Sick, Swim Class, Con Artist

Christian wasn't feeling well over the weekend.....it was a loonnggg weekend!
On the up side, I did get alot of my cabinets cleaned out and organized when he was sleeping.
He felt good enough Monday evening to go to swim class.  This is the next class up from the Mommy and Me class we finished a few weeks ago.  However, he is in the water by himself, with the other kids and teacher. I told him about it and he was adamant that I be in the water with him.  I tried the old, "Oh you're such a big boy now, you can swim without Mommy," routine, but he wasn't buying it.  This went on all weekend.  We would be reading a book or watching Benji (which by the way I was ready to snap that DVD in half, we watched it so many times) or coloring and he would pop up and say, "Mommy in water with Christian."  I decided that talking about it to prepare him so he would know what to expect wasn't the correct approach, so I just didn't answer and redirected the conversation.

I picked him up from school last night and the first thing out of his mouth was, "going swimming, Mommy in water with Christian."  Deep sigh, this class was going to be a challenge. I kept telling him how fun it was going to be with the other kids and he slowly started believing me.....at least that's what I thought.  He started saying, "Christian swimming, Mommy not in water."  So I took that as a good sign, wouldn't you???

He ran up the sidewalk, repeating his mantra the whole time, so excited to go swimming.  He rushed to get his suit on and ran to the pool.  We had to sit on the side and wait for about eight minutes, which made me nervous because I thought he'd change his mind.  We watched some kids on the swim team, who were laughing and having fun, and I told him that he was going to have fun like that.  He was bouncing around, smiling and chattering a mile a minute about how much fun he was going to have. YAY.....not so much.

The teacher started the class, there were only two other kids who were about 5 yrs old.  Christian moved to go into the water by the steps like we did in the other class and the teacher told him not to, but to come around to where she was.  That was all it took. He was embarrassed which turned to stubborness and he wouldn't move, he was like a 100 pound concrete statue, with a vise like grip on the railing.  I could not budge him unless I wanted to pry his hands off the railing, which I'm sure someone would have called DCFS on me.  I tossed out my best lines at trying to convince him to get into the water, but he would have none of it. The teacher tried too, but I knew that wasn't going to work because he'd never seen her before.  So the class started, with us on the sidelines, and me getting wet from the kids splashing me. Note that I am in regular clothes,  not swimwear.  Slowly, inch by inch, I managed to nudge him closer to the pool edge.  I even sat on the wet edge so he would sit beside me.  His feet were now inches away from the water and 10 minutes have passed.  Then the teacher blew it!  She came up to him, moved like she was going to pick him up, and he shot to his feet, spun around, and clamped onto the railing again.  Deep sigh.

So I started the process over again, 5 minutes later the teacher brought out this red foam floating board thing that was shaped like a gingerbread man. Christian wanted to play with it so bad and I told him he had to get into the water first.  He rushed to the edge, hands outstretched to the toy, and before he could change his mind, I picked him up and just about tossed him to the teacher, who quickly laid him on the toy and pulled him around.  He screamed for about 5 seconds and then it turned to laughter. The tide had turned! He stayed in the water the rest of the class and did everything the teacher said.  I was so nervous when they went out to the middle of the pool because he's not too steady yet in the pool and I was scared he would slip off the noodle he was hanging on, go under, and the teacher would be busy helping the other students.  I actually had this dream, so I made sure what I wore wouldn't matter if it got soaked with chlorine pool water, in case I needed to make a splash down to save him :)  But all went well and he chattered all the way home about what a big boy he was that he went swimming, "all by myself."

Tonight he came and laid down on my lap asking for me to rub his back.  A few seconds later, in a softer voice, he asked for a blanket.  Another few seconds, voice softer yet, came a request for a pillow.  He head was turned to the side on the pillow so I saw the sly little dimpled grin when he practically whispered in a weak like tone, "orange juice." HA! HA! HA!  The little con artist!  We laughed so hard and then he kept saying, "orange juice," to make me laugh.  I've never heard him laugh this hard before, all I could do was stare at his beautiful face, a huge smile spread across my own face, while the warmth and love filled my heart for him. It's moment's like those that I wish would go on forever.
~Amy