Your mom – or grandma – likely told you there was a rule to wait a certain amount of time (an hour?) after eating before you could get back in the pool.
You might assume the advice had been handed down but was based on nothing – and honestly, you’d be right.
So, where did your mother (and grandmother) hear that it’s best to give it some time??
Emergency room doctor Michael Boniface thinks the myth came from simple observation.
“The old feelings was that, after you eat, some of the blood may be diverted to your gut so that you can digest, diverting the bloodstream away from your arms and legs. And you may get tired or fatigued, and be more likely to drown.”
Some of the earliest evidence of this myth in practice appears in a 1908 scouting handbook.
“First, there is the danger of cramp. If you bathe within an hour and a half after taking a meal, that is, before your food is digested you are very likely to get cramp. Cramp doubles you up in extreme pain so that you cannot move your arms or legs – and down you go. You may drown – and it will be your own fault.”
Talk about scare tactics!
In 2011, the American Red Cross Scientific Advisory Council found “no incidence of fatal or non-fatal drowning” when people swim after eating, whether in a recreational or competitive setting.
“There is currently no evidence to support any link between eating before swimming and drowning. The persistence of this myth is not actively harmful, but it is nonetheless a myth.”
Your grandma probably meant well.
That said, all she did was deprive you of an extra hour of pool time!
If you found that story interesting, learn more about why people often wake up around 3 AM and keep doing it for life.