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A relatable and honest podcast about the highs and lows of being a youth hockey parent. Join us as we share real stories, struggles, and wins from the rink, offering insights and support for parents navigating the world of youth hockey.
Alright, everybody. Welcome back to episode 25 of the crazy hockey dads podcast. Day two of this week's Crazy Hockey Dads mini camp.
Jamie:Mini camp day two. That's right. Here we go. Here we go. The tools in the toolbox.
Scott:That's right. Coming straight from the Crazy Hockey Dads podcast, the unfiltered podcast for hockey parents. No politics, no sugarcoating, just real talk from hockey parents in the trenches.
Jamie:In the trenches. And I think some of us are gonna be starting to throw grenades from those trenches soon.
Scott:Listen. Let's let's hope it isn't But let me tell you, that's a great segue. You like that? Yeah. So before you start throwing grenades
Jamie:I'm a professional. Okay.
Scott:So what movie is that from?
Jamie:What, I'm a professional or throwing grenades?
Scott:Well, I guess either one at this point.
Jamie:I don't know. I'm trying to think what year what movie you're leaning on.
Scott:I'm not leaning on anything. Oh. You repeated it a few times, I thought it was a movie quote.
Jamie:No. It's not. Oh. I was just saying, I'm a professional.
Scott:Oh, you were so professional.
Jamie:Guess so. Listen. 26 episodes in, I'm a professional. Oh, yeah. Definitely not a professional.
Scott:A 100 a 100%. Definitely not. If I when I open up Webster's and I look up professionally, you'll picture. A 100%. I mean, yeah.
Scott:Okay. So anyway, getting back to it. You So Before throw grenades you throw grenades. So communication. Communication.
Scott:Don't let things build up. Don't let things bottle up. Say it out loud.
Jamie:Day two. Communication is key.
Scott:Yeah. Don't bottle it up.
Jamie:With coaches, other parents, manager, your kid. Right? Hopefully, you don't have to talk to a parent about their kid. But no, communication, I think, is huge in this game.
Scott:Also without saying anything
Jamie:Saves a lot of heartache.
Scott:When you don't say anything, I'll keep it on myself. I start to tell myself stories as to like why someone's behaving a certain way. Yeah. And the truth is, you know, talking to them, you know, look, there are lines, right? And and there's are there are gonna be moments where it may or may not be a good idea to talk about some of this stuff.
Scott:And we can't go through every iteration of these moments when we're gonna have to make certain decisions about speaking up or not. But if something is bothering you and you use your rational, sane human being meter Yes. Right?
Jamie:Well said.
Scott:Yeah. So by talking about things, it prevents resentment from building up. Right? But the important
Jamie:It prevents thing a lot of things.
Scott:Right. In part. But like, you know, harboring these negative feelings.
Jamie:No question.
Scott:But there's also a way to go about having certain conversations that may be difficult. And what are some of the things we're talking about? You mentioned if there's potentially something between kids, if there's maybe bullying, let me go in that direction. Or if it's a coach and it's ice time. Or there's something in the parent mix that just isn't Playing time.
Scott:Playing time or or something like off the ice between families in hotels where you're You know, stuff comes up. Yeah. Stuff comes up. So but I think it's important when we talk about these things not, you know, to to talk. When I was in school, one of my teachers had once said, like, you wanna relay things as the camera sees it.
Jamie:Oh, interesting.
Scott:Not not turn the audio off, but just as the camera sees it. And and the idea there is that you're just you're you're reciting facts, and you're not necessarily color commenting. Commentating is what I meant to Yeah. Say
Jamie:No, I know what you mean.
Scott:And adding judgment. Right? So obviously, speak up, but be thoughtful. Do it with intention. Abide by the twenty four hour rule.
Jamie:That is huge to day two. The twenty four hour rule is huge because how many parents have gotten themselves in trouble where they hit send way too soon? Whether it's a text message or don't think a
Scott:parent's ever done that. Never. Not once.
Jamie:Not even a little bit. Yeah. The twenty four hour rule is a huge part of day two communication.
Scott:And shit. Let's make it you can even make it 36.
Jamie:The more the better, by the
Scott:way. Because, like, the twenty four hour rule all of a sudden is like, the game finishes at 3PM on Sunday, and then 9AM on Monday is when the email's going out. Listen, you're
Jamie:not wrong. The longer the better, in
Scott:my opinion. The longer the better.
Jamie:It's never as bad as you think it is in your own head. Never.
Scott:No, like your worst fears rarely come true. Rarely. Rarely come true.
Jamie:You always make the mountain not always, but a lot of us make the mountain out of the molehill.
Scott:Right. But with that, let's also say that while communication is very important, the other thing is there can be over communication.
Jamie:Also true.
Scott:And I think we've both we were talking about this before we started recording, but there you know, we've both been in the presence of parents that are, like, waiting outside the rink door. But not the rink door into the No.
Jamie:Mean, the rink door to come off
Scott:the ice. To come off the ice. Right. We've seen parents waiting and waiting.
Jamie:That's not how you wanna communicate with your coach.
Scott:No. Probably not.
Jamie:And can I just tell you, that kid did not last long on that hockey team? The one I saw was a mother who literally met the coach at the rink door, take it off the ice.
Scott:Yeah, that's like a part time job for a coach to deal with a parent that's always waiting for them.
Jamie:And Scott, it was every single game.
Scott:Yeah. It's too much.
Jamie:It was it was crazy. Like that's way too much communication.
Scott:Right. Yeah. And so
Jamie:That's not abiding by the twenty four hour rule.
Scott:Right. And and so that said though, I think look, there are always gonna be people on all sides of the curve when, you know, with any of these things that come But, you know, if if you have a moment where you think you you're unsure potentially inside whether or not like your actions, you know, or your words are the right fit for the situation. Like, bounce it off someone that you trust on the team or You a family know, the family member piece, if like if it's they're they're not you know, if they don't understand hockey culture. Some things might not They may not translate.
Jamie:But for the most part, it's common sense stuff. So a rational person can have a conversation with you even if they don't know the hockey world.
Scott:Yeah, exactly. But the same way that we talk to each other
Jamie:Yeah, when you called the other day.
Scott:And again, no doubt there's plenty of people listening that have their person, their people that they confide in and talk to and probably complain to and all that shit. So find those people in your network and talk to them about things if you have some level of uncertainty about how to approach a situation.
Jamie:Yeah, no, you're right. You're absolutely right. It's just a very, very simple thing. Like I said, don't over communicate and make sure that you communicate even if it's with your kid, right? Mean make sure you communicate with your kid too.
Jamie:I mean they're also part of it. These tools that we're giving over this five day period to try to help the hockey parent navigate the new season that's upon us, that's important too to do with your own child.
Scott:Right. And we talk often enough about not giving into those immediate what am I trying to say? We shouldn't give into those moments where we just can't help ourselves in saying something to our kid, right? We want to give it time.
Jamie:Some discipline.
Scott:And then when we revisit it, when the time, let's just say you wanna wait twenty four hours, let's say Whatever the time Timmy just had a really fucking bad game. Right. Right? Timmy just shit the bed and Timmy's dad is not happy about that. Right?
Scott:So at some point, it's not unreasonable to talk to your kid if they had a really bad game about like, hey, what was going on with you? Of course. But there's many ways to approach that. So what we're saying, right, is like give it twenty four hours, thirty six hours. And then what I would say, and these are some things that I've tried to use myself, is that instead of saying, know, you should've or you I was just gonna
Jamie:say that. I'm glad you're going down this road.
Scott:Don't give statements, ask questions.
Jamie:Yes. You don't want to say you could have, you didn't, you won't, you never. Right. Yeah. There's ways to communicate that get your point across but don't make your kid feel like shit.
Scott:I'm gonna ask you a question. So let's just take effort. Right? That's something that
Jamie:Yeah.
Scott:Sure. Amongst parents we
Jamie:talk about big thing.
Scott:A kid's effort. Yeah. Right? And let's just say game in and game out. There's like, you know, you're seeing a peer you're seeing repetitive behavior of Mhmm.
Scott:What seems to be a lack of effort.
Jamie:Okay.
Scott:Right? And you wanna address that with your kid. Mhmm. Right? So before you do that and you know, what does that question look like?
Scott:Would you say like, hey, I have you been feeling Okay? Or have you been tired recently? How would you approach something like that?
Jamie:So it's funny you say that. Because you ever notice how I've noticed a bunch of times with Dom that Nancy and I are like, wow, he was kind of off. I wonder what the story there is and then he gets sick the next day.
Scott:Oh, there you go.
Jamie:Right? Does that not happen a lot? It sure as hell happens a lot in my house.
Scott:Does it, Yeah.
Jamie:Well that Not to say that makes kids get sick a lot. It's always something with these kids. And listen, they're young and they're fragile. And when I say fragile, mean like their minds because they're It still developing, could be this easiest thing like they had an argument with their older brother or their sibling or their teammate in the locker room and it just throws them for a loop. I think sometimes we expect more from these kids at these young ages and I don't think that that's looking back, I think we probably expect too much from them.
Scott:Right. So Okay. And I think that happens a lot. And so I guess what I'm trying to tease out, and I quite frankly don't necessarily know that I have crystal clear thoughts on this. But when you have, again, a perceived lack of effort and again, I keep on coming to that because it's Have kind of top of
Jamie:mind had right me talk about it?
Scott:Yeah. In terms of strategies, because at some point your kid might not be Yeah.
Jamie:So I think, number one, you need to we're talking about being sick. You need to poke around the edges and find out if they're okay. Right? I think that's probably
Scott:number Physically or Or mentally. Maybe it's something in the locker room that happens before the game and is translating on the is like
Jamie:These my kid's kids are fragile. The littlest thing in an argument with their best friend can throw them for a loop. So I think you poke around the edges with that kind of stuff. And once you get through that, you kind of got to peel back the layers of the onion a little bit as a parent but do it in a methodical I don't want say gentle way because that's not the word I'm looking for but I think you could do it in a methodical way where you then kind of maybe get to the root of the problem because, listen, they could maybe just not like the game anymore or they weren't feeling well. Listen, sometimes we expect these kids to be on all the time too.
Jamie:Sometimes they can't be on all the time. Sometimes there's nothing wrong. It's just a rough day. I got to tell you, I play pickleball at a pretty high level for those of you who know me and sometimes I just suck. It just happens.
Jamie:Sometimes But it's
Scott:you're like a fucking stud.
Jamie:Well, yeah, that's fine and all. But sometimes I suck even though I was stud.
Scott:Dude, I mean
Jamie:I know because yeah, I know. Of course, my pickleball pros called me while we're doing this like ten minutes ago and you actually heard her. The woman that I hit with is pretty impressive. But she'll tell you, she sucks sometimes too.
Scott:Everyone does sometimes.
Jamie:That's what I'm saying.
Scott:That's what
Jamie:I mean. It happens. Sometimes your mind's just not with it. Again, if adults are having those problems, you don't think kids are? And adults have a hard time dealing with them, let alone children.
Scott:No doubt.
Jamie:Right? We have more tools in our toolbox to deal with them. And sometimes we expect too much of our kids because they don't have the tools that we have at
Scott:this point. And just about that effort piece, and again, there's so many other things that'll pop up that you might question whether or not your kid's performing at his best. With the effort thing in particular, that could be a reasonable question to ask the coach. Be like, hey, listen.
Jamie:Yeah, absolutely. What do you think?
Scott:What do you think? Because this
Jamie:We talk about communication, right? There you go.
Scott:Again, so Just don't ask
Jamie:the coach what's wrong with my fucking kid or what the fuck did you do to my kid? Oh, you
Scott:mean like blaming
Jamie:Yeah, exactly, yes.
Scott:Yeah, no doubt. But what was about to say was just like connecting some dots about communication. Earlier we were talking about not over communicating. So if you're going to talk to the coach, think it makes sense to schedule time. Right?
Scott:Yeah. So first, you want to wait. You want to give it twenty four to thirty six to make sure that you're clear in what it is that you want to talk about.
Jamie:And he'll be clear also if there's a thing there, right?
Scott:Right. You just want to have that sanity check on your own end Okay, being I'm out of the heat of the moment. Does it still really matter? Or was I just being crazy?
Jamie:You do not want to communicate with emotions that are running.
Scott:Right. So you let that settle. And then if it's something that you feel like you wanna talk to the coach about for perspective, then you're gonna wanna schedule some time. Yeah. Right?
Jamie:Yeah. Before our practice, after our practice.
Scott:Whatever it might be. But schedule the time as opposed Or
Jamie:on the phone or whatever it is. Whatever you guys are gonna do.
Scott:Right. But don't be the parent that's always, like, hanging out by, like, the door just, like, waiting to talk
Jamie:to them. Because that's just you're just a problem then.
Scott:Right. Well, I guess the the problem comes if you're doing that habitually. Like, if you're if you're some of the yeah.
Jamie:If you do it once, it's fine. But if you're doing it every time like that one mom that I knew
Scott:Yeah. And then from there, then that's a healthy, reasonable, mature way to get some information about something that you're struggling with. And then I think again with the effort piece, you might want to as a parent understand if the coach is aligned with let's say, oh yeah, I noticed that Timmy has not been performing.
Jamie:Then maybe the two of you can help fix it.
Scott:And then maybe as a parent, you might be like, all right, is there anything? What are you going to reinforce with
Jamie:That him on the I could stay to him at home.
Scott:At home so we're on the same page.
Jamie:And you kind of tag team the situation. Right. Again, it's all about communication, lines of communication, which is a good life skill, not just you know, in hockey world.
Scott:But then speaking of the life skill piece also talking about like raising like good kids and you know, with good habits and all those things. There are gonna be situations also where like your kid might be down, but he also, well, he recognizes that maybe he's not playing that well. And and he you know, that's a moment where you can be like, listen You can talk to me. You can talk to me as your your parent.
Jamie:And your dad, yeah.
Scott:But at the same time, where I was going with this is you could also talk to the coach. And this is an opportunity to teach kids how to advocate for themselves. Right? So if they're having a problem, if they have questions
Jamie:Very true.
Scott:If they have concerns as opposed for the our kids
Jamie:Mhmm.
Scott:To also keep that inside Yeah. And tell them stories that may or may not be true because feelings aren't facts. That's true. Right?
Jamie:Very true.
Scott:So you can encourage your kid to talk to an adult. Absolutely. A conversation that might touch on negative feedback or that might in their eyes feel somewhat confrontational even though that's probably not the right word, but like a a conversation that is where they might not be getting the most positive response. So this is teaching them to have those conversations.
Jamie:Listen, again, we talk about life skills all the time. We're going to go back to day one for a second. We talk about giving them life skills, why we're doing this. All this stuff a life skill. Communication is a life skill.
Jamie:Yeah, so you're right. There is a kid's component to it too, them talking to us, them talking to the coach, advocating for themselves. That's huge.
Scott:And I've heard this on other podcasts, like parenting podcasts, I've talked with my wife, but you'll often hear about your kids are gonna model like your behavior.
Jamie:Yes, they will.
Scott:Right? So if they see mom and dad like, you know, clearly communicating. Yep. Clear communicating in healthy ways, not, you know, not doing it under emotions. Under emotions.
Scott:Like that's also going, you're setting an example for your kids, right? No question. So the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. So be a rational sane adult and just get your stuff together before you start talking about difficult things. And then that's also gonna help your kid out.
Scott:Because they'll handle conflict the way you do most likely.
Jamie:100%. Right. No question about it. And that's why the twenty four hour rule is so important, not just with ice hockey.
Scott:No doubt. Yeah. No doubt.
Jamie:No, it's huge. It really is. It's funny to actually see Dominic pulling in right now.
Scott:Wow. The
Jamie:car that's turning around. Dom's coming home for practice. Nice.
Scott:All right. Listen, so day two.
Jamie:Day two.
Scott:Day two. Speak up. Don't keep things inside. Don't let them build up. Use your network.
Scott:Yes. Use the team manager. Use your Use your coaches, but always make sure. Give yourself 24 to 36 to make sure you get some perspective. If you're unsure on how to handle the situation, lean into your hockey parent network.
Scott:Absolutely. Balance things off friends and family.
Jamie:Ask somebody, a buddy of yours on the team, to talk to them. Like you did with me, it does help. Communication is huge. Don't hit send when it's not necessary to hit send, right? You were going to talk to that coach that one day and when you spoke to me, you didn't wind up doing that.
Scott:I definitely thought about it.
Jamie:That's what I mean.
Scott:Yeah, yeah, Right?
Jamie:Looking back on that, that was a very smart way to reach out and tamp down a situation that was bigger in your head than it was in reality.
Scott:Yeah, and once you've let 24 to 36 go by, you're just like, oh, really wasn't
Jamie:Exactly, they dissipate. Exactly right. So good. Communication. Day two in the books.
Jamie:In the books. Yeah. What do we got lined up for tomorrow?
Scott:Oh, that is a great question.
Jamie:For Wednesday, day three.
Scott:Oh, well, this one is I think a great one. And it's really teaching kids or just talking about comparisons and keeping the focus on themselves and staying present.
Jamie:Yes, managing your expectations of your child. Again, why we're doing this. That will probably help. I think that will save a lot of heartache if you manage expectations kind of going into the season. So that's what going be going do tomorrow.
Scott:All right, my man.
Jamie:Awesome, It was good. Alright. See you tomorrow.
Scott:In the books.
Jamie:Day two. See you.