Today I came home from bowls feeling a little bit dejected because I felt I didn’t play very well at all. Like a lot of people, I hate doing something if I can’t do it well and I certainly didn’t do well today.
The problem for me at the moment, is that I have had 2-3 coaches and various other well-meaning people giving me ideas and coaching to try to help me. All very well intentioned and I am confident of the fact that they are genuinely trying to help me. The trouble is, every person that has tried to help me has their own way of doing things and so I have such a variety of voices in my head that I don’t know which ones to listen to. It feels like a jumble and rather than helping me it is making things more difficult. I really don’t know quite what to do for the best, but the only thing I think I can do is to go down to the club on my own and practice and try to work out what works.
One thing that I am struggling with in relation to my bowls, is that there are notices on the wall of the clubroom of games that you can put your name down for. Some of these you have to make up a team and so you need for someone to invite you to join them. The problem is, not many people really know me because I have not been able to play for so long. Certainly, I half joked to one of the ladies I played with today, no-one would probably pick me if they based it on the way I played today. I would be “thanks but no thanks” I’m sure.
While I was thinking about the situation, it came to me that the way I am feeling now is somewhat informed by events in my childhood. When I was about 9 or 10 years of age, I was doing very well at school and in those days if it was thought you were ahead of your peers then you would be put up a class. So, that is what happened to me. I was put up a class half-way through the year, so I would have more challenging work according to my abilities. I’m sure my parents were pleased that their daughter was bright enough to be ‘bumped up’ but it – I feel – caused me lifelong issues socially.
I remember well, the feeling of going into that classroom when I was shifted up a year. All the other kids had known each other for 3-4 years or more and their bonds were strong. Then I came along, an unknown quantity when they had all formed friendship groups. I found it incredibly isolating and I struggled to make friends. The friends that I had left behind in the younger year didn’t want to know me and so I was in this ‘no man’s land’ where I felt I didn’t fit with any of the groups.
I also was never sporty, so a combination of lack of sporting prowess and a lack of a relationship with anyone in my new class, meant I was often in the dregs – the last to be chosen – for picking a team for any sport. So, when today I was told that you needed to be asked to join a team, I thought “Here we go again… ” and also based on today’s play, I would not be a hot favourite to be chosen, that’s for sure!
Although the ladies from bowls are all very friendly, they have known each other for two seasons and have built relationships. I have not really played much with any of them and so I don’t have the strong relationship that they have built.
Another aspect of life that has affected me socially has been being married and divorced twice and moving towns several times. I married my children’s father young and I became part of quite a large clan of people who became my social support as my parents lived far away. When eventually I left the children’s father, I not only left him, but left behind nephews and nieces, in-laws and other family members that had become my family. Leaving my second husband, his family was altogether different and I was more than happy to divorce myself from them as well. However, in coming down to Christchurch I left friends in the North Island that I have never seen again.
So, I have always felt on the outside looking in when it comes to groups I float about the fringes of. Perhaps a bit reluctant to make too firm a friend, lest it doesn’t work out for some reason. I am hoping that I will be able to maintain the friendships I have made through bowls. The group of women I have met through bowls has been lovely, but I will need to work on my confidence and improve my play to feel that maybe some day, they will pick me for their team.
I hope that one day I will no longer fear that I may be “Betty no mates”.
Here’s the podcast, if you’d like to listen to it.
My journey with Parkinsons 