When my partner and I booked a trip to Barbados for my 31st birthday in March, all I could think about was the excitement of finally taking a trip somewhere in the Caribbean (in the hopes that I’d feel closer to my Jamaican heritage), what holiday clothes I would pack and all of the gorgeous views we’d get to soak up.
Even though I didn’t know how to swim at the time, I packed some bikinis and knew the all-too-familiar drill of dipping my toes into the water and leaving it at that. However, this trip was different. This was my first ever holiday surrounded by the sea, and when we weren’t out exploring and eating the most flavourful, delicious food, we’d spend our days at beach clubs, soaking up the radiant Caribbean sun and stretching out on beach loungers.
I remember watching my partner confidently swim out into the sea on his back, surrounded by other couples, families and friends, while I looked on sadly, knowing I couldn’t join them. I didn’t even know the first thing about swimming or keeping myself afloat.
That was the moment I promised myself that, once we got back home to London, I’d look into learning to swim, so that my partner and I could make memories in the water together.
Swimming in my childhood
Many adults have fond memories of family holidays where they were taught to swim and feel confident in the water, but that wasn’t really a thing in my family. We had a few UK-based family holidays, but none that included swimming. So, by the time I was eight or nine and doing weekly primary school swimming lessons, I sadly didn’t have an ounce of confidence in the water.
Pair that with the class being split into two groups, swimmers and non-swimmers, and just two swimming teachers responsible for children with different swimming abilities and needs, and I still didn’t know how to swim by the end of the school year. That’s where individual lessons would have come in handy, but I’m grateful that I at least got to spend some time in the water, even if it didn’t feel like it at the time.
As the years went by, not knowing how to swim didn’t really seem like an issue. It’s such an important life skill, but as I got older, it almost felt like I was running out of time to learn, which feels silly to write, as it’s never too late to learn. For me, my lack of confidence in the water followed me into adulthood, and it wasn’t until my trip to Barbados that I realised just how much I was missing out on.
The adult swimming lessons that finally changed things
Looking for adult swimming lessons felt so alien to me. It wasn’t like looking for a pedicure, where you’re armed with friends’ recommendations and plenty of pictures and videos of the finished result. Beyond Reddit threads and Google reviews, I had to find sessions that ticked a few boxes for me: London-based, one-to-one weekday sessions with a female instructor.
One-to-one lessons were important to me because I knew I was starting from the very beginning and needed individual support without the noise and stop-and-start of others on the same journey. It reminded me of my childhood, when it felt like my classmates and I needed to be in unison to get anything out of our lessons.
At the time, I also knew I needed to work on more than just my confidence in the water. I needed to feel comfortable around someone else in a swimming costume, and I couldn’t initially see myself doing that with a male instructor. After three initial sessions with a particular swimming company and female instructor, however, I realised it wasn’t quite right for me. Those lessons knocked my confidence, although I did get a taste of breathing techniques in the water.
Finding the right instructor
That night, I continued my search and found Learn to Swim, who have been instrumental in my swimming journey. It meant scrapping my requirement not to have a male instructor, but the company’s glowing reviews outweighed the embarrassment I initially felt about a man other than my partner seeing me in a swimming costume. I didn’t want anything else to get in the way of building my confidence.
Luckily for me, it’s now been almost six months with my instructor, and despite a lesson where I had a swimming costume mishap, I haven’t died of embarrassment. The first few lessons were particularly hard after my experience with the first company, but my instructor listened to my concerns and reassured me that I was doing well. That praise helped me feel more confident with each lesson. Since then, I’ve gone from not knowing how to swim to swimming confidently and independently, and I've developed a particular love for swimming on my back. Some days my strokes are better than others, but repetition and practice make a world of difference.
If you learnt to swim as a child, are you actually swimming as well as you think?
Since I never learnt to swim as a child, I’ve learnt everything I know so far as an adult. But for many people, their swimming experience and skills started in childhood, so they might not have developed their technique since they first learnt to swim. Sam Hunt, a swimming instructor with 17 years of experience, has been teaching me for the past six months. As a journalist and someone who asks a lot of questions, I continue to pick Sam’s brain during each session, and through this, he’s shared three common mistakes he often sees in adult swimmers.
1. Swimming too fast
“A lot of adults swim too fast,” Sam tells me. “If an adult swims too fast, they'll gas out within a few lengths and won’t be able to continue.” This is something I’m still getting to grips with: while I can always get from one end of the pool to the other quickly, I’m often left out of breath with a leg cramp or two. Slow and steady is much more manageable, and you soon realise that you can also find more power in your strokes, making it easier to keep going without the instant burnout.
2. Breath control
On my swimming journey, I’ve learnt that breathing is everything. It’s the first thing I was taught in my sessions, and it’s easy to see why. Breathing brings everything together, from how long you last in the water to how you link different strokes. It’s also another common stumbling block for adults, according to Sam. “Adults need to learn how to get into a rhythm with their breathing and body so they can sustain a comfortable pace, which will let them swim longer without drinking half the pool.”
I’ve had my fair share of accidental gulps of pool water, and sometimes still do, so I have to go back to basics and get my breathing under control before moving on to the next thing. Dare I say, it can also be quite therapeutic to tune in to your breathing and sync it with your swimming.
3. Swimming efficiency
“Lastly, I’ve seen many attempts where people climb into a pool, windmill their arms through the water, and kick their legs as hard as they can,” says Sam. “These kinds of movements can cause injury and also waste energy. Swimming is about maintaining a long body position, gliding, and saving energy through timed strokes and an efficient leg kick, which will create an elegant swimmer.”
Again, Sam often has to remind me of this, but once it’s at the forefront of your mind, it really changes how you position yourself in the water. It also makes you more conscious of those around you, because no one likes a big splasher-thrasher (unless you’re at a splash park).
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Things no one tells you about learning to swim as an adult
Learning to swim at 31 isn’t embarrassing, but at the start of my journey, it often felt that way. That was until I realised it’s one of the coolest and most important skills to learn. I’ve received some of the nicest messages, both in person and online, when I’ve shared parts of my swimming journey.
There’s a big difference between learning to swim as a child, when you’re fearless and eager to try new things, and learning as an adult, when embarrassment feels like it could kill. There’s also the vulnerability that comes with trusting yourself, your instructor and those around you to be respectful, but fear shouldn’t stop you from trying.
Thinking about learning to swim as an adult? Start here
- Figure out whether you want one-to-one or group lessons: I already had this in mind when I started looking. Since I wasn’t very confident to begin with, I knew one-to-one support would be essential. However, some people prefer a group setting. Just because you pick one over the other at first doesn’t mean you can’t change your mind.
- Poolside vs in-water instructor: I didn’t know about this at the beginning, and it isn’t always clear when you’re doing your research. I didn’t realise how important it would be to have an instructor in the water with me. At first, the idea of feeling comfortable in the water alone felt impossible, but only after having my instructor in the water with me each session did I realise just how much of a difference it made.
- Find an instructor who understands your needs: At the start of my swimming journey, I needed reassurance from my instructor that if I drowned, he would be able to save me. While this might sound dramatic, it was one of my biggest fears. Yet he reassured me every time without making me feel silly for asking. Remember, there’s no such thing as a silly question, and your instructor should make you feel comfortable asking them.
Learning to swim has been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made, and I have to remind myself how far I’ve come. I swim twice a week and constantly have swimming on my mind. Each session fills me with excitement about a new trick I could learn or an improvement I could make to my strokes. I no longer have to sit on the sidelines while everyone else gets in the water. At 31, I’ve finally learnt something I once thought I’d missed my chance to learn, and now I can’t wait to make up for all those years I spent avoiding the water. I just know my younger self would be so proud of me and think I’m the coolest person in the water.