The Unknown
Being a football coach is not easy. It’s also never permanent. Unless you know, you truly have no idea what its like being married to a coach. We have faced every challenge head-on and knew “this too shall pass”. Now we are facing something we never have before, the unknown.
I don’t mean the “unkown” of how the season will go, where we will be, or what our next job will be. I mean the unknown of what will happen with the actual GAME of football, the future of college football is be exact. Before this whole pandemic I was getting used to all the highs and lows that came along with the job. The constant moving from state to state, and across the country. Our family separated for months because my husband had to move right away, and I have to stay behind to tie up loose ends. The months on end being the solo parent and making sure the household runs smoothly and the kids are happy. Stepping in as “dad” because Father’s Day is usually during June camps. The fear of a bad season and wondering if you will still have a job the following year. The internet trolls and the armchair athletes who all think they can do a better job than your husband. The isolation the job can bring, but the sisterhood you find in your fellow wife or girlfriend. These are some of the lows of football that I was starting to adjust to, and not get so angry about. Then the pandemic hit. It hit during a time in football when college coaches are usually on the road and away from their families. Spring ball in April, then on the road recruiting for the entire month of May, and then June filled with camps. The icing on the cake of all that hard work is most of July off to enjoy with your family and rush around visiting people. That all vanished. In an instant. My husband has spent that last few months in constant zoom meetings, phone calls, and watching video. Trying to keep the morale of the players high, even when he himself is worried. Football is a game based on connection, and being a team. Wanting to compete on the battlefield for your teammates, sweating, working hard, and training together. That was suddenly being done sitting at home and being told to isolate and self quarantine. What we thought would last a month or two is still going strong. We selfishly thought that this would just go away, and that this wouldn’t be the new “normal”.
So what about college football? How will be recover from the financial blow? How will universities rebound after a 2020 or no sports since March? I don’t know. That is the unknown. I worry for the players, especially the seniors and the freshmen, because this was never in their plans. Now I am no longer worried about my husband having a job at the end of a season, I am worried about there even being a season or games to play. How will college football survive this? I don’t know. I wish I did, because so many people have text or called me asking me “what are you going to do now?”. No idea. Right now, take it day by day. Be there to support the players during a stressful time for them as well. So to all those who now have an “unknown” because of the corona virus, I see you. Each journey and how we deal with this will all be different. To my fellow coach’s wife, you have held it together this long (or maybe you haven’t) and it is okay to not be okay right now. There is a universal sadness felt through the college football community right now. I can feel it in my husband, I can feel the sadness he is feeling for his players and coaches right now. So whatever college football looks like when it returns, I will be there. Cheering. Even if its through a mask.
My kids have grown up on a football field and in the stands
