This morning I was excited and motivated to hop in the pool and do my morning laps. My normal training pool was closed for chlorination. My back-up pool was closed due to a broken pump. Pool #3 no room for me. So I ended up at pool #4 an hour later.
As I approached my lane, I noticed a sandwich-board style sign in front of lane #1.
It had a picture of a young baby floating on it’s back, with the sign reading, “Pardon my crying, I am learning to save myself.” This was an omen for things to come.
It was obviously the first day of a lesson as the teacher went over the rules from a large black notebook poolside, with what appeared to be one parent and the grandparents. They had to sign some papers.
The very first lesson the red haired boy, approximately 3 years old, was handed over to the teacher.
He was fine for about 15 seconds until the teacher starting to dunk him against his will. Things got really ugly when the teacher forced this poor squirming soul onto his back. The water fitness ladies in the shallow end of the pool looked over in total disbelief as the child was screaming. The bizarre part of it was, the louder the boy screamed, the more the parent and grandparents would clap their hands and say “Great job”. An example of “Cognitive Dissonance” if ever there was one!
This torture went on for a full 10 minutes, and then the listless boy was laid on his side and wrapped in his towel as tight as a drum.
I swam my laps and then low and behold a little 10 month baby appeared on the scene, with pretty much the same cruel, heartless scenario. But this time the teacher, was talking really sweetly to the baby and then… she would dunk the baby. Mixed signals for the child. Torture, love, torture, love.
This whole episode made me feel so sad, I couldn’t do anything about it there. But, it motivated me to continue to spread the word on holistic, child paced, caring baby/child swimming and safety filled with joy, laughter, love and learning. What were the chances of the first three pools being unavailable and landing me at pool #4 precisely at that time??? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
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About the Author:
Rob and Kathy McKay have devoted their adult careers to developing the most stimulating, child friendly, educationally sound and developmentally appropriate swim school possible. The very tangible result of their mission is the nationally acclaimed Serenity Swim at Lifestyle Swim School in Boca Raton, the couple’s award-winning video series, Diaper Dolphins, their book Learn to Swim (DK Publishing), their website www.babyswimming.com and their contribution to The Experts Guide to the Baby Years (Clarkson Potter).