Another Friday night packing the cooler. Another hotel with a pool full of somebody's team. Your daughter is having the fall of her life, and you're sitting in a parking lot trying to remember what a Saturday used to feel like. Then you feel guilty for even thinking it.
Hey, I'm Sammy. Welcome to the Hey Sammy Podcast. Every day I read one question from a real sports parent and answer it like a friend would. Today, burnout.
Not your kids—yours. This one's from Jen in Nashville. She writes, our travel team has a tournament every single weekend this fall. My daughter loves it, but I'm completely burned out. Is it okay to feel this way?
Jen, yes.
Next question. Okay, I won't do that to you, but I need you to notice how fast that yes came. Loving your daughter and hating this schedule are two completely different things. You've been treating them like the same thing, and that's where the guilt lives. She's not the problem. The calendar is. And you didn't build the calendar. Some tournament director did.
A person who, I promise you, has never once thought about your Sundays. Here's what the guilt doesn't want you to look at: burnout isn't a mood. It's information. It's your body telling you the load isn't sustainable. If your daughter came to you this tired, you'd move mountains by Tuesday. You just don't think you're allowed to be a person too. And pushing through it isn't neutral, by the way.
She's watching you grind yourself down for her schedule. That's her model for what being the mom looks like. Is that the one you want her to inherit?
So let's get practical, because feelings don't fix a fall calendar. Print the thing out and sort it into two piles: what's actually mandatory, and what just feels mandatory. Those piles are never the same size. There's a carpool you haven't asked about yet. There's another family who would trade weekends with you in a heartbeat. There's a grandparent who'd treat one tournament like a holiday.
And here's the one nobody says out loud: your daughter does not need you in the stands for every single game. She needs you sane more than she needs you present. A mom who missed Saturday but laughs at dinner beats one who saw every play through a fog.
I've handed my kid to another team mom and gone home to nap. Everybody survived, she scored twice, and I heard about it at dinner in better detail than if I'd watched it myself. And drop the attendance math while you're at it. There's no prize for perfect attendance. Nobody hands out a trophy in November for the mom who never missed a warm-up.
Your daughter will not remember your attendance record. She'll remember whether home felt calm. I know a dad who tracks every game he's missed like a debt he owes. His kid just wants him to stop apologizing and order the pizza.
And think about where this road goes if nothing changes. You in November, white-knuckling the last three tournaments, snapping about cleats in the hallway. Resenting a kid for a schedule she didn't ask for. Handing off a weekend in September is how you stay kind in November.
One more thing. Check whether your daughter loves all of it or most of it. Kids ride whatever schedule they're handed. They don't know there's another way to do a fall. Sometimes they're quietly relieved when a weekend opens up. You won't know until one does. And if she truly loves every minute? Great. That still doesn't obligate you to run on empty.
Two things can be true: the season can be good for her and too heavy for you. The fix isn't pretending; the fix is redistributing the weight. This week, try this: pick one weekend this fall, just one, and hand it off or sit it out. That's it. Just that one thing.
That's the show. Got a question? Email me, hey@heysammy.com.
