Sometimes it can be really hard not to be a stage mum. I write this as I watch my seven-year-old daughter in her second official surfing lesson (she wouldn’t be taught by me, of course).
She’s the youngest in the class and took to the board well for her first lesson yesterday alongside her 11-year-old cousin. But today she seems a bit depleted making me fear she may not have caught the bug, and now I’m terrified she never will.
Having kids has helped me recall more details from my childhood – the highs and lows that came with it – but also left me desperately wanting to transplant my favourite moments into my own kids’ psyches.
Through them I reminisce about my youngster hobbies and interests. The things that I realise now gave me confidence, autonomy, resilience, a sense of self, or an identity in team.
For me, the one that encapsulated most of these highs is surfing. I started aged 13 and it’s been a through-line in my life the past twenty plus years. I have long held a pipedream of my kids, longboards under arms, joining my husband and I out on our favourite surf break and the four of us even lining up to catch the same wave.
But as I watch my daughter get wiped out and clamour back onto the board now and give her an overly eager thumbs up, I see in her eyes she might be doing this just for me.
I know I am not as bad as Tiger Woods’ or name-a-tennis-star’s dad who send their children out to live their unfulfilled dreams or earn the family crust. I do desperately want them to challenge their fears and try new things. So it’s hard not to force them down my path to challenge themselves when it’s the only playbook I have.
But I’m starting to realise the only way through this long game is to see my kids for who they are and not what I want them to be.
