I am not just a therapist who recommends swimming. I am someone who swims in the sea or any open water available: a river, a lake and even ponds. I swim regularly. All year round. Often questioning my life choices while changing on Brighton beach with frozen fingers and pebbles in places pebbles should never be.

And yet, I keep going back. Not because it is trendy or because it looks good on Instagram, but because again and again it brings me back to myself in a way very few things do. Also because I have already told everyone I am a sea swimmer and now I feel socially committed.

As both a counsellor and a long time swimmer, I have become very interested in what actually happens to us when we enter cold, open water, and why so many people describe it not just as refreshing, but as emotionally regulating, grounding and, dare I say it, a bit magical.

When your body takes over and your mind finally shuts up

Cold water does not ask politely. It arrives like a slap.

Your breath catches, your shoulders shoot up, and your body reacts long before your mind has a chance to start catastrophising about emails, relationships or whether you are behind in life compared to that annoyingly productive person you follow on Instagram.

For people who live with anxiety, this is surprisingly helpful. Anxiety lives in the head. The sea drags you firmly into the body.

Breathing becomes the focus. Staying upright becomes the focus. Dignity is immediately abandoned.

In therapy we often talk about getting out of the head and into the body. The sea does this very efficiently and without asking about your childhood first.

After the initial shock, something else happens. If you stay still long enough, your body starts to adapt. Breathing steadies, muscles soften, and sometimes, quite unexpectedly, a sense of calm sneaks in.

This is your nervous system moving out of full alert mode and into something a little more settled. Not because your life is suddenly sorted, but because in that moment your body feels safe enough to stop panicking.

Which, incidentally, is also where therapy begins. Not with insight. Not with fixing. With helping the body feel safe enough to exhale.

When emotions surface (and sometimes come out as swearing and howling)

Many people tell me they feel emotional by the water. Sometimes peaceful, sometimes tearful, sometimes both.

For me, it often looks a bit different at first.

I get in, I feel total shock and complete ecstasy at the same time, and I immediately start swearing. Loudly. With enthusiasm. In English and in Spanish. Sometimes I also howl. I am sure the seagulls have opinions about this. But underneath the comedy, something very real is happening.

That burst of noise, laughter, swearing, sometimes even tears, is energy moving through the body. It is the nervous system discharging tension after bracing for cold and intensity. It is emotion finding an outlet when the body finally feels alive and present.

When we spend a lot of time anxious, stressed or emotionally contained, our bodies are often holding much more than we realise. We stay polite, functional and composed. But that does not mean the feelings are not there.

When the body settles, when breath deepens and muscles begin to soften, what has been held can start to move. So no, the sea is not making me dramatic. It is giving my nervous system permission to release.

For people struggling with depression, this can be especially meaningful. Depression is not always about sadness. Often it is about numbness, heaviness and disconnection. Feeling intense sensation, laughter, tears or even a burst of very colourful language can be a sign that the system is waking up again.

In therapy we work with this same principle. We do not force emotions out, but we create enough safety that they are allowed to arrive, in whatever form they need to take.

Sometimes that looks like quiet tears. Sometimes it looks like angry words. And sometimes, apparently, it looks like shouting swear words at the English Channel.

All of it is human. All of it is release.

When you feel behind in life and the sea gently tells you to calm down

One of the things I love most about the sea is the sense of scale. The horizon. The ridiculous vastness. The reminder that I am one small, slightly shouty human in a very big world. It does not make problems disappear, but it changes how trapped inside them I feel.

So many people I work with carry a deep sense of being behind in life. Behind where they should be emotionally, financially, relationally, professionally, spiritually, domestically, alphabetically, you name it. That constant sense of falling behind is exhausting and it feeds both anxiety and depression beautifully, like an emotional compost heap.

Standing in front of something vast can interrupt that story for a moment. It reminds us that life is not a neat checklist. It is messy, unpredictable and does not care about your five year plan.

In therapy, people often shift from asking, What is wrong with me? to asking, What has happened to me and what do I need now?

That is a much kinder question. And usually a much more useful one.

When even the things that help start to feel hard

Here is another bit of honesty.

Even though I have been swimming outdoors for many years, this winter I have only been in the sea twice since the cold really set in. And I miss it. A lot.

But alongside missing it, I have also noticed doubts creeping in. Doubts about whether I can handle the cold again, whether I have lost my resilience, whether it is too late in the season to start when so many of my swimming friends are already fully acclimatised and casually chatting in water that feels like punishment.

There is also the FOMO. Knowing how good it is for me. Knowing how regulated and alive I usually feel afterwards. Knowing that even two minutes can shift my whole nervous system. And still finding it hard to get myself back in.

From a therapeutic point of view, this is not laziness or lack of motivation. This is what happens when confidence wobbles and self doubt gets loud. We start comparing. We start telling ourselves we have failed at something we once could do. And suddenly the very thing that supports us begins to feel intimidating. Starting again is often harder than starting the first time. Because now there is history, expectations and a version of ourselves we think we should still be. So instead of curiosity, we meet ourselves with pressure. Which, in case you are wondering, is not especially motivating.

I see this pattern in therapy all the time. People do not struggle because they do not know what helps them. They struggle because shame and comparison get in the way of beginning again.

And this is where I keep reminding myself, and my clients, that healing does not require perfection. It does not require long swims, perfect routines or heroic levels of willpower. Sometimes it is about small, kind re entries.

Two minutes in cold water still tells the nervous system, you survived, you are safe, you did something caring for yourself. And often that is enough to start rebuilding trust with our own bodies again. Not the trust of being tough. The trust of being allowed to be where you are.

What the sea and therapy have in common

Sea swimming does not solve your life. Sadly. And therapy does not either, although that would be excellent for marketing. What they can both do is help your nervous system settle enough that you can think more clearly, feel more safely and relate to yourself with a bit more kindness. From that place, change becomes possible. Not rushed. Not forced. But supported.

Healing is not about pushing harder. It is about creating the conditions where your system no longer has to stay on high alert all the time. And sometimes, for me at least, that starts with a slightly terrifying dip in the English Channel followed by a very hot flask of tea, at least three layers of clothing and cake, of course!

And if you see me heading into the sea with my swim cap, mixed enthusiasm and questionable language, feel free to wave. I will be the one reminding myself to breathe and promising I will not stay in long. Probably.