First Time Calling a Dive

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jerrydascorpion

Registered
Messages
42
Reaction score
30
Location
Near Twin Cities, MN
# of dives
0 - 24
Let me start by saying I am a new diver. This would have been both my wife's and my own 10th dive.

We rented gear from our local shop and were going to dive a local quarry to try to get a bit deeper than we have gone before. The quarries that the park allows diving in only get to 60 feet or so.

We thought that this would be a great place to work on skills and to try to get a little deeper of a dive. It sounded like a big outdoor swimming pool. The diving quarries were maybe 150 to 200 feet across at the widest point. We figured that there can't be much current, and looking into the water you could see rock spoil piles all over, so the visibility must be decent.

I have pretty bad seasonal allergies, so I thought I would take a Sudafed before we dive to try to clear my stuffy nose a bit. I never took Sudafed before, but my wife would take it every so often to relief some sinus pressure (even while not diving). I figured what could it harm, we were not planning on doing long dives, so if it started to wear off we could be done diving. I took the Sudafed maybe an hour before we got to the dive site.

After hiking in maybe the half mile with all our gear, we get to the first quarry. As I am getting in my wetsuit, I feel what seems like my nose running. I wipe my nose with my hand and see a decent amount of blood. I do get bloody noses somewhat frequently (a few times a year), and this one was not bad compared to others I have had.

I sit down and tend to my nose to get the bleeding to stop, as my wife sets up our gear.

By the time everything is setup, my nose has pretty much stopped bleeding. My wife enters the water first, and I hand her all of her gear. I then hand her my gear and I enter the water.

We both are all geared up and do our pre dive brief to discuss what we are going to accomplish, our hand signals, our ascent plan, and at what air amount we will start to surface at.

We swim on the surface away from where we entered the quarry being we kicked up some sediment while entering and getting our gear on. We start our descent, and realize that the visibility is around 8 feet at best. It wasn't the end of the world, but not what we were expecting. We surface, and talk about our dive plan again, and decide to head to the shallower side of the quarry and explore some rock piles to see if we can find any fish. We dive around for a few more minutes, and I want to check on my nose to make sure the bleeding is not starting again after all the equalizing I have been doing.

On the surface, I find that my nose has started bleeding again, and we talk about calling the dive or waiting to stop it again. After a few minutes of floating and hanging out on the surface, I got a nauseated feeling. It felt like I had too much caffeine on an empty stomach. I did eat breakfast and some snacks before the dive.

We exited the quarry and broke our gear down. We thought about getting lunch and trying again. We decided it was not work the risk to try again.

We did get about 15 minutes of diving to max depth of maybe 15 feet.

It was not fun making the decision to call the dive after renting all the gear and using only a couple hundred pounds of air, but it was the right choice.

We did learn a lot from our short dive though. It was a great refresher on setup and use of gear, we put our gear on in the water, discussed our dive plan and when something changed that was not in the plan we modified our plan, we were able to practice some basic skills, and it was our first dive with just the two of us. I also learned not to take Sudafed, I do not think I will take it again even if I am not diving.

I am also glad that we had to call a dive that was only a local quarry dive, and not out on a boat in a tropical destination.

It was a very humbling experience, and it was probably the most informative 15 minute dive we have done.

We look forward to the next dive we can do.
 
You learned an important lesson - sometimes the best thing to do is to call a dive even before you start it. One of the hardest things is calling a dive when you have spent a reasonably large chunk of cash to do it.

As often quoted on this forum, it is better to be on the surface wishing you were diving than to be underwater wishing you were on the surface. @The Chairman has a rule of fun he talks about - anyone can call the dive if it isn't fun for whatever reason. A good rule in my opinion.

I have called a few dives before getting wet. This has been down to a number of issues such as computer issue, set up (a number of rental tanks with problems meaning I was tired before I was due to get in due to swapping 3 tanks before I had one that worked) and health. I maybe wondered what I was missing but never regretted calling them.

Congratulations on the first dive with the two of you - I hope it is the first of many.
 
Stuff happens. Glad to see you have the right attitude about it and used it as a learning experience. No point at all in pushing things if you're uncomfortable. And, yes, it can be a little embarrassing to be the one to call the dive but really, there is no shame in it. If someone has a problem with it, then they are the one with the problem.

If you have a history of nosebleeds, Sudafed may not be the best thing for you but I don't have any recommendations for a decongestant that won't give you the same problem. Hope you get that figured out.

Anyway, good luck. You're just getting started on a great adventure. Glad to see you are wanting to get the experience to become a better diver.
 
Sorry about calling the dive but sometimes the best choice.
Guessing you went to St Cloud quarries?
Easier option would be the Iron Mines in Crosby area. Some roads are poor but most of the pits you can drive right up to. Also usually good vis
 
Sorry about calling the dive but sometimes the best choice.
Guessing you went to St Cloud quarries?
Easier option would be the Iron Mines in Crosby area. Some roads are poor but most of the pits you can drive right up to. Also usually good vis
Yes it was the St cloud quarries. We have talked about making the drive up towards Crosby, but we just had a baby sitter for a few hours that day.
 
Stuff happens. Glad to see you have the right attitude about it and used it as a learning experience. No point at all in pushing things if you're uncomfortable. And, yes, it can be a little embarrassing to be the one to call the dive but really, there is no shame in it. If someone has a problem with it, then they are the one with the problem.

If you have a history of nosebleeds, Sudafed may not be the best thing for you but I don't have any recommendations for a decongestant that won't give you the same problem. Hope you get that figured out.

Anyway, good luck. You're just getting started on a great adventure. Glad to see you are wanting to get the experience to become a better diver.

When we returned the gear to the dive shop and told them what happened after they asked how the diving was, the worker mentioned that they use Afrin in the ER (he must work in the ER as well) to stop nose bleeds. I have used Afrin as a decongestant before, but not while diving.
 
It was not fun making the decision to call the dive after renting all the gear and using only a couple hundred pounds of air, but it was the right choice.
It's always the right choice. Always!
As often quoted on this forum, it is better to be on the surface wishing you were diving than to be underwater wishing you were on the surface. @The Chairman has a rule of fun he talks about - anyone can call the dive if it isn't fun for whatever reason. A good rule in my opinion.
Listen to this. You can call a dive at any time, for any reason: no questions asked. If you're not having fun, stop and figure out why before you continue. There is nothing down there worth getting hurt over.

On nose bleeds. That could very well be a side effect of Sudafed. It will definitely increase your pulse rate. I used to get a nose bleed on the first dive of the season. If I went below 80FSW, I wouldn't have another nose bleed unless I had stayed out of the water for a month or two. Something about the pressure affecting the capillaries I was told. I have dove with nose bleeds, but that may not be right for you.
 
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On nose bleeds. That could very well be a side effect of Sudafed. It will definitely increase your pulse rate. I used to get a nose bleed on the first dive of the season. If I went below 80FSW, I wouldn't have another nose bleed unless I had stayed out of the water for a month or two. Something about the pressure affecting the capillaries I was told. I have dove with nose bleeds, but that may not be right for you.

I may have tried to continue shallow diving if it was just the nosebleed, it wasn't that bad. But that mixed with not feeling good (most likely from the Sudafed) was definitely worth calling the dive. I did notice my pulse rate was higher than usual for a good chuck of the day. My watch tracks my pulse, and I noticed it was higher for sometime after taking the medicine. I did take the Sudafed 12 hour extended release, so that is my guess to the nauseous feeling.

Thanks for all the replies and encouragement! I enjoying reading everyone's stories and histories on this site. It helps scratch that itch to go diving, when I am not able to get out and dive.
 
First, congratulations on getting out there and diving on your own without reliance on "dive professionals." The fact you knew to call the dive, and did so, shows you had good training and common sense. We all have called dives for any and all reasons. My little group of old fart dive buddies started being called "The Breakfast Club" by our wives because we called so many dives one year. All legitimate excuses - waves too big, visibility non-existent, don't feel right... (we still tease one buddy for his lame excuse for calling a dive. As we are sitting on our boat gearing up he says, Guys, I think I'm having a heart attack. Fine be that way. After heart surgery he was back in the water. :) )
M
 
I may have tried to continue shallow diving if it was just the nosebleed, it wasn't that bad. But that mixed with not feeling good (most likely from the Sudafed) was definitely worth calling the dive. I did notice my pulse rate was higher than usual for a good chuck of the day. My watch tracks my pulse, and I noticed it was higher for sometime after taking the medicine. I did take the Sudafed 12 hour extended release, so that is my guess to the nauseous feeling.

Thanks for all the replies and encouragement! I enjoying reading everyone's stories and histories on this site. It helps scratch that itch to go diving, when I am not able to get out and dive.
Sudafed can be a godsend for diving, but you need to know how you react to it, and people can react differently. I usually take a dose the day before I go diving to just make sure everything seems okay. For me, it wards off random sinus squeezes I can get; I also take it before diving sometimes. Afrin works well too, especially for a random dive here and there, but shouldn’t be taken daily for extended times.
 
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