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Sunday, June 22, 2008

Learning To Let Go

After a full day of yard work I suited up to vaccum the pool.

I've never been able to swim a day in my life and I didn't want the same for our kids so we recently purchased a pool. It was a big leap on my part because though Ryan and J can swim like fish M and I can't.

M has been getting in there with her little floaties and kicking and doing fantasitic. It's a far cry from a couple of weeks ago when she didn't even want to get in the water. Of course we're still going to do lessons but getting her over the fear so she can get something out of them is half the battle.

The first day I got into the pool with Ryan he tried to show me the basics. His words still ring fresh in my ears, "Just let go, everyone floats, you just have to relax."

Relax?? Me?? HA!! That's funny.

After about 10 minutes my frustrated husband, who's patience could fit in a thimble, found trying to catch a glimpse of my boobs without the kidlets seeing more fun than teaching me how to swim. So that was that and I was destined to be attached to a pool noodle for the rest of my life. Too bad floaties don't come in adult.


So I'm in the pool today doing the vaccuming with J's snorkle gear because I've learned it's much easier to vaccum when you can see the bottom of the pool. I find myself struggling to stay under the water. I do my chore and think...OK I'm in the pool by myself without a 3 year old trying to climb on me so let's see what I can do.

As I lay on my back I remember what Ryan said, " Tilt your head so that the biggest part of your head is in the water." HA! OK I'm floating but I legs hang and my feet want to touch bottem.

I then remember this episode of "America's Next Top Model" and they're doing a photo shoot in a pool with the models floating. They were supposed to look like Water Fairies or somthing. One of the models didn't know how to float and I could hear Tyra in the back of my head telling her, "Just arch your back and relax. Don't forget to elongate the neck." Ok, so that second part was for the modeling not floating LOL

Holy Shit!!! I'm floating!

Let me see what happens if I move my arms and legs.....OK, still above water...still moving the limbs...still above water!! ...hitting head on the side of pool because I've swam, YES SWAM to the side!!

Shit, shit, shit!!

10 minutes later, I'm still floating AND swimming from one end of the pool across and back....on my back.

I then decide to get a little more courageous and downed the snorkle gear once again. I switch to my stomach and YES!! I can float that way too!! Though certainly not pretty, I can get across the pool. I've floundered across the pool a couple of times before in this manner but it's much easier to let yourself "float" and propel yourself rather than using your arms and legs to try to stay up....durf! I get it now!

I can't wait for Ryan to get home from work so I can show him what I've learned to do. I suppose I could all along, I just had to learn how to let go.

2 comments:

Viv said...

You can't beat floating in the pool. If they had a race for that is one we could really enjoy together...LOL!

Carly said...

WTG Paige! That is a huge hurdle to overcome. I bet now they won't be able to get you out of the pool!