Subject: RE: Swimming Anxiety I had exactly the same problem. I am soooo not a swimmer, but was making decent progress in the pool. But - every time I hit OW (for me, whenever it got deep enough that I couldn't stand up ) - I'd panic and start hyperventilating. Funny how hanging on to lifeguard buoys don't help your swim time. At my last race, I decided that I was going to start out reeeaaallllllyyyy sllllooooooowww.... I mean, if I were going any slower, I'd be swimming in place. What I was going for, though, was getting my stroke going and making sure that there was NO WAY that I'd exacerbate my anxiety by pushing my heart rate up from swimming too fast. And wonder of wonders, that worked. Once I started feeling comfortable, I sped up a little, but still kept the pace nice and easy. The only downside - I ended up between waves swimming by myself and that really magnified my awful sighting ability. But, I'm okay with that. In the end, I took over 10 minutes off my swim time from last year, and exited the water not feeling exhausted (or like I had almost drowned! ). That said - if you have the opportunity, OW practice is probably the best way to tackle this problem. |