Make Memories!

It's so dark outside, and having just made sandwiches, packed food bags, and run over the lists again, I have just read/listened and digested all the lovely messages from people wishing me luck, love and as my mum said in her text 'Make Fantastic Memories'...

Isn't that what we're here for? My last 18 months has been FILLED with fantastic memories - 'firsts', my first 10 lengths (with the girls wondering if I'd ever get to 50!), my first mile, first serpentine freeze and meeting the incredible range of ages jumping in, the first sea swim with the yellow hats, our first open water competition and finishing it, first panic in the lake and being supported out, first 2 hour swim, first 4 hours of swimming in a day,and now a first of getting on an off a boat in the middle of the channel to swim an hour at a time.

This is the first time I will be doing a challenge like this with the spirit of others encouraging me on. Its the reason I took it on in the first place having been inspired my friends and family who had cancer and survived (or didn't), then proved they were living by creating fantastic memories themselves.

My wonderful Dad will be with me, telling me 'nothing good in life comes easy', he thought I was mad preparing to swim the channel, and talked regularly about his brother Edmond who was an open water swimmer his whole life, and used to come out of the sea quite blue! Also our dear friend Mike Wynter who died last month after a battle with cancer, I promised his wife Jan I would swim for him, with him in my heart.

So, less than an hour to go, a quick photo opportunity with Ben - wearing my new Seabreezers hoody and ready at last to make Fantastic Memories

WWW.Justiving.com/Nikki-Watkins-Seabreezers

The Night before the Night of....

I knew this time would come, and as i rechecked my bags, kit, clothes, and mental state, I realise I am relatively calm, with just an undertow of adrenaline. We are just waiting to find out our start time - sometime from 3am Wednesday 10th October 2012... Wonder how I’ll sleep tonight..

I can honestly say I am not in the form I was in 5 weeks ago, the life events overtook the training alot, but I can also say I have done the best I can, I can swim an hour at a time, and I am fully connected to my body and it’s ability to do extraordinary things.

Someone just reminded me that it probably won’t be as hard as childbirth (27 hours for Jess), or my Karate Blackbelt - (5 days of torture culminating in 12 x 2 minute sequential fights, black eyes, bruised ribs and shins, torn up feet and black forearms from blocking too hard).

Yes it probably wont be that hard...but it’s tough in a different form...swimming in the dark of night...with air temperatures of 9 degrees and sea temperatures under 16 degrees....on seas battling between a warm air front from the north east and a cold air front from the south...trying to warm up on the boat...dealing with seasickness which is apparently inevitable....while trying to keep down a sandwich or two...Yes it will be some adventure.

The departure of my special friend Claire back to Vancouver has meant that I had a space on the boat for a supporter, two wonderful young men jumped at the chance - my nephew Oliver whose enthusiasm for my challenge was visible on holiday when he asked me daily about my successes and learnings, and my son Ben who has been telling people since I first started training that he was coming on the boat - he manifested this one for himself!!

So, with that level of support, with the wonderful other 3 Seabreezers and our fab coach Peter all ready to set off for our big Channel swim, and a recent reminder of how fortunate I am to be alive, fit, healthy and loved - how could I be anything other than grateful, anticipatory and excited.

One more sleep, One team, One crossing, One hour at a time, One arm in front of the other, Just keep Swimming...

www.Justgiving.com/Nikki-Watkins-Seabreezers

THAT phone call

Last night, Thursday, I had just landed back from a successful client meeting in Amsterdam, had enjoyed a glass of wine in the lounge and an amusing chat with an old colleague, and was on the bus back to the terminal when my phone rang.

Sea Breezer Sarah Moralee was squealing down the end of the phone, and my immediate assumption was that we would be swimming the next day - more fool me for that glass of wine!! THANK GOODNESS her next words did not match that assumptions. "I've spoken to Mike and he's got us down to swim on Wednesday, the tides are good, the sea is calm, and we have to be down there for a 3am start on Wednesday 10th October, eeeeeeeeekkkkkkk" (or a squeal to that effect :)

After another excited girly squealing call with Seabreezer no. 2 Bridget, on the drive home, I was reflecting on phone calls and texts, the exciting ones and the terrifying ones. How many calls I have made and texts I have sent, in the last few weeks to precious friends and family to share the news about Dad, or to update them on the swim - certainly the bringer of news, just in different flavours. Now that the swim date is fixed (well unless mother nature has other ideas), then there will be the phone calls afterwards, sharing the story and the adventure we all had.

For now though the mood is one of utter excitement, and the challenge of getting the 4th seabreezer Niki back in one piece from Egypt in time to swim, she lands at 10pm tuesday night, talk about cutting it fine.

Fortunately our acclimatisation is still working, we went swimming last Saturday to remind ourselves of how cold water can be, after an hour in the Serpentine at 14 degrees and the shakes kicked in, as they did in the old days, sea temperatures should be a couple of degrees warmer, although starting in the dark at 3am the air temperature will be cold (see frost on windscreen thursday morning).

We took this picture during the 30 seconds that the body doesn't know yet how cold it is, I sent it to a friend who said we looked like the Latvian synchronised swimming team - am searching for a compliment somewhere in that statement :)

So now on waiting time to get the phone call that confirms we are off on Wednesday and until that, life goes on. To quote myself, and my little sister recently struggling through practicing our tribute to my Dad at his funeral tomorrow, 'Keep Swimming, Keep Swimming, this'll be one for you Dad xx'.

Enjoy the Journey, not the end game

Its 10pm, Friday 28th September 2012.

Like many, you are probably thinking "The channel swim should be over by now for Nikki and the team!, Should I ring? Did it go ok? The weather has been awful!"

So, who knew.. Who knew except our Pilot, who chose to not proactively tell us, that the week you choose to swim the channel is 'Just a guide'. Just a guide, towards which you have been training for 18 months, towards which your wonderful friends coalesce, travel from canada, and call, write, connect with you to see 'how it's going'....

In all other walks of life a date is a date (well, let's face it except childbirth).. But not this one - Mother nature truly has her fist wrapped around this one, deciding what weather shines or blows through, and in this case this is the daily reports that we were being issued:-

Dover -- Shipping Forecast - Issued: 0405 UTCMon 24 Sep Gale warnings - Southwesterly storm force 10 expected soon Wind -- Southeast 5 to 7, veering southwest 7 to severe gale 9, increasing storm 10 for a time.

i've no idea what that means but gale force 10 seems just a little extreme to me! Despite the sunshine in Great Kingshill with my amazing friend Claire from Vancouver and I having a lovely swim at the local Lido (temperature 21 degrees, and she has a new appreciation for how cold that is - remember we'll be swimming in 17 maximum, and that's warm compared to what we've been swimming!) The channel has had other ideas.

If we reflect and wonder why this has happened, I have to reflect on our real ability to be able to cope with the challenge, Niki and Bridget were both pretty ill last week after managing olympic activities and major organisational change initiatives respectively, and I have definitely been feeling weak and odd as I have been dealing with my fathers death last week. Poor Sarah was the only one really ready, so perhaps Mother nature was taking care of us? For me, the gift of a week to spend at a different pace, being a tourist in london and sharing memories and moments with Claire that wouldn't have been possible if the swim had happened as expected.

Our Pilot has told us he believes we'll swim before christmas, OMG, We seriously hope so, can you imagine a snowball fight one day and swim the channel the next? October is often good weather, and apparently the Neap tide is not all its cracked up to be - or perhaps it is, but if we want to swim, it'll just be a bit harder!...

So, To those of you who have sponsored us, to know our spirit is still FULLY ON! we are swimming in the serpentine in Hyde Park tomorrow morning at 8am - if you have been in the UK this week, it's not warm... swimming will continue and our commitment to our various charities does too. Yet another wonderful friend of mine died this week from cancer, and his wife asked me to swim for him, He was called Mike (the same as our Pilot), I'll absolutely swim for you, just have a word up there to make sure we can!!

We are also having a seabreezer dinner tomorrow night, to just stay deeply connected to each other, and perhaps celebrate the opportunity to extend this challenge and these relationships a little longer. Niki Lemon, Sarah Moralee, Bridget Gisby and Peter Frost, you are all wonderful special people, I can't wait to swim with you.

A reminder once again, that the journey is as important as the end game, as my strength and power return it's each day that matters.

Swimming in Treacle and Healing Hugs

Saturday 15th and Sunday 16th were always planned to be the last all girl swim before the channel neap tides began 23rd September, we put them in the calendar one afternoon early 2012 when we were all together building our training plans, it should have been the most fun weekend, all the hard work done and being fully ready for our swim.

After an exhausting week sitting vigil with my very sick father I said my goodbyes and headed down to his brothers in Sandbanks Poole to meet the girls for a swim saturday afternoon and a few hours on Sunday. Saturday was beautiful, the swimming was simple and cleansing, and the warmth of the late afternoon sun was a perfect balsam to a tired soul.

Sadly at 3am my twin called and broke the news that Dad had passed away, and amidst tears and whispered conversation i confess to feeling both huge sadness and huge relief - he lasted 9 days in palliative care with no food or fluid, he was made of stern stuff it appears, and at last was resting in peace. One upside was that it meant I could tell his brother face to face, small comfort for us both, but the connection to Dad in that hug was very special, something about serendipity there...

As usual, I paid scant regard to my emotional reaction, my rational self telling me that it was a blessing for him, crying a little but then ‘cracking on’ as he would have wanted. The day was grey and cool, but the sea was beautiful and calm, and the first hour was pleasurable with some extra drills in place to practice changing the pace up and down, something I am crap at. As we waited for Niki to arrive after a friends wedding, we did gymnastics and olympic long jump on the beach, giggling like 5 year olds, but anything to keep warm!

So you can see a picture of normality! Well, as normal as 3 grown women wearing multiple layers of towels, dressing gowns and hoodies can look on a deserted beach pretending to be olympic athletes. Pictures to prove it...

So, Why the title ‘swimming in treacle’?

The sea is always warmer the second time you go in, don’t know why, mental game I think. We were all smiling at the fact that at last the 4 of us were swimming side by side again, and the reality of being only 1 week away from the start of our swim was just brilliant. We swim at different paces, well, Moralee basically beats the rest of us hands down while we all try and keep up. We swam for 30 minutes down the coast, when the tide is gentle it means less need to swim back and forth - one of the brighton swims was 25 minutes in one direction and only 7 in the other for the same distance. It was about that point i noticed that my fluidity had escaped me, having learnt to swim from scratch, my muscle memory is pretty good, but I felt tired, in pain, and decidedly lumpy... in fact, on reflection, decidedly soggy.

Despite trying to be brave, keep going, and push them down, tears were trying to force themselves up. On land that isn’t a problem (although driving while crying is hard I have found), but when your face is buried in water, and your eyes are in goggles, the feeling was one of suffocation, and the harder I tried to stop them the slower my body went, my emotions being buried meant my body was somehow playing out the feeling, the slow, sad, weariness of the previous 3 weeks, and the sleepless previous night, and I was getting refusal. I hadn’t associated grief with the impact of shock. Even 4 days later as I write this, I am exhausted, trying not to worry about training, but just getting mentally fit for next week instead.

Anyway, how did it end? I swam slowly until I got into the buoy swimming area, where I could stand up, and then with the gentle waves, cool breeze and nature all around me I wept. I cried hard, those wonderful loud gulping noises we make when we no longer care what people think, sobs wracking me and salty tears joining the salty sea all around me. Bloody hell nature is amazing at helping us heal in that way. Niki, Bridget and Moralee swam to me, and gave me the most precious gift - they held me, all three of them hugging me, wrapped around me whispering, and encouraging me to let it go. I apologise unreservedly to them for the snotfest (to use my twins word), but not for the tears, and thank them from the heart of my bottom for just ‘being’ with me in that moment.

If you ever want to test the human spirit, just let your friends in. If you ever want to make new deep forever friends, take on a challenge with them. Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, its about learning to Dance in the Rain. The Channel swim has become a metaphor, alongside the passing of my wonderful dad, for living life to the full, for all those people who realise today is for now, go large or go home! If you want to sponsor me.... WWW.Justgiving.com/Nikki-Watkins-Seabreezers

Commitment comes in all Conditions

Two weekends ago Sunday 2nd September, we had to divert from Brighton as Gay Pride week was on, so in an attempt to find somewhere equally easy to get to, we scoured the south coast and decided on Worthing... Sounds nice?!

It was grey, raining and miserable - remember, I am the queen of ‘It will be glorious’ but for once, the universe conspired to ensure we were prepared for different weather. In an attempt to not get everything soaked, we agreed in the end to drive Bridgets car and park next to the beach on the main road, and get changed in the car. Our plan was to only wear our swim gear, flipflops, take one towel each and the car keys. Everything else was in the car (including my own car keys, all the phones, money, etc).

Walking to the beach was fun, people in waterproofs, welly boots, coats and umbrellas watched bewildered, and we sniggered at the curious sight we must have made. Fortunately I had packed a dustbin liner, so we packed our towels and keys and headed into the sea. It is a weird experience swimming in the rain, quite liberating, what we hadn’t bargained on was the masses of brown seaweed, the dirty water and the rip tides. Nonetheless we were determined.

At one point we were trying to swim a final 10 meters to a flag pole, it took 10 minutes of hard push to get there and as soon as we did we were swept back again! It was at that point we noticed how high the tide was, so decided to call it quits. At 80 minutes we finally staggered onto the beach as we watched my flipflops already floating and the sea lifting the bag up on the waves. Remember, inside the bag was towels and keys, we had NOTHING else with us.

Whilst the universe might have had ideas about the weather it also had a warning about preparation and safety. Even though my preparation skills are ok, I’ve always been a bit reckless (hated that word when someone first called me it), but it was a sobering thought that we could have been on a beach in the rain in our swimsuits with no way to contact anybody, no money, no transport, no phone. I’m sure people would have taken pity on us....wouldn’t they?

To add insult, we discovered there were no showers - there are never hot ones, but the seaweed and water left us covered in muck, in the end we found a storage cupboard with trains in and changed there - so unglamorous!! Especially when the train man came in midway through....

So, whilst you may have seen countless shots of us on sunny beaches, smiling happily, with ever growing sun-tans, we are committed in all conditions, even if the worthing weather comes to visit us while we are on the boat - after all, as I learnt long ago.... Prior preparation prevents pi** poor performance!!

Tomorrow, Saturday 15th September, we are heading down to Sandbanks, for 2 days of swimming. The weather is destined to be beautiful, the beach is sandy, the sea certainly not as dynamic as Brighton, it will be the last time the four of us swim together before the Channel swim itself - Mental, Physical, Emotional and Spiritual Preparation all wrapped up together, can’t wait! Especially as the team swimsuits have arrived!!

Life is what happens to you when you are busy making plans

I’ve always been busy.

This challenge to swim the channel has once again put a major goal into my life that followed 4 years of pretty intense activity already, with my karate training for my 1st Dan (blackbelt), and building a house for 2 years, and then this last 18 months of training, and as we accelerate through the 2 weeks before the event, I am already thinking about what is next.

However, amidst all of that rushing around, my father has become very ill, a second stroke completely paralysing him this time - unlike last time he couldn’t beat it, and he has only a little time left.

Last week I had a melt down, my workload is huge again, we have decided to sell our beautiful home, trying to swim as much as possible in order to not let my team down, and then dealing with the intense emotions from my Dads condition and the impact on all of our family. I called for help from a friend, I don’t do that often, She listened as I sobbed, and then asked a powerful question, an obvious question unless you are busy....What are you going to ‘Not Do’.

In the split second of realising I could give myself permission to not do it all - the relief was audible. You would think once you’d experienced this you would never forget, oh no, it has happened many times over the years, and here I am again, needing a nudge from someone who cares.

So how does all that relate to my channel swim? I’ve been so busy I nearly forgot to enjoy it... I had an incredible holiday at the end of July when I swam nearly every day, one day I swam 4 hours over the day which should be the maximum we swim at the end of this month, and I reveled in it! But once I came back, got back into work, got sick with laryngitis, and got too busy to swim frequently, I realised it had become a chore.

Oh my god! 'Life' becomes a chore when you are too busy!

Or of course your 'busy-ness is not aligned to your purpose :)

Saturday the universe conspired to reward me for deciding what NOT to do, I prioritised Dad and Swimming over everything else, and Brighton was beautiful, the sun shone, the sea was like a lake and our first 75 minute swim was easy, invigorating and fulfilling. The second swim equally wonderful, and then lounging in the sun on the beach musing with my friends was a real oasis.

On reflection, I have always sought an oasis, that has been what has kept me nourished to deal with the rest of my busy world. I need to build my oasis into my daily world, to find solace in my family, joy in simplicity and quiet, and hope in a productive future rather than a busy one. As another good friend said ‘Your biggest challenge would be to spend the next 3 months doing nothing’...

I confess, I’m not sure how I will do that yet, but if you are my friend and you are reading this, rest assured I’ll be calling on you.

www.justgiving.com/nikki-watkins-seabreezers