Water is an unfamiliar environment for humans, therefore fear of it is natural, and it should be present in everyone to a reasonable extent.
However, often this fear is excessively strong - it prevents not only swimming, but sometimes even entering the water. Such excessive fear no longer brings any benefit.
You can overcome it not with psychological suggestions, but by completing a series of tasks step by step . They are not anything complicated or scary; on the contrary, everything is quite simple.
Below we present a program, the implementation of which, we hope, will overcome this problem.
Exercises to get used to water
From our point of view, as a first step, the most optimal program for this is the program of action recommended by swimming coach Denis Tarakanov.
The point of this program is to get used to the water and learn to relax in it.
It is best to start in a very shallow, warm pool - one that is very shallow enough to allow you to sit in the water. If you have an extremely strong fear of water, your task is to simply sit in warm water and learn to relax in it.
You don't need to start swimming or do anything else - just get used to being in the water .
Take your time - take as much time as you need. In extreme cases, if necessary, you can even spend several months simply relaxing in shallow warm water.
The sequence of actions is clearly shown in this video:
You should develop a feeling of comfort and relaxation from being in the water, then this feeling should “get bored” and you should have a desire to take the next step.
If it is not possible to do this exercise in a shallow pool, then you can do it on the shore of a lake or sea, but with the following reservations:
- shallow near the shore , the water should be warm and pleasant.
- There should be no waves , staying in the water should be extremely comfortable.
If there is neither a shallow pool nor the necessary body of water nearby, or if the fear of them is very high, then as a “zero” step you can teach the body not to be afraid of water at home in the shower :
- at first the water should pour only on the back;
- then we put our heads under water and breathe only through our mouths - we get used to breathing in water.
Name of the disease
A phobia is a common pathology that can sometimes cause severe discomfort and also prevent you from living a normal life, enjoying all its delights. A striking example is hydrophobia (aquaphobia): a patient who suffers from this disease cannot plunge into water on a summer day. The phobia can appear in early childhood and accompany the patient throughout his life.
Today, psychologists call panic fear of water several concepts. What is the correct name for this phenomenon: aquaphobia or hydrophobia? Both of these names refer to the same disease. It’s just that previously the concept of “hydrophobia” was a symptom exclusively of rabies. Today, both of these names can equally be used to refer to one illness - panic fear of water and everything connected with it.
Head Dive
The next step is to train your face to submerge in water..
The fact is that very often the fear of water is associated with the fear of choking, which is enhanced by the discomfort of water getting into the nose. Many people dislike the very act of immersing oneself in water.
Therefore, we move on to the next task, which can be done even at home - in the bathroom, or with a basin of water, or in the pool or open water.
You can close your eyes, but it is much better to wear swimming goggles.
Procedure:
- We lower our face into the water for just a couple of seconds. We don’t plug our nose with our hands, but we don’t breathe either.
- Then we lift it and at the moment of lifting we exhale sharply through our nose in order to completely clear the nose if anything gets into it.
- Take your time - repeat this task as many times as required. You can gradually increase the duration of immersion in the water.
Your task is to ensure that you lower your face into the water, including your nose, without experiencing any discomfort.
If you don't feel comfortable putting your head in the water, you can also try gradual squats into the water in a pool, as shown in this video:
How long does it take to learn to swim?
Is it possible to stop being afraid of water and learn to swim in 1 day, you ask, and we will answer... yes. This is really real, because if at some point you feel that you feel safe in the pool, it is quite possible that you will be able to swim right away. And this may well happen already in the first lesson.
Of course, your technique is unlikely to be perfect right away, but that’s not the question! The most important thing is that you hold on, don’t drown, and even move a little. And you are not afraid at all!
It will take about a month for a dedicated swimmer to start swimming really well in the pool. Quite a real prospect, isn’t it?
Horizontal body position
The next stage is to take a completely horizontal position in the water, with your face lowered into the water.
Like the previous ones, this task is done entirely in shallow water , where the depth is maximum up to your knees.
Grasp the bottom of the pool (or body of water) with both hands, inhale and extend your legs so that your body is lying in the water, your head is lowered into the water .
Relax your neck, relax completely.
Do as many repetitions as necessary to get used to keeping your body and head in the water.
Important elements when studying
To learn to swim and master different techniques, you should go through several stages sequentially. You will need to learn the three most important skills:
- breathe correctly;
- keep the body on the water;
- learn to coordinate limb movements.
Correct breathing
This is one of the most difficult stages and for many people, the inability to breathe correctly remains an impossible task for a long time. Until a beginner learns to breathe freely and easily, he will not only be able to swim, but even just stay on the surface. And mastering crawl or breaststroke swimming is possible only if a person can control his breathing.
The task of learning to breathe is difficult, but both small children and older people can do it. You just need to be patient and strictly follow the advice of experts:
- Inhale with your mouth over the water and exhale in the water. The air in the lungs keeps the body on the surface. Therefore, the deeper you inhale, the longer you will stay on the water. But do not overfill your lungs with air to avoid discomfort.
- In water, always breathe only through your mouth: if you breathe through your nose, droplets of water will enter the nasopharynx. This can cause suffocation and panic.
- When swimming, you need to turn your head to the side. This will allow you to calmly inhale through your mouth and exhale into the water. The frequency of inhalation and exhalation depends on the frequency of movements of the arms and legs. Over time, you will be able to freely coordinate the entire process.
First movements
Follow all the previous steps until being in shallow water and having your nose in the water does not cause you discomfort. This may take from several days to several months, we repeat: take your time.
Then the next step is to learn to lie on the water with your face down in shallow water.
As in the previous exercise, inhale and lie down, holding the bottom with both hands. Then we release one hand. After several such attempts, we release both hands. Finally, we stretch both arms forward and lie face down in the water .
Having learned to lie in the water, we make the first movements with our legs.
The whole sequence of actions, thanks to which an adult who is afraid of water can quickly learn to swim, is very well shown in this video:
In addition to this video, the next step after the steps shown in this video is to also learn how to exhale through your nose or mouth into the water .
This can be done near the shore or at the edge of the pool - inhale through your mouth, lower your face and exhale into the water. Try to get used to exhaling through your nose (exhaling through your mouth is required during intense sports swimming). Read more about inhalation, exhalation and proper breathing in swimming in this article.
Eyes
How many of us can boast, if not love, at least favor for the process of instilling medical drops into the eyes? When the cornea of this most delicate paired organ comes into contact with a foreign object, which in our case is water, a reaction is automatically triggered - we begin to blink intensely. This is a normal protective reflex that protects the mucous membrane of the eye from damage and contamination.
When water hits the cornea, it causes a tingling sensation. Of course, it is better to use special goggles or a mask during swimming lessons. But it is necessary to accustom your eyes to unhindered contact with water that does not cause discomfort. It doesn't matter whether this happens with regular swimming or with practice in the bathroom.
How to get rid of the fear of great depths
If you have learned to lie in the water and at least somehow swim in shallow water (technique is not important now, you can even do it like a dog), then you should no longer have problems getting into the water and immersing yourself in it.
As a rule, in most cases this already removes the fear of water and the fear of choking.
If you still have a fear of depth, then within reasonable limits this is generally normal for any person; this is an instinct of self-preservation.
Do not start swimming at depth unless there is a qualified instructor nearby, a person who will supervise you and provide all the necessary assistance!
If there is an instructor nearby and objectively has every opportunity to help, but even with his support you are still afraid of the depth, then try one of the following exercises :
Swimming with a swim board . Hold onto the swimming board with your hands - this is a kind of analogue of a lifebuoy that prevents the body from drowning. Swim using your legs. You can train this kind of swimming in shallow water and then gradually move on to swimming in deep water (we repeat, under the control and with the safety of an instructor!).
- Psychology exercise: “drown in 30 seconds”.
This exercise is offered by the instructors of the Swim Rocket school, its meaning: being in fairly shallow water (where you can stand on your feet), take a horizontal position in the water, that is, lie down on the water, and with all your might try to completely submerge under the water - “drown”.You should have an instructor with you who will insure you and at the same time time you, giving you only 30 seconds for this task.
To the surprise of the swimmer, it turns out that if you take a horizontal position in the water, you cannot drown.
This gives an increase in psychological confidence for further activities.
The “drown in 30 seconds” technique is demonstrated in this video:
Become a sailor - learn the directions
Few people remember this, but since ancient times, sailors have compiled maps of water areas for their voyages. How are pilot lines useful for swimmers? From them you can get a lot of information about the upcoming swim. For example, you will understand that deep areas will be colder than shallower ones. And also that there may be a strong current between the islands or between the mainland and the island, which means swimming will be more difficult.
If you don’t understand anything about maps, then go online and study the swim locations using reviews and virtual tours. Modern technologies allow us to look at any point on the planet using satellites. The more information you collect, the better you study each kilometer, the more confident and calm you will feel at a distance.
What to do if your child is afraid to swim in the pool
First, remember the main rule of children's swimming: a child of any age, even one who knows how to swim, should only be in the water under adult supervision!
Next, if your child is afraid to go into the water, we will give the following recommendations:
- the water should be warm and there should be no waves;
- If we are talking about a baby, then you should not force him into warm and comfortable water. Let him grow up a little and want to swim himself;
- do not scold him under any circumstances . Take this calmly and, if possible, turn the situation into a positive one. A child’s fear of getting water in his nose and your scolding can put a strong thought in his head: “this should never happen again,” and then that very fear of water begins, which this article is dedicated to getting rid of.
Is it real...?
“It’s never too late to learn” - this expression is heard very often when a person begins to master, by the way, foreign languages or the art of ceramics.
However, is it possible to learn to swim as an adult if for some reason you missed this opportunity earlier? Can changing body characteristics interfere with learning, as in gymnastics and ballet?
Correct answer: yes. You can start swimming at any age, the main thing is to cast aside fears and doubts, and set the right goal. This is where the main catch of the expression “I want to learn to swim” lies - for some it is quite enough to stay on the water and not drown, but for others they are ready to improve their technique by correcting the mistakes made when swimming in order to swim like Michael Phelps - technically correct , beautiful, powerful and fast.
Ideally, all swimmers should strive to master all four strokes, but above all, they need to motivate themselves. Without this, the matter will not move forward, so you need to create the right motivation for yourself.
Causes of fear in adults
- If we are talking about a moderate fear of water, then its main reason is the instinct of self-preservation, combined with the inability to swim .
- If we are talking about extreme cases of non-acceptance of water, then their cause may be precisely an unsuccessful experience with water in childhood . For example, the situation described above, when water got into the child’s nose, he “drank too much water” and was afraid that he would choke, and against the background of this, his parents scolded him severely.
- Similarly, this phobia can develop from cases of forcibly immersing children in water.
For the last two cases, it is especially important to accustom your nose to being in water , learn to exhale into it, and let yourself understand that nothing bad will happen from immersing your nose in water.
Ears
For the most part, the fear of water in the ears is irrational, since the design of the human ear is quite effective in preventing water from entering the auricle. The eardrum is practically inaccessible to water. However, sometimes water can be blocked by so-called earwax (wax) in the outer canals of the ear. As a rule, this leads to temporary inconvenience. You just need to clean your ears. If this is not done, a bacterial infection can develop. The procedure for cleaning the external canals of the auricle must be performed carefully, since excessive zeal can also lead to inflammatory processes.
What is this phobia called?
Officially, the fear of water is called “Hydrophobia” .
According to Wikipedia, celebrities also have this phobia, including Winona Ryder and Michelle Pfeiffer.
We hope that the tips in this article will allow you to successfully overcome any aversion to being in the water.
We also recommend that you read our general article about what proper swimming is, and other articles from the “How to learn to swim” section. We hope that with their help, your stay in the water will be pleasant and useful.
Manifestations of bathophobia
When an irritant appears, that is, water and the bottom, a person experiences acute fear, which is accompanied by manifestations from the autonomic nervous system, which has come to combat readiness:
- cardiopalmus;
- nausea;
- sweating;
- coldness of hands and feet;
- weakness;
- discomfort in the chest and stomach;
- spasm in the throat.
A person’s natural desire in such a situation is to escape, but it is this that perpetuates the functioning of bathophobia, allowing it to develop. The right decision is to stay and endure all the unpleasant sensations. It's all about the conditioned reflex.
Sea monsters
Any phobia presupposes the presence of a serious subconscious fear. This fear is expressed in rapid breathing and rapid heartbeat. The standard fight-or-flight defense mechanism is activated. It’s great, of course, if the object of fear, a dog, for example, is standing before your eyes - here you can escape or do something else. But when such fear arises in the depths, it is many times worse and more terrible.
It's quite normal to be afraid of being eaten alive by a shark. But if a diver simply has an unreasonable fear of coral reefs or something similar, this is already a phobia. For some divers, their fear of sea creatures with fangs, such as sharks, is so intense that even swimming in a regular pool becomes an unbearable ordeal.
But where does this fear of depth come from?
This particular type of phobia, bathophobia, can be both destructive and objective. The destructive form involves inexplicable fears that there are monsters or any life-threatening things under water. There have been cases where people hear the voices of sirens or other marine life. For example, Cthulhu. There are people who believe that the ocean is a huge thinking creature that is extremely hostile to humans.
Objective fear can be explained, and therefore is not so dangerous. This is a fear of depth that occurs due to inability to swim or fear of drowning. The occurrence of this phobia is associated with experienced traumas, as a result of which a person is simply afraid of becoming drowned.
Afraid of getting caught in seaweed
There are people who are afraid to swim in the depths; they begin to panic for fear of being swallowed up by the depths. And there are those who are afraid of algae. In this case, it only takes one time for a person to become entangled in algae for panic and fear of depth to arise in relation to them.
It is quite natural for a person to consciously beware of algae so as not to get caught in their entanglements. This is a normal natural reaction and in some cases can be life saving. Indeed, aquatic vegetation is dangerous for swimmers. But the worst thing can happen when a swimmer, in panic, begins to move chaotically. Therefore, if such a phobia occurs, it is better to refrain from swimming into depth, and especially into algae.
Usually such fear is treated with hypnosis.
