Chaya, a budding paralympian

Chaya and me in the local public pool last week

Our local therapy pool, housed in my daughter Chaya's alma mater, is state of the art and very warm. But it frequently malfunctions in one way or another. The latest snafu has dragged on for more than three weeks. 

Fortunately, though, the timing was ideal:  the wetsuit we'd ordered on line for Chaya had already arrived and we'd been waiting for the opportune day to try it out at the neighborhood pool where I do my laps. The water there isn't heated much. 

Chaya used to shiver whenever we brought her there and appeared to be a perfect candidate for a wetsuit. 

To date, we've used it three times with undeniable success. Chaya floated without support, and even kicked a bit. Her caregiver and I believe that she may not have kicked with her usual enthusiasm because the wetsuit felt cumbersome. So, perhaps with time she'll get used to it and kick as she does in the therapy pool.

Most important, though, was that she didn't shiver, was relaxed and seemed to enjoy the water as much as she does the heated pool.

Several minutes into her third wetsuit session, she had a whopping seizure which would have panicked her hydrotherapist and prompted her to whisk her out of the water. Instead, I just held her until it passed and we then proceeded to have a productive session of 40 minutes. 

I'm now inclined to simply drop her sessions at the therapy pool once it's repaired. I do everything that the trained hydrotherapist does and unlike her, don't charge a fee. (Our health insurance only allows us 12 sessions annually at their expense.) 

Oh, and there's the fact that the best hydrotherapist dumped her so she would be with the second-best therapist. The latter likes to devote part of the 30 minute session on standing Chaya in the water. 

Since I walk with Chaya every day on land for 45 minutes, what's the point?