This summer, I knew the moment had come: high time to get Addie into a formal swim class. Addie's been cleverly avoiding the art of swimming for years now. He rationalizes that because we no longer have a pool, why is it really necessary? He'll proudly announce how wonderful it is to swim at friends' houses with his beloved floaties, and never have to dry his hair afterwards like other sopping wet children- isn't that a plus? This year I vowed I'd allow him to procrastinate no more; it was time to dive in headfirst, literally. So we signed him up for Ms. B's Swim School. His ten consecutive days of sheer terror would commence Monday afternoon.
I admit I was curious to see how this teacher was going to get Addie's head underwater. I had been trying for two years with absolutely no luck. Perhaps his fear was due to a particularly traumatic pool dunking when he was an infant; the experts say that submerging a baby in water is the most natural thing in the world- all babies lived in water for nine months, after all- they will instantly remember their aquatic environment and know exactly what to do. Not Addie. His humble beginnings completely slipped his mind. His reaction convinced me I must have had a liquid-free womb.
Perhaps his fear came simply from the fact that I avoided pouring water on his head during his baby shampoos, and therefore he never got used to water on his face (Tucker, as you can imagine, gets a full-faced dousing at every bath. I've learned my lesson). Perhaps it's just Addie's cautious, over-analytical personality. But whatever the reason, NOTHING I said or did could convince the boy that going underwater would eventually be fun.
What sent us straight into a formal swim class this year? A grueling incident last week, one I fear I'll never recover from. My friend Nick, who is a swim coach himself, advised that one way to get a child used to water is to play bath games. "Try trickling a little water down his face with a small plastic cup. Tell him to close his eyes if that makes it easier. He'll learn to enjoy the sensation of water on his eyes." Sounds reasonable, right?
"Addie, let's play a little game," I said on this fateful day.
"What game?" He asked nervously. The boy was already onto me.
"You sit there, and I'm going to trickle a little water on your head with this cup."
"No."
"Oh come on, it'll be fun," I lied. "You have to get your face wet when you take swim class. This is a good way to practice how that feels."
I didn't give him much time to argue. I told him to close his eyes, and feel the gentle water trickle like a waterfall.
"Ahhhhhhhh," I sighed serenely as I did it, for added effect.
"AHHHHHHHH!" he screamed. Not so serenely.
"That wasn't so bad, was it?"
Addie sputtered and coughed, glaring at me as if I'd just dragged him headfirst into a tsunami.
"Now, let's try it again," I said calmly, "And this time..."
"NO!" he insisted. "No-no-no!"
Now here is where I win the award for Worst Mother on the Planet. I figure every mother wears this self-appointed crown a couple of times a year, and this month it was my turn. I'd had it with his endless protestations. I lost my temper and threw the little plastic cup into the tub water, then stormed over to get his towel. Addie became instantly intimidated. Which was, after all, my subconscious aim.
"Okay, okay, Mama, I'll do it!"
"No," I said coldly. "You lost your chance."
"Please!" he cried.
I took him out of the tub and dried him off, lecturing all the while. "Do you understand that I am trying to HELP YOU?!" I said, speaking to him as if he were about thirty-eight years old. "You are going to get into a swim class and they are going to MAKE you go underwater, and you won't have had any practice. Do you understand I'm trying to help you to OVERCOME YOUR FEAR?!"
Yeah. I know. I suck.
"Okay Mama, I want to try it again," he muttered meekly. Mission accomplished, I softened and put him back into the water. I scooped up a cup of warm water and ever-so-gently trickled it down his face. He squeezed his eyes shut, held his nose, sputtered, coughed, and moaned like a wounded cow. When at last the water was done trickling, he looked up at me, mustered a forced smile and said through tear-and-water stained eyes, "I LOVED it...!"
I told you, Addie can break your heart. He breaks mine every day.
When I relayed this story to Stan that evening, he held me tightly, reassured me I am actually a Good Mother who simply had a Bad Day, and we resolved together to stay the heck out of his swim journey from this point forward. We'd leave the instruction to the pros. Our job was to simply have fun with Addie when we all went swimming, and stop putting any sort of weight on it.
Thus, we found ourselves at Ms. B's Swim School at 12:30 sharp, Monday afternoon. There are three other students in Addie's time slot: fetching five-year-old Molly (I think Addie has a thing for her), her three-year-old, fearless little sister Georgie, and three-year-old pigtailed Mo, who screamed throughout the entire first class. All four of them were called to the pool and ceremoniously told to sit on the first step, one by one.
Now, no mother reading this will be surprised to learn that Ms. B had Addie dunking his head underwater in about two seconds. I watched her tell each child that their eyes were like windows in the water, and they were all about to get their "windows wet". Before Addie knew what hit him, it was his turn and he was doing it. There was no drama, no protestation, no wailing. It really is true that a parent is often the only person a kid will refuse lessons from.
Now, truth be told, Addie wasn't entirely pleased about this dunking. But he is an excellent student, hell-bent on impressing his teachers, and swim school was no different. If Addie could have philosophized his way out of it, he would have. But he really had no choice in the matter. His windows, wide-open and fearful though they were, had their date with destiny.
Since Day One of Ms. B's, Addie has been submerged into the water more times than he can count (although he has tried). "Mama! I put my head underwater nine times today!" He spends the majority of class talking up a storm, and my heart goes out to him, for I know this is how he deals with his nervousness. I admire his forthrightness, actually; I was the exact opposite as a kid. I never gave myself permission to voice my concerns. I stayed quiet and tried at all times to act as if absolutely nothing phased me, when the truth was I was dying inside most of the time. Nobody would have known.
But Addie, ever the vigilant narrator of his own experience, gives Ms. B the running commentary of his inner monologue:
"Are we going to do exactly the same thing today as we did yesterday? I wasn't scared yesterday when we went around the pool holding onto the sides. THAT was fun. Are we going to dive? I saw the other class you had here earlier and they were diving. Does that mean we're diving too? When I jump in the water are you going to catch me? Can I hold onto you? I'm a little bit worried about this. Am I going underwater this time? I know you told me to keep my eyes open underwater- last time I didn't but this time I did. It sure was blurry- is it blurry to you?"
The other children stare at him like he has lobsters crawling out of his ears. The teacher patiently answers his every inquiry, no doubt suppressing the urge to call him Woody Allen.
Today, at class #3, the kids had to jump to Ms. B from the side of the pool, but this time she didn't take their hands first. She promised to catch them, but when Molly and Georgie went before him, Addie observed that she was allowing them to go completely underwater after the jump, heads submerged for a good five seconds. When it was his turn, he bravely walked over to the edge of the pool. But as he curled his toes over the edge and prepared for his jump, I caught a glimpse of his skinny little legs; they were shaking so violently that I could see his swimsuit shuddering from ten feet away. He was petrified. And still, he mustered all his courage and leapt (well okay, toppled) into the water, allowing her to submerge him too. Five whole seconds. She glided him back to the step... and as he wiped those precious windows of his, he turned around to me, smiled, and gave me a hearty thumbs-up.
Proud just doesn't begin to cover it.
