I watched Discovery’s Surviving the Cut again the other day. The episode was about Special Forces Divers. This elite force invites strong elite military officers to start with, and puts them through brutal aquatic training.

The segment of the show that really stood out to me was the drown-proofing exercise. Created to test how the recruits dealt with terror, this intense test started out by binding each recruit by the hands and feet. The men would then jump in the 10-foot water and perform 5 bobs. The bobs had to be timed in such a way as to not completely wind or tire out the officer. After the bobs, the recruits had to swim 150 yards in the bound state. Dolphin kick was the order of the day, hello!

After the 150, the the officers had to dive to the bottom of the 10-foot water and pull up an item ( I forgot what it was at this point, I think it was a face mask) with their mouth and bring it to the surface, complete a number of bobs, 3 or 5, without dropping the mask, and then do 5 more bobs after that before they could exit the pool. If a recruit pulled his hands or feet free, that was a sign of panic, and they failed the test.

A recruit that failed the test was given a chance to repeat the test after a resting period. The night I watched, two men failed and had to repeat the test. Of the two that repeated the test, one failed again. He could not get a hold of the object at the bottom of the pool, and he panicked and pulled his hands and feet free.

What struck me when this man had to leave training was the commanding officer’s comment that this recruit was strong, and he had no doubt that he would pass the program with flying colors after he left and got more training.

The level of respect and seriousness with which these men were treated was a sight to behold. As the commanding officer said, “There is no resting in the ocean. The ocean will pull you out and the ocean will kill you.”

Hence, drown-proofing.

I used to burden myself with the notion that I must teach my children all things. I am, after all, homeschooling mother. The bigger the challenge, bring it on!

That was back when I was schooling two children and having babies and what not.

I found out that I can’t legally teach everything, (hello, driver’s ed!), and I physically can’t teacher other things, not the least of which is swimming!

I can’t do much more than get the kids to the pool and have them practice what someone else taught them. So imagine my relief and joy when I was able to coach my 9 year old to dive yesterday at my brother and sister-in-law’s pool.

It was a lovely scene. I’m holding the 3 year old, who’s doing her usual flailing and trying to get away, but don’t you dare put me down mommy dance, and I’m watching the 7 year old who knows enough about swimming to scare me to death as he inches toward the deep water. Meanwhile, my 11 year old, who knows how to dive, but refuses, was doing something I no doubt considered slacking, because she wasn’t swimming laps and she wasn’t using the diving board. At least she wasn’t drowning, either.

The 7 year old is very driven and competitive, and she wanted to learn to dive. I have so many children that I could have sworn we’d been through this drill before–last year, actually. That was probably with the 11 year old…

Anyway, I’m barking out commands the whole time, rocking my old lady cap again. “tuck your chin,…” “I know,” she interrupts, and she demonstrates what to do with her arms. “Streamline!” I am a drill sergeant with this poor kid. I command the 11 year old to dive and show her sister how it’s done. Eleven year old is not thrilled to dive, even though she is a born teacher if I’ve ever seen one.

I am watching 7 year old, holding 3 year old, commanding 9 year old to squat and do a granny dive/baby dive, and telling her big sister to demonstrate. We are the only people in the pool at the time, but there are several adults having a barbecue behind us.

I am embarrassed by my loud forcefulness, but that’s me in the pool with the kids. All fun and games.

After a while, 9 year old gets the hang of the baby dives and is ready to stand and dive off the board. She does it! We are thrilled. She tries again, and it looks like a flop to me. “Was that a flop or a dive?” I ask her. She doesn’t know. “Does it hurt? If it hurts, it’s a flop. If it doesn’t, it’s a dive.” One of the adults at the barbecue laughs at my assessment. It hurt.

Unfased, 9 year old continues at it until she can consistently dive. Then she was ready for a canonball.

Which inspired 7 year old to do canonballs in the shallow end, and I’m thinking, is it time to go yet?

Cullen Jones recounts a funny 2008 Olympic story in a recent article in the NY Times.

Michael Phelps wakes Jones to tell him that LeBron James and other basketball stars want to meet them in the lobby of the hotel. Cullen goes downstairs and hears LeBron talking to Phelps about going for his 8th gold medal. But when he meets Cullen, LeBron exclaims, “Wait, you got a brother on the team?”

I know Jones is just living his life. He happens to be living his life as a professional swimmer, complete with a Nike endorsement and a job with Make a Splash. But Nike et al are betting on him transcending also ran status, and becoming Tiger or Venus and Serena.

Cullen Jones is taking it one step at a time, first battling performance anxiety that ended up excluding him from the 2004 Olympic team. That’s not even mentioning the demands of sprinting the 50 free–where it’s much better if you don’t breathe for the whole heat.

He’s currently competing in the World Championships–FINA in Shanghai. According to his twitter page, he competes out of the pool as well:

“Well the spades tournament is tied up 2-2 with @MichaelPhelps &@ryanlochte and @Rcberens and I”

Let’s wish him much success–in spades, in the pool, and in life!

I had an unusual challenge at the aforementioned family reunion. We had a formal banquet on Saturday evening. That in and of itself was not unusual; I’m sure many families do the same. But after traveling 15 hours to get there, living out of a suitcase, and taking two young children who EXPECTED to use the pool?

I worried just a touch about that formal evening.

Just in case, I had packed all my hair products and tools, so if I had to wash my hair, I could. But I didn’t really want to add Memphis humidity to the mix of stress when it came to my hair on this already stressful trip.

So I wore my old lady swim cap.

This cap is tight, and I already had a headache, not to mention the fact that I’m usually ashamed to be seen in it. But I knew it would protect my hair from all the splashing involved with swimming with children. I also knew that I would have my hands full with my 3 year old who thinks she can swim, so I hold her as tightly as I can while simultaneously letting her kick and wiggle like a fish.

To my surprise, I got compliments for my cap! And I looked around and saw other women wearing clear shower caps, and I had to admit that my flower cap was actually pretty. And it went with my suit, so that was a bonus. I looked pulled together, in spite of myself.

I have also noted that this cap will keep the hair dry if you don’t swim on your back, so that’s a bonus too, if you’re looking to swim without getting your hair wet.

I know, swimming and dry hair do not go together, and it sounds ridiculous to even mention it, but it really comes in handy if you’re swimming laps in the 10 degree winter, or you go to a family reunion in Memphis and need to look good later that night.

My story about a friend’s experience at the beach sent chills through my daughter, and she questioned whether she really wanted to be a lifeguard. But she went through the training anyway, and my daughter was a lifeguard for 2 years at the Y. Now she’s moved onto a different phase in her life, involving glamor and beauty.

This weekend, we went to the family reunion together, and I thought I’d take the babies to the pool during our down time. My lifeguard daughter joined us, but she hadn’t planned on swimming.

The hotel pool was typical: swim at your own risk. It also suggested that adults accompany children to the pool at a 3 children to 1 adult ratio. I saw maybe 2 adults and two pools and a hot tub full of kids! Everyone was black, and most were non-swimmers. (That is being charitable, I would say nobody could swim, but that would be assuming).

It was a disaster in the making. My daughter cringed as she saw a teenaged girl dive into the 4 foot water.

I had a raging headache and wanted to just take my children and leave the splashing, disorderly mess behind. My lifeguard made a quick decision and decided to go ‘on duty.’ She told the diving girl, who tried her stunt a second time, that she could break her neck diving into the shallow water, and she should limit her diving to the 6 foot water. My daughter prefaced her comments with, “I don’t mean to get in your business or anything, but I am a lifeguard, and you could break your neck diving in the shallow water…”

The girl thanked my daughter, told her she didn’t know that, and seeing as how she couldn’t swim, she would refrain from diving.

Pretty soon, most of the people in the pool were clamoring for swim lessons. “If I’d intended to get my hair wet, I would have taught them to swim,” my daughter, who was in glamor mode at the pool continued.

Eventually the group at the pool settled down and left.

I smell a learn to swim business opportunity–leasing swim lessons and lifeguards at hotels.
How would that work?

Discovery Channel’s show, Surviving the Cut makes you wonder what you thought you were doing in the pool. The show follows wannabe elite naval forces through intense training, including swimming in 45 degree water at night.

In a recent episode, we watched a black man, Guy Smith swim over a mile in 45 degree water with an injured leg. The group of SWCC candidates started out with 40 and ended up with 10 men over the course of 50 days of grueling basic training.

Next stop? Advanced training.

Guy Smith made the first cut. We’ll see how he does in round two.