Lifting weights is my ‘thing’. My job, my hobby for 30 years, my crutch when life gets tough. I hoped my kids would one day be interested too, to keep themselves fit, confident and healthy wherever they end up in the world.
But I didn’t want to force it. After all, the absolute best way to make a teenager hate something is for their Dad to tell them they ‘should definitely’ do it 🙂
Then one day my 15 year old son asked to come train with me.
Avoiding the temptation to punch the air and shout:
OH MY GOD YES, I AM SO HAPPY I COULD CRY!
I used every ounce of self-control to nonchalantly say: “Sure”.
But my long-awaited opportunity to earn my Dad Stripes, dropping Knowledge Bombs he would marvel at, his Luke-In-Empire-Strikes-Back to my Yoda, instead became lessons for me on Love and Parenting.
Lesson 1: I Can’t Hurry Love
It is harder than you’d think to teach people all about something you LOVE, because you want them to adore it as much as you do ASAP, forgetting that you had your own journey to falling in love with it in the first place.
So I ended up overloading him with:
“There’s this exercise… oh and this one too, it’s great… and this other one, watch this… Oh and…”
I soon calmed down, stopped feeling so giddy with excitement, and realised I needed to focus on the Basics I wished someone had taught me at his age:
- Basic Movements — Push, Pull, Hinge
- Tension & Rep Ranges
- Good Pain vs Bad Pain
The rest, all the bajillion exercises out there, and the ones he was seeing on social media, we could learn as we went along.
When I thought about it, it had taken me years to fall in love with working out, after seeing and feeling the benefits. At this early stage I had to just make things interesting and rewarding enough for him to like it and stick with it.
The Love would hopefully follow in time.
Lesson 2: I Am Too Anxious About ‘Getting It Wrong’
Think about the things we all want to teach our kids about succeeding in life in general, so they don’t end up as axe murderers, or just unloved, unemployable assholes:
- Life is tough, don’t be surprised when it’s not easy
- Any new skill takes time and patience to learn
- Focus on progress not perfection
- Be kind to others and yourself
You KNOW deep down that if they get this, they’ll be just fine in life.
The thing is, you can try to teach them all those life lessons with some Big Chat About Life (more on this in Lesson 3), y’know like those families on TV and in movies seem to do:
- Parent tells Teenager ‘What Life Is Like’
- Teenager says “Gee Thanks Dad Now I Get It, You’re The Best!”
- Teenager goes on to become a handsome millionaire with 5 kids and a charitable foundation, etc
Back in the real world those chats don’t happen. Teens hate pre-planned Big Chats About Life, and just roll their eyes and remain mono-syllabic.
So despite saying the right things now and again, and hoping I’m setting a good example, I have always been anxious that I won’t know I’ve done a decent job as a parent until they’re older, when life comes at them fast.
If only I could at least have an inkling, some feedback, that I’ve helped equip my kids for life…
Therefore you’ll understand why my main emotional moment while training with my son (there were many, I’m an emotional Irishman after all…) was this:
- After practising with assistance work for a few weeks to gain some strength and nail the technique, he said he wanted to do a pull-up
- He didn’t engage his back, forcing his shoulders, biceps and forearms to do most of the work, they weren’t strong enough, so he failed, hardly moving. He was crestfallen.
- We went over the technique again — drive down and back with elbows while engaging scapula — we practised with gymnastic rings with feet on floor.
- I said, “we’ll try next week again, you’re maybe getting tired”. He said “No, let’s try again now”.
- Hands on bar. Boom, 2 pull ups.
- He jumped down, smiling at me, proud of himself, endorphins coursing through his veins, and you could almost see the wheels turning in his brain, burning what had just happened into his memory — I tried. I failed. I learned. I tried again. I succeeded.
Ah FFS I’m feeling teary again just typing this… it was his wee face, beaming, that got to me… anyway THAT moment helped me:
- let go of some of that parental anxiety about ‘getting it wrong’
- realise maybe I’m not a crappy parent,
- recognise maybe I have done something right, and
- have some belief he’ll probably turn out OK (though I’m hiding the axe in the garden shed just in case).
Lesson 3: The Big Moment Never Comes. Be Happy With Drive-By Chats
I mentioned Big Chats About Life earlier. My parents never discussed much with me (80s Parenting was pretty hands-off right?), but my generation sees the value in discussing things with their kids like:
- Love, Sex, Consent
- Drugs & Alcohol
- Choosing Friends/Partners wisely
Unfortunately I built these conversations up to being Big Talks I Must Have, the worry being that if I didn’t, I was letting the Internet and TV educate my kids in these things instead.
When was the right time to have a Big Chat with a teenager though?
“Hey Son, I know you’re killing lots of baddies on Call Of Duty, but put down that controller and let’s have a chat about Love, Sex and Consent, eh?”
The Big Moment never seemed to come.
Until I started working out with my son…
I don’t know about you, but my teens clam up when I try to have serious face to face discussions about topics they’d rather not talk about.
But now I found we had ample time for Drive-By chats, quick 2 minute discussions not really facing one another, as we drove to and from the gym or between sets as we worked out.
Instead of waiting for a Big Moment that never arrived, we could talk about things in small chunks over the course of weeks and months.
The more time we hung out, the more open he became to just… talk — we covered everything in tiny bites — sex, peer pressure, self confidence, drugs and booze, career ambitions, and of course plenty of sports chat and dumb jokes…
The important thing was that I had (accidentally) found an environment where he was comfortable enough to talk about everything, and some of those times we could talk about ‘Big Stuff’ without him feeling like it was a parental sermon.
Progress Report and My Advice To You
He’s now over 6 feet tall (taller than me!), can do 6 pull ups, has fledgling biceps and carries himself better posture-wise. AND I heard him tell a relative recently that he ‘likes’ working out (still not love but it’s progress)!
I would encourage all parents of teens to find something you personally love doing, that you can both do together.
Carving out time to just hang out together gives you those opportunities to chat about anything and everything (including the Big Stuff sometimes), while the chance to teach your kid about something you adore and see them learn and grow is awesome for both parties!
For me, my son and weightlifting, even if he gives up, he has given me memories I will always cherish, together-time I wouldn’t have otherwise had, and opportunities to get to know him (and him me) that probably wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t started working out together.
Yet another reason I will always love lifting weights. And my baby boy.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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