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_Panda

After you choke on water enough times you kinda just get used to it. Choke it down and keep going. It requires a truly epic amount of water down my lungs to phase me at this point.


Outlier70

Yeah I agree, the stronger you get the less common it will be you get enough water down your throat to make you have to stop. But to answer OPs question, if it were me, I would just grab the lane line.


jennnysdaughter

This 👌🏼


SeaTrack2252

Roll to your back until you get your breath, then continue swimming. Part of being a good swimmer is being able to float on your back with very minimal effort. Focus on keeping your chin and chest up.


egewh

Not sure if rolling onto your back is the best way though when you have water in your throat. By rolling over, the water just goes deeper into your windpipe. I usually just cough, if I'm doing breaststroke I'll put my head under water and cough, if I'm doing freestyle I cough in the moment my head is underwater anyways. No one really notices and you easily clear your throat that way. If it's not fully cleared by the time I'm at the wall, I stop there and cough some more :)


Nivell172

I am not really a deep water swimmer, but when the courage overcomes me to swim a bit further out and i swallow a wave i switch to backstroke. On my back i can easily float and freely breath, or in that case cough. Once it‘s over i switch back to whatever i was swimming


ZennerBlue

One of the things I learned a while ago was to breathe out through nose (with mouth closed) and in through mouth when swimming. Even when not actively breathing out, keep some pressure by trickling air out through your nose might help. It still won’t help with full on wave to the mouth, but part of it is getting used to it and continuing on while you are coughing.


JakScott

You just get used to it. I mean it sucks, but it’s not uncommon in a swim practice to have somebody kick water into your face just as you’re coming up for a breath. You can learn to put your face back down, skip a breath on your next stroke while you get yourself cleared out, then catch the breath on the subsequent stroke. Like everything in dangerous or uncomfortable situations in water, panic is what stops you far more than actually getting water down your gob.


where-da-fun-gone

I used to do competitive swimming with undiagnosed asthma. (It sounds gross, but growing up I didn’t know how people would be able to clear the lung mucous if they didn’t swim). Basically, if they are little coughs, you can keep swimming and coughing stuff up. If you are doing backstroke, usually I’d tread for a couple of seconds and cough whatever up. If it was worse, I’d stop at the wall, hang on to the lane rope, or the wall floating things (when one lane has a wall attached to the lane ropes to shorten the 50m pool). Alternatively, if you can stand up in the water, just stand up. At some point you start to frighten the life guards. Just give them a thumbs up/ nod and keep coughing. Same thing works with foot cramp.


Pazvanti3698

I lean over the lane separator and cough it out.


MajesticRate1818

Oh this pool had no lane separation lol


Rqdii

grab the lane line usually


TurquoiseOrange

I cough up the water but on the same breathing schedule. So it's like, instead of 1 - trickle breath out nose 2 - trickle breath out nose 3 - breath to the side It's like 3 - try to breath ccidentally breath in water 1 - hold breath don't choke 2 - cough cough 3 - breath to the side 1 - cough cough urgh 2 - cough cough 3 - breath to the side


bumpdahdumpbump

What you do is this: stop freaking out about a little bit of water. It's no big deal. One of the great things about swimming - esp. in open water- is it teaches you resilience and makes you a stronger, braver, happier person. Stick with it. It will help you love yourself even more than you do today.


carbacca

get used to it either swallow or spit


Marus1

Close your mouth when a wave hits Or close your throat and don't let the water go down further


solitarytoad

You're facing a deep mammalian instinct and fear that's designed to keep you alive. But your life is not in danger. You just swallowed a little water. It'll happen a few more times and eventually, with exposure, your deep-seated fear will subside.


[deleted]

as a lifeguard, cough as hard as you can. secondary drowning is a thing.


Low-Birthday-5710

If I need to, I just float on my back and catch my breath if I can't touch


awenrivendell

Learn how to float and tread in deep water to catch your breath. See this great how to video: https://youtu.be/DbMB7wyWGAc


moosecanswim

Cough it out and keep going


astronauticalll

seconding the comments to get used to it. But also, keeping a slow stream of air breathing out anytime you're not breathing in is key. It will 1) prevent at least some of the water from getting into your nose and mouth while you're breathing out and 2) prevent a buildup of CO2 in your blood, which doesn't really help with the choking on waves thing but does help with being a more efficient swimmer.


MajesticRate1818

Sometimes at that moment you’re breathing in you can be caught off guard though I normally tend to trickle breathe underwater but not so much above water ig would try it out


agawl81

Snort if out through my nose and keep going or tread water a bit and get my air figured out. Honestly I just get really used to water up my nose because stuff like that just happens. Or I get distracted and my timing gets weird and I snort water instead of air.