I still have a clear image of my coach's face when he told me, “You will never be good enough to play in college.”
It was solemn–serious. He whole-heartadly believed what he was telling me. “You will never be good enough.”
From that moment on, those six words followed me everywhere. The first eighteen years of your life are arguably the most formative. They make you who you are. They create your whole belief system. I had loving parents who spent my whole life telling me I was talented and smart. They told me I was special, and I believed them until I was ten.
When I was ten, I started playing for a softball coach who was extremely abusive.
Both verbally and mentally abusive, he would constantly single me out. He gave me extra conditioning punishments and relentlessly told me that I was a horrible pitcher who wouldn’t make it to college. As a ten year old who is supposed to look up to adults, I believed every word he told me.
The past ten years of parental praise and achievements disappeared, and I was left with a fear of inadequacy.
Shortly after I started playing for him, I had my first panic attack… and then my second… and then my third; the panic attacks never stopped.
I would panic on the mound while pitching, at school over homework, and on car rides to games. I was in constant distress, and my mental health suffered a steep decline.
I remember the first panic attack I had while pitching. I was pitching in a scrimmage and I threw a ball. I nervously glanced over at my coach to gauge his reaction and saw his red, angry face and the rage in his eyes. After seeing his face, panic set in.. “What if I threw another ball or, god forbid, two more?” “What if I walked this batter and the next one?” “What if he pulls me from the game?” “My parents would have wasted their whole weekend to come and watch me pitch to only two batters.” The longer I stood out there, the more my head spun and the more worked up I got. My throat tightened, I couldn’t breathe and tears began to roll down my face. I had never cried on the mound, until then. Something inside me broke at that moment.
This game I had loved was suddenly something I feared. For the first time, my coach was someone I feared.
That anxiety seeped into every aspect of my life. I began to worry about things I had never worried about before. I believed everyone hated me because they thought I was too loud, weird, or annoying. I was told for so long that I wasn’t enough; eventually, I started to believe it. I began to tell myself I wasn’t smart enough. Then I wasn’t pretty enough… or kind enough… or enough. “You will never be good enough.” Six words had altered the course of my life.
I live with both clinical depression and anxiety and am on medication for both. My first panic attack and depressive episode were caused by my experiences with abusive coaching. I still endure panic attacks and depressive episodes to this day. I wish I could say there is a magical happy ending where I miraculously learned to love myself, but I cannot. It is not always that simple. The damage had been done- I was unable to detach from the belief that I would never be enough.
It is something I have to work on everyday. Despite my struggle, I have to remind myself that I am enough and nothing anyone can say can take that away from me. I am enough. I am good enough to play in college. I am smart enough to get good grades. I am kind enough. I am pretty enough. I am enough. I always was. And it was never somebody else’s place to tell me that I wasn’t.
Yelling , belittling, and making athletes feel bad about themselves isn’t coaching; it’s bullying.
It has become far too normalized in athletic culture for adults to bully young kids in the name of “tough” coaching. Coaches have an important role in athletes' lives and they can impact a child’s entire life from tangible things like the colleges they pursue and the careers they join to personal things like self perception and confidence. There needs to be higher standards for coaches and coaching methods as well as an emphasis on holistic coaching. Holistic coaching is putting the person before the athlete and remembering that you are coaching people. The toxic “tough love” coaching style is incredibly damaging and has traumatized thousands of athletes. While we are athletes, we are people first.
A coach can make or break an athlete.
I know far too well the cost to be paid by having a coach that breaks you. The cost is years of trauma, panic attacks, and severe trust issues. The cost is the love of your sport. The cost can be everything you are.