Priorities and Sacrifice with Swimming and Family

I love swimming!
I love my children!

I would like to share my struggles with finding a balance with these two loves. Quite often I feel torn between the two and feel that giving focus or attention to one is sacrificing the other.

Training for swimming these last few months has been harder than I ever imagined.

Swimming is not only healthy exercise, but it is therapy, relaxing, stress relieving, and comforting for me. It is my “me” time. When I swim, I don’t focus on the other stresses of home or life; I focus on swimming alone. How is my stroke, how are my times, how does the water feel, etc.? With taking time to swim, I’m a better wife and mother.

I have a goal (and have already paid) to do another marathon swim this summer. I like having a goal to do one big marathon swim each summer. It gives me something to push towards and work for. Yes, I’ve had some unsuccessful swims due to weather, conditions, or illness in the past couple years, but I’ve also been able to push my body beyond what I knew was possible. I swam 20-hours non-stop 6 months after having a baby, while still breastfeeding. I trained for a marathon swim and attempted it after severe burns, while being pregnant. I know my body is capable of hard things. The physical training is not what has been difficult over the past few months.

I feel torn between swimming and my family. Having both a toddler and a new baby has made finding time to swim so incredibly hard. Ideally I would swim before my kids wake up in the morning, or after they go to bed in the evening. However, the swimming pool is not open at those times. And during the day, I am home alone with the kids and cannot leave them alone. Even open water swimming before 4:00 p.m. is not an option, because no one would be home to watch the kids. With swimming, the dangers of leaving kids alone by the water prevents me from just being able to bring them along and hope the toddler stays at the edge. In the evenings, when my husband is home and I can head out to swim, we have had bad weather or other factors often preventing swimming.

There is also the reality of being “mom tired.” I can have a 3-hour swim planned for a Saturday or other time when someone can watch the kids, but I end up taking a nap because the baby didn’t sleep well. Other days, I take off and swim for several hours when my husband gets home. Some days I can fit a 10k workout in and other days I’m just happy to get 3k.

A few times, I’ve considered taking a break from marathon swims for a could years while I have tiny children and babies. However, I don’t believe I should give up swimming for my family. Choosing to pursue my goals can help not only make me a better, happier mother, but it can teach my children about goal setting (eventually, when they’re older). It’s all about finding that balance between the two. That is still a challenge I’m trying to figure out. But for now, I’ll take what swimming I can get even if it’s just little bits between nursing sessions and nap times.

I love swimming, but I feel that I’m sacrificing family time when I’m gone for several hours. Some days I go swim alone and uninterrupted for several hours; other days, my kids come to accompany me and I only swim a little bit.