Good Neighbor Podcast: Port Saint Lucie
Bringing together local businesses and neighbors of Port Saint Lucie. Good Neighbor Podcast hosted by Garfield Bowen helps residents discover and connect with your local business owners in and around Port St Lucie, Florida.
Is your business serving the residents of Port Saint Lucie? Then, we need to talk! Visit gnpPSL.com to schedule your free interview.
Good Neighbor Podcast: Port Saint Lucie
EP 246: Ana Johnson's Dedicated Journey to Water Safety for Babies
What makes Ana Johnson with Under the Sea Survival Swim, LLC a good neighbor?
Could your infant survive an accidental fall into a pool? Join us on the Good Neighbor Podcast as we sit down with Ana Johnson, the certified instructor behind Under the Sea Survival Swim in Port St. Lucie. Ana shares her captivating journey from her previous career to becoming a PDS swim-certified instructor, motivated by a pressing need for qualified swim instructors in her community. Discover how her tailored one-on-one lessons equip infants and children, as young as seven months, with essential water survival skills, ensuring they can float and breathe until help arrives.
Uncover the truths behind common myths about infant swim rescue. Ana clarifies that a child's crying does not impede their ability to learn, and short, consistent lessons bolster skill retention. She also busts the myth that instructors simply toss babies into water, explaining her structured and supportive teaching methods designed to build trust and confidence. Listen in to understand how Ana's passion and expertise are making a significant impact in her rapidly growing community, one young swimmer at a time.
To learn more about Under the Sea Survival Swim, LLC go to:
https://www.swimsmart.org/
Under the Sea Survival Swim, LLC
772-834-7464
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Garfield Bowen.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. Are you in need of survival swimming instruction for your infant or child? Well, we may have something closer than you think. Today I have the pleasure of introducing your good neighbor, anna Johnson, with Under the Sea Survival.
Speaker 3:Swim, anna, how are you doing today? I'm great. Thank you for having me, Garfield. How are you?
Speaker 2:I am well Listen. We're excited to learn all about you and your business. Tell us about your company.
Speaker 3:So Under the Sea Survival Swim is a licensed and insured one-on-one instructional program. I am a PDS swim certified instructor here in Port St Lucie and I work with little ones from about seven to eight months all the way up to sometimes 10 years old. It just depends on what they need. As far as the babies go, every case is assessed one by one. We do them individually because it's based on their motor skill ability at that age and the expectation is that we can teach little ones at that age if they're able to pull themselves to their feet and are strong and in good health that age, if they're able to pull themselves to their feet and are strong and in good health to use their ability to flip over in the water and find the air and actually float on the surface of the water in proper posture until someone can find them, in the event they fall into a body of water, whether it's a pool or a pond.
Speaker 2:So, Anna, I must ask how did you get into this business?
Speaker 3:So my little one was trained by a local PDS swim instructor also, and there are very few of us in this territory and through a discussion I learned that that I would leave my regular career and pay for this extensive certification and pursue it. Because Port St Lucie is, as we know, one of the fastest growing cities in Florida and, with the level of residential builds that are taking place and the number of families that are moving here, it was really terrifying to find out that there weren't enough qualified swim instructors for this level of infant survival and child rescue for swim in the water right now in our territory. So I've pursued it, got certified in 2022. And this has actually been my first opportunity to launch the business officially.
Speaker 2:So what are some of the myths and misconceptions of your profession?
Speaker 3:Oh, there are so many, but I think the biggest ones are that babies cry all the time and when they're crying they're not learning and that it's traumatic. And that isn't the case. Some cry every time. They learn while they're crying. You would be surprised they can actually repeat, repeat the skills over and over, even though they're crying. Some only cry for the first couple of lessons or days, until they find it fun or they develop a rapport with their instructor, and some don't cry at all. The lessons are short. They're only 10 minutes at a time, four days a week, because smaller amounts of information for a child at a time is absorbed faster. It's proven so.
Speaker 3:And imagine dropping your child off for the first time in a daycare. But the child can still see you dropping them off. Then, of course, they're going to reach for you. So, seeing as how it's short instruction periods, the parent or the person dropping them off for the instruction stays nearby in my waiting area right here on the pool deck, and if that child can make contact visually, then they're going to reach for that person. So what I do is I ask the people that are bringing their kids, or the guardians or whomever grandparents, to reinforce the process Lots of big thumbs ups, lots of big smiles You're doing a great job and hang in there. Because usually if you're anxious, they mirror that, and in this case that would be an example of something they could mirror that's positive. If you're being positive about it, then they might stop crying. So that's a myth. Another one, if you don't mind me adding one more.
Speaker 3:I think that's really important is we don't just throw babies in the water when we're doing what's called ISR, which is infant swim rescue or infant self-rescue. There's a lot of people on the internet who will say like all they do is traumatize small children and throw them in the water and expect them to float. And that's not how this works. We use operant conditioning, we repeat certain behaviors, and in operant conditioning you introduce rewards when positive behavior is achieved, so that they'll continue to go for that reward, and in this case, the air is the reward we're seeking, and so we show them that the air is up here, the water is here. You don't want to be here, you want to be here. So it's constant hands-on, constant eyes-on, constant guidance. We don't just throw babies in the water. That would be terribly unsafe. So those are probably two of the of the biggest ones. What else you got for me?
Speaker 2:I'm glad you mentioned throwing the baby into the water, because I might have said it the wrong way and got 2000 emails. I said it the wrong way and got 2,000 emails.
Speaker 3:Okay, well, listen you know when you say infant self-rescue.
Speaker 3:ISR by definition. They're like what do you mean? Self-rescue? Are we just, like you know, tossing babies in like a toy and expecting them to bob to the surface? And that's not the case at all. Pedia Swim, like I said, is extensive hands-on training that comes with these certifications for any of our instructors in the community, and it is absolutely critical that when a mom or a dad or any other party looking to acquire services for survival swim, in particular for an infant or a child, they ask for qualifications. It's incredibly important.
Speaker 2:So, anna, outside of work, what do you like to do for fun?
Speaker 3:Oh man, work, work, work, no play. No, I'm teasing Boy, that would be boring, huh. So I am a mom, obviously, and that in itself can be really, really busy.
Speaker 3:But I find it to be a lot of fun. I have three sons and my significant other who, by the way, happens to be a sergeant with the police department here in Port St Lucie. So safety is a very, very big deal for our household and our family. We hold it in the highest regard, obviously. But as far as staying busy for fun, I am busy chasing my 10 year old all over the baseball field and to every local field for games at this point, from Vero Beach to Port St Lucie. My oldest son is now 24. He actually lives with autism every day, but he is incredible and we try to keep up with him and everything he's trying to learn. And my 18 year old is now leaving for UCF on the 22nd, so he just graduated, so he's kept us busy with his athletics and academics for a while.
Speaker 3:But for me as an individual, if I can get mom time, I actually do a lot of crafting which I post to Instagram. I love to make things for people to use and display and I love to read, study history and facts and, obviously, swimming, travel and, if you can find a beach with blue water that I can see my feet all the way to the sand while I'm standing in it. I want to be there, so I'm all about it. And just on a side note, I noted studying history and facts. I'm actually a world history teacher locally for St Lucie County as well.
Speaker 2:So you're not messing around, huh.
Speaker 3:No, you know, I try to hit all the boxes. I guess I want to check them all.
Speaker 2:Let's change gears a little bit. Life often throws us curveballs. Let's talk about one hardship, one life challenge, something you can look back today and say you're better and stronger because of it. What comes to mind?
Speaker 3:How deep you want to go. I actually came from a very, very challenging childhood. I was part of a dangerous environment environment and I was left as a ward of the state as a child actually and I wasn't adopted until I was about 14 years old, which is actually very unusual. Most kids are not adopted at an older age. I was moved to Port St Lucie at about 14, when I was adopted, and I was raised here for the remainder of my childhood and then, obviously, I've called it home ever since.
Speaker 3:But you know, I have to tell you there were some wonderful people in my life that took the time to take this leap of faith and rescue me, and they allowed me to become the best version of myself, to educate, to learn to speak openly, to not be afraid of you know life's horizons, what's out there, and to create these social relationships. But the opportunity to grow and to flourish and to be the best and most creative version of myself, I think, has led me to want to share that kind of rescue in another way with other people. And so my overcoming this particular and very challenging part of my life has led me to always want to help other people. And so here I am, I think, finding the best way to give it back that I know how and, being that I love to teach and I obviously love being a mom and I love children, I figured this would be a wonderful way to do it Now. It may have taken me a great deal of my life to get here, but I'm here, so there's that.
Speaker 2:Well, poor St Lucy's happy to have you. We're happy to have you here. I want you to tell our listeners. Well, I'm going to put you on the spot. First of all, I want you to narrow it down to one thing.
Speaker 3:One thing that you want our listeners to remember about under the sea survival, swimming, oh man. Well, I'm going to go right back to water safety being paramount. There are four skilled as of right now, incredibly qualified instructors in Port St Lucie that have your pds swim certification. That is what I carry. That is what I offer my clients. Quality I come with a a significant public safety background myself, and I think it needs to be remembered that it is incredibly important to put your most prized possessions and children in the hands of people that would treat them the way that you would in the water.
Speaker 2:My listeners now are thinking about their kids, their nieces and nephews and grandkids, and they have one question on their lips right now, and that's how? How can we get more information about the under the sea survival swimming?
Speaker 3:uh, anyone can learn more about me and what I offer by checking out my website wwwswimsmartorg. That's wwwswimsmart. They can call or text me at 772-834-7464, or they can email questions to U-T-S-S-S dot P-S-L at gmailcom.
Speaker 2:Well, Anna, we really appreciate you being on the show showing your business the very best, moving forward.
Speaker 3:I appreciate you very, very much. Thank you so much for having me and good luck to you.
Speaker 1:Also, thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast Port St Lucie. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPPortStLuciecom. That's GNPPortStLuciecom, or call 772-362-3840.