Water will be a big part of family life. Mr P and I met through sailing and we love to be by the sea. Getting Baby P safe and confident in the water is a high priority for us.
Bathtime hasn’t always been smooth sailing for him… Sometimes we still hold his hand to reassure him… But recently he’s been laughing and smiling and even having a bath with Daddy in the ‘big boy’ (our) bath! It feels like we’ve turned a corner, even being taken out of the bath is better now that we heat the towels and his pyjamas up for him!
On the basis of these factors, choosing the right swimming class was critical.
In googling, I came across Baby Paddlers. Not overly commercialised (like others) and genuinely helpful with queries for peace of mind before we booked.
In our area Baby Paddlers have a choice of locations, days and times for the classes. One can choose to swim in super warm pools or more normal ones (where baby may need more of a wetsuit).
I picked the hydrotherapy pool at Winchester Hospital on Saturday lunchtimes for us. Warm water – tick. Daddy and baby can attend together, it can be their thing (I might leave them to and have a few hours ‘off’) – tick. We can have lazy Saturday afternoons when baby is pooped and will sleep – tick.
Baby Paddlers classes are thirty minutes and are fast paced. That’s essential, frequent change of activity keeps the babies engaged and not dwelling on the physics of what they are doing. It’s a bit like a sensory session, in the water. Nursery rhymes and different activities… He chases Nemo or a ball round the pool, swims lengths and surfs or sits on floats! All the while the parent is being coached to move between different holds.
Whilst the sessions are for baby and their water confidence, they are really about equipping a parent with the skills and confidence to keep their baby safe in the water. A baby implicitly trusts its parents and will learn from them. Teach the parent and the baby learns.
We have had five lessons now. We have had smiles from him in each of them as well as some tears. Lots of eye contact and skin to skin tends to bring him back from the brink. It’s a lot to take in for a baby, with the water and the noise. Key is to do it regularly and to focus on the bits he enjoys making him more comfortable as the weeks go by. Our little man seems to take it so seriously and intently, but he is starting to loosen up and splash more!
Be prepared for tears (the power pout that comes before the tears is pictured above) and don’t panic if they scream. It’s not the end of the world. Just a blip. There’s so much for baby to take in, and there are definitely times when they just scream. Each week baby will give you a different challenge! All the other babies may well be splashing and gurgling and yours may be screaming. Then the next week yours is happy and another isn’t.
We found that the week after his jabs and when he was in the middle of a Wonder Week Leap he wasn’t into being a tadpole one bit! When Baby P has cried we carry on with the lesson but sometimes step out of the group circle to calm things down for a while. We also try to get there early so we can get in the water before the others and get familiar with the environment. Every baby has a week when it just isn’t going to be ‘fun’ so it is important to remember that it’s about building confidence week on week, so that come holiday time, we and the baby are happy and safe in the pool.
I have to say the instructors are great. Knowledgeable and friendly and really supportive when things perhaps aren’t going as, er, quietly as you might have hoped! Although we are only a few weeks in I can see that what they do works. The lesson plans get slightly more challenging week on week. Baby P is normally the youngest and newest in his class and looking at the other babies who have been doing it longer they are really kicking and splashing and holding onto the floats. It’s the same as anything, practice makes perfect!
I was nervous about booking Baby Paddlers on a Saturday as it ties us to home every weekend… But Saturday makes it a perfect father and son activity. Happily, Baby Paddlers have a catch up option, if there are weeks you can’t do then they arrange a swap into another class. Week day classes aren’t as busy (we aren’t the only ones to choose a weekend so that Daddy can do it) and we’ve attended a swap without a problem.
It’s not just me saying all of that, my NCT group has all used Baby Paddlers and we are all in agreement that it’s been an excellent way to introduce our little tadpoles to the water! And so far, both the baby and the adult swimmer have slept sounding from physical exhaustion after the lesson which is another benefit!
To learn more about Baby Paddlers check out their website. They have a milestone programme that goes right through to when baby is a 4 year old!
And if there was ever an advert for perseverance and good teaching… Then the photo below is it. Submerged at his fourth lesson and absolutely no tears at all in the lesson! My heart burst with pride for them both.
At his fifth…
He is already more confident in the water than me!!
