Bingo. This is exactly what it was.
OP, you did the right thing.
I used to work with a woman who said she and her husband would co-op a lot of things with their kids. The kids often received cash for birthdays etc. and bank it. Later, if a kid said, “I want a guitar,” the parents would say, “We’ll go half.” That meant that the kid would stop and ask himself/herself how serious this desire was. Sure, it’s nice to get the parents’ $50 for the $100 guitar but the kid would be paying the other $50, which was a fortune based on the kid’s income. If the kid was still willing to pay, it must be serious. If not, never mind.
I’ve often thought it would be nice if you had the same buy-in for things like this. That is, money isn’t the only thing because you schedule time too. If parents are pushing the kid, ok, I understand it…but is the kid somewhat equally invested? Where was the ball drop on due diligence—parent, child, or coach?
I’d let the kid off the hook, then ask how to avoid the situation in the future.
The whole thing was a reasonable misunderstanding and resolved correctly. I don’t see a pattern here.
I go with the consensus on this; the OP made the right decision.
This, to me, is the key factor. The son was not just worrying. He made what seems to have been a realistic assessment of the situation and then based his decision upon that. He was not looking at the type of event he had planned on. Nothing wrong with saying “I now have new information and I’m adjusting my actions accordingly.” That’s a useful life skill that a lot of people never learn, so he’s to be commended.
Joining with everyone else here. You and your kid made the right call.
Just for fun, I’ll try to come up with some alternate facts that might have made me come to a different conclusion. Let’s say this clinic really was meant for kids like your son, but for some reason it got overrun with the kinds of kids who showed up. And let’s say your kid had some kind of baseball-related goals, like playing in a low-key intramural league, and he wanted to sharpen his skills. This clinic could potentially have been an opportunity to do that, if he could just get past the intimidating ringers all around him. And that might have been a conversation to have with him. Still, I would’ve let him make the ultimate decision.
Sure you may not be able to do more than shuffle but you might learn from watching the lead and no one is going to care if you suck.
I take it you’ve never been in a show. The director and the rest of the cast don’t have time for someone who’s learning as they go. At best, their role would be reduced so they didn’t have to dance; at worst, they’d be let go entirely. Same with this pseudo-clinic; someone who is learning the basics is going to be a disruption. The coach won’t have time to school one lone player, and the other players won’t get a fair assessment of their own skills if they have to work around him. It’s not a good way to make a first impression. And it’s not fair for the people who showed up to play serious ball.
I’d be rewarding the crap out of a child who is not only wise enough to recognize a forthcoming bad outcome, but have the self possession to admit it, and then act on it!
I know too many adults who, after a disaster, admit to sensing things would go horribly wrong but…’it seemed too late to…what would people say/think?’ The world doesn’t need more people like this.
‘I sense I’ve misjudged this and would like to withdraw pre disaster’, is mature AND brave. Def worth celebrating I think.
My son was in in a soccer program from when he was in first grade through partway through third grade.
They only practiced once a week and really maybe only three times a month. While they only rarely played other teams in real games, and never won any, but they had a blast.
Then when he was in third grade, a few kids from another school joined. They were on their elementary school soccer team and practiced every day but Sunday. They joined this team so they could get one more practice day in.
When it was a couple of kids, it was ok, but then by the time there were eight of them, they totally dominated everything. They team was winning tournaments but only a few of the original members ever got any playing time.
Finally my son said it wasn’t interesting and quit. Other members also quit. The newcomers were only friends with their friends and the coach changed his focus from teaching basics to advanced strategy.
That was for nine-year-olds. High school team members? The gap would have been insane. In a perfect world, the team members would nicely help teach the kid instead of laughing at his misses, but you can guess which is more likely.
Your son made a very wise call.
My kids are adults now, but I can’t remember ever forcing them to do an activity that was supposed to be fun.
I was contacted by the high school football coach who wanted me to pressure my son to play. He had signed up as interested because that was a way to get access to the school’s weight lifting facility over summer break. I was impressed he figured out a work-around like this.
I told the coach if my son didn’t want to play that was his decision, and I thought it was a wise one.
I’d go the opposite and say there was no win condition here. The kid would have gone out before his peers, dressed incorrectly and looking out of place, and then been told to go home by the coach. So he’d get to enjoy being set apart and rejected in front of his classmates and no baseball. Granted, Overlyverbose didn’t know for sure that this would be the case when she chose to take her kid home but it sure looks like she made the right call.
Thanks everyone for all your comments! I really appreciate it. I was second guessing myself for a few hours before I wrote that (because I needed something else to overthink). I worried I was setting a bad precedent, but I think I did the right thing. The last thing he needs is to go into high school with a reputation with the jocks as the clueless idiot who got kicked out of baseball practice.
As someone who has coached baseball for kids 8-16 you definitely made the right decision. The fact is once you get to the high school level practicing with kids throwing 60 mph during warmups is just dangerous.
When I coach 11-12 year olds we get a few kids every season who have never played because many of the local private and charter schools don’t have gyms and tell their students to fulfill their phys-ed requirements by playing a sport in a town rec league. At that age pitches are around 50mph. If you get hit by a throw or a line drive you’ll probably get hurt but not injured. The kids on the teams would be very welcoming with new players and we’d do everything we could to teach them the basics and put them in positions where they could help the team and not get hurt (although even then we’d have a broken finger or two each year). I remember one kid realized he probably wasn’t ever going to hit a 50mph fastball so he focused on bunting and got himself a few base hits that way. If your son were that age I’d have said he should have joined in.
Once you hit 13-15 however it’s another story. The kids start going through growth spurts and building real muscles. Pitches are coming in at 65+ mph and the batters are using heavier bats made from mad scientist materials. Even the baseballs we use at that level are harder. At that point if you haven’t put in your 10,000 reps each of throwing, catching, fielding, hitting you’re going to get injured. When we have a kid who has never played before show up for practice at that level we do our best to keep him out of harms way and then someone from Parks & Rec will call his parents and go over a list of safer sports he could play.
Sounds like the kids at this practice were even older than that. You made the right call. I bet the school had other sports starting up whether official or club variety and pretty much any one would have been a better, safer choice.
I also definitely agree it was the right move. There’s absolutely nothing to be gained for being a beginner surrounded by people way above your skill level especially at that age.
To the OP, you did right.
I participated in a 8 week anxiety clinic for my middle kid. The way to overcome anxiety (the mind over anticipates how bad something could be, and totally under estimates the ability to cope) is in a mindful step by step series of exposures.
You CAN teach a kid to swim by throwing them into the deep end. They may not drown, and that’s success. They may even use that to build character (I’m dubious). But probably a better way is to step by step introduction to how swimming is fun, photo’s of peers swimming, video’s of peers learning how to swim, letting them pick a swim outfit, visiting a pool, dipping in a toe, wading, and then starting a class. It doesn’t have to be so broken down, but maybe it does for your kid. This is a non-traumatizing way to “innoculate” your kid with anxiety. Or you could throw 'em in the deep end, hope they don’t drown, nor fuck up their trust in your and the world. YMMV
I guess my thinking goes like this. Since the camp was your idea, and he was originally willing to go along with it, he didn’t have any obligation to follow through on something that was clearly not what it was expected to be, and forcing him to attend is not right.
But had this been something he’d wanted to go to and caused you to spend a bunch of money and/or time to enable him to attend, and he got cold feet at the last minute, then I’d say he would have a choice- suck it up and go, or pay you back for your time and effort if he chooses not to attend.