In need of some positive reinforcement!

[HowardE]

On the deep dive my instructor and I agreed to go to 60' or 15 minutes (shore dive) then turn back to shore. We got started ok and I was very focused on my guages and compass and towing a dive flag.

Yeah Karl... You should try to find a different instructor. I would question the instructor's ability, if he couldn't have surfaced... found your flag, and then followed the line down to you. That would have taken about 3 minutes, if you were only 30' deep, and had just gotten into the water...

 

[ID diver]

Karl,

As others have said many things went wrong on this dive on both your instructor's part and yours. Everybody got out of the water safely and you learned some valuable lessons. Hopefully the instructor learned some lessons too.

One thing to remember you are taking the course to learn what to do and sometimes more importantly what not to do. Instructors are not perfect but it sounds like your instructor made several mistakes that were far and above your inattentiveness to your buddy. It sounds like you were fairly task loaded. Your focusing on the task at hand is not uncommon while taking the AOW course.

Both my wife and I (both of us are instructors) read your post and were very surprised that the instructor left you alone in the water. Even if we "lose" a student (which happens on occassion) due to the poor visibility or whatever reason we do not leave the water and we do not take our gear off. In fact we stress quite a bit until we "find" that diver again. What agency (PADI, YMCA, NAUI, SSI) does your instructor teach through?

Keep diving and keep practicing your skills. Use the tips given to you by the others. Don't let one bad experience ruin your diving.

 

[Sasquatch]

I agree 100% with Tom725 when he stated you need a new instructor or at least a suitable explanation as to why the instructor hit the beach while you were down. If that explanation was given I'd love to hear it. :11:

 

[Karlbiederman]

I in no way wrote what I did to put down my instructor. He has been wonderfull through both my OW and AOW. I have full confidence in his abilities. He has been diving most of his life (ex navy seal). I do believe he was confident in my abilitiy to get back to shore on my own. I also think the only reason he scratched the night dive was so that I could have time to think about this dive and learn some valuable lessons.
I have gotten many good sugestions here thank you all. I think ScubaBoard is the best thing that ever happend to diving.

 

[cudachaser]

I find that when I have students do a navigation run they tend to focus solely on that compass and start to speed up their swim pace like they are in a race. I now caution them of this and tell "it's not a race, just focus on slowing down and enjoy the sceanrie."
Know what...they still do it!

 

[HowardE]

I in no way wrote what I did to put down my instructor. He has been wonderfull through both my OW and AOW. I have full confidence in his abilities. He has been diving most of his life (ex navy seal). I do believe he was confident in my abilitiy to get back to shore on my own. I also think the only reason he scratched the night dive was so that I could have time to think about this dive and learn some valuable lessons.

I don't think that that is the way to teach someone, by leaving them alone, and making them feel like they made a mistake.

It sounds like you said "in need of some positive reinforcement" why? Because you felt crappy after this episode? It seems to me like you felt like a failure because of the way your instructor made you feel.

What it seems like most people on this thread are saying is that you shouldn't be hard on yourself, and that honestly, your instructor should not have left you like that. Navy seal or not, that's just not how it should be done.

 

[dmmike]

I have to agree with sliden, the instructor made more errors than the student. IMHO the time to reinforce the buddy check was right there underwater. If the instuctor felt to much time had gone by without a chech he should of tapped you and gave the buddy up signial. Not doing any more dives seems like punishment.
And yes, having to deal with the float, compass, and depth is a task loading nightmare waiting to happen.

Look on the positive side, you were in training to increase your knownledge base, right........

Good luck, and keep diving.

 

[Ber Rabbit]

The others have offered some good insights so I'm just going to throw in a tip. Don't be afraid to tell the instructor, DM or whoever you dive with where you want them to be. Just because you are taking a class doesn't mean you don't have control over your dive, it's good for you to take charge; I know I'm proud of my students when they start telling me how they want their dive to go once they have been oriented to a site.
Ber :lilbunny: