Why cant i swim??

Question

Hi am 14 yrs old. I've been going for swimming classes for the last one week. I've have learnt how to kick in water but somehow when the coach leaves my hands n make me attempt to reach the railing of the pool, i get scared and go right under the water. And i dont manage to keep my head under water for more than 7 sec and i dont open my eyes.

Answer 1

its ur phobia..once you come out of that phobia..you can do it easily.. :-)

all the best

Answer 2

you are just scared, and when you get scared you simply DROWN. think of the water as you friend. I know this may sound g*y, but when I was about 7 years old, I learned how to swim by playing a personal game called "Mermaid game". I simply imagined myself as a mermaid, and all of a sudden, I started swimming perfectly.

try wearing water goggles, they help a lot.

Answer 3

it will come in time dont worry u just have to learn the basics for you to do the stroke without struggling

Answer 4

Because you're afraid.  Maybe this will help:  courage is not the absence of fear.  Courage is doing what has to be done despite the fear.

Besides, you can float.  Float first.  Also, open your eyes underwater.  It doesn't hurt very much, and sometimes not at all.  It depends on the water.  Things look amazing under water.  Do you want to miss that?

EDIT:  Float on your back with your ears under the water line.  You'll be amazed how relaxing it is...all you can hear is your own thoughts.  As long as you keep breathing, you'll keep floating, I promise!

Answer 5

Oh well just dont do swimming in the future!

Answer 6

I know this may be discouraging, but I took swimming lessons at the YMCA for probably 4 years and summer camps for maybe 6 years. The teachers always seemed to be very insistent on details like how you did the side stroke and the breast stroke and the Australian crawl. They seemed to believe that I was some sort of idiot /coward. I hated every minute of it.

I was never comfortable putting my head under water or opening my eyes under water.

In those days boys at the Y were expected to swim in the nude. It would probably be considered child abuse now.

And the water always seemed like it was too cold.

I think that I finally passed the test with the side stroke.

My mother was afraid that I would drown. My solution was to never go into water that was above my knees.

My sister was in synchronized swimming events for years.

I'm 65 and although we have a pool in our apartment complex, I get in it about once a year and float on those swim noodles.

Your mileage may vary. Good luck.

Answer 7

Because you are dealing with a phobia of water. This needs to be overcome before you can start learning to swim. I am the same way. I still can't swim to this date.

I'm 2 years older than you by the way. =)

Answer 8

just take it gradually and don’t force it, took me more than a week to learn to swim. as some people have said you could be scared of water just because 14 years old is quite late to start learning to swim and you have developed a phobia but you haven’t mentioned that really and you can still be in water with the coach. i think the main problem is that you feel out of control when the coach leaves you

you said you have learnt how to kick in water which is good but kicking in swimming is to propel you forwards not to keep your head above the water if you do not move your arms allot it will not be easy to keep your head above the water. You said "when the coach leaves my hands" if the coach is holding your hands this will encourage you to do nothing with them.you need to move your hands in any way just remember that when you move in water you are trying to push the water away and use it as something to push against rather than just moving your hand through the water

you also need to make sure you are breathing correctly, this will change depending on what stroke you are doing but you need to breath because the air in your lungs will keep you above water you will notice when you breath out you start to sink which can make some people panic this can make you try to take quick sharp breaths which will not help you much because you are not getting much air into your lungs.

it doesn’t really matter that you don’t open your eyes i closed my eyes when i first learnt and went underwater just because of the chlorine in the pool

gd luck :)

Answer 9

you won't try