Rapture of the Deep - being narc'd

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Narcosis or Bad Buoyancy. Either sound possible from the description.

I agree. As far as buoyancy goes, I remember doing the Grand Turk wall earlier in my diving life and it can be disorienting to have no bottom and reference to the wall is not as easy as it looks. At least to me. It was easy to loose track of vertical axis.

I found narcosis is very manageable. First real experience was also on the trip mentioned above. Never been beyond 110 so a buddy and I planned a bounce to 130 just to see. As we crossed the 120 barrier the anxiety did increase and the focus narrowed. As a paramedic we gain experience containing our emotions and reactions so, to us, it was very manageable. Just focused on the task and put the anxiety on hold. Cleared quickly as we came up but we both noticed the change in our anxiety levels and had very similar eerily surreal feelings. I have since been over 170fsw on the San Francisco on two separate occasions. The first time was again anxiety provoking but not at 130fsw like before. The second trip I knew it for what it was and just enjoyed the euphoria. There was a ton of tunnel vision on all three occasions but I never had any loss of memory such as when on a major bender or when given pre-op medications.

AS NWGrateful stated, I suspect that the reactions are very individualized. If someone doesn't have a lot of experience in an altered state, (take that exactly as it sounds) then NN may very well be anxiety provoking. On the other hand, if in life a person has experience being altered, whether chemical, herbal or through highly charge emotional situations, then they should be better able to manage the symptoms. And as others have stated experience helps.

Just my theory. No attempt to validate made.
 
My (now ex) girlfriend was with me when I went to Mexico, and she was very curious why I kept running off to play cave diver. She is an AOW diver and wanted to try a cavern dive. She had experience diving deep to 130' as well as some night diving experience, so I figured she would do reasonably well. After doing the touristy Chac Mool, she decided to try The Pit I believe, and at about 115' she wouldn't turn her flashlight on and began to twirl around. She also was hallucinating that her mask was flooding and kept attempting to clear it, despite being dry inside. Ultimately, we had to nudge her upwards a little bit and gradually her symptoms resolved. Following the dive, she had no recollection of the event, and was even becoming belligerent in stating that she was not Narc'd. Fortunately, my little gopro captured the whole thing. Somehow I was still to blame, :banghead:. Link below for anyone interested.


http://youtu.be/EQp3aNyeCJU
 
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One thing about nitrogen narcosis - It’s very hard to do real science to determine what is actually happening to an individual diver in the water at a given PPN2. This is because the things that we CAN measure (recall, math skills, manual tasks, etc..) can all be affected by multiple factors on a dive other than nitrogen, such as anxiety, hypothermia, and CO2 retention. Of course, N2 has a big effect on very deep dives, but for dives like the OP mentioned (90 feet), the relative contribution of N2 may be way overestimated by people who feel that they are narced.

The most important concept in medicine is “there is a bell curve for everything”. So of course, you have people diving deep air to the Doria and doing incredible tasks, and you have people with a wide range of symptoms at depths above 100 feet. And no one will ever be able to prove that they were or weren’t narced. But one of the things that John Chatterton stressed in our deco class was that nitrogen narcosis is overblown and that the importance of CO2 retention is under appreciated, especially at moderate depths. This is why he doesn’t teach recreational trimix.

Here is the man himself on this topic:
Diving with Stevie Wonder
 
I was told by different instructors that woman get affected more than man, less depth and worse effects of narced.
 
I was told by different instructors that woman get affected more than man, less depth and worse effects of narced.

... I don't think that's true. There are many factors that affect someone's sensitivity to narcosis ... I've never noticed gender to be one of them ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)
 
Agree with Bob on this there are many factors that contribute to narcosis and I never heard of gender being one of them
 
Agree with Bob on this there are many factors that contribute to narcosis and I never heard of gender being one of them

I've also experienced most panic with women,but that doesn't necessarily translate to the gender itself being more susceptible

Could just be observational based on differences in body types etc the instructors might be exposed to and their narcosis experience (inaccurate given the small sample used)
 
I've also experienced most panic with women,but that doesn't necessarily translate to the gender itself being more susceptible

Could just be observational based on differences in body types etc the instructors might be exposed to and their narcosis experience (inaccurate given the small sample used)

I think panic is a somewhat different thing ... women tend to have a healthier sense of survival than men and also have more of a tendency to respond to things on a higher emotional level ... that is, of course, a generalization but it might explain the observational differences ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/peregrine/

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