Swimming lessons

Deo has become afraid of the pool if I bring him in past the stairs. I am upset this is happening because he used to love swimming so much. I started his swimming lessons today and he cried the whole time. I started by having him hug my neck and I hold his legs and make him kick all around the pool and say "kick, kick, kick" over and over. I do this for like 5 minutes then my arms hurt and I am sick of hearing myself say "kick" but I hear that repetition is key. I do 5 minutes sessons of kicking 3 times letting him play inbetween because the people in the surrounding apartments must think I am killing him because he is crying so much. But this is for his own good, he'll get used to it. At the end of the kicking sesson he gets dunked under and I yell kick very loud while he is under. He hates it. Seriously.
I couldn't get one kick out of him on his own today he would just lay there with his legs out crying while I floated him around the pool. I hope he gets better.
I am going to do this every morning for the next few days and afternoon too if it is not really hot.
When you ask Deo how old he is he says "2" now. I will get it on video for you.