Swimming Lessons
One of my mom friends has a pool and each year, she has this swim instructor come and a bunch of us sign our kids up for the swim lessons. It’s a tad pricey but everyone says that their children had learned to swim within a week unlike other programs that takes months or even years.
I was forewarned that the lessons were like swimming boot camp and you have to brace yourself to witness your child choke on water and scream out for you the first couple of days but at the end of the week, it will be well worth it. Andy and I debated doing the lessons because we thought Sean might be too young and this training method was against our parenting principles but we thought we would give it a chance and would pull him out of the program if it was too much for him.
On Day 1 of lessons, she had me hand Sean over to her and she took him screaming and crying to the middle of the pool and told him to swim towards the stairs when she counted to three. That was it, no further instructions. Then she counted to three and pushed his head down and let go. Instinct probably kicked in because he kicked and struggled and swam all the way to the stairs choking on water and screaming for me. Tears were rolling down my face but I yelled out to him, “Good swimming, Sean, you’re doing a great job!”. She did it a few more times and when I thought I couldn’t take it anymore, the lesson was over. It seemed like hours but when I looked at my phone, the lesson was only 5 minutes.
Sean hated going to lessons and hated getting handed over to her but when he was in the water, maybe because of fear or something, he was focused and listened to her. She would count to three and he would swim to the stairs, then to the wall, to pick up rings, etc. She even had him jump into the pool and swim towards the stairs or to the wall. Even though it hurt my heart to know he was so scared, the whole jumping in the water and turning around and clinging to the edge or jumping in and swimming to the stairs made me know I made the right choice to get the lessons because if he ever accidentally falls into a pool, he had the tools to save himself.
Incidentally, a few months before, he was playing at a friend’s house and did fall into the pool. Instead of waving his arms or kicking his feet, he was just limp faced down in the water. Of course, we were right next to him and grabbed the back of his shirt to pull him out but I think the fear of falling into the water immobilized him and he didn’t know what to do. This scene played back in my mind as he was learning to jump in the water and swim to a safe spot.
After the first day, I had Andy come with me to the lessons. Somehow the burden is lightened when both parents are sharing the stress and worry. Each day, the lessons became longer and even though he was fearful before each lesson, he still performed wonderfully in the water. As I saw Sean facing his fears that week and performing well each day, my heart was just bursting with pride.
Now he is an excellent swimmer and we go swimming almost everyday and sometimes more than once a day. Everyone is amazed when they see him swim and you can tell he’s proud of himself too. When we would mention to other people that Sean knows how to swim, he would chime in, “I swim like a fish!”
Leave a Reply
