Help me get my DS swimming

[Littleunicorndreams]

We are struggling with getting my DS swimming. He is 4 and he has always been nervous and reluctant in the water, unlike DD who has always been a water baby (by 3 she was confident to go unaccompanied into a swimming class.)

DS has sensory issues with getting his face and hair wet which obviously is a problem, even washing his hair in the bath can be a challenge. Anyone had this? Any tips on how to help a DC get more confident with this?

We don’t manage to go swimming as a family very often ( maybe once a month?) and DS will not be able to join a swimming class at the moment. So I am trying to think of strategies to help?

He is ok if he is wearing a boyancy aid and has his feet firmly on the bottom, but needs DH or me to be holding him tight to take his feet off bottom or comfort him of his face gets splashed. If he gets out of his depth or splashed he panics and gets hysterical...

Both DH and I are confident swimmers and do ( or did) a lot of water sports - so we would really like DS to be at least safe around water. (I don’t expect him to take up water sports but would like him to be safe around water IYSWIM.)

Any help would be appreciated.

This was me many years ago. I couldn't stand water and hated it touching my face even when being bathed by my parents I was hysterical.

I'd say swimming lessons where you can be involved would be fantastic so he knows he's got someone that he trusts with him.

I'm 23 now and I'm still not 100% on water on my face in the shower but am confident enough to jump in the sea!

Book him into decent swimming lessons, with a small number of children (3 or fewer) per class.

Does he wear goggles? When Ds was 4 and similarly scared of water I bought him the type of goggles which are more like a mask. It didn’t solve everything but it did help a lot.

My son was like this. Diagnosed with ASD around age 10. I've spent horrendous money on 121 lessons with minimal results. Things only started to get better after he started specialist asn swimming lessons. He's still shit at swimming but can do enough to be allowed to do most watersports. It turns out he hated water in his eyes so goggles really helped. So did swimming lessons when there are far fewer people in the pool.

Tbh I start with the bath.

Lots of bath toys and maybe even putting his buoyancy aid on him (after you've got him clean).

You need to try and associate water with fun.

I'd especially look at goggles. Made a big difference to DS. His issue with washing hair/water on the face was getting it in his eyes. As soon as he realised goggles would prevent this it was a game changer (he'd wear them in the bath getting his hair shampooed with zero fuss).

He then started to have fun in the bath blowing bubbles, putting his face underwater (we got him a submarine bath toy) and he loved being able to see it underwater with his goggles on.

From there the swimming pool was a breeze (taking some of his favourite water toys).

Good luck

Ds was like this. Terrified of water, and it took years of patience to get him to put his face under. But with an excellent swim school (who had more patience than me!) we got there in the end. He won’t be winning medals at the olympics but he can now do all his strokes competently and enjoys swimming for fun, and even snorkelling.

Talk to all the swim schools you can find to suss out how sympathetic they are, and how experienced they are at working with kids with a fear of water. Ask parents you know for recommendations. Our swim school was simply amazing, but we tried others first which were not.