TrueSport: February 2021 - Resilience

One of the many outcomes of the COVID-19 pandemic was that young athletes had to become resilient. No matter how much we may want to shield children from the harsh realities of cancelled seasons, lockdowns, and quarantines, every child experienced some kind of loss or hardship during the pandemic. But board-certified family physician and TrueSport Expert Deborah Gilboa, MD, explains that we can use these difficult moments as a learning opportunity to help our athletes become better prepared for inevitable challenges later in life.

This is a set of skills, Gilboa explains, as resilience is not simply a character trait. It can be nurtured and developed. Here, she discusses the five ways she wants coaches to approach building resilience on their team.

1. Building connections

Strong connections strengthen resilience because they diminish a person’s feelings of isolation. Fostering connections can be as simple as starting every practice with a question, whether that be a sport-specific one about the day’s practice goals or a sillier one like the last snack each person made for themselves. “Ask team leaders for ideas about icebreakers and ways to build better connections on the team,” Gilboa suggests.

“You can also have athletes divide into practice teams using things like sock color or their preferred house at Hogwarts! This way, they start to see what they have in common with each other. Then, turn it into an exercise that will improve the team dynamic: Have each person on the team ask a question to the group about something related to the sport, like how to improve a flip turn in swimming." Asking for advice helps build strong connections between teammates and shows that even the star player on the team has things they want to improve upon.

2. Managing discomfort

“Nobody grows when they're comfortable,” Gilboa explains. "Managing discomfort is crucial to becoming more resilient, because if you cannot handle being uncomfortable, you can't go through the steps required to experience a change and get to your goal. You get stuck.”

As a coach, you can grow in this arena by taking a step back and allowing students to deal with discomfort. You can still show empathy -- no one likes running laps because they’re late -- but don’t let athletes skip the hard things. Gilboa adds that you can turn this into a team discussion: ask athletes how they can help teammates manage their discomfort? How can they help teammates when they're sitting on the sidelines or can’t compete? How can they help when a teammate feels embarrassed about their performance?

When a situation is tough for the team, Gilboa says that part of managing discomfort is allowing people to express their feelings. “For example, if your team needs to run laps for some reason, I would tell them that they have 60 seconds to complain about it as loudly as they want, and then they need to get over it. And after that 60 seconds, they all need to find one positive about the situation—even if that positive is just that they’re suffering together."

3. Setting goals

To build resilience, Gilboa recommends having every member of the team first identify their ‘why’ behind playing. “We want to intentionally focus on the fact that every activity we undertake has a purpose,” she explains. Goals can also be small, daily objectives: Each practice, start by laying out the goals for the day and how those practice goals will eventually help lead to achieving bigger goals down the road. This helps athletes continue to come back to their ‘why’ and can help them push through tough practices because they have a good reason to do so.

4. Identifying options

“Unfortunately, we all tend to go with the first solution to a problem that we think of,” Gilboa says. "In general, we don't list a bunch of options before we decide what we're going to do. Being resilient means pausing and thinking about all your options and potential outcomes. That way, if one option fails, you know you have alternatives to try next -- that makes it easier to persevere or show resilience.”

As a coach, whenever possible, let your team work together to identify different options, whether that’s making a plan for game day or picking what drills to do during a practice. And after a game, identify potential options you could take towards making improvements.

5. Taking action

While thinking through options is critical, action is a key final step in practicing resilience. “A lot of young athletes get stuck in option overload or decision paralysis,” Gilboa says. "And you can't be resilient if you can't move. So, you have to pick something and try it. It may not work, but then you can move on to the next option.”

Coaches can facilitate action by putting athletes in decision-making positions. Make sure every athlete on the team is tasked with choosing and leading actions, such as choosing stretches for warmup, picking drills, or leading the team through cooldown. Gilboa notes that it’s important for all kids to have a turn at making decisions, rather than leaving it to the loudest or strongest kids on the team.

Takeaway

Developing resilience in the athletes on your team is critical, but it doesn’t have to be hard. Follow these five simple steps to help your athletes become more resilient.

Helping your young athlete understand the difference between an uncomfortable situation and an unsafe situation can be incredibly difficult. "We have to protect our children from danger,” explains board-certified family physician and TrueSport Expert Deborah Gilboa, MD, but we shouldn’t necessarily protect them from discomfort. A specialist in youth development and resilience, Gilboa wants parents to understand that in order to help children develop the resilience and skills they’ll need for adulthood, they must learn to deal with discomfort. In fact, stepping in and solving all their problems can actually hurt them in the long run.

Here’s how you can help young athletes recognize the difference between uncomfortable and unsafe so that they can both develop resilience and avoid danger.

Understand your role

"It is our job to protect kids, or at least warn them about things that can cause harm,” Gilboa says. When a situation is uncomfortable, it can typically be looked at as a learning experience for your child, one where you can help them decide on a course of action, but ultimately, allow them to be responsible for the outcome. An unsafe one, on the other hand, likely requires your intervention to remove the danger and/or alert the proper authorities. Both require your understanding, empathy, and belief.

Understand unsafe versus uncomfortable

Uncomfortable can be difficult for young athletes to cope with, but it's not the same thing as unsafe. “A student once told me, ‘Uncomfortable can lead to bruises. But unsafe can lead to scars,’” Gilboa says.

One activity she likes athletes to do with their parents or as a team with their coach is to create a Venn Diagram of things that are unsafe versus uncomfortable and see where the two overlap. Come up with definitions of each early, so that athletes understand when they should seek help from an adult. “This process also opens up a dialogue so that when a kid brings a problem to you, you can have a better conversation about the next steps that both of you should take," explains Gilboa. And of course, make sure that kids know that if there is anything that makes them feel unsafe -- whether it’s on the diagram or not -- they can come to you with any problem.

Believe your child

"We have to trust our kids,” Gilboa says. “You may remember that on Sesame Street, the Snuffleupagus character was once invisible to adults. The viewers at home and the kids in the show could see Snuffleupagus, but the adults on the show couldn't see him and didn’t believe that he was there. Sesame Street realized that this was modeling a bad lesson for kids and for parents watching at home: that kids could say something happened to them or that they noticed something, and parents wouldn't believe them. Of course, kids will make things up sometimes. But we should default toward believing that their point of view is valid and true, because that’s how we can keep kids safe.” So, when your child tells you that something happened or made them feel a certain emotion, default toward checking it out versus telling them that their feelings are wrong.

Step in if it’s unsafe, but follow up

When you do need to fix an unsafe situation, parents can always talk to a coach, principle, other authority figure, or law enforcement official. But after that, don’t try to hide what happened from your kids. “Think about if there is something in the situation that your child should learn to prepare them for other problems in adulthood,” Gilboa notes. “You will not always be there."

If, for example, your child is getting bullied by another player on the team, you may need to step in and speak to the coach. But afterwards, can you have a conversation with your child about how they could advocate for themself next time?

Unsafe and unhappy aren’t the same thing

Step in if safety is an issue -- but don’t try to solve every grievance. “It is not an adult's job to keep kids happy at any given moment,” Gilboa says. “Our job is helping kids grow. And you can't grow if someone is constantly fixing everything for you. You don't get to learn anything, you don't get to try and fail, you're not motivated to try and change anything yourself. It's by trying to affect change to relieve discomfort that we actually learn and grow.”

Use discomfort as a learning tool

"Managing discomfort is a skill that builds resilience because nobody grows when they're comfortable,” says Gilboa. If your athlete cannot handle being uncomfortable, they will always be stuck in the same comfort level. Managing discomfort might mean urging your child not to quit a team because he’s struggling at practice, or it might mean helping her work through a problem with a teammate rather than switching to a different club.

Takeaway

Adults are responsible for keeping kids safe, but it’s important for both adults and young athletes to recognize the difference between unsafe and uncomfortable so that athletes can face and grow from uncomfortable situations.

Plant-based meat products have become ultra-popular in recent years, with many of the standard fast food places now offering a vegan meat option. Thanks to brands like Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat, chains like Burger King and White Castle can cater towards a meatless audience. Unfortunately, not every plant-based patty is going to be a healthy substitute.

Here’s what you should look for when considering which faux meat to give your young athletes.

Just because a burger is meatless doesn’t make it healthy

Plant-based meat substitutes are surprisingly often not the healthiest choice for kids: they can be packed with artificial flavors, chemical preservatives, and high amounts of fat and sodium. And some don’t contain much protein, the primary macronutrient found in meat. For example, a plant-based burger from Burger King actually contains similar saturated fats to the traditional Whopper but adds more sodium!

While some research has shown that a diet based around meat is less healthy than a plant-based diet, the plant-based diet in that research is centered around legumes rather than modified plant proteins like those found in burger substitutes. Also remember that while your child’s burger is plant-based, the fries and soft drink that often accompany it at fast food places are far from ‘health conscious’ options.

Look for whole food ingredients

Look for options that are made with ingredients that you know and can pronounce, as well as options with higher amounts of fiber and protein but a low sodium count. Burgers based on beans, legumes, and even mushrooms are often going to be the safest bets. A plant-based meal can be great for kids, but it’s better if you can focus on whole food sources like lentils as the protein source. There are also thousands of recipes for plant-based burgers that you can make at home with beans, mushrooms, and vegetables. Experimenting with those recipes is a great way to have fun in the kitchen and add more vegetables to your young athletes’ plates.

Look at macronutrients

Many of the plant-based burgers now do offer higher doses of protein that are similar to those found in actual red meat hamburgers, but always read the label. Most children require between four and six ounces of protein per day according to national health guidelines, and that can be tricky if a vegetable-based burger only contains a few grams per serving. Additionally, young athletes do need to ensure that their caloric intake stays high enough to fuel the work they’re doing, and often vegan burgers will be lower in calories than their red meat equivalent. Pay close attention to a young athlete who’s only relying on vegan food sources and consider having them sit down with a nutritionist to talk through a day of healthy eating.

Look for key micronutrients

Calcium, iron, and vitamin B12 are often lacking in vegan diets, and while your young athlete may not be eating a strictly plant-based diet, they may be getting less of these micronutrients than they need if they swap a burger at dinner for a plant-based option. Most children will eat a vegetarian breakfast and lunch naturally (such as cereal or granola for breakfast and a peanut butter and jam sandwich for lunch), and their dinner is the only place where meat-based products play a role in their daily intake. Plenty of plant-based alternatives are fortified with these vitamins and minerals, but you will need to pay closer attention to the labels.

Takeaway

Unless your child is a full-fledged vegan, a plant-based diet can still have some space for meat-based products, just in moderation. And a completely plant-based diet can be a healthy one, if your child is focused on nutrient-dense vegan options that provide enough calories to keep them healthy and training hard. If your child is considering becoming plant-based, or you’re hoping to make your whole family less reliant on meat, enjoy the experimentation of trying new plant-based meats and other vegetarian sources of protein, but pay attention to the labels. It may be helpful to meet with a dietitian for guidance when getting started so your athlete doesn’t miss out on key nutrients!