Sticking the Dismount

In what has become a weekly routine, Trina takes Tiffany to gymnastics on Wednesdays and I am to pick her up. Tiffany has progressed quickly through the ranks of the gymnastics classes and after only four short months she is now on the gymnastics team. Her first meet is in October and she is working hard in order to get ready. She has natural talent for this and many of the moves have come easy for her. Her coaches are very impressed with her discipline as well as her talent. Tonight as with every other practice, the girls broke up into small groups and rotated to the various stations to work on each apparatus. Tiffany began with the vault and did very well. This is her specialty and she takes pride in the handstands and flips that she does. After the vault, she moved to the balance beam. This is the one area that fascinates me. I cannot imagine trying to stand on this four inch wide piece of wood let alone try to do tricks on it. Tiffany holds her own on the beam and is now progressing to the point where she can do a cartwheel on the beam with regularity. Today, she was working on handstands on the beam and then dismounting the beam. During her dismount, Tiffany overextended in the flip and instead of landing on her feet, she fell forwards. This would have been fine if she would have landed on the mat. Instead, she fell head first onto the beam, hitting her mouth on the bar as she came down. It immediately knocked one of her front permanent teeth out onto the floor. Two other teeth were driven back into her mouth. To her credit, she did not cry. She immediately took the tooth on the floor and wrapped it up. A call was made to Trina who quickly made her way to the gym. Phone calls were made and we finally found a dentist that would meet us in his office as soon as we could get there. It was going to be a long night and one that would be filled with pain for Tiffany. I have realized that as a parent, there is nothing worse than watching one of your children suffer. I would gladly trade places with Tiffany in a second if it meant that she would not have to suffer.