Dark side of competitive sports: Hyper-controlling parents, anxiety

At a recent national tennis tournament for under-16s in Mumbai, one of the players went to the washroom during her break and came out shaking. When her coach asked her what had happened, she said her opponent's mother had followed her in and threatened her. She wanted to file a complaint but had no proof. The girl won the match but lost her romance with sportsmanship.
While this year's Olympics comes to a close, what continues closer to home is the dark side of competitive sports filled with hyper-controlling parents and distressed children. More and more young players are showing signs of high anxiety and early burnout, especially among those playing individual sports like badminton, tennis, swimming and, of late, shooting and chess.
"A lot of the young athletes I counsel say that apart from the pressure that they experience on the field, they feel even more pressure from their parents," says Dr Sanika Divekar, head, sports psychology division, MPower, a mental health facility in Mumbai. "Parents sometimes become the harshest critics after a child loses a game, and I hear a lot of children say, 'I wish my parents understood me better and were more supportive.'"
What is clearly a global phenomenon is more amplified in India for two reasons, say sports psychologists. First, Indian parents see their children as an extension of themselves. They often project unresolved ambition onto their progeny, pushing them into Kota Factory-like situations. Second, mental health is still not considered on par with physical health, despite sportspersons in other countries unabashedly speaking out about it -- whether it was American gymnast Simone Biles who opted out of the 2020 Olympics with the full support of her family, or Japan's tennis champion Naomi Osaka, who spoke about her depression and dropped out of the French Open in 2021, or legendary swimmer Michael Phelps who has shared his ups and downs with the seamless ease of his butterfly stroke.
"In India, parents tend to be over-involved - like you often see them coaching the coach and they want to be present for all the matches," says sports psychologist Urja Mehta, a former state-level football player, adding that she really appreciates how her parents supported her in equal measure whether she won or lost. If parents badger a child when he loses, the child will over-ruminate so much that it will definitely change the way he plays next time and is unlikely to grow into a successful athlete, she suggests. "There's a thin line between nurturing and pushing. If the latter happens, children might be too scared to tell their parents they don't want to compete in a particular tournament, or compete at all."
There is also a generational divide, says Mehta, referring to an older Olympic athlete she had encountered who lightly dismissed the need for sports psychology. Gradually, however, and with increased exposure, coaches are becoming more open. "Since coaches are the first point of contact for young athletes, we have been educating them through sports foundations across India and it is really nice to see them interested," she says.
"Frankly, I prefer that the parents should not even be around when the child is training, or watch from a safe distance," says swimming coach Shailesh Chavan. "Sometimes they interfere and try to push their child ahead of another."
Children are being pushed from a younger and younger age to perform. For example, a coach had referred an eight-year-old child in Mumbai to a counsellor because he was having sleep issues. The boy loved tennis and had started playing competitively, but his mother used to prepare weekly excel sheets of rankings in his age group and stick them around his bedroom. Through playing games and puzzles and getting him to open out, the counsellor discovered that he loved tennis but no longer wanted to play. He eventually quit. "Self-reflection among sports parents is very poor," says Varadayini Gorhe, who works with pre-teen and adolescent athletes. "Parents need to be mindful of their behaviour. Today, kids in cities are not encouraged to play sports just as a way of life."
There is an interesting divide between cities and rural India where many elite-level athletes come from. Psychologists find that parents in villages tend to be more understanding and have a holistic approach to parenting, compared to those in the cities.
The question is, did Vinesh Phogat even have access to a sports psychologist? And would that have changed the game?