#rollerderbyreferee

I started reffing just over a year ago. I didn’t get into roller derby with the intention of reffing, and I didn’t enjoy it for a very long time.

So then, why did I start it? Basically, I’d been skating for a while with the league I was with at the time and laps were the only thing keeping me back from participating fully with the big girls. The lovely refs saw I was reasonably rules-savvy and invited me to start reffing to get some more skate time in. I think I was so touched by their invite that I cried. I kept up training to be a ref and also training to be a skater for a long time. I wasn’t particularly good at either.

In reality, reffing made me feel horrible for a very long time. I’ve never second guessed myself so much in my life. Looking at what’s in front of you is HARD, and it took a long time to actually start to SEE what was right in front of me. It took several months before I called a single penalty. And several months more before I started calling anything that wasn’t a cut. Those first months were awful. So much doubt, so much bringing myself down. So much pressure from myself, and from skaters caught in the heat of the moment on the track. Being a baby zebra is hard.

But I stuck at it. Out of stubbornness, mostly. Gradually my training to play the game took a back seat as I got more and more anxious about not being good enough. I got caught in a cycle of avoiding training through anxiety, and then being even more anxious because I was avoiding training. It was a poisonous loop for me, and I had to escape it. And I’ll tell you what, I feel SO much better for having chosen to focus just on reffing for now. It’s still one of my goals to play in at least a cherry popper some time, but right now is not the right time for me, and I am okay with that.

So anyway, REFFING. It is only in the last couple of months that I’ve really started to finally “get” it. I’m growing more and more confident with each session. I’m calling a range of different penalties, seeing more, understanding more, just generally getting the hang of it more. I’ve even head reffed a few scrims and taken on the pack definition role. If you’d asked me to do that more than a couple of months ago I would’ve laughed in your face and probably thrown up. But I’ve enjoyed the challenge. I’ve made mistakes, of course, but I think I’ve done an alright job for someone so new to it. And just the fact that I can say that loud and genuinely mean it shows so so much personal growth.

So there we have it. After many months of stressing out, I no longer get nervous, no longer hate myself, no longer hate reffing. I’m really, really enjoying myself. I love the officials community, you really feel a part of something no matter where you go and who you're reffing with.