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With the waves slapping in my mouth and up my nose… I heard the helicopter, and thought it had come for me!... Setting your own challenge as a parent, what do you and your children gain?


I am 41 and my mum is the most supportive person I know, positive with my children, positive attitude in work, resilient and wise. The one thing my mum is a little of, is risk averse. There are many reasons for this, one being, living with my dad, her husband, who regularly did risky things that didn’t pay off.

Last year I announced to her that I was going to swim the Solent in aid of the Ian Pratt MND foundation. I casually said ‘you know, swim from mainland to the Isle of Wight, hundreds of people have done it’. Hundreds of people haven’t done it in fact, but I decided to lie a bit to get her on board. She said
I’m worried, it’s dangerous’ when that didn’t seem to have an impact; she said ‘is it not a little irresponsible, you’ve got a husband and two children’

Driving these not so helpful responses was anxiety and love. As parents when we predict an outcome or share our worry, we are saying I can’t sit, feel and tolerate the anxiety. Don’t get me wrong, my mum has done her fair share of tolerating anxiety (she has 4 strong willed children), but she was asking me not to invite anxiety unnecessarily. After her initial worry, she understood and became very supportive about the swim.

So, when you have a teenager that is creating anxiety and worry in you, it is hard to decide to challenge yourself, do something risky and grow from it, because it feels like you have no more room for anxiety of your own.

Nearly everybody has heard reference to the comfort zone, there are lots of inspirational people speaking inspirational quotes about personal growth. What are the central messages in these quotes? Challenge and determination wins the day and changes you. None of these quotes say ‘yes you feel scared sh**less and your waking at 3am with your heart pounding out your chest, but forget all that. Just do it’.

What I’m going to explain in this blog, is that when that is happening, the exact thing to do is to embark on a challenge of your own. Here is why.

·       Because it gives you a sense of the bigger picture; loosing perspective is easy as a parent and our friends want to seem empathetic and supportive so they say things like ‘no wonder your worried, I would be’ and it might be something big to worry about, but worry isn’t action and it rarely provides answers as it is coming from the amygdala, which is the emotional part of the brain.

·       Setting up a challenge is acknowledging to yourself and to other family members that you have a need as important as all their needs. Yes, you are a parent, but you are allowed a life and to be passionate about things.

·       When you have signed up for something, you are forced to dedicate the right amount of time to it. This is a good thing, it gives you timeout, a different focus, an interest to read about and learn.

·       It gives you another aspect of identity, not just a parent but a mature student maybe, triathlete, reading club coordinator, swimmer.



Now if you will allow and read on, I would like to tell you about my challenge; which will explain the title of this blog and you will learn what lessons I took from it.

5am start, I wake my nine-year-old, I wake my husband (bags already packed) and we start on the road, 300 miles down to Portsmouth.

My safety briefing is at 1pm and my swim starts at 2pm. I have raised nearly £1600 and trained in a disused quarry that is a dive centre for about 9 months. Sometimes I have swum in water as low as 6 degrees. What has this taught me? That my body can endure short bursts of very cold water and that water invigorates me.

What has my training taught me? That with some improvements and hard work, I am as capable as any other swimmer to complete this swim. Ceri, my trainer trusts me to put the work in and tunes into my need to succeed. She teaches me that there is no short cut or easy way.

Prior to my swim I researched about Motor Neurone Disease and the Ian Pratt foundation and have learnt that life expectancy of people diagnosed with MND is on average between 3 to 5 years, around half will die within 14 months. MND kills around 5 People every day in the UK. Ian Pratt who was diagnosed in 2012 wants to raise awareness that this disease will eventually deprive him of the ability to walk, to move, to talk, to eat and breathe. His foundation funds support, awareness and research. To learn more about the terrific work they do go to https://www.facebook.com/IanPrattMNDF/ or
http://www.swimmingthesolent4mnd.com/contact-us/

We arrive and go through the safety briefing. The Solent is a strait that separates the Isle of Wight from main land England and is a major shipping lane for military, passenger and freight vessels. Every swimmer has a safety Kayaker and there are two safety motor boats for everyone, just in case. The distance we need to swim is 2.5 miles, but with currents you can end up swimming close to 3. Safety is the priority, we talk about procedures for when we struggle during swimming.

We are given Ian Pratt MND wristbands to take over the Solent. Those wristbands are sent to people all across the world who have lost a loved one to Motor Neurone Disease.

I stand on the beach in my wetsuit, thermal hat, gloves and boots. I could be in the water for over two and a half hours. I don’t want to get cold. I have specially made moulded earplugs and a tight rubber cap over my first thermal cap, hearing is limited, not the best idea.

The wind is picking up a little; I kiss my son and husband and get in the water. Zippy and Paul, my Kayakers have spoken to me, telling me to keep close, but a safe distance as not to collide. Zippy has swam the Solent, I am in safe hands.

I start swimming, I’m terrified.

I realise my training bears no relevance to the task I need to complete. I feel in trouble and I keep stopping. I keep trying but get a mouth full of water every time a wave comes. All I think is “I have another 2 hours of this”. Zippy shouts that ‘it will get better when we get past the big metal buoy,’ she shouts it again, she is smiling and is optimistic and encouraging.

This moment is probably the most important in all the swim, what did it teach me? It taught me that you guess your own limitations when rational thinking shuts off when scared or worried, but here was a person seeing me differently. Zippy didn’t know my thinking, she didn’t see those limitations. She was saying its ok, I’ve felt that and I get it, but let’s press on.

Later I learnt that my son started to cry on the beach at that moment, because he could see that I was struggling. My husband reassured him that the whole event was surrounded by safety measures and that the worst thing that could happen was that I didn’t complete the swim, but no harm was going to come to me.  

I swapped sides with the kayak and got into a rhythm. It felt like I was managing, I was getting used to the task. Maybe just over a mile in, a second kayak came to sandwich me in and ensure my direction was right. The sea was a bit choppy with swells. The current was so strong that it was pulling us east. I could hear a helicopter overhead. I turned and said to the new kayaker ‘that helicopter isn’t for me, is it’ he laughed and shouted ‘no if that helicopter was for you, my face would look a lot more worried than it does now’

I was disappointed with the need for a second kayaker, but later I have learnt that my helpers were giving me the best possible chance of completing the swim in the correct place.

We pressed on, all the time these people believing that I could complete this swim. The current was so strong that it was decided we would abandon our planned landing point near the pier and instead come in on the sands about half a mile east.

Just over the half way point I got stuck in a current, I was swimming and swimming and not moving, a decision was made to move me sideways, I panicked and said ‘I’ve got to do the full distance’, the guy on the boat shouted back ‘you are still doing the distance, we aren’t moving you any further in across the swim, just sideways’

The sensation of sea swimming when you are out in the middle is a little like being in a washing machine on a gentle hand wash wool cycle, the motion is never ending, sometimes gentle swaying, but often, steady solid rocking. I began to feel seasick so I started to sing the songs my sister and I had chosen exactly for this purpose. Stand By Me is a great song and even more poignant in this task.  

I don’t know how much further it was after that point, my sensory deficit with ear plugs and fogged up goggles obscured my distance gauging abilities. What I do know is that I have never been happier to see sand beneath the water on my way in.

My husband and son waded out to greet me, my son said

you’ve done it, I’m so proud’ I started to cry and replied

I struggled it was really hard’

My son replied ‘YEAH BUT YOU DID IT’

What a fantastic life lesson to watch and digest as a nine year and a fourteen year old.

So, what have I learnt and gained from this challenge?

·       That other people can see your potential and if you allow yourself, you can trust those people and learn something about your capabilities.

·       That even in the worst time when I was scared, my commitment became unwavering because these people believed in me as did my family and friends.

·       That as a parent, you need something else to push you through and work towards. To explore, work on and develop that other aspect of you that has nothing to do with parenting.

·       I feel emotionally stronger and a little changed in some way. I set a goal, I worked towards that goal when things got in the way. I felt fearful, but I achieved, and that makes my heart feel bigger.

If you would like to donate to the Ian Pratt MND foundation on my just giving page, this is the link to follow

My trainer was Ceri Smith of The Aquatic Body 
https://www.facebook.com/theaquaticbody/

Please share and like this blog to raise awareness for this fantastic charity.

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