Chocolate

I have the same problem, I've never been able to float even when I was young & thin. Many people have refused to believe me & spent a long time trying to show me how to float without success.

If you are no longer thin, try again - you will probably float

I'm far from thin but still float like a brick.

That blows someone's "fat floats" theory!!!

I have been both thin and 10 kg overweight, it never changed anything with regard to swimming either!!!

10kg!!!......... you're just not trying hard enough.

Floating is partly average body density, partly technique. If you try to move rapidly into a floating position, inertia will cause you to sink initially, even if your body is essentially buoyant. As an infant, I could float. During my mid teens I was genuinely a non-floater, but could float again once my lung capacity started to increase - albeit with only a small area around my mouth protruding (synchronising the breathing was a real problem). Later, as I put on a bit of weight, a more reasonable proportion of my face came out of the water. Of course, bone density will have some influence, especially if you are built like a testosterone-charged sprinter.

I had similar problems! Not funny when small either. I had two parents that could have when younger, been Olympic swimmers and a brother about the same......various attempts by my parents to get me floating/swimming usually ended up with me with half the pool water inside of me!!!! BORING!!!

My best feat which got me some recognition was that I could swim the length of many swim baths underwater by the time I was 12!!!!!

I did actually eventually learn to swim after a fashion, but as 75% of my energy was being used to stay on the surface, I do not get farther than a couple of 100 meters before being completely knackered!!!(spell checker does not know this old English word!!)

A tip from a work colleague about 30 years ago go me buying a wet suit top, it gives me about the same buoyancy as a "normal" human being, with it on I can swim literally for miles.

On a recent Turkish yacht holiday (temps up to 53°C, it was a hot summer last year!!) I spent up to 4 hours a day, often in one go, in the water, mostly with a diving "Shorty" on but not always.....as the water is very salty there....

On the RN entrance swimming test, you have to swim the length of a pool to the deep end, float there for 5 minutes, swim back and get out unaided, all wearing a boiler suit with no buttons, that really slows you down.

I was (luckily for me) first in the pool with 3 others of a similar age, who could all swim like fish!! But even though I had to swim around (cannot float) and they just floated for the 5 minutes at the deep end, I managed to complete the test absolutely at the end of my tether!!! and passed (almost out).

Those who did not pass (many) had to have extra swimming lessons till they did pass......I was happy that the Guys I went in with were all good swimmers and I just was not going to be the only one that gave up!!! Maybe I would not have tried so hard if I had seen the many others failing, who knows.....

Is it my imagination, or are a lot of you chocolate-fanatics rather dense?

Is this problem related to the chocolate or from your childhood and people are born with it?

Regards;

Nadeem

It has nothing to do with chocolate at all. I have never eaten a lot of chocolate, its only an occasional thing with me, nothing more.

I can go a year or more without it...... but in my youth in Singapore, chocolate all turned whitish and patchy in the heat and humidity and did not look attractive at all,so I got out of the habit of eating it at all.....

No, my question was the ability to float and not float. I do not know how to swim so if I go in the water, I will not float and sink. So what is the density of bones and floating inability relationship? That is what I would like to know. Why it is so and is it common with many folks? I know we are going away from the chocolate thread but I was just curious to know.

Regards;

Nadeem

I have met several people with the same ability (problem?), but as far as I am aware, nobody knows the real reason, but heavy bones seems the only "sensible" answer.

I got lead poisoning as a tot in the UK around 1948 or so from chewing the window frame of my bedroom (do not ask why!!) watching the steam trains go by at the bottom of the garden.....(you shit blue turds with lead poisoning!! I remember that!!) and I always say that I never got rid of the lead fully...... Maybe I would have been more intelligent without that! Who knows!! (Lead is known to cause learning disorders in children who lived near busy roads when all petrol was leaded......)

Sorry to hear about this. In US, lead paints along with the leaded gas are outlawed and the seller has to provide a certificate that the house in painted with non-lead paint and buyer has to have the inspecton done and paint tested. We went thru this many times and in several states the same law applies.

I thought the porous bones are bad and may cause to break if some one falls and now dense bones are bad as one can not swim.

Regards;

Nadeem

Lead based paints are banned at least from domestic usage in the UK and all European countries I believe. Since when? the 60's at a guess, but i do not know exactly either!!

I have the sinking issue also. My ultra dense bones (besides my head) are from Tetracycline for acne as a kid. I have no idea if it is related to not being able to float. I do float fine in salt water but in fresh water its swim or sink.

If my early memory serves my right I had a hard time learning to swim and floating was not an option. That would be pre Tetracycline.

Brad

Ah...swoon...be still my aching heart..

Your are not a lady cat are you?

Meeaowwwww!!

Excellent instructive post...this has helped no end with some rather recalcitrant fur balls

Del

Do you think they might take to having Marmite on it?
(I started out with a central European version - crust with beef or goose dripping and crispy speck substitute; it's probably shortened my life expectancy by at least 20 years)

Most Germans do not like the taste of Marmite (except my Wife who loves it!), it would appear that you either get to like the strong salty taste as a child, or it is a bit too OTT for you as an adult.....i have given it to many to try without success. My children like it only in gravy.....

Seconded. That is really cool !

The taste was complex and bitter - now complex and bitter and twisted?