Diary Adventures of LagosMums: DALM | What I Learned from SwimmingÂ
Fear is a state of mind and therefore it is something that can be altered – DALM, What I learned from swimming.Â
Over the year the children have not been swimming because of one bout of cold or the other, i feel like we are constantly nursing a cold. Did you know that on average children have 8 to 10 cases of colds a year? Â That is a lot of time to be nursing running noses.
Anyway as a result of all the colds I in my Mummy mind figured that swimming would aggravate the colds. So I keep on sending messages to school that they cannot swim because they have colds. After a while of this I noticed that the children started to have an aversion and a fear of water. I cannot swim so I wasn’t very happy about this as I didn’t want my children to wind up like me, only able to stare at the pool and not be able to swim in it.
A visit to our trusted paediatrician Dr B and a conversation around this allayed my fears. She mentioned that swimming does not cause colds nor will it give them colds. She advised that one just has to be smarter about their exposure in the swimming pool by closely monitoring how long they swim for and drying them off quickly after they come out etc.
This was what I needed to reconsider our embargo on swimming because of colds and allergies. The final push came when we went to a birthday party and this little girl was swimming like a fish. She looked so confident in the water and was clearly enjoying her herself in the pool that even I longed to be able to swim half as well as this little swimming star!
So there and then I exchange numbers with the swimming coach and decide that we all will start learning how to swim – the children and I! Yes I was also going to attempt to learn how to swim (never mind my last lesson was when i was in Primary 2)!
What  I have learnt from the children learning swimming so far is that there are some elements that are important as you start something new and work on overcoming fear –
- Encouragement
- Consistency
- No excuses
- Make the time
- Find the right coach
Encouraging the children with words of encouragement keeps them motivated to try. Keeping up with the lessons and making sure that despite all the initial hesitations we were always at the pool ready for lessons did make a huge difference. We didn’t have lessons based on whether they felt like it or not, we did it because we had scheduled the time for it and as I reminded them I had already paid for the lessons. Lastly finding the right coach is important as the coach we got is very good with children, patient and knows how to balance firmness with coaxing.
In less than a month for children who were fearful of swimming, are more confident and are actually swimming at a basic level now.
The truth with most things in life is that the fear of the unknown is a barrier and if fear is not managed it can limit and hold you back from achieving what you could become. The minute you put a foot forward and start, you get bolder and like my kids get more daring in the water, before you know it you are better than when you started.
I on the other hand with my grand plans is yet to start my swimming lessons because I don’t know where to find a swimsuit in the whole of Lagos! My swim instructor did offer me “Okrika” which apparently means “fairly used swimsuits” I politely said no thank you, though in my head I was screaming “eeewwww – used swimsuits”?!
So with most things in life just keep going and you will eventually get good at it! I ignored the tears knowing that it is for their own good to be comfortable in the pool from a young age.
photo source: afrobella.com
DALM – Diary of LagosMums seriesÂ
