The Mum Who Cried At Sports Day

Today we woke up to the most beautiful sunshine after a night of torrential rain. I knew it was going to be a busy day where, at the end of it, I’d be on the train to Britmums Live. And here I am, on the train, writing this. I feel ok now, but today was the first day in a very long time that I had felt completely disappointed and just totally gutted. I’m not usually easily disappointed because I don’t usually expect much, but I had gotten myself so excited for this morning.

You see, it was Toby’s first ever sports day at nursery. He’ll be 3 in August, so it was held at his nursery. He had seemed so excited to go and do his running, and I knew that he’d been practising because his key worker had told me he’d been moved up into the bigger group because he was just so able. Toby’s always been much more physically advanced than quite a lot of kids his age which I guess that makes up for his lack of speech! And because he had shown such an interest, I was so excited for him and for us to watch him and, hopefully, do well!

He hadn’t been in the best of moods for the last couple of days so for him to be a bit chirpier was really lovely. We managed to arrive at 10.50am, meeting Nanny and Pop outside the gate and we all went in. This is kind of where it started to go wrong. Obviously there were lots of parents there and I think this may have thrown him. Not forgetting that he realised we were all there to stay, he didn’t want to go into nursery and walk out with the other children either; we then decided to keep him with us just to try and diffuse a situation before it had even happened. Too late, he’d already started crying. And from then on he didn’t really stop.

We encouraged him to go and sit with his fellow nursery buddies, and even Pop couldn’t persuade him! I eventually got him into the spirit and we went and sat down and did some clapping and then it was our turn to go up. Because there were so many in each group there were two races. Toby had already started running in the first race when he got called back to run the second race, but it was too late. The tears and tantrum had already started. We now know that was probably our only chance to see him run his race, because after that I was almost in floods of tears. I picked him up and walked past all the other parents and children. All of who were sitting down on their picnic blankets with their smiley kids – not ONE other child was crying or causing a scene.

I was mortified. Utterly mortified.

I got Toby back to where we’d been standing and put him down on the grass, only to turn my back on him and the parents. That’s when the tears started. I was so gutted. His first ever sports day and he just sat on the floor crying. There was meant to be a Mummy’s race and a Daddy’s race, plus a picnic and cake afterwards. But we’d already picked up our bags and left.

I was genuinely just so devastated that my first experience of my first born’s sports day was utterly crap. I was so angry with him. It felt as though everyone watched us walk out of that gate and back to our car. It’s made me miserable all day.

Yes, when he’s older we’ll take the mickey out of him for it, what parent wouldn’t? But for today, I am the mum who cried at sports day. All I wanted was for him to run 20 metres and for me to get a picture. Instead we’re stuck with a video of him starting to run and then falling on the floor in tears. Bloody brilliant. What a let down! The only good thing to come out of today are a couple of pictures I managed before the chaos descended.

It doesn’t help that on Facebook I’ve seen some other mums with their kids holding medals and enjoying their cake and pictures of them mid-race. I won’t have that and I’m just so sad about it.