Swim Lessons

This summer I got the notion in my mind that it was time to get to boys to swim lessons. I really wanted them to be comfortable in the water and confident enough to pull themselves up if they fell in the pond behind our house. Overall, I wanted them to have a fighting chance if something happened in the water.

Our original lessons were delayed to a fall session because of Seth’s ear tubes being infected, which ended up being a blessing because the separation anxiety from when we went to Hawaii in July was subsiding by the time September rolled around. The boys were pumped, I was pumped. They dressed in their finest swim wear. We packed the swim bag. We previewed the pool the day before so that they would know what to expect. We speculated whether it would be a girl teacher or a boy teacher. It looked like it would be a great success…

They day finally arrived, and got we to the pool nice and early. We sat down on the bench by the pool and saw that our teacher was going to be a boy. And then they FREAKED. Afraid of the water? Nope. Just afraid that I wasn’t in the water with them; afraid that I was going to leave them.

So there I was: by the side of pool with the only two screaming  in the entire pool and with two high school age swim instructors urging me to put them in the pool, screaming or not, and walk away to the stands. “We do this all the time,” one said. “I had a girl who screamed every lesson for a week,” the other said. What a nightmare. I just didn’t feel right just abandoning them to cry in the water, though (for their sakes, my hurting hearts’ sake, and for the other kids’ sake). So I sat on the bench by the pool and tried every trick in the book to coerce them into that pool—to no avail. Lesson #1 all they ended up doing was jumping in the pool at the end.

Lesson #2 rolled around and I was dreading it as much as Seth and Sam. This time, however, I got them into the pool (and they had a great time) by telling them that I’d sit on the bench by the pool. The success was short lived, though, because I was told that I HAD to sit in the stands. “It’s better for the kids,” the high schooler told me again. Sigh. Because they know what’s best for a three year old, right?

Lesson #3 still lots of tears. I was ready to throw in the towel by the fourth lesson. Then, finally, a old parenting scheme worked for me: reverse psychology. As the boys started fussing when we walked out to the pool, I simply told them, “You don’t have to go in. Then only thing you had to do to be obedience to Mama is sit on the side of pool with your feet in. That way you can at least learn from what Mr. Reuben is saying.” My theory was that once they stopped crying and saw how much fun the other kids were having, they would want to join in. And it worked! Within minutes they went in the pool, and had a blast!

The final six lessons weren’t without their little anxieties, but each time, I just told them that they only had to put their feet in the pool and within minutes they were swimming. Their teacher, Reuben, was wonderful with them. By the end they were putting their head in the pool, opening their eyes under water, back floating a bit and way more comfortable in the water. I was thankful that I persevered through the frustrating (and embarrassing) lessons!

(Darn, forgot to change the name on that collage…it’s Sam, not Seth on the second collage)

Sam, Seth before lessons (you can tell, because their lips aren’t blue from the cold water yet)  Seth, Sam after lessons—doesn’t Sammy look freezing! Poor boys with no fat on their bodies were soooo cold by the end of the lessons they would be shivering!