One evening, bored to tears while we watched Cooper warming up on the mat, she asked, "Can I do wrestling too?" Of course, my Mama instinct said no way, absolutely not, but her Daddy the wrestler was quicker with a response: "Sure, Sis, come on out here."
I cringed, I winced, I cautioned, I pleaded, but to no avail. She ran happily out to join her dad and brother, and that was only the beginning. Each night thereafter, she packed a bag with shorts and a tee shirt and jumped right in to the mix, learning single leg take downs and half nelsons, and thoroughly enjoying herself. Soon she asked for wrestling shoes, and a singlet, and Aaron tried to convince me that her flexibility and core strength was helping her hold her own on the mat, at least with her practice partners.
As a mom, it is painful to watch your son get taken down hard and stretched into multiple unnatural configurations, but it is doubly difficult to watch your little girl, who formerly spent her days curled up on your lap with a stuffed animal and storybooks get thrown into a headlock and flipped over onto her back.
She braved her first mat burns, her first accidental choke hold, a few bruises and other unmentionable scuffles all the while basking in the glow of her father's attention.
Cooper also began to thrive...due in no small part to his sister tagging along to practice with. She outweighs him by 3 pounds, so he has to make up in technique what he lacks in weight. Aaron is proud as punch, obviously, and before long we were wrestling in Sherburn on Monday nights, in Blue Earth on Tuesdays, and in Fairmont on Thursdays.
This weekend we thought they were ready to try their first Open Tournament. There have been a number of Team tournaments throughout the winter, but we didn't think they were ready to wrestle-off for a position on the team. An Open allows everyone to enter, unattached to a team, and it was finally time to see if their practice minutes were making any kind of difference in their skills.
We arrived for the Fairmont Youth Open early, to get a jump on weigh-ins. Cooper made the 45 pound class, and Carys made the 50 pound class, and both kids were giddy and excited. As the rest of the world poured into the gym, I began to get really nervous. There was a line forming outside the building to check in and register. The stands were packed. All ten mats were crawling with kids practicing. At one point, they surpassed 200 in registration, and I was full of anxiety.
Carys and Cooper tussled around for a little while on the mat, calmly ate a banana next to me in the stands, and casually sipped on their water bottles. I chewed on my fingernails, re-braided Carys' hair for the third time, and tried desperately NOT to look on the outside like I was feeling on the inside.
Coop's class was called first, and Aaron took him down to the mat. He lost his first match, mostly because he was so surprised by the actual meet format that he wasn't very prepared and he got pinned almost immediately. As soon as the ref held up the other boy's hand, Cooper finally realized what that meant, and he just plain got mad. The next match he battled much better; in the middle of the match Carys yelled, "Sink it in deep, Cooper!" and Aaron about died laughing - she pays attention at practice, apparently! When the ref held up Cooper's hand at the end of the match, his grin spread ear to ear. By the end of the day he got to stand on the 3rd place podium and get a medal to take home. If he wasn't convinced before, he was definitely convinced now, and you could see the pride and excitement glowing in his eyes.
And then it was Carys' turn. When they called her class down to the mat, I thought maybe I was going to throw up. There is no fear like the fear of the unknown, and I had no idea how this was going to go. It was clear that these kids were here for real competition; I knew this would be very different from the clinical approach that they were seeing in practice.
She stepped on the mat for her first match, and at the whistle I tried to concentrate on filming so I didn't think so much about what was actually happening. Grandma Gail, who has had years and years of practice cheering from the edge of the mat, was shouting all sorts of encouraging words, and Carys just grinned and giggled and wrestled her way through three rounds. She lost by decision, but she made it all three rounds without incident.
I breathed a little, then, and Aaron picked her up and squeezed her hard and she was pretty happy with the first one, even though she didn't win. For her second match, we all thought it would probably be similar to the first one. Except it wasn't. Her competitor was a no-nonsense little tough guy and Carys walked almost immediately into a headlock. One of the Fairmont coaches was kneeling on the sideline and he talked her through it, trying to get her to hook his leg. She survived to the end of the period, but she was definitely a little rattled. She took the up position to start round two, and just wasn't strong enough to hold him. He got away from her, and she walked right into headlock #2. This time he threw her down, and she hit the mat pretty hard. I could hear her gasp a little, and my throat closed up and my heart stopped beating for a few seconds I think. Fortunately her practice minutes paid off, because she rolled through it and nearly earned a reversal. But the damage was done, because while she wrestled hard for just a little bit more, her opponent caught her in a cradle and finally managed to pin her.
So there I stood, on the edge of the mat, feeling like I might maybe die, as Carys slowly removed her leg band, shook her opponent's hand, shook his mother's hand, and then walked over to Aaron. She held her composure until he picked her up. Then her head tucked down on his shoulder and a few tears began to drip from her eyes. She rubbed her chin and the back of her head, and said, "Mommy, that really hurt." I probably shouldn't have said anything, because her pride might have let it go at that, but my throat was already thick and I kind of choked out, "Oh honey, I know..." And then she started to cry. (I was dangerously close to tears myself.) Aaron just walked her away from the mat for a few minutes and rubbed her back and told her over and over that he was proud of her.
We both told her she didn't have to continue if she didn't want to, but once she got over the initial shock of it, she asked him, "Dad, how do I get out of that headlock? I don't want that to happen again." And Aaron jumped right on that and took her to a practice area to work on it. She didn't even hesitate to go to the next match, and she got a 4th place medal out of the deal.
I still feel terribly conflicted; on one hand I am so proud of her toughness...much more than I would expect out of your average 7 year old. She has always been the softer of my two girls, so I just have no idea where this quality came from. There is another part of me that is pulled by my mothering instinct to put the big kibosh on this wrestling business. Basketball will be starting in a few weeks for her age group, so why not wait for something less...physical, I guess?
But last night we went over to Blue Earth for practice. Aaron wasn't feeling well, so this was the first time I had attended this particular practice session. I was really impressed by Coach Wood's clinical approach to teaching technique; he spent a lot of individual time working on each skill. It was nice to see other girls on the mat as well, and Carys had no shortage of practice partners. At the end of the night, Cooper scored 5 in the Takedown Tournament, and Carys even scored 1. When Coach Wood mentioned the Blue Earth Open coming up this weekend, BOTH of my kids cheered. And on the way out the door, Carys says, "Hey Mom, I bet I can do better than 4th this weekend!"
All I can do is smile, and say "I bet you can, sweetheart, I bet you can."
The video for Carys is below; the headlock I previously described happens around 1:48.
Cooper's first win!
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