There have been many coaches throughout my life of playing sports, but this one, in particular, helped me through so many things I can’t even name them all. Coach McCamy was very disappointed in me for doing what I did. She still supported me the same as before. It made her and I closer than we were before. That would have been the only good thing that had come out of that mistake. McCamy really helped me through it all and impacted me in so many ways from just two years of having her as my coach in volleyball. Even though I made a bad choice, she was one of the very few people that saw it as more than just a bad choice. She understood that I wasn’t a bad person just because I had made one horrible decision. It took awhile to gain her trust back, but I finally did. When I showed her that I was better than that one stupid choice. One of the important life lessons she has taught me was to not only believe in myself but to believe and have trust in my teammates as well.

Teamwork is the most important thing in sports, especially volleyball. If you were to have people not talking or communicating with each other than it would cause a lot of problems. Dropping the ball and collisions are some of the effects. Showing that we can work as a team is a really important thing so, we are able to communicate with each other. I was taught teamwork, communication and those were the biggest things I learned from the time I met her until now. Positivity is also a huge role in teamwork since if you are down on yourself and or teammates, it will affect the whole team. That is a big issue when playing volleyball. After one mistake in a game, I would just break down and get down myself so quickly. As a result of that, I spent most of the time after my games crying because I felt like I sucked and wasn’t good enough to play. In the result that brought my whole team down with me since most of them had looked up to me as a leader. A team is not just about how you act on the court it's about the way you treat each other and come together to figure out how to accomplish something. I was taught that exact meaning by her and that changed my whole view of everything in sports or even some things out of sports. McCamy did a really good job of helping me with my attitude. When I came to her two years ago as an eighth grader I had one horrible attitude. She wasn’t the only person that had driven me to focus on the good things and not just the bad things I had done wrong my team also did. That was so amazing to me that I not only had one person that I really looked up to but many of my friends also.

I struggle a lot with confidence in all of my sports but, I have learned to control it with the help of my coaches. Whenever I was down on myself I would always get picked up by her even when I wasn’t always the most cooperative person. She always had my back and supported throughout everything. Once I really started realizing I just need to have faith in myself and my teammates, I started being better at being a good teammate. Volleyball has never been much of my favorite sport but, I have turned out to enjoy it a lot. I really found love for this sport because I had someone helping me through it the whole time. The way she taught me everything in and out of this sport makes me want to coach kids like I was. By helping them figure out how to find their passion in a sport like she helped me find mine. Also, I want to be able to be there for people that have made a mistake and need someone to help guide them to not do it again because that is what she did to me. This is what everyone needs to know when mistakes are made you have to forgive them and support them through everything all the time if you are going to be part of a team.

Mistakes happen a lot, I know that because I am only fourteen but, I have experienced a lot of them myself. One happened not too long ago at the beginning of this years volleyball season. Lots of things can make a person smarter, but that one mistake had made me a very different person overall. I really figured out who my friends were and who really cares for me even though when I messed up. McCamy played a big role in helping me through my bad decisions. It really made me a more understanding person to know that it is okay to mess up but make sure you will never do that again. One thing that stood out to me a lot this year was making the right decisions even in sports like if you should get that ball, or let someone else take it, or just life decisions in general.

Coaches are suppose to make you better at the sport you are playing. They are also supposed to make you a better person, help you, support you and teach you all the important things about being on a team. Most of them do accomplish that, but I feel my coach went above and beyond to really make sure that we knew what we needed to know. Also, she really cared for us even out of the sport. She really put an effort into making bonds with each and every one of us even though we annoyed her and made her mad all the time. She would always be there for us through everything even if you didn’t know her that well, that’s how caring she is.