There’s something about being in the water that makes you forget. All the chores, the worries about your kids and the hum of everyday life just falls silent. I’ve always loved swimming; I think it’s the best place to think clearly and to process. So, when I started getting anxiety as a symptom of my menopause and my children were ready to fly the nest, I needed something to fill that void – to do something for myself again after all that time looking after them. That’s when I decided to swim the English Channel.
Why? Well, I needed a swim long enough to work through the changes that were happening, not just to my body but in my life. In the past two years, my son has left for university and my daughter finished A levels and is preparing for her gap year. I was going through the menopause and was aware of the passing years. It was now or never.
In some ways, I don’t think I could have done this before. It’s an incredibly selfish thing to do; the training you need to do to prepare to swim the 21 miles from England to France takes up a huge amount of time and effort – something I couldn’t have done when I was looking after my children. It used to be that swimming was an escape from work, but now work is an escape from swimming.
Some days, I’m in the pool for four or even six hours at a time. It sounds like a lot, but I love it. That time to myself, when it’s just me and the water, is what keeps me going. Even when my muscles ache and I don’t think I can go any further, I sing myself something or try to work through the list of things I have to do at home – and as any mother will tell you, it’s at least a six-hour-long list.
Everyone always thinks the mental block will be the hardest – swimming 15 and a half hours on your own – but it’s the physical part I’m most worried about. Mentally, I might feel 28, but I have to face the fact that I’m 53. My body has seen me through two babies and a lot of life, so it’s funny to think of myself as ‘an athlete’ – but with a swim like this, you have to really take training seriously. It can be all-consuming, making sure you’re getting the right food in and recovering properly after a long swim – things that are made much harder by menopause. One of the symptoms I started experiencing a few years ago was insomnia; I find it really difficult to sleep nowadays, which makes recovering much tougher and also doesn’t help with trying to lose a bit of weight. I’ve given up drinking, to my husband’s dismay, which has helped a lot, but it was always going to be more difficult as a woman of my age.
Some of my friends think I’m totally mad for doing this swim, especially because the rules are so strict and organising the swim is no small feat. It’s taken nearly three years of training and meticulous planning to get everything in place. You have to book a pilot, who drives a boat alongside you to make sure you take the right route, a team to check on you and an official observer to make sure that you’re following all the rules – there are an awful lot of them. The rules are very strict around what you can and can’t do, and what you have to wear. I have to swim the full distance without touching the boat or anyone else, and I can’t have anything that’s seen as an aid – that means no wetsuit, no long sleeves and no headphones. Just me and the sea.
That’s when I have to rely on the great Gloria Gaynor. When I hit the plateau and feel like I can’t go any further, I pick a belter of a song and sing it as loud as I can in my head. More often than not, I’m repeating the lyrics to ‘I will survive’ over and over – a bit like a mantra – to keep me going. I’ve asked my wonderful crew to hold up some boards with lyrics along the way to keep me going – I’ve got some ABBA and the Black Eyed Peas in there among other favourites.
My team are there to keep checking in with me and feeding me along the way. It’s been difficult because I have to choose who to have in the boat alongside me, but the advice is not to have family, which has been tough on them. But I know it’s for the best because there may be times when I’m sick in the water or I’m so exhausted I feel like I can’t keep going. I need a team there who will push me to carry on and talk me through it, and I don’t want my family to have to see that.
My age – 53 – is by no means old, and I do think where we are in society now makes it easier for women of my age to do things like this; we’re much freer to show just how strong we are and how much our bodies can handle. With the swim inching closer – my window is the 19 to 23 July this year – the nerves are starting to grow a bit. Thankfully, when worry niggles at the edge of my brain, I get back in the water and remember why I’m doing all of this – and just how fantastic it feels to be pushing myself through those waves, past all that anxiety.
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