Two weeks ago, at my daughter's swim meet, they had a "Parent's Relay". The original email stated that each parent would swim 25 yards (one pool length). So I got myself signed up to do the relay. The day of the relay they told us we would be swimming 50 yards. Well, I was not going to back out, what is one more length of the pool, right?
They had us do a warm up lap or two (I chose to do only one lap, to preserve my energy, especially since I had forgotten my inhaler in my other handbag, so did not have that available). I felt pretty good, confident that I would be OK out there. How very wrong I was.
I opted to swim second for my team. That was probably a good thing. So I bellyflopped off the blocks when it was my turn, swam to the end of the pool. No problem, so far, so good. About half way through the second lap, I started gasping for breath. So I tried to slow down and breathe. Then my body just stopped working. I was trying to will my body to do the freestyle stroke and really nothing was happening. So I did the only thing I could think of, I flipped over to my back and started to do the backstroke. I was still very winded, and not moving very well. I started to panic and cry, thinking I was going to die out there in the pool, making a complete ass out of myself in front of my daughter and everyone. I finally made it to the end of the pool, but could not climb out on my own and had to be pulled out. I really should have dropped out of the thing once I found out it was 50 yards. What on earth was I thinking?
I take a bit of pride in the fact that I DID finish my leg. And I did not die out there.
The next day, we had a family kayaking day for the Brownie troop. Matt, K, and I rented two
kayaks, one single and one tandem. I put Matt in the tandem with K, because if I got stranded I did not want K stranded with me. I was really nervous about the kayaking, especially since I had really gotten in over my head swimming the day before. But it was a lot easier than I thought (and way easier than canoeing, which I have done before). I almost capsized my kayak a couple of times, and got seriously soaked, but it was really fun. I really want to go again.
