The Little Fish Can Swim

When Abe was one and a half, we gave him a Speedo vest that made it possible for him to cruise around the pool independently and and helped him to keep up with the older boys at the community pool. By 2, he was begging for water slides and bridges to jump off of. He was fearless when he wore the vest. After 3 summers of threatening his life if he ever jumped in a pool without his vest on, it was a hard sell otherwise. We decided that since we have a pool in our backward and another summer to work with him due to our hemisheric move, it was time to try and retire the vest. This was no small feat. Often times, it is more difficult to teach someone else how to do something or rid them of their fears than learning ourselves.

Abe is stubborn... and he does things on his own time. If he wants to learn how to do something, he will. Obviously, this requires us to find ingenuitive ways of helping him to believe that he really wants to learn what we think he is ready for. He walked when he was 9 months old and began reading at 3, but we still were having much difficulty convincing him that he really could swim. If he felt like he could touch the bottom of the pool, he would swim, play and float. This has been going on for some time. It has taken months to help him understand that if he is swimming on the top of the water, it does not matter how deep it is underneath him.

The point is... our little fish can finally swim! In the picture above form last week, he jumped in and swam to the other side where the water was deep enough that he could not touch. He has continued to swim without the vest ever since and hopefully, it can be packed away for someone else. GO ABE!