In February, I began swimming laps a couple times a week. I am a decent swimmer, I always have been. But, never great. My brother and sister were great. Both were on high achieving high school teams with their own state titles and my brother even swam in college. We were a swimming family.
Well. Sort of.
I kicked off my parents twenty year career as “Swim Parents” on the local community swim team when I was five, but I never did anything beyond the summer, neighborhood team.
I could have. I thought about swimming on the high school team all the way through my senior year knowing you could just walk on the team. With a little more dedication and training than the summer programming, I probably could have been pretty good, too.
I think about this sometimes as I crank out a workout or when the old men in the lanes beside me ask, “So, where did you swim?” thinking I am an ex-athlete.
Why didn’t I swim? I wonder.
I like swimming. I always have. It makes me feel strong and accomplished. I can do it easily and well. And, I love being in water. It’s something about the cool, weightlessness of it all. I was always the butt of the joke while day drinking or on spring breaks. Everyone else could just stand in the pool and chat. I would be there with them, just tucked up in a floating ball with my head just above the surface.
But then, a few stroked later, I’ll remember. I didn’t like swimming.
I knew myself well to know that school was hard for me and to add the pressure that two practices a day, one of those at 5 AM, would be very bad for my grades and whole general way of being. Even if school had been a breeze, the thought of jumping into the pool that early in the cold, dark winter was very unattractive. But, most of all, I didn’t love swimming.
At least not like that.
In a recent swim set, I challenged myself with a work out I found online. The speed was intended to be faster and on a 1:00 mark. As I pulled the water, working to ensure a few second rest, I felt a panicky feeling creep in. It was a feeling I was familiar with. I hated sets like this. I hated feeling like there wasn’t any rest. I hated knowing a 20 year old on a power trip, ahem.. I mean my coach would be at the end of the pool yelling at us to, “Go!” I didn’t love how in swimming you could get breathless while underwater. Memory of my googles filling with tears on the community team in grade school created a tightening my chest. This is why I didn’t swim. I didn’t like feeling this way.
The good thing about swimming is that you can do a lot of thinking. It’s just you and the bubbles. No music, no podcast, no conversation. I thought back to me as a girl, full of anxiety and overwhelmed in the pool; but, without the words or knowledge to call it that. Instead, I just figured I wasn’t good enough to swim beyond the summer season because everyone else seemed so unbothered. If I couldn’t keep up, it wasn’t right for me my memory recalls thinking about this… and many other things.
Sometimes when I swim, I think of my own kids and wonder if I want them to swim or not. Every sport has a version of its own version of intensity. Even academics and music can. Do I want them to feel this way?
I think about how so often it seems like everyone else is managing what is asked, but you’re having a hard time keeping up.
There are good lessons here about teamwork and even growth. Proving to yourself that you can do things you once thought you couldn’t or that scared you. But, I can’t help but think how I want to protect my kids from this feeling. I don’t want them to feel like this: scared, panicky and overwhelmed.
I make my way back to end of the lane, skipping the flip turn and opting to just grab the edge and turn around. This is a move I have done for years when swimming on my own, believing that out from under the rule of a hungover college student coach, I didn’t need to do those anymore. I made that decision on my own, knowing what was best for me and what would make me enjoy swimming. This thought makes me add ten more seconds to my rest at the end of the next lap changing the work out.
One of the best pieces of parenting advice I was ever given was from the dentist. It was buried in what is likely her well worn spcheal about getting kids to brush their teeth even if they don’t like it. A problem I don’t have (most of the time) with my kids. She said, “Remember: You are the parent.”
It’s a strange thing to have to reckon with. Me. The parent? I have questioned the whole idea since they told me I could leave the hospital with Theo. Like, really? Me? But, I have so many questions and shouldn’t there be more instructions, supervision or… something?
But beyond being obvious, it’s real. I am the parent. This line has helped me so much when I question rules I make for my kids or the punishment bad behavior deserves or the safety gut checks I feel or my own emotions I want to let loose. I am the parent. I make the rules. For the most part, I am in control.
I have taken the idea behind this line into many other parts of my life now, including the pool. I make the rules. I set the pace. I don’t have to do flip turns and if something feels uncomfortable, I change it or rest.
The same panicky feeling crept in the other week looking at our summer calendar: Weddings, camping, vacations, boating, camps, VBS, visits, and dinners out. Busy day jobs, a puppy to train, a book I want to write and laps I want to swim. I was overwhelmed and felt some major post covid “too much, too soon!” anxiety.
But, then I remembered, I am the parent. I set the pace. I make the rules And, so I changed course. I took things out and added a little more rest to make sure this summer something I still enjoy.
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