Never Too Late

Today I stumbled across an inspirational blog entry. Too often adults can let a fear of water develop into an incapacitating foe over time. I teach many adult classes and find my pupils in good humor, if a bit self-deprecating. It cannot be said enough, but adults deserve never ending kudos for getting in the pool in the first place. Having allowed fear to develop and take root over many years, they have a much more difficult time getting in the pool than children. The hardest step is the first - as illuminated in the below citation.

A lot of my friends were surprised when I finally told them the fact that I had never had swimming lessons in my life. To tell you the truth, I was a little bit embarrassed about this fact and hesitant to tell anyone. Most kids have youth swimming classes when they are young, you see. In my case, however, I was never allowed to have child swimming lessons. My mom was deathly afraid of the water. She had a brother who drowned when she was young, and ever since then she would not enter any body of water no matter how small. She thought that if I had even one child swimming lesson, I might join her brother at the bottom of the water.

I probably would have kept my lack of swimming lessons secret to this day, except for the fact that I was found out. You see, I was having a group outing together with several of my friends. We went to the lake to have a picnic, and because it was such a nice day everyone wanted to go swimming. I tried all of the usual excuses for not swimming, but no one would believe me or accept them. Finally, I confessed my secrets. I told him that I had never had swim lessons.

My friends were very supportive. They were a little bit surprised, but they were all eager to help me out. They offered to give me a swimming lesson right then and there. At first I declined, but my friend Jill is a very experienced swimmer. If she told me that she could give me swimming lessons, she probably could. I gave it a try, and to my surprise it was much easier than I had thought. I had inherited my mothers fear of swimming, and I had had it for so long that I didn't realize that it was there.

Soon after that, I signed up for adult swimming lessons at the local rec center. It was slow going at first, And I was a little bit embarrassing being taught by a 17 year old kid, but nevertheless I learned to some very quickly. Everyone there was very supportive, and soon I could swim like a champion. If you have never had swimming lessons, there is no reason to fear it. It really isn't that hard once you get in the water. Overcoming the fear and stepping into the pool is half of the challenge. ~ Original Posting