The Kid Who's Too Hard on Himself

He's the one who made fourteen saves and can only talk about the two that went in.

You've probably already met this kid, because a lot of young athletes in this position are this kid — the position selects for it a little. Conscientious, detail-oriented, holds a high standard, notices everything. The same traits that make him good at standing in a cage are the ones that make him merciless with himself at eleven o'clock on a Saturday night.

It's one of the hardest things to watch as a parent, and one of the easiest to accidentally make worse.

The short version

Don't argue with the self-criticism. Arguing with it — "you were great, stop it, that wasn't your fault" — tends to make a kid defend his position and say it again, louder.

What tends to help is redirecting from judgment to evidence. Not "you played well," which he'll reject, but "what would you have needed to do differently on that one?" — which is answerable, specific, and doesn't require him to agree that he's good.

And hold this loosely alongside everything else here: the decision belongs to you and your athlete, and if the way he talks about himself has changed, or this reaches past lacrosse into school, sleep or how he sees himself generally, that's the point to bring in somebody qualified rather than a coaching routine.

What's usually going on

The position gives him daily evidence for the prosecution. Most kids' mistakes vanish. His get a number on a scoreboard. If a young athlete is inclined to keep score of his own failures, this is the worst possible position and also, handled well, the one that can teach him the most.

He's confusing performance with worth. Almost every version of this is the same underlying wiring: I played badly, therefore I am bad. That's the thing worth gently separating, over years, and it's separated far more by how the adults around him behave than by anything anyone says.

High standards aren't the problem. This is worth being clear about, since the instinct is to lower the standard, which usually fails and shouldn't work anyway. The problem isn't that he expects a lot of himself — it's that he has no process for what happens when he misses. Standards plus a process is an excellent athlete. Standards without one is a kid who burns out at fifteen.

And some of it he learned. Not necessarily from you — from a coach, an older sibling, a culture around his team — but it's worth an honest look at what gets talked about in your house after games, because kids calibrate their own harshness against the adults nearby.

Suggestions on what you can do

Ask instead of reassuring. What did you see on that one? gets you a thoughtful twelve-year-old. You were fine gets you an argument. Questions treat him as a competent judge of his own game, which is both respectful and more useful.

Help him find the one thing, and stop there. The program's structure after a rough game is deliberately limited — one fix, one focus, then closed. A kid left to his own devices will generate eleven fixes, which is indistinguishable from despair.

Point at process, repeatedly and boringly. "You stepped to every shot today" is a fact about something he controlled. Over a season, a kid who keeps hearing about the things he controls starts measuring himself with those instead.

Make him find one good thing. The program has him bank a piece of evidence after every game, including the bad ones — and especially then. If he says there wasn't one, he's wrong, and finding it is the exercise.

Notice how he talks about himself, and name it neutrally once. "You're harder on yourself than you'd be on a teammate" is a true observation that doesn't require him to defend anything. Say it once, not every week.

Watch your own commentary. If you're visibly disappointed after games, or critical of other players, or hard on yourself in front of him, he's learning the standard from that rather than from anything you tell him.

By age: with third through sixth graders, keep it light and physical — food, a change of subject, a ritual that runs regardless. Seventh and eighth is where this often gets loudest, and where the questions-not-reassurance approach starts really working. In high school, he's capable of a genuine conversation about the difference between standards and self-punishment, and it's worth having once, calmly, not after a game.

A few things worth avoiding

Try not to praise him more to compensate. Turning up the volume on encouragement usually reads as evidence that you're worried, and a kid who's already anxious about his performance now has that to manage too.

Go easy on "at least." At least you made fourteen saves dismisses the thing he's actually feeling, and he'll stop telling you about it.

Try not to make his self-criticism a problem he now has to fix for you. Adding "and you're too hard on yourself" to the list of things he's failing at is a genuinely common own goal.

And don't tell him elite athletes don't do this. Many of them do, some of them are damaged by it, and he'll know you're managing him.

When to bring in somebody qualified

I'm a coach. I can't assess your athlete and I'm not going to pretend that a routine solves everything.

Worth a conversation with your doctor, a school counselor or a mental health professional if: the self-criticism has spread past sport into school or friendships; how he talks about himself has genuinely changed; a bad performance is still weighing on him days later; it's showing up in his sleep, appetite or mood; he's pulling back from things he used to enjoy; or you simply have a feeling about it that isn't going away.

That isn't an escalation or a failure. It's the same as taking a sore knee to a physio, and the earlier it happens the less there usually is to do.

If you're ever concerned about your child's immediate safety, contact your doctor or local emergency services.

The reframe I'd offer

The trait that's making this hard is not a defect.

Conscientious kids who hold themselves to a standard turn into adults who do careful, serious work. What he's missing isn't a lower standard — it's somewhere for the misses to go. That's what the reset is, that's what the twenty-four-hour structure is, and that's what you're helping build, slowly, over about a decade.

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The program gives him a structure for the bad games rather than leaving him alone with them. Three real days of a fifth-grade week are open on the site, no signup. Take a look at the free week.

Coach Greg — LAX Goalie Hub

Coaching from a coach — general information, not psychological, medical or mental health advice, and not a substitute for a qualified clinician who can assess your athlete. If you have concerns about your child's mental health, talk to your doctor, a school counselor or a mental health professional. In an emergency, contact local emergency services.