How many here were scared to death and still completed OW classes?

[NAUI Wowie]

My main fear was doing something wrong and upsetting my instructor. He was a Navy Seal, very big and VERY serious.

I did scare the crap out of my family. Once certified, I rented a set of gear and brought it home to practice in the pool.
I was maybe 14 or 15 and my brother, sister and both parents were pool side watching the crazy kid don all this gear, we are talking horse collars and 80's and I'm just a runt.

Sooo, do the whole set up, and take the steps into the pool. Submerge under water and BOOOMMM, blow the o-ring. Pool is boiling, water spraying. I knew what was going on, and so did my dad. My sister scream Godzilla!!! and ran in the house, my brother who was thinking about diving stuck to snorkeling and it took my dad and I about 3 weeks to convince Mom to let me continue to dive.

yea tough sell after you explode in the pool lmao

 

[NAUI Wowie]

So you ran out of air but your pressure gauge still read 650psi?

Time to get a new pressure gauge.

that was in cabo san lucas during my OW dives and it was all rented. the next dive i did with a different reg the guage read 3900 before jumping in. on an AL80 which can AT MOST hold 3200 psi on a perrrfect fill. and the rented wetsuit gave me what looked like a flesh eating disease. large dark black spots getting bigger all over. many antibiotic shots and pills.

needless to say the very first thing I EVER did was buy everything needed to dive except weight and tanks and I always travel with everything and I mean everything. I hand carry on my regulator both dive computers, 3 mil wetsuit, 2 dive masks and my bcd. It all fits in a large backpack. My bcd is super small and compact like completely flat in fact. The hydros pro. I love that bcd for travel, its as flat as a pancake in the backpack provided by them and I fit all the above in the hydros pack. And the bcd is totally dry seconds after you leave the water. there is zero fabric at all.

 

[Lorenzoid]

I wasn't scared at all during my OW class or immediately thereafter. It wasn't until after a few dives that I started thinking about how dangerous this is. But when I started reading SB ... now that's when I started getting scared. So many things that had never even occurred to me that are conspiring to kill me.

 

[NAUI Wowie]

I wasn't scared at all during my OW class or immediately thereafter. It wasn't until after a few dives that I started thinking about how dangerous this is. But when I started reading SB ... now that's when I started getting scared. So many things that had never even occurred to me that are conspiring to kill me.

Yes and not to bring a lighthearted thread down but now Im seeing how dangerous this sport is. I think tourist destinations and the scuba industry both try to make it seem like its safer than driving to the grocery store. Not true. I read 35 pages back in accidents forum. Went back years. And linked to threads from 9 and 10 years ago with people mentioning other accidents and I am literally reading threads where our own posters here that have passed away are talking to each other. Its scary. You read one post with a person that has RIP and then someone replies and they have a RIP, both people died doing scuba and they are having a conversation with each other. And both had lightyears more experience than I do. Thats when I realized so many of the people that post here have died in scuba accidents or will eventually.

 

[TMHeimer]

I wasn't scared at all during my OW class or immediately thereafter. It wasn't until after a few dives that I started thinking about how dangerous this is. But when I started reading SB ... now that's when I started getting scared. So many things that had never even occurred to me that are conspiring to kill me.

Sort of the same with me. After taking Rescue course I realized what could happen and that it was foolish to not practice the pool skills I learned in OW.

 

[NAUI Wowie]

Sort of the same with me. After taking Rescue course I realized what could happen and that it was foolish to not practice the pool skills I learned in OW.

I dont know much about pool skills but I know when you are on vacation and everyone is going into a wreck that is 100 plus feet deep and everyone has just one tank and there is no entry line.....dont go in. Trust what you learn. no overhead. no deep with tech stuff on a single 80 or 100 tank. be safe

 

[rvojr]

65-70 degree F in fresh water at the surface (50 F around 40') with a few feet of visibility while wearing a 6.5mm farmer john and 6.5 mm top and hood(I was definitely too warm). Thick gloves which made everything difficult including all the basic skills for OW. I had trouble getting down feeling like the Michelin man. My mask was leaking most likely to the hood being folded under or my hair. We had dropped weight pockets by others, and my buddy got his first stage hooked under a cross piece we swam under playing follow the leader with the instructor. After 5' distance from the instructor, we swam in the general direction and eventually caught sight of him. After doing that, I realized it is going to get easier most likely on any other dives. So yes I was terrified but got over it.

 

[TMHeimer]

I dont know much about pool skills but I know when you are on vacation and everyone is going into a wreck that is 100 plus feet deep and everyone has just one tank and there is no entry line.....dont go in. Trust what you learn. no overhead. no deep with tech stuff on a single 80 or 100 tank. be safe

By pool skills I mean the stuff you learned in OW course---reg retrieval, OOA procedure, unit doff & don, CESA, etc.

 

[Seaweed Doc]

I wasn't scared of diving per se, but concerned I couldn't pass the tests. However that fear rapidly declined as training went on. By the first OW checkout I was fine.

As a result, one of the toughest parts of "going pro" for me is recognizing severity of student anxiety and knowing when to use supportive encouragement to push on versus when to step back or, in OW, thumb the dive.

 

[TMHeimer]

I wasn't scared of diving per session, but concerned I couldn't pass the tests. However that fear rapidly declined as training went on. By the first OW checkout I was fine.

As a result, one of the toughest parts of "going pro" for me is recognizing severity of student anxiety and knowing when to use supportive encouragement to push on versus when to step back or, in OW, thumb the dive.

Yes, realizing that any skill or situation can be unnerving for a student, even though we may wonder why.