Swimming

Today Kiah and Eli started Swim lessons.  They are normally every Monday and Thursday, but Anna has speech on Mondays at the same time so they will have to skip on Mondays.  This is something I have been trying to do for quite some time.  When we had Y memberships I tried to enroll them only to find out a week later that they were cancelling the class for the month.  From what I could gather, the person who taught the lessons had quit.  Well, I was having a baby, Anna, the next month.  and they weren't sure when they would have another instructor.  And the private lesson wait list was over a year long.  GREAT!

Then a wonderful opportunity opened up.  A friend of mine decided to teach lessons.

Here is the irony, sad irony.  Kiah has always been my overly cautious child.  Especially around water.  Eli was my no fear f water child.  So I wanted to get Kiah not so afraid and Eli more able to handle what he jumps into.

While my dad was here we took the kids to River walk.  We have been so many times.  But it had been awhile since we hadn't been yet this year since it opened.

Here are a few pictures of Kiah.  The one on the left is a small fountain found throughout that is a few feet deep.  The kids like to pretend the fountain is a slide and drop off into the water. 

At the end of the walk there is a fountain you can play in and a pond you can rent small paddle boats to ride.  The water must not be too deep cuz they don't have life jackets.  There were a ton of kids there that day.  we were playing in the fountain and having a great time.  I was super worried about Anna cuz it really was her first time ever playing in the water, besides the bath tub.  On op of that back in February clicked through to a blog about a family whose baby drowned in the bathtub.  As I read I realized the boy was born the same day as Anna.  It was terrifying to me.  I have always been super cautious of my kids.  Sometimes I think I teeter on paranoia. 

I think the set-up pf the watering hole at the end of the River Walk is a bit weird.  There is a bridge that separates the "deep" part from the shallow wading/play area.  At least so I thought.  A lot of the other kids were on the "wrong" side of the bridge... or so I thought.  But then a guy who worked there came along and pointed out the the gaggle of kids where they could go and where they couldn't go.  That is when I found out there actually is a play area on the other side of the bridge.  All 3 of the kids kept wanting to go to that side and I kept saying no.  With all the kids there is was hard enough to keep track of them when they were standing in front of me.  Finally I was worn down enough and most of the kids had gotten out.  The next time they asked me I said Kiah and eli could go over, but they needed to stay in the shallow play area.  And I explained where it was.  I then sent my dad over to them since he could get there faster than I could  since I was terrified with Anna in the water.  

As I made it over to the bridge I look over the bridge, which my dad was just crossing, and Eli has slipped off the edge and is bobbing up and down in the deep end.  It was EXACTLY how you see someone drowning in the movies. Arms flailing, water splashing.  My dad  jumps in the water and pulls him out.  I have no idea how long he was in the water.  It was less than a second, I'm pretty sure because my dad saw him standing then looked where he was walking and then turned back and he was gone. But let me tell you... it felt like and eternity.  I guess I had worried a little too much about the wrong child drowning. 

He really was OK.  I am sure he was so annoyed with me asking him if he was OK all day long.  I knew he was at a higher risk for dry drowning since he had pneumonia less than a year ago and he passed meconium at birth.  Though he didn't aspirate it, it did turn him blue from the lack of oxygen.  He didn't cough when he came up out of the water... so I guess once again he didn't aspirate it.  THANKFULLY.  I am know I am lucky.  There are so many accidents every year.  I only got a glimps of the horror and I never want it again.  It was terrifying.

This ended of fun for the day... it was only 10 min before we were going to leave anyway.  Though my dad did have wet pants to wear on the plane.  (we drove him straight to the airport from River Walk)  They actually dried out most of the way on the walk back to the car.

So now Eli is terrified of the water.  His first swim lesson consisted mostly of screaming.  Hopefully that will get better.