Now, during the summer, I had an experience that made me reflect about fear.  When I was a child I was very close to drowning in the sea.  This trauma lasted all my childhood, making daily baths and learning to swim well very difficult.  Now, as an adult I decided to face my fear and learn to scuba dive.  I got my diving certificate with a lot of effort.  However, the first time I actually went diving in the open ocean, two years after my certification, I paniked and had to surface almost immediately forgetting everything on the course and almost drowning with the weights and tank, for I didn’t even remember to inflate my vest or use my regulator!

This made me think how fear can paralize us in life and muddle our minds.  For my children it served as an example to see how useless one can become when one lets fear win, and for me it served to remind me just how strong and pervasive childhood trauma is.  I will have to continue working on my fear of drowning and keep trying to dive until I have overcome it.