The swim I never had...and the one I did

On dealing with disappointment

I think, maybe it was the swim that did happen that in its own roundabout way caused the swim that didn’t.

That and, oh an avalanche of other things. In reality, something was bound to happen.

It started in early February. A text from my swimming friend:

‘It’s sign-up time! What do you think??’

My heart stopped in horror. Last year we talked about this event longingly. Having missed the booking deadline, we promised we would do it together this year.

But that was then.

Now, all I could think was: Really? This year? She can’t be serious. There is no way. No way this year that I can swim between the two piers in Brighton. I just can’t. How can I find time to train? How can I fit it in with hospital trips and keeping tabs on my son’s complex treatment schedule? And how can I dream to swim so far in the deep rocking sea when I haven’t swum anywhere at all since October? And mostly, what about the unpredictability of our days? Who knows where we’ll be in my son’s treatment schedule by 27^th June 2026?

‘Well…you could just sign up and see?’ suggested my husband.

I gave it a few days, then went to the local pool, trying not to cry as I drove. The resistance within me was immense. I don’t love the pool: too busy, too chlorinated. I was tired. I had other things on my mind. What was I even doing? I swam two lengths and stopped, panting for breath, weeping into my goggles. Pathetic. I kept going but, even with lots of rests still only managed 20 lengths.

‘It’s been too long. I can’t do this. It’s been too long, I can’t do this.’ The refrain repeated in my soul.

But something made me try again, on a better day. I managed more. Not enough, but enough to make me decide. In my insanity, and for my sanity, I signed up, knowing n one could actually force me to do it if I wasn’t ready by June. I had little to lose.

And then I went for it.

Between hospital appointments and my (admittedly very part-time) work, while my son was at school, I would nip round to the pool to build up my lengths and my strength. Then, on an unseasonably warm day in late February, we went for a beach walk and I threw in swim things, ‘Just in case’. It became my first sea swim of the year. Short and breathtakingly sharp. Also sublime.

I built and built on those tedious pool swims, interspersing them with delicious sea dips as often as was logistically possible. We measured the length between groynes, calculating how many times we needed to swim them. Around a month before the event, we were swimming pretty much the full distance in the sea, managing the currents and waves and everything.

It actually felt like it might be possible!

Early one Saturday morning, two weeks before the swim date, we went down to the coast. The previous day, we had received devastating, heartbreaking news about a friend. I was still in shock and, as much as anything, I wanted to swim it out. To let the sea wash it all away, for a time at least.

I winced a little as I walked from the car and across the greenway to the beach path. My hip had been playing up but past experience told me the sea would numb that pain too. The sea always made things better.

We pushed through shrubby bushes to a secluded section of beach where a couple of other swimmers were getting ready. Stared at the water.

‘Oh.’ we looked at each other. ’Oh no!’

The weather was perfect, the tide was right, but… it was rough. Was it safe to swim? We debated for a while. Many times I have simply had to turn around in fear. I won’t risk a dangerous sea. But this one was borderline. We hesitated, wandering down towards the water to gauge the waves. As the other swimmers launched themselves in, we took confidence.

‘Let’s just try. Get out if it’s too much.’

And so, we swam. We swam and laughed in delight. The wild sea threw us around in the waves, but we didn’t feel any danger, and it was deep enough to swim close to shore.

Maybe in the end, that Saturday morning was the swim I needed. The wild lilt of big unbroken waves. Sunlight reflecting on their giant curves. Tossed around but still in control. Held safely in a tumultuous time. It felt like the best theme park ride ever. The lack of inhibition, the freedom. The adrenaline. I didn’t want to stop.

We came stumbling out after 45 minutes, with the satisfaction that we had swum over 1km – the distance we needed to cover in two weeks’ time. If we could do it in that free-spirited sea, we could do it anywhere.

‘I’m so wobbly!’ I laughed as we congratulated ourselves. We walked in sea-drunk zig-zags to the Bluebird for coffee, gazing again at the gleaming turquoise water. Returning to the car, relieved I wasn’t driving, I joked how my legs still didn’t feel quite stable.

‘Those waves were just crazy! That was the most amazing swim ever!’

And yet.

The following morning, my left leg was still feeling a little odd. Wobbly. There was a weakness in it. I couldn’t lift my foot when I walked. My hip was raging. As the day progressed it got worse. I checked it out. Nothing serious. Just a strange side effect of sciatica apparently – it was something I occasionally suffered from, but never like this.

I allowed myself a gentle pool swim a couple of days later. Slow and short. 30 lengths. I didn’t want to push my luck. There were still another ten days though, and I read that 80% of swimming is in the arms. I should still be ok.

Then, with a week to go and after a busy few days of hospital to-ing and fro-ing ending with a stress-and-rush filled Saturday, the crunch came. A literal crunch.

We had arrived harassed at a concert and, walking to the stadium entrance, arms full of drinks, tickets and my phone, I paused to take a photo. Realising I was losing the others, I hurried ahead.

I didn’t see the patch of wonky cracked paving. There was the hum of rush, the layers upon layers of stress, my weak leg, my foot not lifting up enough, all of it a fatal combination. As I tripped, my mind fumbled for the best way to steady myself without dropping everything. And failed. I landed flat on my left arm. Agony fizzed through my being. As soon as I was up, I knew I would faint if I didn’t sit down again.

My first thought was, ‘The swim! Oh no! The swim!’

Yes. The swim. Of course, the swim didn’t happen. At least not for me. And that was devastating.

Instead, I went along with my family, my arm in a sling, to cheer on my friend. As I watched a flamboyance of pink-hatted swimmers fling themselves into the waves, all I could think was ‘That should be me!’ The yearning and sadness not to be in there with them was as deep as the sea itself.

A thought struck then. Pretty much all the disappointments this year have fallen squarely onto our son’s shoulders. While we’ve tried to allow him as much freedom and normality as possible, he has had to say no to countless things he would have loved. Missing my swim is a microscopically teensy taste of what he’s been putting up with. Literally nothing in comparison.

I wanted so much for this to be a victory story, a 'look-what-I-did-despite-the-odds' story. But it's not.

It turns out, it's a 'learning-to-deal-with-disappointment' story.

I wanted to be that person who achieves a great thing. But it wasn't my time. Maybe, though, the biggest thing is managing to look that disappointment square in the face and say, 'Actually, it's ok.'

Because, perhaps it was never about ticking off that one big swim. Maybe it was about all the swims along the way. The quiet beaches and wide waves lulling in sunlight… the evening of post swim fish and chips at the water’s edge with friends… the steady commitment of keeping going… the glow after a particularly long one.

So no. I didn’t get my big impressive swim.

But maybe, what I really needed this year, were all the ones I did.