Courtesy: Teri Lynne Nelson
I felt the weight of the world on my shoulders. By the time I was thirty, my entire immediate family – my father at 17, my mother at 21, and my brother at 30 – had been taken from me. It left a void so massive, I often felt like I was naked in a desolate forest, with no path out. I was consumed by anger, resentment, and a fear for the future. I felt vulnerable, alone, and had trust issues.
I tried everything to find release. I’d stand at the top of a mountain and scream, but I found I couldn’t really let go. The sound dispersed into the wind, and so did the feeling of release. I worked with many different therapists, each offering tools and insights. I even became a workaholic, hoping to bury the pain by drowning myself in work. Yet, the core issues – the lack of trust, the grief, the resentment, the fear– remained.
In my journey to be healed, I stumbled upon a form of “underwater therapy” that changed everything.
One Flip Turn at a Time
Did you know you can scream underwater and no one hears you? It’s an incredibly exhilarating and freeing experience. When I first began, I felt shy, even doing a few tentative “one, two, three” tests. It was like whispering into a mic at first. But soon, I found you can unleash every ounce of despair, again & again and the water swallows it. For months, I screamed during every single flip turn. Unlike the mountain where the scream felt lost, underwater I could let go.
The combination of the flip and the scream just made sense to me. It’s similar to how gymnasts perform a flip turn – you momentarily invert your world, gaining a completely different perspective. It reminded me of that iconic scene in Robin Williams’ Dead Poets Society, where his students stand on their desks to see the world from a fresh perspective. The brief inversion underwater is where I began healing.
I learned grieving isn’t a passive state, but rather takes on an active role. You don’t just “get over” loss; healing is everyday work.
Finding Trust
Underwater, the deafening silence provided a buffer from the noise in my head. Through these underwater screams and swims, I slowly began to rebuild. I trusted the water, and in doing so, I slowly started to learn how to trust again.
When I emerge from the water, my husband always asks, “How was your workout?” After one of my underwater therapy sessions, I always have the perfect reply: “Great. It’s like taking a cold, refreshing outdoor shower while looking up at the blue sky.” It truly is that freeing and clear.
Try it, you won’t be disappointed.
About Teri Lynne Nelson
Teri Lynne Nelson (TL) is a new writer and a new competitive swimmer. This is not her first publication—TL has been a sales manager for Lakeshirts for the past 25 years. She created and wrote a weekly rep update to provide reps with information as well as motivation. The rep update was required reading which resulted in a captive audience. She swims once a day and does her best thinking while doing laps.
