finish his senior year when he broke his elbow during wrestling practice.
What will I do next year? Will I still coach the girls? Can I give enough time? Do I have enough knowledge to be valuable to the coaching staff...or should I just take a break from the racing heart and sweaty hands as I watch the wrestlers I love, especially mine, step onto that mat and into that circle?
Such short time we have. Those never ending 7 hour tournaments where I sat on hard wooden bleachers in hot, stuffy gyms are now not seeming long enough.
I'm proud of my boys for wrestling. Wrestling is the hardest sport I personally know of at the high school level. As I am preparing myself to take off my mama wrestler hat, I realize just how much I will miss it...all of it; sweaty gyms, heart attacks, thrills, tears, pain, effort, and friendships. Here's to a great 12 years spent. Let's go Jake!
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