From devastation to elation - how can we best support our young children released and transitioning out of sporting programmes? - 'A conversation with Stephanie Burge'

In this episode sports parent and life coach Stephanie Burge joins Gordon MacLelland to discuss 'Deselection, Release and Transition' and how we can help support young people through this incredibly challenging time.

During the conversation they discuss amongst other things:

• Intense parental emotions: shock, grief, helplessness
• The emotional fallout of deselection and the importance of parental support
• The importance of being present as a parent rather than trying to “fix” the situation
• Helping young athletes to develop interests and skills outside of sport throughout the journey
• Supporting dreams but also working through some 'What if?' scenarios alongside this
• Creating emotionally safe environments and validating young people beyond their performance
• Recognising that grief is not linear and that ending a sporting chapter can often lead to new freedom and opportunities

Stephanie Burge is a businesswoman, entrepreneur and ICF qualified Life coach with a powerful story of resilience, reinvention and mindset mastery. As the sole survivor of a serious car accident, she has turned trauma into a driving force for personal growth, purpose and helping others navigate life’s toughest transitions.

A mother to two daughters, one a successful entrepreneur with ADHD, and the other an ex-GB and England hockey player now thriving in her career, Stephanie understands the highs and lows of the neurodiverse brain and the player journey after elite sport. She is passionate about ensuring athletes, parents and professionals develop the right mindset, and get the right support, to thrive beyond competition.

Alongside supporting parents to show up in the best way to enhance their child’s sporting journey, Stephanie also coaches injured, de-selected and often psychologically broken athletes. Her objective is to facilitate them to process their loss, rediscover their identity and build fulfilling new careers. Often much time has elapsed before athletes finally realise they need to make peace with their past and reconnect with the joy of sport.

Transcript

Speaker 0:12

Welcome to season six of the Parents in Sport Podcast. I'm your host, Gordon Maclelland. I'm delighted to be joined today by sporting parent Stephanie Burge. Stephanie, thank you for joining us on the show.

Speaker 2 0:25

It's an absolute delight to be here. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 0:28

I'm glad we're feeling so joyful because this is without a doubt one of the most uh challenging things of being a sports parent. You've been through it, I've been through it, and we're gonna talk today about how we can best support our young people, those that are released uh from sporting programs, those who maybe transition um out of those sporting programs, perhaps those who finish and perhaps don't even end up playing their sport again. But we're gonna get straight into this. This is really real. This happened, and then I'm gonna get ask Stephanie uh to talk about her memories of this very difficult time. In May 2022, two days after celebrating her 22nd birthday with family and friends, our daughter had returned to centralized Great Britain training. The pre-Olympic selection phase was approaching, physical testing was ramping up, along with a heightened pressure and scrutiny. It was tough and all consuming. Then by 11 o'clock on the Tuesday of that week, it was all over. She was called into the coach's office to be told she was no longer needed in the squad, and she was sent home. Quite simply, they liked the look of other players more, budgets were tight, and there was no room for maybes. There was no opportunity to prepare for an end that came with no warning. It was traumatizing for her as a player, her sporting dreams and hopes for the future shattered in a matter of minutes. As her parents who had vested in her journey through school, club, university, national squads, and had watched every one of her 20 senior international caps, it was the toughest test of our emotional strength as we grappled to find the right words and actions to support her. Stephanie, that's a few years ago now. Um what are your what are your recollections now of of what must have been a really difficult time for all of you?

Speaker 2 2:32

Oh, clearly it was. Clearly, it was the the biggest test of my uh parental strength at the time. I mean, it's it's incredible it was three years ago, but just hearing you say all that, I mean, those feelings were so raw at the time, you know, it does bring it all back. And um, you know, I do remember the phone call that I took where my stomach just dropped when she told us exactly what happened, or she attempted to tell us. Clearly, she was absolutely devastated. And we were the first phone call she made when she was at her absolute rawest and in shock. And I just remember feeling physically sick actually. And and you know, that feeling as a parent, when your child is so traumatized, you know, all you want to do really is take the pain away. It's like if your child's sick, or you know, if your child's facing any adversity in life, as a parent, you just have this natural instinct to protect. Um, and you know, all we wanted to do was to sort of make her feel better in that moment. But frankly, there are no words. There are no words that you can say at that point, other than we love you and we're here for you, that will ever take away that pain of somebody taking your dream away just like that in a flash. And that had been what happened to her. She'd literally walked into the coach's office, bouncy after her birthday with a hockey stick on her back, ready for a training session, all kitted up, and no warning, and that was it. And they said, Well, you can go home. And they literally sent her home because that was what they did, and there she was, wandering around London trying to find a way back to her flat. Um, it was just horrendous. It was the most horrendous day of my life.

Speaker 4:34

Yeah, uh yeah, I can I can. I mean, you can you can only imagine that, and I'm sure those parents that have been through it, I think that feeling you say if you just feel sick, yeah, just hits you in the stomach. And you probably had about a thousand thoughts, did you? I mean, what were you thinking? It's like, well, how can I make this better? What am I trying to do?

Speaker 2 4:55

And of course, immediately I wanted to know why, what's happened, you know, because she'd only been playing internationally, you know, a week or so previously. We'd watched the game. We thought she played quite well, actually. And you have so many questions, but you know, I was fighting all those instincts because I just absolutely knew it wasn't the time to interrogate about anything. The only thing you can do with somebody who's that devastated is just scoop them up and try and make a plan to be physically in their presence so you can be there emotionally and do the hugs and get the tissues out. Because there is no, there is no other way. There's no point saying, Oh, never mind, it'll all be better, because frankly, it's not gonna be for a while, is it?

Speaker 5:41

No, no, it's not. And I think I think you you see that on a on a minor scale played out week in, week out with just normal parts of sporting disappointment that people just people just try to take the pain away, try to come out with phrases that they think are gonna make it better, and actually, none of them are overly helpful because the reality is, like you say, it probably requires you to literally be there in that supportive role, and you're just gonna have to sit through a huge amount of pain, which I think for a lot of parents is just well, it's just really hard. It's all very well saying to us that that's what you've got to do, but yes, it it it almost is, isn't it? There's there's not a lot else that can be done.

Speaker 2 6:27

No, it's it's an unnatural place to be as a parent because you do want to make it better. But you know, when somebody is that devastated, it is like losing someone you love, uh, you know, with no notice. I always equate it, the experience, to that feeling. You know, if you've lost someone, someone's died who you've loved intensely, it's that same feeling of shock and disbelief and anger and confusion and fear and everything all mixed up together. And at the beginning, there's just nothing you can do apart from sit with it. I mean, I think one of the things we probably managed to say quite early on in our sort of frenzied attempts in our heads to say something that was helpful was, you know, let's be clear, you've not let us down. You know, we are proud of you, irrespective of this horrendous thing that's happened to you. It doesn't change how much we love you, how much we believe in you. You have given us so much through sport because I knew, you know, she knew how much we sacrificed. And making that call to us and telling us was almost role reverse and painful for her to let us down as parents. And so, you know, the last thing I wanted her to feel was that there was anything coming from us that was going to add to her burden, you know.

Speaker 7:58

Yeah, absolutely. And I think what you say there about um that letting us down, I think there's a lot of young performers I speak to feel that pressure of parents, but not parents like yourself who just supported everything um and tried to do the best that you possibly could compared to those who really have piled on the pressure and it's everything about their whole existence, whatever. But lots of young people can't separate that. They genuinely feel that when they think of sacrifices parents have made, I look at the people who who say to me every week, oh, time cost, Gordon, logistics, sibling guilt. You know, we've got Molly Sacker. Yeah, we've got we had Molly Saka on last month's episode, the British Sailor, and she was talking about the challenges for her and her family and the hours they drove at the weekend, and that feeling of, oh well, they've done all this for me, and this is the end product. But it's almost like we haven't talked about well, what what what was success actually going to look like? And you will you'll have done it because I know you well enough offline that you'll have also told her that you were proud of her numerous times, not just because of what she was achieving with a hockey. But when you talk to parents, I do think we sometimes struggle with that. We become really good, particularly around sport and maybe even exams, outcome-driven based stuff. Yeah, if we're not careful, we tell our kids we're just proud of them when they've actually achieved something, as opposed to actually I'm just really proud of you because you're a decent human being and actually I love you. And it's just an I think it's just a natural trap you fall that you fall into. And see how this adds up for young people into the type of conversation that you had.

Speaker 2 9:47

Because it is a cultural epidemic that we're in, this sort of comparisonitis that we have in society where you know we're comparing. We, you know, we started when they were really young, didn't it? When you were comparing, you know, how they performed in their spelling tests and their times tables and everything. You're always they're always being benchmarked all the time, you know, and you're being raised in this society where you're always looking around and thinking, we're doing this, but what's everybody else doing? And of course, when Ez was playing hockey, um, as the her career in hockey was gathering speed, so was the academic pressure. And she was at an academic school because she was also very bright. So, you know, you always got exam pressures and grades and achievements, and then you know, what sort of what GCSE results is she going to get, what A levels will she get? Where is she going to go on to university? It was all benchmarking all the time, and um, you're right, it's very easy to lose sight of just the person that they are, and actually, I guess one of the things I'm most proud of is how she juggled all of those things. And I told her the whole time, you know, the that was one of her super strengths. And I don't think anyone who's young and can be really good at sport can't be really organized, really focused, really determined, you know, and those are all the things that you have to praise alongside the actual gongs and the medals and the accolades that they get.

Speaker 11:24

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that that's become a bit a big part of our work is is celebrating and and picking out the the stuff that helps these young people understand why they're winning and being successful, but not just winning their sport, actually winning as people as well. And the only way, yeah, and the only way you can do that is to actually talk about it. You you've just reminded me when you talk about that, I guess, where we are today as society, and I think the challenges remain for us as sports parents. I know in talks that everybody's journey is going to be different as well, whilst the rest and this is why I do have sympathy for parents. You know, they're judged in age groups based on where they compare to their peers.

Speaker 1 12:09

Yeah.

Speaker 12:09

But actually, that could be a comparison that's totally fruitless because there may be a child in there that's gone through puberty compared to one that hasn't. There may be a child that that can't listen particularly well at that stage, doesn't get the most out of sessions, but then a couple of years later does, and their growth accelerates. It could be coach relationships that are amazing for one person who sees them fly forward and not so good for somebody else, and and their journey's slow. So you've got all of these things going on with journeys being very individual, sporting development being very individual, yet we spend the whole time benchmarking as though we're all meant to go through those phases at exactly the same time on the same day, and it doesn't think sport really is a sausage machine, like school is a sausage machine, you know, and everybody gets stuffed in at the beginning and have to jump through the same hoops.

Speaker 2 13:05

But we know in life, and particularly now we understand more about neurodiversity, that just because somebody isn't particularly good at sitting exams, for example, doesn't mean they aren't really creative and really bright and really good at problem solving in other areas. So it is a really tough journey. And I think I've seen so many people fall out of sport because the sausage machine of that particular program doesn't work for them and doesn't flex for them. And you're absolutely right, you know, you've got to play fundamentally for the love of what you do. And I think if your child is loving what they're doing and they're developing and growing, not just on the pitch or on the track or whatever it is they're doing, but in other areas of their life, then that's still success.

Speaker 13:55

Yeah, yeah, completely. And I think that's the way, probably the best and most healthy way to look at it as a sporting parent. What you're saying about this outcome-driven, I guess, society that we live in, but also even parents. I had Katie Mobed, um, who actually is the um GB hockey sports psych on the men's programme, and she was talking about fridge door syndrome, and we all set it off from the very younger stage, the first day that we send our kids off to school, they come out with probably the worst piece of art that we've ever seen. And they come back to us and we say, Wow, you're just absolutely amazing. Look at this, look what you've done. And not only do we do that, we then say, But I'll tell you what, let's just put that on the fridge door so that everybody can see how amazing you are as well. And she was talking me through this, and I said, Yeah, but we everybody's done that, everybody will be able to relate to that. And she said, Yeah, but there's a little bit of a problem because what you're telling your kid is you're so amazing, I love you, I'm really proud of you for something they've actually done, as opposed to for them just being them and you love them for who they are. And I said, Well, what do you do then? I said, That that every parent will have fallen into that trap. And she said, Dr. Steve Peters, who who came, who was sort of first started, I think, talking about this um at length, she said the first thing you should have done is actually taken the painting or the drawing off your child and put it down, given them a hug and say, I love you very much, and then talked about the picture so that there was a clear separation between what you were saying you loved them for and what they'd done and who they were. And it was like, Well, I'm glad we've talked about it. If we can get one parent to even consider that in the heat of the moment, we're doing really well. But it does show you how we can embed if that carried on and that was all we ever did, you can then see the challenges around their identity and their self-worth if that is all we ever do.

Speaker 2 16:03

Yeah, yeah, I agree. And I used to talk as a parent about um what I saw of them and what they said and what they did on the outside and who they were on the inside. Because when they used to come home and say things like, oh, you know, so and so is wearing something amazing, or actually so-and-so came to school and they looked like this today, and they, you know, sort of in a derogatory way, I would say, but that's how they are on the outside. Who are they on the inside? Because that's what's really important. Are they kind people? Like, are they are they nice to their friends? Do they, you know, do they make you smile? Do they make you laugh? Are they are they basically, you know, lovely children on the inside? Have they got sunshine in in their inside? Because it doesn't really matter what's on the outside. And this was a sort of culture that I try to embed as a parent. So be good people first and worry about the exterior stuff after, you know? And I'd like to hope that some of those things carried Esme through, you know, in terms of the way she conducted herself after this awful thing that happened to her, and how she what her own self-worth was like afterwards. You know, she knew underneath her failure in her eyes at that moment as an elite athlete, she was a good person, a good, strong person with lots of things to give to the world. It may have taken a while, you know, for the trauma to settle and for those things to bubble back to the surface. But inside her, she had that core strength to get her through, which ultimately, Gordon, as you know, comes from good solid parenting, doesn't it? There's no placement for it.

Speaker 17:58

Yeah, how long did I mean we're still on, we'll be lucky if we get through our question today, because we're still on question one here. But I think it was such a an impactful time, that initial pain when you took that first phone call. I'm guessing you either wanted a home or you wanted to be with her as quickly as you possibly could be. How long are we looking in timescales before you felt you could have a proper conversation about it? One, I know it's still raw to you even today in some respects, but how long be you before you felt she was ready to chat a little bit more and maybe look as to what was coming next? Because I'm guessing it it wouldn't have just been the next day, it's gonna take a little bit longer than that.

Speaker 2 18:45

Yeah, I mean, inevitably, um it's a gradual process, and I think the biggest thing as parents that you can do is just use your intuition as to when the time is right, because just being present in that early stage and just being there and reacting to however she was is all that matters to start with. So if she needed quiet, we gave her quiet. If she wanted to rant and rave, she could rant and rave. You know, if she wanted to sob, if she wanted to go out and see friends and just distract herself, it didn't matter. I think you're in just one day, well, one hour at a time to start with, then one day at a time with any of these huge shocks, you're just getting through. And then the more you talk about what's happening, the more everyone starts to process what's happening, and then inevitably the conversations start to shift to so what is this next chapter for you going to start to look like? But we did start those conversations quite early on, but with a big caveat of nothing needs to be rushed, you know. When you're ready, there will be time for you to do lots more exciting things. Actually, this is going to be the start of an amazing new chapter for you. Those are the types of conversations that we started to naturally seed in over time. I can't remember how long it took to get to the point where we were starting to have those sorts of conversations. But I think it's obvious as a family when those situations present themselves. And I think just being there means you can respond to when it feels right because it has to be their agenda, not your agenda. It's no good you as parents thinking, oh my God, I'm so anxious. How's she going to earn a living? What's she going to do? You know, not helpful. Actually, just wait until the conversation is there to be had. And I think one of the advantages that we had as a family was we had done some preparation for a plan B before the shot came down. We weren't expecting the end when it came, but we'd always had as a family a culture of, you know, try and keep as many balls juggling as you possibly can along this journey. You know, when you've got downtime, try and use it productively because elite athletes can't train all the time. You know, there inevitably has to be periods of downtime, you know, post-tournament downtime or in between really hard blocks of training. So, you know, we will always encourage encouraging exploration into other areas. So at least we didn't get to the end and have this huge shock, and there was just a void of like nothingness. We already had a little bit of clarity about a direction that she might be going off in. And to be honest, that was a saving grace because when you're faced with trauma as a family, no one can think with clarity about anything. You haven't done some thinking up front, you're on a hide into nowhere for a really long period of time because the trauma just takes over everything. But at least we had some things that were already there and sort of ready and waiting for us that she'd created, and that was um that was really, really helpful, you know, along with the fact that she had some really good friends, friends outside the sport that she had kept and nurtured throughout her hockey career. And although she hadn't been able to see very much of them, she had stayed in touch, and those people really stepped up and gave her some context and sort of an ability to soon begin to realize that there was life out there after sport, you know. So these things all sort of gradually um happened, I guess. And if I look at the timeline, and and actually I did that this morning before we started, I thought, when when did she lose a contract? It was May 2022, three years ago, and it was December of that same year that she landed an amazing job. So it took a sort of seven months to get from devastation to launching herself into a first class career. Yeah, she did some bits and pieces in between that and changed her mind about a few things, but you know, I think that probably happened quicker for her than maybe it did for most because she had done some groundwork and she had got some part-time work she could step into and some people who she could go and have conversations with, who she connected with before. So that made it easier. That was a long answer to your question.

Speaker 23:57

Yeah, no, I and look, there's the there's so much really important stuff in there, and and you dig back over the years, and I think of the sort of I guess the proactive stuff that we're trying to do with parents now around kids' identities, you know, planning for the future. And I think those ones that you talked about about along the it's far easier to do little bits along the way, yeah, 100% than picking up the void at the end when, like you say, it it you just can't. It's it's it's really too difficult, too difficult, and nobody really wants to think. I mean, you you're obviously a bit tougher than me. I I tend to try not to use plan B because I always like people to hope and aspire. But I do think I recognise me, I just then include that as multifaceted kids rather than actually talk about that that that could be the the end, you might have to do something else. But I think the multifaceted kids want, so they've got other interests, other hobbies as they're going along is important. I think, like you say, that social group that is outside of sport is really really important. Staying in touch with people who were around you before you joined these programmes becomes really, really important still. And as you say, it's not going to be at the same level of volume or as it once was. But actually, if you've fostered those and developed those interests when you do get to the shock, or the shock in this case, that actually you have got something to attach yourself onto that wasn't just the the the only thing. I I think it's it's so hard to I think it's hard to talk about, but I think it's definitely easier to talk about before it actually happens. You don't want to consider the worst case scenarios, and I think that you I mean it's it's happened to you and people talk about it, is we do not have a crystal ball. You didn't have a crystal ball for that morning in May, nor did you know seven months later that she was gonna work walk into the wonderful job that you know and career that that she's now doing. But that's the same in sport, there are no guarantees, it is messy, and I think that that makes it really hard for us as parents because we invest all this time, all this emotion into something that ultimately there's an awful lot we've got absolutely no control over. And when you think about our lives, there are a lot of things that we can hopefully have some control over, and this is one of those, and I think that's where it makes this space incredibly difficult, is that you just don't know what tomorrow's gonna bring.

Speaker 2 26:44

No, you don't, and if you look rationally at the statistics, uh yes, nothing's guaranteed, injury is prevalent, non-selection is common, and of course, depending on where your child is in that pyramid, you know, there is fallout at every level until you get right to the very, very peak. And even then, when you get to the very peak, you're still competing to stay at the peak, and there's always someone nibbling away at your heels, trying to get your spot. So the reality is as parents, much though we all want to live off this dream that it's all going to be amazing and you know we're going to have incredible times and they're going to be superstars. The reality is most of them won't be. Something's going to go wrong along the way, and we've and we better prepare for it. And of course, it preparation means different things depending on what age those children are, because if they're still at school and they're playing sport, there isn't really a lot of room in their life apart from sport and academics. You know, they've yes, they've got to sleep, they've got to eat, they've got to see their mates, but it's not that complicated at that age, because fundamentally they need to maximize their academic ability while they're playing sport. And if they're doing that, so if they're basically between the ages of about 14 and 18, it's it's school, homework, revision, exams, and it's sport, and a bit of whatever else you can fit in alongside it. But once they get beyond that and into that realm of, okay, we're leaving education, maybe they're going to university, in which case that takes over. You know, you've got to have a reality check then about, okay, what would happen if sport wasn't in their lives? And this is where, you know, you've they've got to stay connected to who they are as people and what their interests are, and maybe start testing out some opportunities about what sort of career would interest them if they weren't athletes, you know, and thankfully we had done a little bit of that and it really helped.

Speaker 28:58

Yeah, I just want to dig a little bit deeper into that because obviously this was a shock for you, but you had actually done some planning. Obviously, I come across a lot of parents who maybe haven't done quite as much planning as in hindsight, they probably wish um they had. Um, but also some parents in programs do sometimes, it's not a complete shock. They perhaps know it's coming if it's been you know communicated well, they've been given some chance to maybe you know inform family, friends, prepare the ground, think of next stages, what's going to come next? Sometimes we know it may be coming. Um, and obviously that's different then because you've obviously got the shock element and the one that you've got time to prepare for. What do you think? I I guess for both of those parents as well, do we need to be thinking about along the way? Is this a case of playing out scenarios? Is this a case of general looking after the holistic development of our child? What can we do? Because we're both big fans of performance sport as well. I think we need to get this out here. We've got this is this is absolute key to this. These kids are doing this incredible efforts that they're putting into it to try and achieve. And actually, all we're trying to do is the realities of that are never going to change, they are always going to be the same. But how can we support them in a way that I guess is it does does the least damage, or how does it so how do we support them in a way that regardless of outcome, they're gonna thrive as human beings or thrive in what in other walks of life they go into?

Speaker 2 30:39

Well, it it's really, really hard to get the balance right, that's for sure. Because on the one hand, you've got to hundred percent back their dream to achieve the maximum potential in the sport, and you've got to tell them, well, we certainly always said, wherever you're enjoying this and wherever you whenever and wherever you want this for yourself, we will back you. We will do everything we can to support you if genuinely that's what you want. But I suppose knowing that we had a really bright child as well, we all we never wanted her to lose opportunities that maybe she might look back and regret in the future. So if she hadn't maximized her academic potential, for example, because sport had compromised that, we think she might have looked back and regretted that. So we sort of tried to navigate this path where we didn't really give up on those things. And as so that was the first thing is to make sure you don't miss big milestones and big achievements that other people of that age are doing. That as a family meant quite a lot of sacrifices for us. For example, to make sure she still got a first class degree alongside playing in the GB hockey program, because we did, well, mainly me actually did a lot of practical stuff to facilitate that. Just, you know, vast amounts of laundry, vast amounts of food prep, a lot of driving for her when she just slept in the car because she was so exhausted and then had a quick shower and went to take an exam, you know, all those types of things. She wouldn't have done that without our support. So I suppose that was the first thing, trying to keep those things going.

Speaker 32:28

But I think I've just got to jump in on you there, because I just think so that that's obviously so obviously Esmea academically bright as well, and we still see that. See that a lot of sports, kids doing their exams, even though even in in football academies, some still sitting A levels, which is really good to see. A lot obviously take different paths um at 16, and I think that still just boils down to make sure you've got uh other things going on, so that if it doesn't there, you've got something to uh to fall back onto.

Speaker 2 33:00

Um But I think this I think what I want to say is just because you discuss future options with them doesn't mean you don't believe in their current commitment to their sporting success. It's trying to have that conversation where you're trying to say, just protect your financial future and protect your future mental health because look around you at examples in your sport and how many people, and everybody knows people that this has happened to, or they've got injured and it's all been over, you know, and you've got to get them mentally prepared. I suppose to think of the hazards of not preparing, you know, you want them to stay grounded about their future, so that yes, it'd be amazing if you stay driven and lady look looks at you in the right way, and the coaches are are on your side and everything works out and and you get this glorious career, and amazing. Always put that first. But when you've got opportunity to keep working on the all all-roundedness of yourself as an individual, to keep testing yourself out as to what sort of person you might be outside of sport, all we're saying is take those opportunities. So I'll give you a few examples. There was lots of downtime when Ez was in the elite program, where she had blocks of time where they were released, you know, post-tournaments, or um, there's always time in the week, even when you know you can't be you can't be physically in the gym all the time. So to start with, she had a degree to finish. That was that was easy, that took up all the time. But then it then there were blocks of time where you know, you look at what I know. I hate to be a bit gender biased here, but the boys in the program were just happy playing on the Xbox and chilling out and and you know having fun. That was their priority. We'd be like, okay, have a bit of fun, but then we would facilitate some opportunities through our networks for to go and test herself out. So she didn't know whether she was interested in law, for example, but she thought, maybe I'm interested in law. So we facilitated through our network an opportunity for her to go and do some work experience in a lawyer's practice. So she could just be around that environment and ask questions and figure out if that was something that she got excited about. You know, there were other opportunities like that where we were able to introduce her to people or to opportunities where she could just go and test the water a little bit and figure out if it was something that she liked. And in actual fact, after she finished her degree, she ended up working in a voluntary capacity to start with for a really top sports marketing agency in London because she wanted something to do. She didn't want the pressure of a job that she was being paid for because then she didn't have the flexibility to say, I can't come this week because I've been selected and I'm off to Europe to play in this tournament. But she made the effort, rather than just do nothing, to get herself out there and try some stuff out. And actually, the thing I really believe, Gordon, is this doesn't detract from somebody's sporting journey. It adds to it, having time away, having opportunity to think about different things, use your brain in a different way. Actually, you sometimes go back being better at what you're doing on the pitch or on the track. So I think I'm not saying we were responsible for those opportunities, but we facilitated some conversations and certainly encouraged her to do that sort of stuff. And you know, she may not have needed that information for ages, but the way it turned out, actually she did because you know, this guillotine came down. And actually, once she'd recovered from that initial trauma and shock where she just physically and emotionally was incapable of anything, that agency who she'd been in and worked for found out what happened to her and said, Do you want a job? Almost immediately. And now we're not saying that was necessarily her job for life, but she said, Do you know what? I need something to do. Um, I've actually negotiated three days. I can't do five. I'm just too busy processing all of this, but I'm gonna go in. And it was the best thing she could have done. Well, didn't happen like within a week or so, it was probably a month, six weeks later, she eased herself into some work to get her started on this journey and get her out there and got some routine going. Because, of course, one of the biggest problems with athletes who lose their careers is that they've had such a structured, controlled life. Their routines and rituals are so rigid that when everything just gets whipped away from you and you wake up the next morning and it's like, oh, haven't got to put my kit on, haven't got to be in a meeting at eight o'clock in the morning, haven't got to be on the pitch, haven't got to be rehabbing here, haven't got to be eating here. You've got to start getting a structure to your day back together again. Otherwise, it's a big, hard, slippery slope you're gonna fall down. And we see lots of people do that. So these were some of the things that we just tried to facilitate and finding, you know, good mentors for her to chat to who had been through similar situations to her as well, really helpful. Giving examples of what good transition looks like through other people's life experiences. You know, these are all the things that will help you along this journey. And I think just as parents, we were just trying to facilitate some of that. It wasn't a case of you must, it was a case of stepping in when it was appropriate and seeing if we could add anything to that journey, really.

Speaker 39:14

Yeah. Yeah, and uh you've just got me thinking of the analogy I use, how how I guess as sports parents, we gradually are trying to get from the driver's seat into the pit lane, and ultimately our kids are doing the driving, but we're still there with the headsets on and we intervene, you know, as and when we when when we think it it's right to. I mean, I think there's you know, I think keeping young people with a range of experience is really important. I've seen some really good apprentice stuff going on recently, kids going off doing work experience in other sports. Yeah, just expanding their horizons, listening to different people, seeing people operate in different ways, getting a broader sense of the world because some sports environments can become quite what's the word I'm looking for, just closed, aren't they? That it's it's almost like it's its own. Well, we use the word bubble.

Speaker 2 40:14

We use the word bubble. Yeah, and I think the problem is the bubble that surrounds you as an athlete gets smaller and smaller the higher you go up in that pyramid, to such a point where if you become a full-time athlete, then all you do is that, you know, you're eating, sleeping, working, playing with the same people all of the time, traveling with the same people, rehabbing with the same people. You know, you've got downtime with the same people because when you've got time off, no, none of your mates have got time off because they're all at work or at uni or whatever, and you've suddenly got a week off, you know, in the middle of March when no one else you know around, apart from the play your players that you play with, actually. No one else can go on holiday because you didn't know you were suddenly going to be released and have this time. And you know, so the bubble is very, very small and it becomes all your life. It's all you can think about when you are a full-time elite athlete. It's very hard to escape it. And I think one of the things that's exciting when the bubble bursts and you you get out the other side of the trauma and the drama of letting that sporting career go, is suddenly you think, oh my god, there's a massive world out there that I hadn't hadn't really experienced. There's all this stuff going on. And we watched our daughter's personal growth go through the roof that first year after she left the program. It was like watching the lid come off and this flower, massive flower, open up. And suddenly she was interested in all sorts of other things, and she was traveling and meeting people, and you know, she was listening to the news and being interested in current affairs, and it was like a whole new world. And and I remember her saying to me, Oh my god, my world was so small. Yeah, I only just realized how small my world was.

Speaker 42:20

Yeah, and I think we look, I think we can all, you know, I think there's something in that for all of us. I I think of my coaching and educational career, and how you can get stuck in your own bubbles, and and and I think about my work now where I'm just privileged to travel to so many different places, meet so many different parents, coaches, young performers. And it's just enlightening. Some of the things that I held views about, or some of the things that I thought, oh yeah, that's the only way of doing that. And actually, no, it isn't. And actually, there isn't just uh the only way, and that isn't just necessarily the right way because everything's got to have context. It it just opens your eyes to all the possibilities. And I think then if you if you're happy to experience that and take it on board, as you say, I do think it hopefully allows you to go back into your environments and and hopefully do it better because of that experience.

Speaker 2 43:17

You are gonna take some enormous superpowers through to whatever this child's next chapter is going to be. And I know from what we watched with our own daughter, you know, the resilience that she ultimately built through going through what she'd been through. Nothing is worse for a young adult than facing what she faced, having her whole life, her whole dreams, her whole future ripped up in a matter of minutes and somebody shoving it in the bin. And actually realizing that when you walk out the door, you are completely dispensable. All those coaches, all those managers, You know, a lot of other players they move on really quick. And you soon realize that all those people that made you feel day to day that you were really important, you're never going to speak to them ever again. You know, that's a really hard realization that you're on your own and you've got to move on. But I tell you something now, nothing frightens her. She's not scared of anything at all. She often says to me, nothing will be worse than that. And I'll give you an example. She started her um new career. She works for JP Morgan now. She's uh she started on an amazing athlete and uh military transition programme. Day one, I think there's about 30 to 40 of them in a room, and they're on this week's induction where these 40 cohort get sort of moved around the business and introduced to all the big wigs that are there, and they have presentations and introduced to all the different facets of everything. And then out of nowhere, they're they're right, okay. Well, we're going to do some presentations now. You've got an hour to prepare, and then you're going to stand up and you're going to present on this subject and a bit about your journey, and you've got this amount of time. And by the way, we're just bringing in the board, basically, of this company for you to present to. And um, as was the youngest on the transition program by a long way, and she said, I looked around me, and people were in absolute panic that they were going to present to these people, and they didn't know what they were going to say and how they were going to phrase it. And she said, Honestly, I was just so chilled. I just she said, I just thought to myself, well, it's nowhere near as bad as what I've been through. Yeah. And she stood up and said, I have to say, I absolutely smashed it. And I'm saying, I bet you did. Because you know, what you've got now, you've got this no-fear mentality, and God, that's going to carry you a long way.

Speaker 45:59

Yeah, and I think, and I think, and this is where I think if we're taking young people, teenagers in particular, into these programs where we're spending an awful lot of time with them, we've got to be bringing things like that to life for them at that stage, so they can see the parallels from life and their sport, that they can see the strengths that they're potentially building up alongside whether they achieve as performers. And I I do think that's the because then it's win-win on on every level. We we talked about earlier the realities of the realities, they're never going to change. But what we can do is if we are taking out huge holes, chunks of their time, we've probably can bring some of these more to life um as organizations. And loads are doing that, loads are starting to do that far earlier than they maybe did 15 years old.

Speaker 1 46:57

I agree.

Speaker 47:02

Um now, what we haven't talked about yet, we obviously that was a pretty dark day, is that she still played hockey at a really good level. So, okay, she's not playing GB hockey, but she still played at a really high level. So she didn't leave the sport, she just continued, just looked a bit different to her.

Speaker 2 47:24

Yeah. Well, actually, um, the way the GB program was set up is um the girls all played club hockey when they could alongside their international um commitments. So that her door has been always been there as part of her life. But the nice thing was when the international stuff was taken away, it was to hear that she definitely wanted to stay playing the one sport that she was the most passionate about and that she really, really loved. And just because she wasn't in the top 30 players doesn't mean she wasn't still a brilliant player and she still had a lot of experience to offer. And ultimately, hockey's in her blood culturally. You know, she'd been playing it since she was nine, ten years old. She'd always loved it. It was where she'd built her friends, it was culturally what made her really happy, what was what motivated her. And the club that she played for were more than happy to keep her on, obviously, with all the experience. And actually, they were really, really supportive. The club were amazing. They appreciated uh things were a bit wobbly to start with, but funnily enough, she was at the team dinner the year after she left, she was awarded most improved player of the year. And I thought how revealing that was that once the shackles of all that pressure of being an internationally international athlete were on, her club career just blossomed, and actually now she captains Hampstead and Westminster ladies' ones who've just won the Premier League this year.

Speaker 49:06

Amazing. And that and that's so good to hear because so many young people yeah. I mean, look, it it's incredible to hear that, and so many young people they they strive quite rightly, they've got hope, they've got aspirations. Um, and if they don't quite get it, it's really sad when you hear them say, Archie and I just stopped playing. Yeah, it wasn't good enough. Because actually, that love and joy, you would have enjoyed playing probably at any level, but the right level for you. It sounds like I'm really preaching here because I didn't do this once I didn't reach the level I wanted. Yeah, I got into coaching though very early, so I did it slightly differently. But it is tough, but actually, looking back when I look at it now, it's like, oh, actually, I just like to sort of, even if it was some kind of sort of walking and jogging version, I'd probably still quite enjoy doing elements of it. And I think we've got to try and foster that because ultimately we want young people if they fall out of programmes or they fall out of high performance for instances that they actually still enjoy physical activity, they still enjoy that connection of being with people, and perhaps they do other things around their sport, which brings on the next group of hopefuls, I guess, who can. I mean, what ex I mean, the experiences that Esme will be able to pass on to young hockey players absolutely huge.

Speaker 2 50:25

Yeah, I also think just practically, if you have been playing elite sport for a long time, you're pretty much addicted to the adrenaline and the endorphin rushes you get from sport. And I think your body would struggle to not have that back in it. I think all athletes at the top need that. If you've played a team sport and you've experienced the the highs and lows of playing for a team and what that means, very hard not to have that in your life and just to stop it immediately. So um she's still addicted to all of that without that.

Speaker 51:09

Brilliant. That's great to hear now. Just tying up uh the the show now. I think for me, just your final thoughts or your biggest takeaways just for you guys as a family. I mean, you've been through this. Um what did you what have you learnt from it? Well, where where are you what are your biggest learnings? You only have to give me a couple. I don't need all of them. What what sticks?

Speaker 2 51:33

Very hard to pick a couple. Um, I think regret nothing is one of my key takeaways. You know, yes, we had some pain as a family, obviously Ezra's in particular, but looking back, we had some amazing times, amazing times as a family that you know you can't have you can't have the highs without some of the lows. And some of our best times as a family, some of our proudest moments of as parents have been, you know, through sport and what Ezra's gifted us through sport. And I I think she would say she doesn't regret anything. She sacrificed a lot, she gave up, you know, she made decisions where she prioritised sport above other things, but she'll look back and she'll regret nothing. And I think that's one of the key things. Um, what else have we learned? That grieving is not a linear process, I think. You know, when you lose something, there is no formula for getting it right as a family. I think you just do, you you turn up and you do instinctively what you think is best. You accept that sometimes you're not going to get it right. Um, but I just think being there is the most important thing and recognizing that you know, when one chapter ends, you you turn a page and actually so much of life to live. There really is. And the thing about letting go of a life as a family around elite sport is you move from a place of sort of not being in control, pretty much of anything, to being the pilot of your own plane. And actually, that's so liberating. So liberating to be able to, oh let's go on holiday now, here, wherever we want to go. Oh, that's such a nice feeling. So there's a lot of that.

Speaker 53:36

Maybe that's not a learning, but I think I think it's a learning and an experience, and I think uh uh a lovely way to um round off the show, a very real uh conversation that we've had. Stephanie, um, I really appreciate you taking the time to share your experiences uh with our listeners. Such a challenging time, such a difficult topic, and uh thank you for bringing that to life for everybody who's listened to this episode.

Speaker 2 54:04

Oh, it's an absolute pleasure.

Speaker 54:06

Thank you for listening. Check us out at co.uk