Swimming into the deep end for the first time…you know how to swim, arms move right over left as you emerge your face into the water, pull through, kick your legs, and take a breath, repeat. You open your eyes to see where you are at. You finally have taken a chance and found yourself in a place that is unfamiliar to you. You panic just enough to send an adrenalin rush through your body. You realize you have taken a chance and now you are here, in the deep end. You are scared.
As you tread in the water you turn around and see what you have left behind. Not too far away you see the water begins to get shallow, you see the steps that will guide you out of the water. You see what is familiar to you. Doesn’t seem so scary now, does it???
The time has come now where you have to venture down and see just how deep it is. You tell yourself, you are not scared. You have held your breath under the water a million times. You know when it is time to come up to breathe, to breathe to breathe You have ventured to touch the bottom a few times and you let the water bring you up to the surface to breathe yet again. But fear has over come you and you think you might drown. You look around and no one is there, no one is there to save you if in fact you did drown. You swim back to what is familiar.
Swimming into the deep end for the second time…you know how to swim, arms move right over left as you emerge your face into the water, pull through, kick your legs, and take a breath, repeat. You open your eyes to see where you are at. You finally have taken a chance and found yourself in a place that is familiar to you. You panic just enough to send an adrenalin rush through your body. Rush soon turns to a sense of warmth and you realize you have taken a chance and now you are here, in the deep end yet again. Doesn’t seem so scary, now does it?!?
The time has come now where you have to venture down and touch the bottom. You tell yourself, you are not scared. You have held your breath under the water a million times. You know when it is time to come up to breathe, to breathe to breathe. You have ventured to touch the bottom a few times before and you let the water bring you up to the surface to breathe yet again. But fear has over come you again and you think you might drown. You look around and no one is there, no one is there to save you if in fact you did drown. You have been here in the deep end so many times before and finally you make the decision to sink or swim. To drown or to breathe, regardless of who is around.
You flip your body upside down and go in head first. You’re doing it. You’re really doing it. You are almost there. You find the bottom of the deep end. You made it. You’re not scared. You are almost out of breath so you see how much longer you can go before exhausting yourself. You swim to the top just in time to catch your breath.
The first time I ever went swimming in the deep end I was faced with challenges that I can’t even begin to explain. It was the first time in my life that I thought I was going to drown. I made a promise to myself that I would take the next 5 years of my life learning how to swim. July 1, 2010 I celebrated my 5th year of being Cancer Free. They say I am cured now. They say I can swim anywhere I want. So I did. So now I am free, to breathe to breathe to breathe!!!
