Six Things Only Parents of Gymnasts Understand

Being a mom of a rhythmic gymnast – it’s a full-time job. IK School of Gymnastics in Miami says a big thanks to all parents of our gymnasts! Every day you are doing a great job, and we try to do our best to your efforts have been rewarded. Together we develop young talents of Miami in gymnastics, helping our kids to reach their fullest potential.

Rhythmic gymnastics is a unique combination of sport, art and dance that captures girls’ imagination, so they begin eating, breathing, and sleeping gymnastics. Therefore, even outside the gym your whole family’s life will still be full of gymnastics, and here’s why.

1. Your Home is a Second Practice Gym. Moms, whose daughters are involved in rhythmic gymnastics, almost never lucky to stay at home in silence. Every night I shudder from the clubs hitting the wall and I don’t even hope it will stop in the near future. Gymnasts climb the walls, move around the house in cartwheels and do homework sitting on the splits.
2. Your Car is Your Gymnast’s Second Home. Even if you are lucky, and don’t have to drive hours a week to bring your daughter to gymnastics classes, the time gap between school and gymnastic classes is often too narrow to bring her home after school. It’s no wonder that your car becomes your gymnast’s home away from home, a place to eat lunches and snacks, change clothes for training, make a hair bun, and even do homework on the way back home.
3. Your Daughter Is More Willing to Play With Apparatus Than With Toys. Balls, hoops, ribbons, and ropes are one of the most desirable gift items for a gymnast. If you are a rhythmic gymnast’s mom, you probably heard with half an ear about Barbie, Monster High and American Girl dolls, but every day have to keep talking of Sasaki, Chacott, Venturelli, and Pastorelli.
4. You Are Ready to Pay a Fortune For the “Proper” Leotard. As soon as you meet the leotard that totally suits your gymnast, and “suits”, by the way, includes size, color of her eyes and hair, all the routines for a competitive season, and whatever she and her coach can come up with together, you no longer care how much this miracle costs. Even if you realize that it’s probably more expensive than any single piece of clothing in your own closet. Compared to the price of the competition leo, practice leos seem to be quite inexpensive for you, even if in fact they are not.
5. Your Daughter Constantly Kidding About Your Physical Abilities and Body Shape. She has workouts every day and she can boast a six-pack, built from muscle. She can tie her legs and arms in a knot or get up on hands from a sitting position, she does so many amazing things with her body, and each time she asks you: “Mommy, can you do that”? No doubt, I can’t. At least I managed to find a good answer: “If I practiced as much as you do, then, of course, I would be able to”. Yet neither my husband nor me are avoided these everyday jokes about our butts and bellies.
6. You Wouldn’t Have It Any Other Way. Despite all the complications you are very happy that gymnastics is such a big part of your life. You are so proud to be a parent of gymnast, and you are totally sure it is all worth it.

To get more information about rhythmic gymnastics in Miami and gymnastic lifestyle, visit www.ikgymnastics.com, subscribe to IK School of Gymnastics in Miami YouTube Channel, join us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, or read our previous articles.

Parent's Guide: Competitive Rhythmic Gymnastics in USA (Part 1) – Everything you need to know about rhythmic gymnastic competitions in the USA.