It probably wasn’t big news in most households in this area. Then again, it was a pretty amazing end to a football game gone into overtime. Assuming that you stayed up late enough to watch the end. Oh wait. It wasn’t late. It was just past my mental bedtime. (You know, that time when your brain has given up and gone to sleep whether or not your body has made it to bed yet. I know I’m not the only one who has one!)
The game was Michigan State vs Notre Dame, and although my brain was a lot closer to sleep than my body was, I was aware enough to know that the fake-field-goal-turned-touchdown to win was a GREAT ending. Especially in this house. But did you hear what happened after? The Michigan State coach had a “mild” heart attack, and wound up in the hospital in surgery. Ummm…. after a WIN?
So the next day, I did some reading. I mean, it may be football instead of basketball, and college instead of high school, but the reality is that stress is stress. My husband isn’t thinking at the end of a close game, “Oh, this is just a high school game. It’s not that big a deal.” Ha. In the stress and challenge and adrenaline of a close game, you might as well call it life-and-death. (Yeah, yeah, it’s not, but do YOU want to convince him of that? And actually, to his heart, it may be.) So I’m feeling a connection to this coach and his situation. And I’m feeling fear for my husband…who came home the next day and told me it was probably good that I wasn’t reading some of the same articles about it that he was. (Maybe so, but I found some others, mister, and I’m not liking it!)
Here’s an interesting quote from Steve Spurrier, University of South Carolina (another favorite in this house): "Sometimes you can be fit and in shape, and it happens to you anyway. There are no guarantees in coaching except if you don't take care of yourself, you're almost guaranteed to have something happen. That's why I work out five days a week all year round. I've done it for as long as I've been coaching." Oh, boy, this does NOT make me feel better.
I want him to do what he loves doing. I can’t imagine asking him to quit coaching…he would be miserable. But I don’t want to lose him because of that job either. And while we’re hopefully still many years away from heart problems, you can’t count on that. So I try to make sure we eat well. And I make sure I get my workouts in, in the hope that he will be inspired also. And I hope that our life and our kids are enough of a stress reliever to him that coming home is a chance to wind down.
By the way, THAT is easier said than done! It is NOT always an easy thing to remember that I need to do what I can to relieve stress, not add to it. The coaching life is pretty tough on marriages, and I think a major contributing factor is this: that it’s awfully hard for a wife to adjust to needing to take a back seat during the season. It’s too easy to fall into the trap of thinking that because his mind and time are taken up with basketball, he cares less about us. It’s not true…it’s his attention that is divided, not his love.
So I will keep my focus on keeping our house together…keeping the kids on track…keeping him healthy(?) as much as I can. And praying that the factors I have no control over will stay at a minimum.
And praying that he will always have the ability to discern between what really matters and what is only temporary.
Which is the prayer we should all have anyway, isn’t it…
We'll pray too!
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