Six years ago, I didn’t know the first thing about wrestling.

Sure, I’d watched the WWE, or as we used to call it, the WWF, back in the day. Every Sunday, after church and Sunday school, my grandmother and I would watch the likes of the Iron Sheik, Rowdy Roddy Piper, the Macho Man, and Jake “the Snake” pummel each other and engage in ringside shenanigans.

Sure, I knew that “real” wrestling was nothing like that, but other than a few lonely souls who would take advantage of the hot, humid pool environment to sweat off a few pounds while I was coaching swimming, it just wasn’t on my radar.

When the Wonderful Husband came home one night and said he wanted to sign the boys up for the knee-hi wrestling program, I said, “sure!” I did have visions of cauliflower ear and ring worm in my future, but I made everyone promise that they’d hit the showers immediately after practice, and all clothing would go right into the washing machine to be boiled on the sanitary setting and not their bedroom floor.

Proper head gear was an absolute must.

The boys, who were in preschool and first grade at the time, went off to practice, and the WH, a former college boxer, was quickly sucked in as a volunteer coach. They all seemed to enjoy themselves and I was eager for the first match. Still, I had no idea what to expect.

I sat on the bleachers, waiting for their debut. The varsity wrestled. Then the JV wrestled. And my kids were nowhere to be seen. Finally, at the end of the match, they were granted “exhibition” matches, with either their own teammates, or with the other team, if they had a suitable matchup for them, weight and experiencewise.

Coming from the swim team, where we have lots of lanes for everyone, and everyone participates, I was just a little shocked. “All that practice, and they don’t even make the team?” I asked the WH. “No. They have to earn it,” he said. “Well, maybe next match,” I said.

Little did I know it would be years before they would earn that spot on the JV team. Years. They kept going to practice, going to matches, going to tournaments, and still, they didn’t have a scoring spot on the team. I could clearly see them maturing as competitors and getting better, but there was still always someone better. The first time they came home from a team wrestle-off having earned a spot on JV, they were bursting with pride. There is something to be said about having to work for what you want. There is very little instant gratification in wrestling.

Even though I’ve been a coach for a long time, wrestling is a different kind of sport. It took a while to get used to it. All the crying that isn’t in baseball? It came to wrestling. I was horrified by all the crying. “These kids need to learn how to lose gracefully,” I griped to the WH. But, the more I watched the blood, sweat and tears that came out of these kids, the more I appreciated that after pouring your entire self into a grueling one-on-one match with another person, sometimes the only thing you had left was tears.

Being a wrestling mom is one of the hardest gigs going. Watching your child get pinned is painful. Even watching your child pin another child can hurt. It’s important to sit with another group of moms so that you can all keep each other from running out on the mat to help your “babies.” I’m sure my boys would rather be pinned 100 times than have their mommy run out on the mat just once.

A will be graduating from the knee-hi program, and this is the end of his wrestling career. Even though he loves the sport and the team, there are a few reasons that he won’t be continuing his career. This was a tough decision to make, and we are all sad to see this chapter close, but as I watched him gut out a second period pin to help the team win the match last weekend, I realized that the lessons that wrestling has taught him will stay with him long after his days on the mat are over.

When you walk out on that mat, you walk out with the support of your team and coaches behind you, but you walk out alone. There is no one else on that mat to blame or to hold accountable your actions. From your fingers to your toes, your whole self is invested in achieving success. Some days, you will find it. Other days, you won’t. But win or lose, you’ve got to pick yourself up off that mat and shake hands with your opponent. Wrestling matches can be over in a matter of seconds or they can last a whole three periods. Learning how to make a split-second decision, or how to react and gain the upper hand when you’re down, there are very few real-life situations where kids can learn that kind of skill these days.

My hats are off to all our local wrestlers, from knee-hi on up through high school. In my book, it’s an often overlooked, underappreciated sport, and I’m very proud of all that our local wrestlers have accomplished. They’re some of the finest kids I know.

Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.