Ewen has always loved swimming and was so excited when my parents bought a house with a pool in the back yard last year. But when he got sick in December he became afraid that he would drown in the pool. Over Christmas my parents had it heated to 80 degrees and my sister who was visiting from NY and her family, swam every day. But Ewen hid away in the computer room and didn't go anywhere near it. Today was the last day of the intensive CBT therapy. He is going to continue with CBT one or twice a week indefinitely. But today was his "graduation" so the final challenge was to swim in Grandma and Grandpa's pool. They got it heated up to 76 degrees which is still a bit cold. Katie and Matt met us at my parent's house and Katie jumped right in the pool first. Then Ewen had to jump in next. He was not excited about it, and when he did jump in he swam just fine across the pool but he was freezing and wanted to get out. So they eventually got out and then he played ...
What do you do when your brilliant, confident, happy 10-year-old suddenly plunges into a frightening downward spiral of debilitating panic attacks? This blog is a mother's journey about a family working it's way back from a crisis, to some kind of happy normalcy.