She never learned how to swim, and at 63, she took matters into her own hands. Last summer, Laura Miller, of Plantation, learned how to swim at the British Swim Schools in Sunrise, graduating from the program in December. Now at 64, she is taking a refresher course in a group class.

Why didn’t you learn to swim as a child?

I grew up in an apartment in Brooklyn; neither one of my parents swam. I only went to sleep-away camp twice for two weeks and [I didn't learn] there. I went to Brighton Beach with my parents, where the waves were very strong. Other than those few weeks at camp, I didn’t really have any instruction or role models. It’s something I always wanted to do, but I had a fear.

Did your children learn to swim?

Yes … they took professional swim lessons. My husband worked with them, too, but they were very young and I tried to not let them notice because I didn’t want them to develop a fear of the water. When my son got to be 5 or 6, he said, “Mommy, you don’t swim!” But I was very happy that my children learned to swim at a young age.

What encouraged you to learn?

I was at a point in my life where I wanted to do something different, I wanted to do something new. And also, for me, since swimming was the one thing that I had wanted to accomplish my whole life, it seemed natural that that would be the thing that I would tackle. I did call various facilities to find out information about them; the British Swim School seemed to be a very good fit for me.

What were the classes like?

The swim instructor starts off with small steps, which were small, but to me they were large. Even though there was some fear involved, for some reason I found the courage at this point to overcome the fear. It was something I wanted to learn my whole life. I’m now able to do freestyle, I’m able to do the back float, do the back stroke. My husband just recently taught me how to tread water; I can turn from my front to my back.

Did you ever get frustrated?

I never felt like I couldn’t do it, but with each new skill, I sometimes would get frustrated when my instructor, who is wonderful, had me do something over and over and over and it was difficult to master a skill.

So, you’re never too old to learn to swim?

My swim instructor … said people older than me were taking classes. … She had some students who were even afraid to step into the pool or to move away from the wall. One thing I do feel fortunate, even years ago, was that I was never afraid to put my face in the water. So that was extremely, extremely helpful. That was something that did not bother me. My instructor was able, little by little, to work with using goggles, opening up my eyes under the water. For me, I knew that I had to take private lessons and have that one-on-one attention and have someone understand where I was coming from, so I was able to be vulnerable in front of her.

How does it feel to say you can swim?

It’s almost the most wonderful feeling that I have, other than being a mother and being a grandmother. It’s such a feeling of accomplishment, to be able to have overcome this fear. And also, I really wasn’t active in athletics when I was younger, but when I started to be able to swim, I felt athletic for the first time in my life. There still were times when I would swallow water, but most of the time … it felt very natural. The main feeling I feel now is a feeling of accomplishment. Before I learned how to swim, it seemed when I wasn’t going to be able to that it would be such an accomplishment that I always felt that if I could learn to swim, I could learn how to do anything.