I don’t know if I’ve always been afraid of water, but I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t. I remember as a child sitting next to the bath to watch it fill lest it flood the house if we stepped away while the tap was still running. I’d had no bad experiences (that I could remember); my fear seemed innate.

Like most Australians, I had swimming lessons in primary school. One of the first tasks was to submerge your face and head in the water, and I flat-out refused. The instructor told me that if I didn’t I would have to stay in the first lane with the little kids doing water play. I said that was fine, and she left me alone after that. So I never learned to swim.

I got by pretty well masking my inability – I became someone who was “not really a beach person”. And when I did go to the beach or pool I could wade and splash about in the shallows – no one noticed I rarely put my head under the water.

I noticed, however, that when I walked past the pool on my way to the gym the smell of chlorine filled me with a choking anxiety. I would feel short of breath until the heady chemical smell was out of my nostrils.

When I became a parent I had the same intrusive thoughts all parents have: what if my baby stops breathing in his sleep? What if he chokes on his food? What if we’re walking next to a river and we both slip in and I can’t save us?

I’d learned first aid for babies, I’d studied the safe sleeping guidelines; I figured I should really learn to swim.

The prospect of going to my local pool, in my mid-30s, and asking about beginner swimming lessons (“No, I don’t need to work on my stroke, I need to work on getting my face in the water”) was a somewhat embarrassing one. The prospect of finding some bathers to fit me in my postpartum period even more so. Standing on the side of the pool as I waited for my first lesson to begin, other women my age were gathered there to watch their kids’ lessons. A thought surfaced that I was a bit pathetic and I worried I might cry.

I shared these feelings with a friend who said learning a new skill like swimming was no different from an adult taking guitar lessons. But it felt more like not knowing how to read – something it’s assumed everyone can already do and which must surely be harder to grasp as an adult.

It’s generally assumed all Australian adults can swim but almost a quarter of us report weak or no swimming ability. So I am hardly alone, even though I’ve never heard another adult say they can’t swim.

There were only two pupils in my first lesson – me and a middle-aged English man who had the simple, almost heartbreaking desire of wanting to swim in the sea for the first time. However difficult it had been for me to show up to that lesson, I wagered it had been more so for him.

We started small. No putting our faces in the water, just some kicking as we lay on our backs, getting comfortable with having our ears under water. At first, I kicked my legs but went nowhere. It told the instructor I didn’t seem to be moving. She laughed and told me I soon would be.

And, without knowing what had changed, I began to move. I managed to do loud but peaceful laps, up and down, up and down, hugging my kickboard, more than once bumping my head on the wall, not realising that’s what the flags ahead were for.

I left the first lesson elated. I had done it. I swam. I didn’t drown and nobody laughed at me. Sure, I had used a flotation device, but I had walked out of there a little bit better than when I’d walked in.

When it came time to put our faces in the water, the instructor told us about blowing bubbles. This was a concept I had never heard of. On the rare occasions I’d submerged myself in water I’d held my breath. After that lesson, I asked people if they knew you were meant to blow bubbles underwater. They said: “Of course! What else would you do under there?”

My progress has been slow, but better than I had expected. I spend entire lessons swimming up and down the heated indoor kiddy pool, practising blowing bubbles, sometimes even dipping my eyes underneath the water. After each class, I have gained a new skill, or improved in some small way.

It has quickly become addictive. The feeling of doing something I’ve never done, of overcoming a fear I never expected to overcome. I started going to the pool alone, swimming lap after lap practising whatever I had learned in that week’s lesson, trying to master the tiny incremental skill of taking one hand at a time off the kickboard, or breathing to the left, then to the right.

I’ve spent hours holding a pool noodle, bobbing past groups of socialising teenagers in the recreational lane, and practising putting my face in the water.

As I entered the pool one day I suddenly realised the smell of chlorine sparked my excitement not my terror. I’d started learning to swim for the sake of my child but I was staying for my own sake and for the euphoria I felt at being in the water, at beating my fear of swimming. I stopped noticing the discomfort of having water on my face, up my nose and in my ears, and instead started noticing the patterns of light dancing on the tiles of the pool. I came to enjoy that rushing pressure and the silence that hit my ears as they’re submerged.

I’ve noticed my son is also afraid in water. He tenses up when placed in the bath, and clings to me in the shower and pool. I look up whether phobias can be inherited (they can be). If I have passed on my fear of water to my child I hope I can also pass on what I know about overcoming it. I’m not there yet, but I’m getting closer.