No one knows how to swim by birth. Maybe, but that’s all very rare.
You see in advertisements and perhaps most famously, on the cover of Nirvana’s Nevermind album, there is an image of one or more newborn babies swimming. You wonder why children have the ability to swim without having to learn like that, even being immersed in water and seemingly unharmed. Are babies born knowing how to swim? Not.
Children often go to swimming lessons early to reduce the risk of drowning when they grow up.
They are still too … baby, even too weak to actively hold their breath or keep their heads afloat. That swimming is a reflex of children when they are immersed in the water, the swimming movements make you feel that the children already know how to swim, but it is not. When submerging the whole body under water like that, according to the survival reflex, the baby’s heart rate and breathing rate will slow down, called the bradycardic response , which works just as its name suggests.
Not all, only most babies have reflex to hold their breath for a short period of time when immersed in water, the purpose is to protect their trachea. Children often go to swimming lessons early to reduce the risk of drowning when they grow up, but this method is not really … reliable. It should be noted that the baby’s muscles are still very weak and cannot be used to perform strong activities such as swimming.
This diving reflex is reinforced by the ability to save oxygen during body activities.
Most babies will have this breath-holding, swimming, and diving reflex until they are six months old. This reflex includes a number of factors such as stopping breathing – not being aware that you need to breathe to survive, heart rate slowing down to use less oxygen, and slowing blood flow, mainly in areas where you need to breathe. areas such as fingers and toes.
Specifically, the baby’s heart rate may drop to about 20%, the baby’s glottis will close tightly, the water entering the upper respiratory tract will be transferred down the esophagus and into the stomach. This diving reflex is reinforced by the ability to save oxygen during body activities. The oxygen saved is transferred to the lungs and heart.
This ability of children to hold their breath and swim can be considered as a defense mechanism of the body .
Traditionally, swimming lessons for children begin when they are 4 years old or older, because children under the age of 4 are considered too weak to swim. However, it is becoming more and more popular to let children go swimming at a very young age. The Australian Federation of Swim Instructors and Teachers advises parents to start swimming lessons as early as 4 months old. In the US, the Red Cross also offers similar swimming classes. Any baby who has the ability to roll over and raise his head “to catch up” is said to be able to swim.
However, experts also say that this is not an absolute measure of your child’s protection from drowning. Parents still need to keep an eye on their children, can’t use the excuse that “baby has learned to swim since a few months old” as an excuse for possible unfortunate circumstances. All parents should protect their little ones with the utmost care possible.