(I think he shows a healthy amount of trepidation, don't you?)
My youngest
son, Evan, started high school this week.
He wasn't looking forward to it.
I understood his apprehension as there's much to be anxious about. He's coming from a school with 200 kids and
going to one that has over 2000. He'll
be changing classes, obeying bells, and dealing with lockers for the first time
ever. Plus, the school is huge. Schools this size eat smaller ones like his
old school for lunch. Speaking of lunch,
he didn't even know how to use a cafeteria as he's never had to navigate one
before.
I did my
best to prepare him in whatever ways I could.
We studied a map of the school and plotted out routes to his locker and
all of his classes. I showed him where
the bus would be parked so he could find it at the end of the day. I reminded him to ask a teacher if he gets
lost or needs help. I assured him that
everyone feels nervous when they start high school but it will get better after
a few weeks.
I don't
think he quite believed me.
During the
summer, I enrolled Evan in swimming lessons. He'd never learned to swim, and
since he'd need to know how for gym class, lessons seemed like a good idea.
Over the
span of a week, his instructor guided him through a predictable sequence: first,
kicking with a board, then swimming freestyle, then the backstroke, and then the
breast stroke. The final lesson would be
diving.
Evan did not
want to dive. Every day, he worried
about it and every night, he lost sleep over it. I told him he'd easily bob back up to the surface
and that it's incredibly difficult to sink all the way to the bottom. We watched small kids diving in the
twelve-foot end of the pool with ease.
None of this calmed his fear. Each
day, his instructor would ask, "Are you ready to try diving
today?" Each day, his response would
be no.
Finally, at
the last class, he couldn't avoid it any longer. His instructor knew he was nervous, so she
had him progress to the diving board in steps:
first, jump off the side of the pool straight into the water; next, squat
and arc a bit into the water; finally, stand and arc into the water. Evan performed all of these tasks, surprising
himself with each success.
The only thing
left to conquer was the diving board. I
knew that the diving board was a symbol of dozens of other little fears that
Evan had allowed to consume him. If he succeeded with this one thing in
spite of his fear, it would give him the confidence to push through all kinds
of other challenges in his life.
Evan's
anxiety was visible as he reluctantly approached the diving board. He paced in circles at the base of it, unable
to move onto the actual board. His
instructor assured him he could do it. His
father and I assured him he could do it.
His instructor even agreed to walk out on the diving board next to
him. Evan wasn't having any of it. He was frozen with fear.
As someone
who understands anxiety well, I thought of things that help me move through
fear. In my experience, the quickest way
out of fear purgatory is to get angry about being there in the first place.
"Evan,
you've got to get angry at your fear," I shouted. "It's keeping you a prisoner. You've got to get mad and just do it! Don't let your fear have control over you any
longer. Do it and get it over
with!"
I'm sure this
advice made him more angry at me than the diving board, but at least it
convinced him to move. As his instructor
encouraged him, Evan inched out to the end of the board. His dad and I cheered him on until finally -
miraculously - probably just to shut us up - he dove in the water. He bobbed back up to the surface with a huge
grin on his face, jubilant over his success.
He took a dive in the deep end and he survived.
No doubt
Evan's triumph over the diving board was on his mind as he started his first
day of high school.
When he
arrived home, I asked him how school was and if he was able to find all of his
classes.
"I
nailed it," he said. "It was
much easier than diving in the deep end at the pool."
I don't
think I have anything to worry about. This
kid's going to be just fine.
