Panic - Split from overweight thread

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Pete, I don't think anybody is arguing that there are ways to "manage" a full-blown panic. We're just suggesting that training and experience can make it less likely you'll end up there, and that the process that leads to full-blown panic can often be recognized and nipped in the bud, if the person involved has learned the significance of the symptoms of stress.
 
TSandM:
Pete, I don't think anybody is arguing that there are ways to "manage" a full-blown panic. We're just suggesting that training and experience can make it less likely you'll end up there, and that the process that leads to full-blown panic can often be recognized and nipped in the bud, if the person involved has learned the significance of the symptoms of stress.
People have taught that you can manage narcosis too... and we have since seen how foolish that was. I just don't feel that THIS panic is a training issue. There are many who are quick to vilify the agencies and the instructors just because they don't train in the same manner. That's just a specious way of using this incident to further an anti-agency agenda. Why entertain a knee jerk reaction and condemnation of how this person was trained? The lesson here is not about how training could have saved this person: it's about how quickly panic can overtake and kill any diver.

Can training save your life? Certainly. Can you train to respond to an instantaneous and complete panic? No, not really. We can learn how to RESCUE someone in that situation, and sadly there is no way to guarantee that this will result in saving the panicked diver.
 
NetDoc:
Can training save your life? Certainly. Can you train to respond to an instantaneous and complete panic? No, not really. We can learn how to RESCUE someone in that situation, and sadly there is no way to guarantee that this will result in saving the panicked diver.
Perhaps you can't respond to an instantaneous panic but can you respond to the stressors that may lead to the panic? Absolutely! When a person enters into an uncomfortable situation and their breathing and heartrate begin to elevate, wouldn't you agree that learning to control these (among other things) could actually quell the onset of panic?
 
NetDoc:
So, you think that a lack of training led to this woman's demise? I fully disagree.
Heh, no I am not going to enter the "agency and lack of training" realm so stop trying to pull me into it. :D What I am referring to is simply understanding the stressors that may lead to a panic in your life and the ability to recognize and suppress them so they do not lead to a panic. It seems to me that elevated breathing and heartrate (both controllable) are common to a stressful situation. If one could recognize this soon enough before the event spirals out of control then, I am of the belief that the panic can be avoided.
 
I think it's great to identify those stressors, and learning how to handle more and more loads is also a good thing.

But, this does not appear to fall into that category. There is no reasoning with an unreasoning and fairly instantaneous panic. There is no way to learn how to recover from that.
 
NetDoc:
But, this does not appear to fall into that category. There is no reasoning with an unreasoning and fairly instantaneous panic. There is no way to learn how to recover from that.
In all fairness, we don't know the accurate details of the incident to be able to refer to it as instantaneous panic. This individual may have had a great deal of anxiety well before entry into the water. This would have been controllable had it been recognized. If the title of the thread is correct and the person were overweighted, this would be another stressor that had not been recognized beforehand (keeping in mind that stressors aren't necessarily physiological but will manifest in a physiological way). Without accurate details, it is difficult, at best, to determine any pre-existing stressors.
 
I think a lot has to do with how well a person's instructor has taught them. I know mine spent a lot of time going over rescue techniques in both shallow and deeper water. Also, my military background has prepared me to face many dangers, that someone without this training would panic under.
 
freediver:
Heh, no I am not going to enter the "agency and lack of training" realm so stop trying to pull me into it. :D What I am referring to is simply understanding the stressors that may lead to a panic in your life and the ability to recognize and suppress them so they do not lead to a panic. It seems to me that elevated breathing and heartrate (both controllable) are common to a stressful situation. If one could recognize this soon enough before the event spirals out of control then, I am of the belief that the panic can be avoided.

Freediver - Most panic... a lot of panic can be avoided, not all, and there is a very big difference between most and all.

Jump in the water off of a boat, and your breathing and heart rate will go up...neither you nor anyone else can "control" that. Experience and training all are capable of reducing the window for panic... and that is a very good thing... but everyone has a limit.

Sometimes in life, you get just one second to make the right choice... just one, and if you pick wrong that is it. What happens next may be fatal, and it may not even matter if you Panic. Hope that never happens to you, or anyone you know... but every year there are people that it does happen to.

I hope that you are allowed to go thru life, believing that you are in control of everything... because it means that you have never been in that situation to discover the nasty hard reality of this.

Don't care if it is Walter, or you or anyone else, if the combination of tasks exceeds either you ability to handle them, or the time you have to handle them.. it is going to get ugly. I know I am good at three... might be ok with four (don't know, thankfully never have had to try), but what if you have to deal with 5... or 7 or 10? At some point, you will run out of time, or pick the wrong order, or make a mistake... and there you are in panic mode.

You do know why they don't pull masks off, shut air off, inflate vests on students any more, don't you... because every so often, it will go terrible wrong... even with the trained ones.
 
Puffer Fish:
Jump in the water off of a boat, and your breathing and heart rate will go up...neither you nor anyone else can "control" that. Experience and training all are capable of reducing the window for panic... and that is a very good thing... but everyone has a limit.
What you have described is a normal physiological response to entering the water but this isn't necessarily a "negative" stressor. Yes, experience and training can increase one's threshold of panic. Stress is learned through an educative process and I feel that, in the same way, my tolerance to the stressors leading to panic is trainable.

Puffer Fish:
I hope that you are allowed to go thru life, believing that you are in control of everything... because it means that you have never been in that situation to discover the nasty hard reality of this.
I am NOT in control of everything that happens to me in life but I can be in control of how I respond to everything that happens to me.
Puffer Fish:
Don't care if it is Walter, or you or anyone else, if the combination of tasks exceeds either you ability to handle them, or the time you have to handle them.. it is going to get ugly. I know I am good at three... might be ok with four (don't know, thankfully never have had to try), but what if you have to deal with 5... or 7 or 10? At some point, you will run out of time, or pick the wrong order, or make a mistake... and there you are in panic mode.
The neat thing is that in many cases if breathing and heartrate are brought under control the other physiological stressors subside.
Puffer Fish:
You do know why they don't pull masks off, shut air off, inflate vests on students any more, don't you... because every so often, it will go terrible wrong... even with the trained ones.
However, if you were trained to anticipate one of these occurring, don't you think you would respond differently?
 
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