3 Ways To Help Your Athlete Deal With Mean Girls In Sports So She Can Play With Confidence Without The Drama

Welcome back to the racing unstoppable girl athletes podcast. I am your host, Bree and elite defender coach for female athletes. And I am so excited that you are here. Now, whether you are an experienced sports mom, you've got lots of seasons that you've been through already, or maybe you're just starting out on this whole sports mom journey or anywhere in between this podcast is for you to help you develop confidence in your athlete daughter, and also to help her develop those skills that she needs to have to keep for herself and navigate those tricky situations. Like the one that we are talking about in today's podcast. How to handle those mean girls that come up in sports so she can play with confidence. Without all the drama. So you're in the right place. If that is you, I actually haven't met an athlete or a mom who hasn't encountered some sorts of. You know, situation with a teammate that is less than ideal. So we're going to get into that today. And before we do, I actually want to shout out. Mom from our community. Leslie, I'm talking about you today. I am so excited about what you posted in our group. Our private group for moms who are going through the elite competitor program with us, that's our signature mental training program for female athletes and our moms. Leslie posted this the other day about her progress in the grip. She said, I have been able to communicate with my daughter better. And also my daughter says my girl has so much more self awareness and is realizing how to handle situations with confidence. She is having so much fun, so nice job, Leslie, I'm really proud of you and your daughter for both doing your parts and helping to develop this part of her game. That confidence on how to handle situations. We're actually going to be talking about that in. This episode, because we know that there's going to be situations that happen. And our athlete daughter's life and in her sport that are hard, that are tricky, that are like, there's no rule book on it, or like playbook on how to. You know exactly figure out what to do, and there's going to be situations that are, you know, where you actually don't have a lot of control as a mom. And so being able to equip your daughter with the skills, to be able to communicate, be able to advocate for herself, be able to handle situations on our own with confidence. That is key. And, and what, what a Testament to your daughter, Leslie, for her being able to do this, but also what confidence she's developing in herself. Not only handle these things that are sport, but this will carry it with her throughout her life. So. Really proud of you again. We're going to be talking about how you can help your daughter do this. In this episode specifically, we're gonna be talking about how you can help your daughter deal with these mean girls in sports. And I kind of want to first preface this with an, with an overarching. You know, focus, I suppose. And I've mentioned this quote before, but it just keeps coming up over and over and over again. And that's the don't shape the path for your child, shape your child for the path. Okay. And I just think that this is, this is so important in this situation. Because there are, like I said, going to be some things that are out of your control when it comes to your athlete, daughters experience. And one of those things are the personalities and the behaviors of other people. On her team. Okay, man, she is going to have teammates that are hard. To play with and, or hard to interact with, or she's going to have teammates that are potentially. Leaving her out or doing really hurtful things. And as much as we don't want this to happen, Sometimes it will. And we, we actually don't want to, and we'll draw a line like there is also, you know, a whole category of behaviors that would be classified as bullying, where you really do need to step in. And make sure that your daughter is protected, but we're talking about. Right now in this episode. Those girls that are, you know, sometimes just not kind and maybe they just have a personality that's way different than your daughter's. And she's having a hard time interacting with them. And so we want to develop our athletes confidence to be able to handle people like that, because it won't be the last time that she is interacting with a person like that. And instead of just removing all of that obstacle in our way, which I, you know, sometimes I see moms that are coming in and they're trying to. To really influence and change everybody else's behavior. And it really gets you like, it's all, it's all this one person's fault, all this one teammate's fault. And she needs to change in order for this to get better. When in reality, you know, some of that might be true, right? Everybody has things that need, they need to work on. We also want to encourage our daughters to look at their role in situations as well and how they are going to navigate them and how they're going to show up and what that looks like for them pay. So I just want to kind of. Preface with that. And before we go any further also, what am I talking about when we say mean girls? Hey, I'm talking about teammates and this is what I hear from moms that are negative. Maybe they're rude, maybe they're jealous case or they're pre. You're not portraying some of this behavior of jealousy, maybe they're they're not inclusive as, as inclusive as they should be. Maybe there's just, you know, just have a different personality. That's not meshing with your daughter. I'm not talking about bullying. Okay. So bullying where, you know, a teammate or somebody on our team is. You know, intimidating making it unsafe for her to show up to practice and to games every single day. So those behaviors. Manipulating like, you know, there's a line, there were bullying is that's not what we're talking about. Okay. If you suspect that there's some bullying going on, then I do encourage you to loop in the coach and to, to take care of that at that level. Okay. So. Let's get into this with, with mean girls. I will also say that, you know, anytime the, our athletes have big goals, anytime that our athlete is going after big things on the court and life. She will be met with judgment. And I actually tell athletes in our program that like, Hey, that's actually one of the signs that you're on the right path. It's one of the key indicators that like, you're doing something big. If people are, you know, you're getting some adversities, people are jealous, like. You know, and when people are jealous and they're, they're feeling insecure about themselves, they do things that are unkind sometimes. Okay. And as unfortunate as that is, This is also a sign potentially that your daughter is on the right path. And we find the athletes who have big visions, big goals, and are more confident in themselves. They're less pulled down by these negative teammate interactions. Okay. When they are more laser focused on where they're going, what they're doing, and they have that deep confidence in the cells that they've developed, then they are less distracted by these, you know, these mean girls or this, some of the other teammate dynamics that can be tricky to handle. Okay. So again, the best thing we can do is teach them. To keep living live in big, like going off for those big goals. You know, haters are proof that they're on the right track. It just is like, bring on the haters. All right. Okay. Let's get into it. First thing that you can do. And I think I put on here three things you could do. I have four, I think I have four, maybe even a bonus thing. Okay. But the first thing that you can do is teach her to ignore the haters. Now. I'm not saying that this is not mean that we excuse unacceptable behavior. Okay. That is not what I'm saying, but I am saying that what we focus on expands. And what we put our energy to gets bigger. And so if your athlete daughter is going to continue to put her energy into a person that is not, you know, There's not treating her well, or it's being unkind or it's just like negative. She's going to continue to put all her focus and all of her energy into that. That's situation just going to get worse and worse and worse and worse. And so Sue Enquist. Some of you may be familiar with her. She is at least she's the most winning coach softball coach at the NCAA level. So she's, she's amazing. And she talks about this this concept of, of the top third, middle third, bottom third. And this is something that I have really kept in mind in my professional life as well. And that is that there's going to be people in your life. And you can tell this to your daughter too. Because it's true on every team that I've coached as well. There's going to be people in your life that are on the, in the top third that are just like, they are your number one fans. They will be supportive. They are. Positive. They are like on your on your team, if we were talking about like, yeah, they're always rooting for you. They're they're just those people. Okay. And then there's going to be a third of the people in your life that are, or on a team that are kind of in the middle. Like they, they could go either way. They're not super concerned, you know, with you, they're just, they're just kind of in the middle. They're hanging out there. Okay. And then there's the bottom ther and that's usually like one or two people who want to take you down. And I wouldn't say like, you know, maliciously, but they're just like negative. And, you know, for whatever reason, whether that's like some sort of insecurity in themselves, they feel threatened. It's what's been conditioned in there, you know, from their home environment. But those bottom third are usually where all of our attention goes, but it's actually the people that we need to spend less attention on. And so if we can teach our athletes that like, Hey, it just comes with the territory of being on a team that you're going to have probably one or two people on your team. That you know, are, are unkind potentially, you know, they're not as inclusive as, as you would want them to be. You know maybe they're rude. Hey, guess what? Let's focus. If we can, let's see if we can shift our focus from those people and stop giving them our energy and shift to the people who are kind, who are on, you know, your, your, your cheer squad, if we're going to put it in those terms. But like, they, you know, they are supportive because. What we look for, we find as well. And so if we're going to be, you know, shifting our focus to let's look for where the, where the positive teammates are, who are those people who are those ones that I can clean too? And I can put my energy into that. So that, that is expanding rather than these negative behaviors that are expanding. On a team now. This actually was a question that came up on our level of coaching call with athletes last week. So this is a call athletes who are going through the athlete elite competitor program. We get on a call together every other week. And they ask questions and there's like probably every call. There's a question about like, Hey, how do I deal with negative teammates? And one of them was about, you know, one of these native teammates is really, I'm really having a hard time with, and she's in a leadership position. And so I was like, okay, you know, that's hard because it's like, you're asking she's, she's in a leadership position and you know, you maybe don't agree with what she is doing as a leader. What can you learn from that? How maybe you can't change her behavior, but you can absolutely learn. And this happened to be an underclassmen. And she was like, well, I don't want to be a leader like that when I became an upperclassman and this is how I'm going to lead, I'm going to invite the underclassmen. I'm going to. Make sure that I'm checking in with people. I'm going to be kind, we're not gonna leave people out. I'm like exactly. Right. So if anything, we can learn from these people on how we don't want to interact. With our teammates. Okay. So that was number one, you know, that skill of ignoring. I'm not saying that we excuse bad behavior. Again, there's a line. If there's like, you know, really hurtful behavior that needs to be addressed, what kind of get get there. But I would say like, first line line of defense is focus where your shift, where you're putting your focus. But we focus on expands. Find the people who are supportive of you, who don't have this negative outlook, negative behavior and clean to them. Right. So that is number one. Okay. Number two. Number two, it's helped her know her boundaries. Hey, this is kind of the buzzword right now. It's like, oh, okay. You know, boundaries and I think it's great. Like we, we need to have boundaries and sometimes it gets you know, misinterpreted on, on what that means. And this means like helping her know what behavior is acceptable and what is not right. When a line has been crossed, how much, not how much, but what is she willing to tolerate and what is she willing to not tolerate? And so we want to empower. Our daughters with this idea that, Hey, you know, I'm, I know I'm going to come across people in my life who are negative or who are you know, just not as, not as helpful or positive as I would like. You know, and that's that, but when is it where she needs to be empowered to step up and say, that's not okay. Or ask the question. What did you mean by that? Okay, or I'm going to walk away now. You know, where are, where is that line for her? Okay. And that isn't necessarily like, okay. You just tolerate, tolerate, tolerate in here? No, it's okay. That teammate she's, she's being negative. She's being kind of rude. I'm going to just ignore him and focus on my other people. Now, if she says something to me or she is talking behind my back or somebody, you know, there's, what is it for your daughter? Okay. If she. says something and she starts coaching me sometimes. It's for athletes who are like, you know, if, if a teammate starts coaching me you know, that is not okay for me. The coaching needs to come from the coach and you know, sometimes that can be a tricky situation. So when it, where is that line to say, like, Hey, you know, That's not okay. Or please don't coach me. Okay. The, you know, teaching your athletes to say stuff like that. That is hard work, but that is so, so necessary. For her longterm confidence and to be okay with somebody being potentially disappointed in her or upset with her, or, you know, when we set boundaries like that. Sometimes people don't like it and being okay with that and seeing that it's more important that I hold the boundaries of what's important to me. Then having somebody, you know, be pleased with me. All right. That was really, that's really important. So help her identify, like where where's the line, you know? If I'm trying to think of other examples, like she's. With holding a high five for me. You know, maybe that's like somebody that's like, just ignore it, focus on the other people. Or maybe that's like, Hey, you know, when I'm, when I'm putting my hand out for high five, I need you to high five me back. Okay. And some of that can come from the team standards. So if your daughter's coach has established some team standards around that, Can you can fall back on that too. You know, she could say like, you know, the standard is that when we're going on the line and everyone's, high-fiving everybody, high-fives everybody. And so if that's not happening, then that can be something that can be brought to the coach as well. Okay. So that is number two, help her to know where her boundaries are. What's acceptable. What's not acceptable. Where does the line, what. What behaviors are like, okay. I can kind of be more that, and I can just focus on something else and what behaviors are like, Ooh, that is crossing the line. That is not what I'm okay with. Right. And that could be a sit down thing with your daughter to help her Oh, that'd be a really productive thing for her to do. Okay. Number three. This actually should probably be like number one. This goes along with, you know, modeling and shaping the environment for your daughter. Show her how to treat other women. Show her how to treat other women, some number one in, in. Dealing with mean girls is don't raise a mean girl. And sometimes I think we unintentionally. Lien in this direction. Because we feed into it. Okay, I'm gonna be honest here. We feed into it by comparing our daughter with other people. And by saying things about other people like, oh, she's not playing well. Why did coach put her in. I hope that that's not a conversation going in what's going on, but if it is like no shame, this is just, Hey, let's work. Can we, can we be better? We're all in the business of improving. I'm improving. Right. You know, comparing her to other people, pulling other people down, you know just realize also that there are lots of sides to every story. So automatically jumping in and being like, oh, well she is, you know, fill in the blank and, and, and judging other people. You know, that is actually going to breed. This mean girl behavior is actually going to make it worse. And also when it comes to like your peer group and your friends and people in your life where it could be easy to pull other people down. How can you actually champion other women? How can you be happy for their success as well? So we sometimes live in this model of like scarcity when it comes to success, especially with, with females, right. With, with other women, it's like, oh, if she's successful, I've got to figure, I got to pull her down, knock her down a couple notches. Right. Or like, well, what about when she did all this? And then we think that, you know, if she's having success that I can't have success. And so how can you model that in your life, where you are encouraging and champion your other friends and other, your colleagues? And showing like even two things can exist at once. All right. It could be who I'm so happy for her. I'm also feeling a little jealous about that. Because I wanted that, you know, and show her that two feelings can coexist in that way, but it doesn't mean that we need, we pull her down. We don't, we don't do that. Okay. So be happy for other people's successes show that show how to handle conflict in a productive way, how to have boundaries yourself. Be really aware of how you talk about other women, how you talk about your daughter's teammates. Okay. Surround yourself with positive people. Show her how to include people rather than exclude. Right. Don't point out other people's flaws. And so I think that you know, this is again, more of a long game, but more is caught than taught when it comes from these situations. So how are you, even when you're hearing about your daughter's talk about this mean, girl, You know, how are you reacting with empathy in a way, and helping her realize, like, you know, what. Most people who are rude mean, and, or not. Are not nice are usually pretty insecure with themselves. You know, There must be something going. I wonder what's going on. You know, in her life to make her react this way. You know, and so helping hurt your daughter, like be curious about like, you know, other people's behavior and how that could be an underlying. You know, behavior is always a mirror to two underlying things that are going on. And so encouraging that empathy and that, that curiosity rather than judgment is just such an important skill. That our athlete daughters. Can have to be really good teammates and be really good people. Petty. So. And that is number three, but like I said, probably should probably should be number one. It's show her how to treat other women and other people. Okay. I got a couple bonus things for you. And this again, leans on this idea that we want to be shaping our daughters for the path, not the path for our daughters. Okay. So give her the skills. To be confident in the face of people who are not supportive of her. Right. We want our daughters to be able to navigate and interact with a multitude of people throughout their lives. Right. She's not always going to be met with people who are. Agreeing with her who are supporting her. That's just like how it works. Okay. So we also don't want her to put her confidence in her power in other people. So like, I'm going to feel good about myself. If you know, if Susie on my team is, is, is interacting with me in a positive way. Yeah, that's helpful, but we don't want our daughters to give all of her confidence to somebody else. Like. That is not what we're trying to teach them. Okay. If we want our daughters to be confident in themselves. And that in the more confident that they are, the less they're going to be pulled down by some of these like outward. Influences. And so these are skills to be developed, right? Knowing her boundaries, knowing her goals, knowing how to speak up. Knowing what it, you. You know what it takes to shift negative thinking and herself, right. When she's going on this negative self-talk. All of those things are actually going to strengthen her confidence so that she can be resilient in the face of some of these things that come up. In her life and in her sport. All right. So that is the, I mean, I wouldn't even say that, but that's like, again, that should be up there. Probably I'm like number one. Is that she needs to have these skills of confidence herself so that she can navigate these tricky situations. Okay. So on that go to train her game.com, check out our free training for sports bonds, all about how you can help develop that confidence in her. Now the bonus one that'll add. Is your your role in all of this beyond how you're modeling, how to treat other people. And that's your intervention. Okay. So only a necessary. So we obviously want our daughters to feel empowered, to advocate for themselves to focus on. You know, the people who are supporting them. Have them be confident, but we also want our daughters to know that we have their backs as well. And so if a situation escalates to the point where it's bullying your daughter is feeling unsafe, or if it's like, she is just trying all these things and it's still like, You know, maybe it needs to come to the coach's attention and then don't be afraid to step in and speak with a coach or speak with the parent directly. And there's really productive ways that you can do that. Always approaching, you know, most coaches, I will say, as you know, I'm. I'm a man with my coach hat on right now, you know, very open to wanting to know what the athlete's experience is. And sometimes the athletes. Somebody who doesn't know what the athlete's experiences and so coming at it, not in an attacking way, right. You're going to get the most productive conversation with the coach. If you come in with this, like, Hey, this is just something I'm noticing. I know you care a lot about my daughter. I know you care a lot about your team. I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but this is something that my daughter is experiencing. I just want you to be aware you know, are there, if it gets so humorous it, can we work together to. Intro that this is a safe situation for my daughter. And so coming at it from that perspective, I think for most coaches that's gonna be really, it's gonna be really productive for you and the coach, if you're on the same team working with that product or that problem. Okay. So that is your bonus. So to recap, number one, teacher, to ignore the haters. They're always going to be there. It's just what it is. We, we actually don't want her to under some live in this world where she's not conflicting with anybody. We want her to know how to handle those conflicts and know how to handle people who she's not diving with. And a lot of times that's just to divert her attention to the people that she is driving with. Okay. Number two, help her to know her boundaries. What's acceptable. What's not acceptable. Where, where is that line where it's like, okay, I can ignore this. I can. You know, I can really just kind of divert my attention here, but when it gets to this, like, you know, that's not okay and I need to step up. And say something. Show her how to treat other women and also advocate for her to know what to say in those situations. You know, like if this happens, this is how you can handle it. You could talk to that person after practice, you bring it up to a coach. You know, there's a lot of different ways and a lot of different avenues that she can do that. And supporting other women also includes how to handle conflict and what that looks like to hold boundaries. And also what it looks like to encourage other people instead of pointing out their flaws and trying to bring them down. Number four, give her the skills to be confident in the face of people who are not supportive of her in the face of adversity. Remember she needs to develop these confidence skills herself. As well, and then bonus intervene. Like don't be afraid to intervene. If this is escalated to the point where it's getting to bullying or nothing's improving, don't be afraid to advocate with your daughter. Sometimes she needs that support. She needs to know that you have her back as well. All right, moms, before we leave, it would really help us out. If this is helpful to you. If this podcast is helpful, this episode is helpful. Share it with another sports mom. Send it send it her way. You can actually copy the link. You can text it to her and be like, Hey, I know we're dealing with mean girls. This is what's helped me and just send it her way and also rate and review the podcast. This helps us a lot to be able to get into the ears of as many families as possible, and also to bring on really great guests that can serve you best. Her mom's. I am coach Bri. And elite performance coach for female athletes and the host of your raising unstoppable girl athletes podcast i will see you in the next episode