Fear of drowning

I would say half of the students that come to me for swimming lessons have fear of drowning. Sometimes it’s because they had a traumatic event, like “my father just threw me in the deep end and said swim”. Sometimes it has been a cautious parent or adult in the child’s life that said stay away from the water it can “kill “you or you can “drown”. I could go on with many more examples, but instead, I would like to move forward with my solution, moving pass fear to bravery. The first thing to practice is your language, Switch I almost drown to “I’m so excited to be learning to swim and kick my fear out the door. Parents it is so important to move past your own fearful thoughts because it doesn’t serve its purpose, which is to keep your child safe.
A swimming lesson is one of the most important life skills that a person can add to their tool belt. I start on practicing skills that are the building blocks of swimming. These skills include the face in the water, blowing bubbles, floating and jumping in and going under. I believe teaching these skills before they can talk is very important.  When you start your child as an infant it will allow your child learn or awaken something that is innate in all of us. I believe we came from water and tell all my students we have fish inside of us. I tell myself “I’m a mermaid that needs to be in water every day to feel peace”. My positive language with everyone allow me to live without fear, building my skill with practice builds my confidence. I will always teach with compassion for students challenged with fear. My compassion will some come with my coach/cheerleader voice, you can do it and I’m right here with you if you need help. That’s is one of the many tricks I use every day to teach swimming.