Do life preservers help if you wear them 24/7?

I struggled for quite some time about what Drew was going to do for camp. You may remember Camp Mom where I explained my frustration with camp plans in October. One of my largest concerns with big boy camp was the pool aspect of camp.

I have not been quiet about Drew’s inability (at times) to effectively listen to instructors. That coupled with a bad swimming experience in a zero depth pool last year (read about that here) made me really uncomfortable at the thought of Drew going to a camp that had any type of swimming involved.

In the future, however, it will be inevitable that he will have to go to a camp where there is swimming. So I decided that swim lessons were in order. He has done swim lessons with us several times. But holding your toddler (or baby when he started) and singing songs in the pool aren’t exactly the same as learning important life lessons for survival. So I signed him up for real bonafide swim lessons.

Thursday was the first day of his lessons. The whole time I watched him in the pool and sat on the edge of my seat, anxious to jump in and protect him. I kept my cool and let him find his way. Half way through the lesson the instructor turned her back to walk out towards the center of the pool (leaving Drew to hold on to the side). Of course Drew did not follow these instructions and went under. It felt like a solid twenty minutes of screaming before she got to him and got him out of the water. In reality it was probably more like a minute but it was the worst minute of my life.

As we enter this new week I have Thursday looming over my head. I know it is so important for both of us for him to get back in the water and keep at it. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I want to lock him in his room and keep him there forever. That accident was scary and we’ll both get over (relatively speaking). The hardest part for me, though, is that I can’t always protect him.

As he gets older there are going to more instances where he does things and is exposed to things outside my realm. He’s going to go to longer school days, bigger camps, friends’ houses, etc. And I’m going to be left behind praying that he’ll be alright. There’s no guarantee. Nobody will assure me that he will always be safe and protected. That fear plagues me as it does many parents but I feel like I could potentially let it cripple me.

I know I will ruin him, ruin our relationship and ruin myself if I don’t learn to take these things in my stride but I’m petrified that something bad will happen to him (them). I need to put this in its proper perspective and recognize that even if they stay under my wing their whole life, there is still no guarantee that they will always be alright. Life is too short to dwell on all the potential unhappiness and sorrow. But how do I shake the sick feeling I have had since the pool incident?