I've got 73 days left until I ship out. It feels like an eternity away but I'm sure that time will fly and before I know it I'll be in the push-up position being yelled at by Drill Sergeants. :-)
I realize it's been a week and half since my last post. I'm finding that while I'm in DEP (delayed entry program) there isn't a lot of stuff going on. I will try to post updates every week or two and fill ya'll in on my basic training preparation is going.
My focus this past week has been swimming. For those of ya'll who don't know, I HATE swimming. In the past I have had a tendency to freak out and panic when the water would get up to my chin...I have never even learned how to go under water without holding my nose. One part of OCS is a water survival test. There are multiple parts to it but in essence they want to make sure you can survive in water with your ACU's on and all your equipment. This link gives an outline of what the water survival test encompasses.
With the help of a few friends, I have decided to overcome my fear of water and learn how to swim. The first day of lessons was slow and I felt like an idiot through the whole thing. What 25 year old doesn't know how to swim?! I had to get past my pride and just do it. I was taught how to go underwater without holding my nose and how to stay under water without floating back up. That may seem incredibly easy for most of ya'll but for me it was a huge obstacle to overcome. Day 2 we moved into the deep end (9ft)...anything beyond 4ft is a "deep" end for me haha. I was taught how to freestyle swim and breast stroke (I'm still not very good with that one). This was also a big day for me because it was the first time for me to jump off the diving board. The rest of the week I've been focusing on improving my water treading time. The first time I tried to tread water it was for 45 sec but now I'm up to 2 1/2 minutes. Swimming is easy for most people but it's been a fear of mine since I was a little kid. All in all I'd say that this has been a very productive week. :-)
Unfortunately my work-outs have not been very good this week. I'm going to have to step those up next week.
I'll let you in on a little secret... I'm gonna be 25 and I can't swim very well either. I cannot hold my breath underwater without holding my nose. If any water goes in my nose I panic. It's horrible. I can doggie paddle and tread water for a short amount of time but that's about the extent of my swimming abilities. One summer I learned to actually swim but then the weather got bad, then the next summer I didn't swim and the next I didn't and before you knew it I forgot how. lol.
ReplyDeleteGood luck on that water survival test!