I Signed up for adult Swim lessons at my local pool thing place.

They're private lessons as in it's myself and the instructor rather than a group lesson.

I didn't know what to say when I signed up because the options were adult beginner or adult intermediate and while I can swim (so not a beginner) I can't do the front crawl properly (I don't think it was ever a favourite of mine) and I don't really swim with my head under the water proper breathing.  Like, I mean I'll PUT my head under water but I don't like... swim with the breathing out and then lifting/turning head to breathe in and then back under thing.  I just... can't. 

So I signed up as a beginner because of that and then honestly I freaked out about doing this until the first lesson.  Which was last week.

I was SO SO SO SO nervous leading up to going to the lesson.  And I honestly can't 100% explain to you why I didn't just back out of it and I can't 100% explain to you why I signed up in the first place other than I saw they were offering this and something inside me went "do this" and I listened to that and I signed up and I was nervous for months and I was nervous the day of but I kept going for it.

If you remember, I worked hard to get myself to the pool in 2019 and then Covid lockdowns hit and while I've swum in the ocean since, I haven't been back in a pool.  And I don't mind swimming.  And I know it's easier on the body and maybe that's part of my motivation is wanting to give myself another cardio option that isn't weight bearing.  But, yeah, I can swim.  And I had a bunch of swim stuff in a handy bag from 2019 so I didn't need to go get anything, just check the bag for the stuff.  (Like a water proof bag to put a wet swimsuit in for the trip home).

So the day of, I collected and checked my stuff and I got ready and I noticed my heart was thumping and so I checked my heartrate and I was so nervous that my heart was beating like I was doing cardio.  Man bodies are weird.  And clever.  But also not.  Because no saber toothed tigers.... just... a swimming pool.  Ahem.

I got there early, of course, and wasn't super sure of the change room situation but I changed and then kind of sat there awkwardly for a while because it was too soon to go in (I thought) but I didn't want to be late and oh the overthinking, my gosh. 

But, I did go in, and I asked where to go and I waited for the instructor and I got in the water and I did a half hour lesson and I did it.  I DID IT!

I'm so pleased with myself for doing it.  I was scared and I did it. Yay me, so much!

Anyway, the long and the short of the lesson is that we practised breathing.  Breathing out into the water mainly as I'm still not great at "grabbing" a whole lot of air in a short amount of time but I did notice that as the time went on I was able to breathe out (underwater) for longer.  I also discovered that when I do put my head underwater (while holding a kickboard and kicking) to breathe out, I veer to one side enough that a few times I'd bring my head up to breathe and find I'd nearly run the poor instructor into the wall!  D'oh!

So swim goggles are probably needed.  Oh and putting my hair into a braid like was suggested just meant I had a bunch of hair falling out all over my face.

So I know I'm unfit, cardio wise and that's not something lessons will fix that's just on me to improve or not.  And yes my body hurt that evening and was sore the next day but those are the sort of expected discomforts... I used my body in a new way for half an hour... it makes sense to be sore.  The headache from the neck usage was not delightful but again, at least made sense, you know?

I'm probably going to be nervous for next lesson as the instructor asked if maybe I wanted to try the arms as well as the breathing and most of me is like NO I CAN NOT DO THAT WELL ENOUGH TO BREATHE so, I mean, we'll see.  

And as a final note, I can't tell you how proud I was of the other adults in the lesson area with me.  How effing brave and wonderful is it to try to learn to swim as an adult.  I mean it's also smart and potentially life saving but I just, it made me so happy and proud of the adults I saw doing something new for the first time.  How wonderful!