When You Can't Make Them Understand

When You Can't Make Them Understand

"Is everything okay?" was a text from a very close friend from church after a last-minute change in plans that had been set for months. 

"Yes, why? Am I giving off 'not okay' vibes?" was my way of responding to see which part of my hot-mess self she was concerned about. 

It turns out that she thought the change in plans indicated something negative about coach's job status. I explained that it happens all the time, and I've learned to make plans but hold loosely to them coming to fruition. 
 
Another friend came up to me after the end of a very long, very losing season and just said, "Can we be friends again?" I explained that we were never not friends. But as the season dragged on, the weight of carrying the extra load became exhausting. Not only did I need to be with coach to help him process and decompress, but I also just didn't have energy left in me to hang out.

I keep forgetting that our abnormally normal isn't normal to most people. I realized that I have built a beautiful community around me and my family that still doesn't completely understand our lifestyle. 

There are many hard things about living in the sports industry, but one of the most difficult, even after 20 years, is trying to make people understand our day-to-day and season-to-season chaos and how it affects our ability to show up. 

I still haven't figured out how to make them understand. I have learned that you can talk all you want, explaining what it's really like living as a coaching family... 

I want them to understand that we do want to hang out with them, but there aren't many minutes, let alone hours or days, where we have time with coach. His job isn't just crazy during the season; it's year-round with only a few weeks off. He travels for recruiting and away games. He is in the office for practice, film, lifting, planning, meetings, individuals, etc. His job is to show up consistently for his players, the other coaches, the school, and the program. That means he has to show up inconsistently for everything else. Since we deal with it as a daily inconvenience, it shouldn't be too hard for them to accept their occasional ones. He honestly just can't take a day off. 

I want them to understand that he would be at their event if he could. It might sound unbelievable to anyone outside the industry, but I was lucky to have him make all three births of our children. He's missed some birthdays (mine and his), many holidays, major events in our childrens' lives, and even family vacations. So, if it is hard to get him to those, you can imagine how other things would be impossible for him to attend. It's not personal.

But I've also learned that there's no way to have anyone fully understand unless they live it. All we can really do is hope they see…

*Hope they see our hearts, believing we mean what we say even if we can rarely, if ever, back it up with action. 
*Hope they see our tired eyes, realizing we've stayed up way past our bedtime just to catch up with coach and hear how the players are doing because that's the only time we get with him.
*Hope they see our body language, acknowledging that we are carrying the weight of our entire family so we can support him in his job that is changing lives and making a difference. 
*Hope they see our disheveled state, accepting that we are trying our best to be everything to everyone and most of the time, we can only be that to our immediate family. 

It doesn't make it easier, but it allows you to separate those who are paying attention and those who don't care enough to notice. 

The ones who see and give you the benefit of the doubt—well, then, those are the ones you give your precious and extremely rare available time, energy, and attention to when you have the capacity.

 

Jess Gilardi is a lacrosse coach’s wife living on the East Coast. They have three young kids and have been living this life since 2004. She was a mental health therapist in the school system before becoming the full time chaos coordinator for the family (a.k.a. stay-at-home mom). Jess started writing, hoping that by sharing her stories and lessons learned, she might help others learn “the easy way.”
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