I love it

Great thread - brings back so many horrible memories. But there is a payback..

One early June holiday in Spain we discovered the only heated pool in the hotel didn't have a shallow end. I sat on the sun lounger and watched my 4 year old DD climb into the pool. She was stopped by a concerned mum (chest high in lukewarm chlorine, two toddlers attached) who asked my DD where her arm bands were. My DD laughed 'don't have any', jumped into the deep water and confidently swam across the pool to play with her 6 year old brother. I smiled (somewhat smuggly) at the astonished mum and picked up my book.

Was that moment worth nearly 4 years of weekly swimming lessons?? It kinda was!!!

hate it, thats why I pay a fortue for swimming lessons so I can hide in the cafe and watch from behind my cappucino...

yep.. for 'subtropical' read 'sub arctic'

Centerparcs is definitely a place for water-babies as the "subtropical [snigger] swimming paradise" is the only thing you get to do for free. But you can do lots of other stuff.

SO, so, so glad I found this thread - I thought I was the only person on earth who hated it with an extreme passion. My dh takes the p whenever we go (very infrequently if I can help it) and we're going to centre parcs soon - I can't avoid it there........... Harumphs off in miserable cloud of chlorine and 'hairs on the floor' loathing.

I also think it is a mistake for parents to try to teach their children to swim

even if they are very good teachers and with very good technique themselves

they are quite likely to get their children into bad habits

swimming lessons are a win win

mine swim like fish now. I like watching them. They swim so much better than I do (not hugely difficult) and their strokes just look so good. I'm glad about that.

ahh, yes, two swimming costumes at least!

we are by the sea also, yet had to wait 18mths for DD2 to get a place for swimming lessons.

it might be a pain in the *rse now, but when they can swim they can take-up surfing, sailing, canoeing, windsurfingetc they will thankyou for it in the end.

: )

DD could swim at 4, and she had swimming lessons since she was 6, she is 13 now and by yr 6 she had passed her swimming level 12, she is not a fast swimmer by any means, but she has good technique and she regularly swims 3 miles which takes her 2.5 hrs. (£50 a term)
DS on the other hand has CP, he has had private swimming lessons since he was 4 (at £15 PER HALF HOUR!!!!) he has had 5 yrs of lessons and last week he swam his 25m on his back. It costs a fourtune, you melt while waiting for them, and feel soggy your self when you get them dry, but ... it is the best thing I have ever done for both of my kids, because to paraphrase my ma, we live on an island dont you know!
My tip, two lots of cosies, and as SOON as you get back re pack the bag, then you can grab it and go.

we have three kids and now they are all at swimming lessons...

some ideas:
always have both of you go, always wear flip-flops, have a swimming bag for each child...

choose a nearby hotel for swims as a family they are usually the same price as local swimming pool, but much nicer facilities!

: )

I think that if you don't want to go yourself then you should pay for lessons and sit and read a paper with a coffee. It is an essential skill and may literally mean the difference between life and death.

I agree that it is dirty, unsalubrious, smelly, cold, uncomfortable and decidedly unhygienic.

But you still haven't taken my advice and sent them to swimming lessons - then all you have to do is take the Times with you and read. Or do the crossword. Or doze. They'll wake you up when they need a lift back.

I hate swimming with a passion and haven't ever taken my two boys. Neither of them wants to do it anyway. DH keeps saying he will take them but never has so it will be up to the school to teach them. They are less likely to throw a tantrum with their teachers so it would be easier all round.

yes i hate it too...feel in awe of those mums who manage it every week!!!
(i'd struggle simply locating all the kit needed...let alone actually go out the door1 Everytime mine go with DH...i have a nasty habit of finding the 'last weeks kit' still in the bags...just at the moment he says...2i'll take them swimming NOW..if you get their kits together!!!!"

!!!

Mountaingoat - I really wanted to take DD swimming when she was a baby, but she had terrible excema. I only started this winter when she was 2 - and she is as confident in the water as she could be - she goes under, jumps in, can do a stroke or two. I don't think she'd be better at it if we had been going regularly for the last couple of years - her standard is the same as other kids who have been going since they were babies. IMHO I don't know if your baby would get much more out of it that in a paddling pool...

Mountaingoat, I have been taking my 2yr 3month old to swimming lessons since he was four months.

He can now jump in, go underwater (we put them underwater from the first lesson), swim a stroke or two, and is very happy and confident in the water. He will be swimming unaided by the time he's three. He also loves it and will play happily in the pool for as long as I let him.

I wanted him to learn asap so he never develops a fear of water. It is much, much harder to teach a four year old who's never been swimming before. I also wanted him to swim so he can be safe. And having experienced school swimming lessons, I know that if a child doesn't already know how to swim, they are generally a chaotic waste of time.

But it's up to you. I enjoy going swimming with him - it's one of our fun things we do together. I would never tell anyone else they were a bad mother for not doing the swimming thing. Like I say, I'm lucky. I can afford a nice health club.

Public swimming provision in this country is absolutely shit and is getting worse - pools are being closed all the time by money-grabbing councils and many of those that are left are being deliberately run down so they can sell them off to developers. And then the government preaches to us about obesity and wonders why we don't like taking our kids to far-away, shitty, smelly, filthy pools. And then spends £12 billiion on the fecking Olympics. Grrrr. Sorry, rant over.

I think they get a tremendous amount from it. It is nothing like splashing in a bath! I took mine from babies.It gives water confidence and I got them swimming very early-it is a skill that might save their life one day. You can't go underwater in the bath for a start! I didn't learn to swim until I was 11 and am still not keen on going underwater so it is wonderful to have DSs who don't think twice about diving to the bottom or jumping in. I am really surprised at the amount of posters who don't like going!

Can anyone tell me - do pre school kids, and particularly babies really get anything out of swimming at a swimming pool, that they don't get from splashing around in a paddling pool/ bucket in the garden, or in the bath?

I HATE swimming with the kids for all the reasons described already in this thread (My children are 4 yo and 6 months) yet all the mums I know seem to do it. My MIL counts my failure to take mine swimming as one of my many failings as a mother.

I can see that my 4 yo may now get something from swimming lessons but what about babies?? Mine adores her bath, but that is 2 inches deep and warm. What more would she get from expensive stressful swimming lessons?? Please tell me. Fully prepared to be persuaded because at the moment I just don't get it......

If we're naming and shaming, Bramcote Leisure Centre in Nottingham. Used sanitary towels shoved down the back of the benches, plasters, eugh, makes me wince thinking about it!

I love swimming.

In my nice expensive clean health club pool.

Not in the local ones with cockroaches in the changing rooms and mould up the walls.

this thread is hilarious

Don't think I shall EVER take my dc's swimming having read this. I had never thought about how gross it really is, yuck!

HATE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AND having to remember to shave legs beforehand and suck in stomach whilst walking around pool.

Oh, and DS clinging to me for dear life and digging his sharp toe nails into my thighs...

I like soft play and love parks (we live in them as soon as the sun shines) -- the killers for me are playing Scalextrix (the cars are always coming off and what IS the point anyway???) and playing with the train set in which I really have to try hard to feign interest. But that's boys! Is it easier with girls?

that is why I pay for DD to go to swimming lessons, where I can stay fully clothes and watch sat in a nice comfy chair....

I think I fall into the toe dangler category (apart from the full make up bit). I always keep my glasses on (blind as a bat without them) and rarely get my hair wet (until the showers).

Hate, hate swimming. DD loves it but is really naughty. Stopped going when 38 wks PG and was crying constantly (me, not DD)
love soft play and parks

I see nobody has admitted to being a Toe-dangler yet

I haven't taken dd swimming since I lost my engagement ring in the changing room (i know it's got nothing to do with the swiming pool but it pissed me off). I know that the woman in the next cubicle must have picked it up too cos where else could it have gone? thieving cow.

I should really take dd now that our local one has opened again... but I so can't be arsed.

I really really hate soft play centres - anyone else?

totally agree with you Oliveoil. Nightmare. I now pay someone else to take DS swimming (his favourite thing -- would be, wouldn't it???) which is shameless of me but I don't care. Suggest you do the same. It's blissful release!

I notice a couple of people have named and shamed particularly bad pools.

Well - Gainsborough - municiple pool run by a contract compay. Shit up the walls and toilets overflowing

Miss gelly take YOURSELF a packed lunch.

I hate the dreaded Monday evening swimming lessons...inevitably, I miss out on tea when i'm rushing to get them from school to the lesson as I travel a half hour to get them to their lessons. THe thing I hate the most is that they crank the heat way up so its basically a sauna session for all the mums who have to wait... then the dreaded changing and half hour return home. Yak.

I take my two each week. We love the swimming in the water bit, but hate the getting dried at the end

I bribe them with lolly pops so I can get them both dressed and then Put DS2 in a play pen whilst I get dressed.

It is easier now they both stand in the shower, so get a good wash after. also much easier in summer with shorts T-shirts and chrocs (thats for the boys not me)

Only thing is the bloody puddles in the changing room, one slip and I just might as well not bothered getting them dry and dressed

my strategy here has been to have kids in such quick sucession that dp has to take the older kids alone, while I sit on the sofa with a yorkie bar

I will take my kids to any pool, but TIDES in DEAL. The pool is that dirty that I once saw peas floating in the water!!

It's never been my favourite activity, but it's part of having kids isn't it. To be honest, I'm was never that keen on changing pooey nappies, been woken twice a night, wiping snotty noses, being exhausted all the time, having to plan a military operation before leaving the house, etc., etc., etc., but it's part of it - and you know, when they do that first 5m - it's all worth while.
You can also look forwards to the rewards - eg, ds this weekend has been away canoeing - couldn't do that if he couldn't swim. Another good one to look forwards to is you staying at home MNing doing the housework, while dcs go off to the baths with their friends when they get older. It's also the easiets birthday party you'll EVER do. You just need to get a BIG chart, and do a tally of the number of weeks until their 8th birthday (ie, when they can go in the water without you) and then get enormous satisfaction from crossing them off each week .

Varacoise veins. If you have them, tis a no-no. Leave it to your 70yr old partner.

They look better in them, somehow ...

uqd, you forgot to add 'buxom' to the MILF's attributes.

or can you be lissom and buxom?

Parks are okay. Nothing like the hell of swimming. Everyone is fully clothed for one thing (except in high summer, when it is obligatory for there to be dads stripped to the waist - why are they ALWAYS the shaven-headed and tattooed ones as well?)

The other thing I don't get about pools is the Toe-dangler Mummies. They sit in swimsuits and FULL MAKE-UP around the edge of the toddler pool, dangling their toes in and gossiping. If I'd paid five quid to come in I'd expect a little more than that. Some of the bespectacled ones don't even take their glasses off.

And some people of both genders really really should not be wearing stuff that reveals their lardy stomachs, either. But it's sometimes worth it for the odd bronzed and lissom MILF goddess, and for the catty looks the other women throw in her direction. Always very amusing.

I like swimming, which is just as well as it is currently the only suitable exercise for dd2 with her hip problems.

DH HATES swimming. Cold, boring, kids splashing etc ....

So now dd1 is over 8, I can take all 3 in myself. He sits in the Cafe, reads the paper or works, I have fun with the kids (he has to take us as I dont drive and it is a 30 min trip on the bus each way) and then helps with the drying process.

Works well for us.

I dont think YABU to hate it, but it is good for them. I hate broccoli but I eat it with my kids!

Fizzbuzz: my technique for dissuading DD1 from drinking the swimming pool water is to tell her that it's Bum Water.

The only problem is that IT IS.

Highlight of my week is going swimming with DD1. But then our pool is fab: heated to bath temp, tons of slides and bubble beds and wave machines and we always bump into folk we know. It's what I pay my council tax for!

The deal is that DD1 gets to call the shots about what we do and where we go and how long we stay in for. Our record is 3 hours. She's 3.

TBH if the pool wasn't so good I'd probably hate it too.

Fizzbuzz - you have made me laugh so much I am in danger of making this seat moist!

(but my bum is clean)

Can't help thinking about all the athletes foot (feet?) and other horrible "moist" disease being spread everywhere.

As an earlier poster said, willies and fannies floating about, ugh. And what if stuff comes out of them?!! <barf>

Or what about unwiped bums on changing room seats? I am making myslf ill just thinking about it

I hate it with a passion. I'll only do it if I have someone else to go with (SIL, friend etc.

So much faffing about beforehand, mind-blowing tedium when you are there, and the tantrums and more faffing about afterwards.

Swimming pool too cold
Showers too cold
Toilets smelly and usually blocked
Changing rooms smelly

Does anyone else's local public pool have really filthy changing rooms? The last time we went to our local there were dirty nappies on the floor and our cubicle had shit smeared over the walls and DD2 managed to get it on her clothes, as we didn't notice until we were locked in the tiny space.

I'll name and shame: Dane's Camp in Northampton. Got that? Avoid like the plague. Full of scum. As in people not frothy pool.

I find it's managable because I go every week with three friends and their children. Moral support and someone to chat to.

Pity me - soon I get to experience the whole thing with a baby in a car seat at the side of the pool . Please baby, don't cry and make me drag furious toddler out of the pool early so I can drippingly breastfeed you in the freezing cold changing rooms.

oh I love parks

they have ice cream vans and therefore MAGNUMS

No, I hate it. Won't take them. It's punishment and I don't understand why people would take children swimming if they could at all help it.

also don't like parks - miserable cold places full of children and miserable cold grown ups.

bleugh.

Message withdrawn

oh I am pleased that most of you seem to agree (apart from the odd bods who like it, weirdos)

I used to hate it when I had to take them into the pool myself, but now DS has lessons, and I use the 30 mins to swim myself, which I really enjoy. Dont mind being a bit damp etc when weather is OK. We cycle home, which dries hair and other bits off. I do find crocs are great, as I dont have to do socks, or bother drying my feet.

I do not like swimming and so I don;t really go now. Dh did it alone for a few years and now either he goes or the dds are old enough to go alone.

The wet, the heat, the bacteria, the red face, the tangled hair, the cold - hate it all.

I swam with them every week until they were 5, and now I pay for them to have lessons. Dd had lessons from when she was 6 until the age of 11. DS has had lessons from when he was 4 (he is 9) 1:1 at £14.00 a week, I have spent £3500 he can now swim 25 metres as of last wednesday, which is so wonderful.

My DH takes ours. Every Sunday. Bliss- peace and quiet.

He makes the whole changing room thing easier by having a packed lunch in the bag for after the swim. DH gets dressed, DS1 quiet and content, then DS1 willingly gets into clothes too cos v sleepy and full.... off they go, DS1 falls asleep in car, sleeps more once home, = about 4hrs for me without a screaming 3yr old to deal with!!!!

Me? I LOVE swimming pools, for that very reason

We were on holiday a couple of weeks ago and just came out of the swimming pool showers and a mum walked in to them with her 2 boys. The older one said "Mum I want a wee" and she said - quietly, but we could hear- "Well just do it here" in the shower area - and he did! Then the little one did the same and she said really loudly "oh you are disgusting!" obviously thinking none of us heard her tell the older one to do it I know wee is sterile, but ughh

no no sounds about right. I can't bear to do it so dd only does swimming if it is at the weekends when dh can take her.

I'm so glad it's not just me. I also live in Germany where taking your kids to the open air pools in the summer is a national past time. Both my sils do it and seem to genuinely enjoy it. I don't. Can't bear the mess and the muddle, it's just all thoroughly miserable, damp and cold. <shudder>

It's a dh chore and he ropes in his dad to help.

Has anyone mentioned the used plasters and other people's hairs in those grubby damp gutters in the changing rooms, yet?

I don't go.

I really despise it too - even though we live in germany where the pools are lovely and very clean. I just hate the whoel thing, but have to go, as we have 3 so DH can't do it by himself, but I count the minutes, I really do.

i hate it too

i only swim with kids on foriegn hols in clean pool

so havent done that for 4 yrs

dh hads taken dd2 to 4 swimming parties in the last fortnight.bless him

gawd, i despise it too with a passion. the local pool is really old and crunbly, freezing changing rooms, rather suspect grime round the sides of the pool. freezing changing rooms, having to have a shower when i get home. have i mentioned the freezing changing rooms?

i like swimming on my own when i can pound up and down a pool getting rid of any stress, can't do that with DS, he just likes to lark around. am trying to teach him to swim but is a bit hit or miss.

am off to majorca next month with prvate pool for small block of flats, will be a much nicer expreience [grin}

but they don't let the kids in here

i'll go away now...

try here

I don't mind going.
I take ds to David LLoyd pool,tis much nicer than local rec.
I am a pool snob.

I hate it too,
luckily they are both old enough for lessons now, so i only have to go occasionally to the 'fancy pool with slides' in the next town with them for a treat, and they have a cafe there so i can reward myself wih a big slice of cake afterwards to get over the trauma!

I haven't done this for ages it is one good thing about being ill

it is hard bloody work

also to use the disabled entrance at the hotel gym (cannot use public pool - too cold for child with spasticity) you have to walk all the way through the restaurant, past the adventure playground and through the back of the building

it takes at least twice as long to get out as it does to swim

Message withdrawn

Ah yes. That happens to me too. And once it was one of the very few crush-worthy dads too .

For some reason I can't quite fathom we seem to have got into a routine whereby DH takes DS to his football lesson on a sunday morning and by some strange default I take DD swimming (DS has lessons at school - y-a-a-a-y!)

Every week without fail we bump into someone we know and I actually have to look at forty-something dads of children in my DCs class WITH VERY FEW CLOTHES ON. URGHH!

Yuk, Yuk, Yuk!!!

I take three mindees under 26 months every week, (with a mum with one of her own as it is ratio 2-1 here)

Its a faff getting them changed but have it down pat now, especially the getting changed after, (strip child sit them in a rubber ring on the floor put towlling poncho over them, and giv ethem a biscuit) dress yourself, kids are warm and eating so dont mind waiting and if you are dry you dont shiver so dont take so long to get kids changed.

Take them home and they all sleep till lunch time

We go on a Friday and most of the mindees go early on a Friday so its a really lovley easy day for me.

Yes I hate it too but do it out of duty: - verucas, wet kids whingeing as you try and cram them into dry clothes, horrible loos, getting there and finding the baby pool is closed due to an "incident", parking fees, washing the costumes out afterwards over the bath. Yep, great thread!

HATE IT. I break out into a menopausal sweat the minute I cross the threshold of the building.

I loathe trying to squeeze still damp children into clothes that have been dragged around a hair infested slimy floor. Makes me sweat even more.

All those feet...all those bodies... fannies and willies swishing about in the water.

God it makes me feel ill just thinking about it.

Yuk, most hated thing ever.

Wrinkled prune like skin, squelch squelch all the time including car on the way home, totally destroyed hairstyle, skin needs an entire body moisturise afterwards....and all those germs <shudder>

Hate it.

Dh takes both gilrs, has odne for the past 18 months.

And he showers thema and washed their hair at the pool, so that saves me another job!

And dd1 has swimming lessons at school now.

I like swimming with my son, but only with anither adult there to help, otherwise it's hard work. Our local kid's pool is heated, too

I like taking my two swimming. We'll be going soon.

They now swim better than I do (not hard) so I can let them bomb up and down while I lounge in the hot tub on the side of the pool!

my dh takes them both swimming olive
he can manage both
mne are the same age as yours

and why the baths when you get home?

I refuse to go because I hate it so much. I do want DD to be able to swim but I'm getting her into the local beavers where they do swimming lessons for £1. I don't have to swim in other peoples piss then <boak>

I go swimming three times a week...on MY OWN. It is blissful. I troll up and down, hatted and goggled and flippered, 60 times, with moronic determination.

And then I take DD1 to her swimming lesson. And sit on the side with my clothes on.

I hate it but manage to avoid it these days(mostly) thanks to dh and swimming lessons. But I love it when they arrive home tired out, chilled and already showered.

The swimming bit is ok but all the changing, bathing, wet hair and OTHER PEOPLE palavar is a drag. That's why it's dh's 'special time' with them

I hate it with passion.

My mum seems to enjoy it.

She takes ds when she looks after him.

Thank god.

I used to do a lot of swimming/training as a teen, but can't stand public swimming, especially public swimming plus small child.

Standing round in a cold pool/cold changing rooms with puddles on floor/small child flinging clothes in said puddles/smell of chlorine over both of us/having to sort out all wet gear when get home.

None is my idea of fun.

Don't really like taking my 2 dds by myself as i have to stay in the baby pool, bored out of my mind.
But lately, my DH who is a total non-swimmer has started to come with us, so he gets to look after DDs and i can go to the big pool and have some fun.
Even got myself some goggles and ear plugs so that i can swim underwater (used to manage a width totally underwater when i was younger, and last week even managed to float on my back for a whole lenght.
But the one thing that annoys me about swimming pools, are the people who hog the showers.
There was a whole familly (about 5) all using one shower each, not even washing, just standing under it.
My DDs had just got out of the pool and wanted to warm up under the shower, but would the father move his little girl to be with him?
Of course not, my DD2 (aged 3), just got under with the girl, who promptly pushed her out, did the dad say anything? NO.
Luckily for him, by then someone else had moved so we all got under one shower, with the shower hoggers looking on.

love it! Orinoco - you sum up my trips precisely! My 2 are just 3 and 2 so I have to add that I spend half the time jumping out the pool with legs wobbling to chase after them as they run around the pool. Oh and give the spectators a right eyeful when I bend over to to put on arm bands! You also have to avoid the bored peepholes in the communal changing cubicles!

I hate it, it's such a faff!

Fight to get kids out of the house. Go back in to fetch dd2's swimming bag which she's left inside. Drive to swimming pool, drive around car park sixteen times till you get a space. Get changed in hideously overcrowded changing room, dd1 drops her clothes on wet floor, dd2 wanders off and into the showers. Into the pool and spend the next 3/4 hour spinning head furiously trying to keep an eye on both dd's at opposite ends of the pool. Panic when dd1 disappears, but then realise she's just holding her breath underwater.
Leave pool accompanied by chants of "I'm cold" x 2. Back into packed changing room (avoiding used plaster on the floor). Fight with locker, kicking, cursing, till dd1 points out that it's not our locker, ours is the one next to it. Open locker door, entire contents spill onto wet floor. Get dd's towels, rub one dd dry whilst the other chants "I'm cold". Dry the other whilst the first wanders into the showers/falls over on the wet floor and gets wet through again. Realise haven't brought towel for self - but then again don't need one as it's taken so long I'm dry already. DD's trail swimming bags through puddles on the way out of changing room, then pick them up so that they leave damp patches on their backs. Try to sneak past the crisp machine "It's broken darling" "But Mummy that boy just got some out" and repeat under breath "we are never coming here again"... until the following week.

I am surprised that you all hate it-I took them from babies-one of my favourite outings!

It's not so bad in the summer months when I am wearing three quarter length trousers or shorter skirts with sandals.
Different story in the winter when jeans/trousers get soaked on the floor as I try to step into them when getting dressed.
I usually cover the little bench with a towel and stand my son on it whilst I dry and dress him. So his clothes stay dry...but if I were to stand on the bench I am quite sure I would be arrested for spying on others getting changed in surrounding cubicles!!!

Best part of swimming? Listening to all the cubicle conversations that go on round about!! (But then I am nosey)

Olive, you'd love our new pools, honest
They are so fab - tropically warm, we have a changing "village" so families can all change together (and take turns in hoisting damp little girls into their leggings) and spotlessly clean. Our bit of London "does" swimming pretty well - we also have flume-infested nightmares nearby too. But this new build for "real swimming" is so simple and cleanly done, it's a joy. And packed with happy swimmers of all shapes and sizes.

Gave it up for all the reasons above (especially the awful moistness combined with awful heat, noise and general muckiness), but especially because it was £3.50 to watch DS2 fail to learn to swim week after week after week in a HUGE class. He would walk across the pool about 7 times per lesson which was 50p per walk.

you forgot the veruccas they'll\you'll pick up

My eldest didn't go into a pool until she was 5. Then "told" she was having swimming lessons [harsh mother] and now swims like a fish. And goes on her own - result. I was a single mother who couldn't/can't swim so easy decision for me.

I hated it with a vengeance. However I am so crap at swimming myself didn't want them to grow up with the same handicap, so at least they can now both save themselves (& me if i misguidedly tried to jump in to help them out) Still remember the disproportionate joy of finding an empty family changing room on the day, the awful smell of chlorine (why is it linked to smelly socks?) & embarrassment of being asked why I had a "hairy front bottom" by a friend's child!

Hate paying five quid for the privilege of standing in cold, chlorinated water and having other people's brats kick more cold, chlorinated water over me while I watch mine on the slides for an hour. Yuk. I try to get out of it whenever possible.

well, yes, but they need to learn to swim don't they?

and I can't force dd1 to do lessons if she doesn't want to, dh can't take them both as one or the other wants holding a lot of the time

so we both have to go [grits teeth]

Don't do it then. I never have

I dont mind the swimming its the after bit I cant stand. Took ds and dd1 this afternoon and they feck about soo much while I try ot change that I may as well just dunk dd1 in the pool dressed as her clothes are always wet when we come home..

yanbu BUT there is a solution y'know

send them to swimming lessons

this means they get to do the changing rooms, cold, unpleasant, other people routine while you read the paper

at the end you get to smile sweetly and say "Did you have a lovely time?"

fab new swimming pool opened by us, been for the last 4 weeks (started day after it opened). Me, dp, dd's went this morning and they love it now. But agree it is wonderfully new and clean which is a plus point- the old one was yucky!
My dd1 will now jump into the pool by herself and swim- [kicks legs furiously whilst wearing arm bands] and dd2 no longer has to stay by the steps- fab fab fab

YANBU, they are like plague pits. We've more or less stopped going after ds1 came back and promptly came down with a stinking cold/chest infection/other ghastliness about four times in a row. They're still small (1 and 2) but poor old ds2 has never yet been in a pool. Ugh.

And when I see old sticky plasters in the showers. Ugh ugh ugh.

Good job Maureen is on holiday or she'd be on this thread like a flash. She HATES swimming with a passion too!!

love love love swimming, I go at least twice a week, and always take the kids at the weekend. How else do you get your kids confident in the water and swimming well?

If you heard the way a swimming teacher at my local pool spoke to a little boy who was crying and terrified yesterday when I was there you would make yourself go and teach your kids to swim and not give that bitch a penny of your hard earned cash. I wanted to punch her.

Find a decent pool, go on a weekend afternoon rather than the morning (less packed) and make it fun for your kids.

I urge you, all you petri-fied of the petri-dish!!!!

dd1 has point blank refused to do lessons yet, water is one of many things on the list of stuff she is scared of so I will have to go with her for a while yet unfortunately

but every Sunday morning I think ohhhhhh ffs, do I have to, like I am 14

swimming lessons at school here worth every penny plus you now need one adult per child under 8 at pubic pool so can't take them anyway .

Cold, wet and stink of chlorine and it involves hair washing - absolutely my idea of hell.

Absolutely pmsl at this as I was talking to a friend today about this exact topic.

Fortunately, dd1 goes in on her own for lessons, but I still hate the mad rush from school, the fight to get the sodding swimming hat on, the heat of the changing room etc etc.

Dh takes the girls swimming outside of lessons thankfully. I cannot bear placing my feet on the pube-ridden floors - eugghhhhhhh!

lessons or swimming club. parent not required

love it here too! where we used to live the pool was like a petri dish, always wished i had wellies for the changing rooms. where we are now the pool is fab. dd loves it and asks to go every day. once a week is enough

"awful moistness" <<shudder>>

Actually this thread is making me feel a bit queasy...I could also link it to the recent verruca thread, would be v relevant imo!

AND dd2 announced loudly today that she could see my hairy bum (again) to the changing room

it is a regular occurance

I am waiting for dd1 to agree to going for lessons and then I can loll about in the cafe watching through the window

I skim read this and thought Franny had put that the receptionist helped to get her changed, not her ds. Flip I thought, she must have been in a very bad way.