A fresh start after 60: I overcame my fear of water and learned to swim at 69

It was the green mud on the wall of her school pool that Jill Craven remembers best, when she felt her teacher's hand on her head, pushing her under water. “You know how time slows down? Pass under. Watch…” she says.

It was in Palmerston North, New Zealand, when she was five years old. While his three older siblings could swim half a mile (800 meters) or more, and his peers did at least a quarter, Craven "would do anything to get out of class". His mother was a physical education teacher, his father a school principal. They played tennis and rugby, and in this culture of sportsmanship, Craven could hide his fear of water by playing tennis and netball.

Craven, who moved to London in her twenties to pursue a career in journalism, is adamant that she did not fear for her life when her teacher pushed her underwater. Something about the way she insists "I never feared for my life, ever" suggests the idea terrifies her. Instead, what she had was "a permanent fear of being underwater". She could lift her feet from the bottom of the pool for a quick doggystyle paddle, but nothing more was beyond her.

But eight years ago, Craven was treated for breast cancer, and was advised to swim as part of her recovery. Still finding the fear insurmountable, she instead took up water jogging - "like surfing in place, but in motion" - with a buoyancy aid around her middle. Her lymph nodes had been removed during cancer treatment and she was terrified of having lymphedema in her arm, which would make playing tennis impossible.

In 2019 , Craven was visiting family and friends on a four-month trip to New Zealand when the pandemic hit. His stay was extended to more than two years thanks to the confinements and the feeling that "of all that is rotten, there is always something good" - in his case the "absolute joy" of spending time with his close.

She continued her aquatic jogging, and one day at the swimming pool of Feilding, she saw a group of children having a lesson. It was an indoor pool, nice and warm, and the children were five or six years old, about the age Craven was when his teacher took him. "I just thought it was time to do it," she said.

"God knows what I looked like. An egg beater." "I did five strokes, or six. I was so proud of myself. Then this lifeguard said, 'If you can do five, you can do 10.'" p>

He told her how to breathe. A friend gave her glasses, "a turning point". Her niece Justine, who swims in Wellington Harbour, walked by the pool cheering, and Craven felt she had "earned a...