So for those of you who know our children, you know Sam is our cautious, sensitive first born. One thing I have learned raising Sam for the past 6 years is not to push too hard and when to give him a little nudge. With Sam, if you push too hard, he tends to get scared and shut down, making my job that much harder to convince him he can do something that might be a bit scary.
Enter little Sarah, who's personality is equal and opposite for the most part. She is aggressive, willing to try just about anything she thinks others are doing, and not willing to miss out on what she feels she is owed ! Well, for the first time we enrolled our little three year old dare devil princess into swim lessons at the YMCA. At first, I decided to put her in the Pike with Parent class, which I figured was the best place to start. In this class, I get to go in wither her and practice with her while she learns about swimming. Well, it would be safe to say she was quite bored the first lesson, as it seemed we spent more time singing in a circle in the pool and less time jumping in (Something she loves to do and has no fear doing it). As we took our class together, I found Sarah watching the Pike class (Without parent), and rolling her eyes each time we had to stop swimming/jumping in the pool to go sing songs. After class I spoke to a YMCA teacher, and she encouraged me to move her into the Pike w/out parent class since she was so far ahead of the other kids in her class. So the next week, I decided to push her a bit, and moved her into the Pike class. In this class, I get to watch from a bench next to the pool while she sits with the other kids, hanging on to the side of the pool while the teacher takes each one and works on skills.
So there we were, I brought her over, and the teacher asked her to touch her ears into the water and blow bubbles. She did both with confidence and a smile. The teacher then smiled and said "Yeah, your ready!". Sarah smiled at me as she hung on the side of the pool, and I glowed with pride, patting myself on the back for pushing my child when I was supposed to, and it working out. I watched with pride as the teacher took Sarah, put her on her back and guided her around the pool as she tried to kick and make "ice cream scoops" with her hand, learning some basics. Then it happened........ I looked up to see Sarah in crisis!!! She had lost her grip on the side of the pool, and was struggling to keep above water. I jumped up, and dashed over to the side of the pool to pull her up and out of the pool. She was shocked and started to cry. screaming "I want to go home!". She had had a scare, and in my opinion, knowing Sarah's tendency to be on the wild side, taught her to respect the water. Now entered my critical moment as a parent on this occasion. If this was Sam, the day would be done, and we would go home and try another day. That is what you do with him, as he needs to take some time to think about what happened, and approach a challenge on his own, well thought out terms. But this wasn't Sam, it was Sarah, and we are still working on when to push and when not. After she stopped crying a bit, I asked her is she wanted to try again or go home. I assured her that she was OK and wasn't going to drowned. She replied "I want to go back in the Pool and be a Pike!". So she did, but this time sitting on the side of the pool, going in when it was her turn. She is still afraid to stay by herself in the pool hanging on the side, but happily sits with her feet in the water, going in with her teacher and learning her strokes.
In the end, I think I was more afraid that she was. When I saw her struggling, I went into a complete panic, wondering if I had pushed her too hard !!! I even spoke to her teacher after, asking if she was comfortable with Sarah in the class to which she assured me Sarah was fine and would do fine in this class.
Sarah talks about the incident all the time, and is very cautious around the pool (This is a good thing!).
Anyway - My little Sarah is a Pike, and learning how to swim!
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