On Wrestling
By Cara Stolen
@carastolen
When I was a kid, I would occasionally become hyper aware of the saliva in my mouth. The sensation would come out of nowhere, the sudden awareness seeming to trigger an overproduction of spit. It was all I could think about—all I could feel—and I would swallow obsessively, desperate to rid myself of the feeling of constantly salivating. This went on for days, weeks sometimes, until my mouth was dry, sore, and, often, bloody. The more I tried to stop sucking the spit out of my mouth, the worse it got. All these years later, I’m still a little afraid that just thinking about it will trigger its onset, let alone writing it down. But back then, it only took one thought: I haven’t done that in a while, and I would start again.
It was like my fear of spiders, and how, falling asleep at night, I would tell myself do not think about spiders, only to be inundated with images on images of spiders in my mind. Or, later on, in high school, when I threw up before track practice every Monday, so nervous to run two race-pace 400 meters that I’d work myself into a sweating, vomiting frenzy.
The more I tried not to think about something, the more top of mind it became.
***
Before my oldest son, Royce, started wrestling, I knew exactly two things about wrestlers: they run around in garbage-bag sauna suits and spit in cups. But now that he’s been wrestling for four years, I know a little bit more. Mainly, that wrestling isn’t a team sport. You’re out on that mat alone. No teammates, no subs. Just you. And really, you’re wrestling two opponents: the kid you’re grappling with and your own mind.
***
After my youngest son, Reid, was born, I spent about eight weeks in pelvic floor physical therapy. Before that, I knew as much about my pelvic floor as any other woman, which is to say I literally never thought about my pelvic floor—until it failed me. I learned a lot of things in PT, but what surprised me the most is that, for some women, what causes bladder leakage is actually too much muscle tone, not too little. And it’s the inability to relax those muscles fully that causes leaking, not that you often forget to do your Kegels.
A few years later, during a particularly stressful time in my life, I found myself standing in my daughter’s classroom fighting back tears as I watched her kindergarten graduation slideshow, while simultaneously peeing my pants. After my stint in PT, I knew what the problem was, and yet the more I tried to relax, the more incapable I was of releasing the tension. After a few days of this, I was wearing a pad full time. The tightness in my pelvic floor was all I could think about.
***
Royce wakes up pale, his eyes glassy. I press my lips to his forehead multiple times before we leave the hotel room, trying to determine if he’s sick or just nervous. There’s something particularly heightened about an arena wrestling tournament—the sheer number of mats and people, for one thing. But the whole vibe is different, too. Kids who are dabbling in the sport don’t show up for events like this one. Every athlete here is exceptional. Driven. Goal-oriented.
We stand beside his assigned mat, waiting for his first match, when he recognizes his opponent as someone he’s lost to before. And really, it’s this moment of recognition that loses the match for him. Before he ever steps on that mat, before he puts his toe behind the line and crouches in his stance, before the referee calls the pin.
But the opponent Royce loses to isn’t the kid in the blue and yellow singlet getting his hand raised. My son loses to himself.
***
My doctor looks at me with kind eyes and offers to make me—yet another—referral to pelvic floor PT. She has listened patiently to me explain the tightness, the leaking, the stress. She stands, signaling the end of the exam.
“Here’s something to try in the meantime,” she says. “Notice the tightness; acknowledge it. Just don’t try so hard to make it stop.”
A few days later, I simply notice and acknowledge how my body feels. Yep, it feels tight. And that’s okay.
The leaking stops completely.
***
For the last year, at least once a week, Royce has brought up wrestling in the Olympics someday. He’s asked us repeatedly to let him join a club that wrestles year-round. And before wrestling started this year, he set a goal for himself to qualify for the regional tournament in Utah. But as the wrestling season progresses, his losses start to affect his confidence. He starts freezing up in his matches, coming home frustrated with himself and questioning his ability to achieve those lofty goals he has for himself. He doubles down, practices more, and asks to lift weights with me before school. We do “confidence” workouts in a special app and practice repeating mantras. His dad and I tell him over, and over, and over again that we love and support him no matter the outcome of his matches. I tell him to relax and have fun.
But his self-doubt only grows, and I observe his struggle in agony, experiencing the particular heartbreak of watching your kid battle something you grapple with, too.
I stream videos, listen to podcasts, and order books on raising confident kids and athlete mindset. I write affirmations on Royce’s bathroom mirror in Sharpie. I drive my husband (and myself) insane with my rumination. Royce and his confidence consumes me. It isn’t that I care whether or not he becomes an Olympian or qualifies for regionals. It isn’t even that I care whether or not he keeps wrestling. It’s that I’m afraid my son has inherited my obsessive, anxiety-ridden brain, and I’m terrified it will be the thing to hold him back.
Somewhere around this time, my right eyelid begins to twitch with a maddening regularity.
***
I’ve been seeing the same therapist for almost eighteen months now, which is the longest I’ve ever stayed in therapy consistently. In a recent session, I described a pattern I’d noticed lately between my husband and me, caused by, essentially, how difficult it is for me to identify my emotions. Specifically, how hard it is for me to realize overwhelm is building in my body.
Afterwards, she emails me a feelings wheel, and gives me homework: look at the chart once a day and just notice.
A few days later, on the way to school, in the silence after a conversation about an upcoming wrestling tournament, it occurs to me that I haven’t experienced the tightness in my pelvic floor in a while. But instead of panicking, of letting the awareness of my muscles create tension the way I used to do with the saliva in my mouth, I simply bring awareness to the way my body feels. Fluidly, without effort, I go back to worrying about Royce, my pelvic floor forgotten. Except, this time, a light bulb goes off.
I sit up straighter and explain my revelation to Royce. I tell him how, sometimes, looking at something head on makes it less scary than looking at something in the periphery.
We practice: I’m feeling nervous, and that’s okay.
I preach to myself as much as to Royce.
I’m worried Royce is just like me, but he’ll be okay.
***
While I wake up my daughter, Maggie, my husband wakes Royce. The lights of the big city blur through the raindrops on the hotel window, creating colorful bursts of light in the predawn darkness. We drive to the arena, wait in line for the security checkpoint, and stand in the rain to scan our tickets. Finally, we walk through the tunnel and stand on the steps looking down onto the floor of the Tacoma Dome, where twenty-four wrestling mats take up every inch of space. I squeeze Maggie’s hand in mine and look down at Royce.
He looks up at me, his eyes gleaming, then bumps his hip against mine before taking the steps two at a time toward the competition floor. I notice my eye is no longer twitching.
Later, after winning several matches, he’ll lose two matches that will put him out of the tournament. He’ll be devastated, but he’ll lose those matches to tough opponents, not to anxiety or self-doubt or nerves.
Because that match? The one with himself? That one he’ll win today.
Cara Stolen is a ranch wife and work-at-home mama of three who lives in rural Washington state. An avid runner and outdoor enthusiast, she loves exceptionally early mornings, pushing the limits of an acceptable day hike, and backpacking or horse packing with her husband, Levi. She believes words have the power to buoy us through the hardest of times, and hopes to make other mothers feel seen with hers. You can find more of her work on her website and Substack.
Photo by Jennifer Floyd.