Strategies to Support Your Young Athlete’s Mental Health

A friend recently recommended I pick up the book, What Made Maddy Run, by Kate Fagan—an account of the life of Madison Holleran, a promising young athlete at the University of Pennsylvania. After reading Maddy’s story, which has a very tragic ending, I decided to explore ways that we as parents (and coaches) can support the mental health of our young athletes—placing just as much emphasis on strong minds as we do strong bodies.

One promising strategy is to help your athlete develop a growth mindset at a young age. Through sport, we can teach our athletes that setbacks are OK, and help them navigate toward bouncing back. We can emphasize flexibility as it relates to having to play a different position to benefit the team or pivoting when a coach calls a play the athlete doesn’t agree with. We can also foster an environment of self-esteem vs. self-doubt by focusing on the positive. Small steps toward building resilience will add up along the way and can make all the difference in how your athletes will handle a tough situation in the future. 

Another supportive approach is to allow for the emotion that comes with athletics and help your player process through it. When something doesn’t go their way, kids will experience sadness and/or anger. When kids lose, they will feel disappointment. When they are about to take the field or the court, they might feel fear—they might be nervous. We cannot expect athletes to “brush off” those emotions and always be positive, but we can help them work through those feelings. Offering a safe environment to discuss and process emotions, while actively listening and offering a sensitive response, can go a long way toward helping your athletes have a positive experience not only in their sport, but also life in general. When athletes have a handle on their emotions, they are also going to be set up for success in advocating for themselves when it becomes necessary. 

As our athletes grow from youth players to high school athletes—and perhaps even beyond, and their sports go from “just for fun” to more serious endeavors, let’s continue to support and nurture their mental health so they can thrive both on the field, and off. 

If you'd like to weigh in on this topic, or have other ideas on strategies to support the mental health of our young athletes, email your thoughts to amandajanke@macaronikid.com