Watch This Baby!!
http://www.childdrowningprevention.com/index.html
This made me so nervous I could hardly watch it..
But I did..and I am glad I watched it clear to the end..
( Even though I was hollering out loud.." Someone Get THAT baby!" )
I was ready to jump in. Could hardly stand it, even though I knew what it was. My daughters all were and are great swimmers and on swim teams and one was a swim coach for several years. The importance of water knowledge certainly is visualized in this video.
I'm sitting her with tears in my eyes and slight angina pain. :) A friend of mine took her toddler to one
of those swimming classes where they put them in the water and keep moving away and forcing the child
to swim........anyway, she said it was the hardest thing she had ever done. When they finally let her pick him
up, he had big tears rolling down and cheeks, looked her straight in the eye and said, "Bad Mommie". She said
I will never forget that as long as I live.
I think "drownproofing" kids is great, but it's no substitue for adult supervision. Here we absolutely cannot have a pool that is accessable directly from the house. We have more problems with flood engorged creeks and drainage ditches, retention ponds, flooded quarries, kids jumping off bridges and drunk teenagers goofing around.
I was a Water Baby ! :D
It was a 2 week course... I was 12 months old (1976)
To graduate my mom had to drop me off the end of a diving board :o
and I had to swim to the side of the pool.
So, I'm curious . . . do you think it was good?
Do you have a memory of growing up not being afraid of water?
Did you grow up swimming and wondering why everyone else wasn't?
Would you recommend it to parents of infants and toddlers?
??? ??? ???
Good questions! My dad learned to swim by being thrown into the creek. Anyway that was the story. He was a very strong swimmer and loved it.
Both my boys were "water babies" but I didn't do it like the video.
The boys didn't know to roll over on their backs , but they could bob to the top and dog paddle to the side at 2 yrs old. Danny was snorkeling with Mark when he was 4.
When they were 6 months old they could..at that age, hold their breath if they went under,
but at that age, they would have drowned if they had been alone.
What I did with Danny and Derek, and I also did it with Ashley when she was 10 months old was laugh and play with them out in the lake and then blow in their nose ( which made them catch and hold their breath and real fast go under the water with them and come back up laughing and acting like it was such fun etc..
They would look wild eyed for a bit and then break out in a smile...You have to time the blowing and the going under and make it fast, so they don't catch their breath while you are going under.. But it water proofed our kids. They were both swimming by the age of 3 and water skiing by themselves at the age of 5.
I had to do it that way.. we were at the lake every single weekend, and I couldn't take a chance on them falling over the boat and not be able to dog paddle to the side of the boat or at least pop to the top so we could get them.
They are excellent swimmers as Mark and I are.. and Derek has already used the blowing in the nose technique on Mason this year and he did great with it. And Ashley is swimming like a little fish.
My daddy taught me to swim as he was swimming and I was on his back and then he just slid out from under me and was right there as I learned.
I have taught this the few times we have enough interest in Infant - Toddler classes. Parents must attend and be in the water with their child and it helps if they have played in the water with their baby beforehand. Too often, the parents and/or child aren't water acclimated and you spend the 20-30 minutes waiting for the fear to subside. But we use the kick, roll over on your back method when we have instructed parents and their babies. We also, in levels II and III, still instruct those swimmers to roll from the tummy to the back and position their arms out to the side or above their head to distribute their body weight to support a back float. So many children, especially boys, have difficulty on their backs because of the weight distribution of their muscles. But, again, it is no substitute for adult supervision, but to me it's the same as preparing your children for a fire or tornado drill. You never know when an emergency will arise and the training might be necessary.
I could not stand the "5 minutes later" text. I'm screaming inside my head, 'pick up that baby, dumb-sh**!!!' You knew he was trying to get Daddy's attention too. That smile at the end made it all better though.
My dad tried to teach me to swim by throwing me in a lake. I hate to swim. I DO NOT put my face under water. Even when I'm in the shower, I squint my eyes shut tight and take a deep breath before rinsing the soap of my face. I love to be near the water, and to wade in the water, soak, and so forth, but when everyone else was doing cannon balls, I was sitting on the side dangling my feet. I have no idea if that has any thing to do with being thrown in the water, but my son is the same way. He hates water in his face, and only goes in the water on his terms. Last summer my husband threw him in the pool too. Natalie seems to fine though. She just doesn't like the feel of water in her ears. Makes you think....
Makes you think.....................Humans were not designed to live in water? My thoughts exactly. Water is for drinking and washing and raising fish so humans can have the fun of catching them. Water on my body needs to come from a faucet and be clean and controllable.
I do not put my face in water and I'm worse then you are, dandymomma, I can't even put my face under the shower faucet. Just can't do it. Can't splash my face with water. I use a washcloth. That's the only way my face gets washed.
I like to be on the water, not in the water.....except for a bubble bath.
Love the water, love to be in it, under it, on top of it, drinking it, showering in it, listening to it, swimming in it, cooking with it, growing things with it, sliding in it, walking in it, let's see what else?..................
managing the swimming pool?
uh.....yeah.....that too. Oh and balancing water, (chemistry) , cleaning the water, guarding the water, doing stunts in the water, aerobics in the water.................................
Have you started the walking on water trials yet?
Or dividing the water, ala Moses?
I'm ready to watch those experiments.
;D :angel: ;D
Quote from: Mom70x7 on September 21, 2007, 10:13:35 PM
So, I'm curious . . . do you think it was good?
Do you have a memory of growing up not being afraid of water?
Did you grow up swimming and wondering why everyone else wasn't?
Would you recommend it to parents of infants and toddlers?
??? ??? ???
After my mom had me do this course, I wasn't around pools very much until I was 8 yrs old. I remember being terrified of water being over my head. At water parks I would make my dad get in the pool to prove that water was only three feet deep.
When I turned 8 yrs old, I joined a swim team to learn how to swim (didn't know I was a waterbaby at this time) and ever since I have been like a fish. I have been Red Cross Certified since I was 10 or 11 (girl scouts).
I would suggest that parents that parents do give some sort of water survival skills to their young ones. But make sure you keep them around the water as they grow up so that fear does not set in.
Quote from: emptynest on September 23, 2007, 05:22:37 PM
Love the water, love to be in it, under it, on top of it, drinking it, showering in it, listening to it, swimming in it, cooking with it, growing things with it, sliding in it, walking in it, let's see what else?..................
I agree with this......but, I still can't relax enough to learn how to breathe and I think my fear/panic from my youth and (mother) just
has me so brain-washed that I am just as happy wearing a life vest.
This video has me very glad that I did get my kids to the Red Cross swimming lessons and
really need to forgive my mother for the damage that was done (now, I am not totally sure of this) but as much as I love the water
in all aspects of it......I even enjoyed going after mussel-shells when I worked with a shell gatherer.
So, I don't want to see people tramatized by being dropped into a pool of water...............some aren't suppose to get in there.
I don't like torture of any kind and that is what I think this is....
Hugs and God bless
Judy, I've aways been part fish and comfortable around water also, but I want to hear about your adventures as a "mussel snatcher." Tell all please, I love mussels.
Quote from: Diane Amberg on September 24, 2007, 05:20:14 PM
Judy, I've aways been part fish and comfortable around water also, but I want to hear about your adventures as a "mussel snatcher." Tell all please, I love mussels.
Diane these were fresh water mussels.
I worked for a guy(Louis Britain) here in the area who bought mussels and harvested the meats and sold the shells to a company who makes jewelry and uses pieces of the shell to produce pearls in oysters.
I can't remember which company bought from us/him. I started to guess at the name, but it just wont come.
Mainly I stayed home (at Louie's) and bought shells from harvesters here.
The rivers around Kansas are good sources for some great ones.
Now this was back around 1989 when I last worked with them.
But, we all had to have license's to go to river and harvest them. Then take them back to Louis' and steamed the shells and took out the meats (saved them for later) and sorted them by the type and stored them until we had enough to call a semi to come and get them for this company.
I only got to go once or twice. Most of the people were guys and not all of them liked having a woman around with them.
My fun time was spent wading through the water and finding them with my foot. I had river shoes on and felt good when I could sense them and pull them up. (also found leech's, Ugh)
When we had the shells sorted, we went through the meats and collected the fresh water pearls that were there.
Now for the gross-out. We did all of this in a rural area.....( for you locals it was on the outskirts of Oak Valley) and we just kept the meats in buckets till we had time to work them. This means fly's were awful.......bugs were bad..........the meats spoiled and we still had to go through the meats one at a time.......and by the time we would get to the end of a batch.......the maggots and other types of nasty critters would be pretty gross.
It was just 3 of us cooking the meats with Louis being around to carry the shells and tell us when a shell wasn't a good one.
this man was the last of his breed, meaning he was born one century too late..........would have made a super trapper and explorer back in the 1800's. His place was pretty rough. but, I didn't mind at all.
I loved working outdoors.......and the guys watched out for me. Now this might have been what got me injured enough to get arthritis.......but I would do it again.
I can't explain all that this involved........you wouldn't believe it anyway. Out of all these mussel meats we harvested that summer we fattened 6 hogs. I found out the only good hog is when he is in my freezer.
Fascinating! I think there still may be some fresh water mussels around this area, but I haven't seen any in many years. I remember seeing them occasionally in White Clay Creek when I was little. The raccoons would get them and the crayfish.
Since I worked with them, the shell harvest has really gone down hill.
some type of parasite got into the rivers and seemed to get them.
I keep wondering if the polution that goes down rivers has something to do with it.
Like I said I enjoyed it and am so glad I had the expierence..
Out of this for about a year or so, Louie had a combination jewelry shop with crafts on the side here in Longton and that gave Randy and me a place to work for the winter.
Didn't last of course, as small towns go, just wasn't enough people coming in to make it work.
Hugs and God bless