Scared. Am I cut out for this?

[tomahawkpilot]

My Open Water class is about to start and all I can think of is whether I should quit now before I kill myself.

I am familiar with the sport and the skills involved, so I not a total newcomer. I took classes 12 years ago, when I was 12 years old. I did fine, but I did not go on the open water dives (family issue out of my control, being only 12). I never finished certification. I have spent a lot of time after that in the water with my snorkel, mask, and fins, so I'm pretty comfortable with that stuff (even swimming without a mask).

Here's the problem: I can't imagine how I am ever going to leave the safety of the pool for the open water dives. I do not want to ever take the regulator out of my mouth, for any reason. I don't want to go below 10 feet. I want to to know that I can reach the surface if I have to.

All I can think is, when the regulator quits or gets knocked out of my mouth, it won't be after I inhaled deeply like we practice in the pool. It will probably be just after I exhaled all the air in my lungs while swimming vigorously, so my body will be using oxygen so rapidly I will have even less time to find the regulator before losing consciousness.

I don't think I will panic. I am an instrument rated private pilot and I have been in real (non-training) scary situations but maintained perfect control of myself. I just don't know what it will be like all the way down at 30 ft. I know I can probably find my regulator. I just don't know if I can do it in time.

I had a bad experience in the pool when I was 12. The instructor came up from behind, knocked the regulator from my mouth, and handed me a bottle of Spare Air. I did not know how to work it, so I fumbled with it while growing ever more desperate for air. Finally, I bolted for the surface. After which, I was chewed out. I tried to explain that I had to breathe. Didn't matter. That won't work in real life. So how am I supposed to deal with a situation when I can't breathe anything and I have limited time in which to act?

I love the water, and I love being underwater. I am not trying to get certified to impress anyone or to prove anything -- I want to do it because I like it. But all I can think of is screwing up and having an accident.

I am envious of the diving students who just plunge in and never consider the danger, or just seem to be fine with it like it's driving a car. They have confidence and have fun. I wasn't carefree like that even when I was 12 -- I always worried about everything. I have no confidence in my abilities.

Please, can I hear some advice from someone else who worries about everything? Am I cut out for this? The only thing keeping me from canceling the class is looking forward to using scuba again. Just not on the open water dives. Not yet.

 

[Kayla]

I guess the best advice I can think of is DONT FORCE YOURSELF. I would be upfront with your instructor about your concerns, and more then likely they will be willing to work with you to see if you can overcome your fears. However, if you decide overall that your not comfortable with it, thats ok. Its not something that you HAVE to do, and while its a great sport and has so much to offer- its not worth risking a panic type situation at depht because your uncomfortable.

Anyway... if you want to chat some more... PM me... Im sure that the others will be behind me shortly with some great advice also.

 

[Tassie_Rohan]

Mate - These are normal fears that most people have before learning to dive.

You will do exercises in the pool and open water that will cause many of your fears to evaporate. In a few weeks time you will look back on your fears and wonder why you were so worried.

Loosing a reg is a non-issue: you can spend a minute or so without a reg in your mouth before anything serious starts to happen. You will do reg recovery exercises, and if that fails then you have a second regulator to switch to that will be clipped somewhere handy on your BC. You will also learn buddy skills and how to share air with your buddy. And if that isn't enough you will also learn skills that will allow you to ascend to the surface from around 30 feet.

The transition to open water, although a source of concern, normally turns out to be a non-issue.

Meet with your instructor before the class, chat to them about your fears, and if they make you feel comfortable then go for it.

Cheers,
Rohan.

 

[Parysa]

First, let me say that I am a worrier. I worry about everything. I'm a total wimp. I'm afraid of anything even remotely extreme. Base jumping, never. Skydiving, no. I swore I'd never scuba dive because I'm afraid of the ocean (lots of things that sting and bite, lol). Now I'm certified and hoping to go on my first Gulf dive in a couple weeks.
Take it slowly. Get used to being in the pool. The best advice I've gotten so far is if you can breathe, you are OK. I don't know how old you are, so I don't know how long ago it was since you've been in class, but from what I understand, it's changed a lot. My instructor never forced me to do anything I wasn't comfortable to do and I knew that at any time, I could always say no. You will practice regulator retrieval until you could do it in your sleep. Over and over and over until it's automatic. I had several times that I would make myself spit my reg out without taking the big inhale first, just to see if I could handle it. 30' does not feel all that much different than 10'. You're looking down, not up, so it doesn't seem like you're that deep. Yeah, the pressure changes, but as far as feeling depth, you're not looking at the difference from the surface to where you are. It's different than being in the pool where you can tell all the time how deep you are. Explain your concerns to your instructor and maybe see if you can get some extra pool time in. And just keep in mind that at ANY point during the training, you can say, "Forget this".

 

[tomahawkpilot]

Parysa, I like how you think. Spitting out the reg with minimal inhalation just to test yourself. That could be a good confidence builder. It seems as though no one I talk to is even slightly concerned with stuff like that. The attitude seems to be, we practice it in the class, so I guess I'll be okay in real life. My attitude is, we only practiced it 10 times. We could have practiced it 50 times, at different depths, while already starved for oxygen, or in other unusual situations. But for everyone else, they do it a few times, then jump right into the quarry. Again, I wish I could be that way.

I'm taking a weekend class, so I hope I have enough time to practice my own way. They tell me that 97% of their students go straight to open water. Well, I'm in the 3% that is constantly thinking about every o-ring, seal, hose, connection, and every possible situation.

I hear of all these people who are very conservative, but are divers. A friend of a friend is a meek little accountant (apologies to anyone in finance) who is tiny and shy -- but she loves diving. She won't fly though. I'll fly anything, but believe me, I had to work to get to that point.

I flew to Chicago and back to do someone a favor once. It's about three hours from where I live. So it's a moonless night and I'm over Indiana, flying home. It's beautiful. I look out into the blackness below and realize that if the engine quit, I would have no way of knowing whether I am making an emergency landing to a soft farmer's field or to the pointy trees of death. I didn't freak out. I just thought, I'm here now, and yes I could die easily, but it doesn't matter, because this is where I am and this is what I'm doing right now, and I can't do anything about it except continue flying and enjoying myself.

What I will probably have to do for diving is what I did for flying. I spent months thinking about all the ways I could die, took more lessons than any normal person would need, and finally got to the point where I was staring down the runway as usual, ready to solo, pretty sure I had the skills but terrified of the "what ifs". I was fed up with worrying and delaying and waiting, tired of taxiing out to the runway, looking at it, and turning back. I said, "F--- it", jammed the throttle forward, and took off.

The more I flew, the more I desensitized myself to the fear. I still had the fear, I still had all those thoughts. I didn't enter a state of denial; it's just that after dozens of successful flights, I got used to it.

I just hope that I can find a way to get comfortable with diving.

 

[bleeb]

Although you haven't specified your age in your profile, since you're an instrument-rated pilot, I'm going to assume that 12 years old was at least last century.
Dive training standards and philosophy have changed since ten or fifteen years ago, and in general, there isn't much of the attitude any more that students have to be subjected to harsh treatment to 'prove' to them that they can handle problems, like your experience with getting the reg yanked out of your mouth (or getting chewed out if they couldn't manage a particular skill the first time.) The general approach now is to help you learn and be comfortable with the necessary skills to cope with situations like loosing your reg. The operative word there is 'comfortable'. Not just throw you in the deep end, but help you step by step until you feel ready to walk yourself there.

However, there are probably still at least a few 'old school' instructors around like the one that taught you when you were twelve. An observation you'll see in these forums is that the individual instructor (in this case, particularly their teaching style) can have a large impact on whether students subsequently enjoy diving. You may benefit more from one willing to spend some extra time with you to practice particular skills, or you may even want to consider hiring them for an extra session of private tutoring. I'd suggest taking time to talk to several different instructors (if you haven't already) and make sure you're comfortable with the approach to teaching before picking a particular one. There are enough stories floating around about inexperienced instructors and assembly line classes that this would probably be worth your while.

All that being said, another comment you'll see in these forums (particularly the accident investigation ones) is that once you've gotten through a course and are out diving, listen to your inner voice. Thinking and listening to what's making you uncomfortable is one of the best ways to avoid more serious problems. The concerns you mentioned all involve anxiety and while, as you seem to be aware, a bit of anxiety about alien situations is normal, the last thing you want to do underwater is panic (not unlike pilots). It's also possible that you'll eventually decide that your inner voice is telling you some aspect of this activity is just not for you. If so, we'd be sorry to loose a fellow diver, but most people here would respect that decision.

So, I hope that helps and you'll still be giving diving a try. If you want any more advice or clarification, feel free to ask. As you probably noticed, we're a verbose lot, some of us more so than others.

 

[tomahawkpilot]

Since it's been asked more than once, I am 24 years old.

Glad you all like the verbosity. After meeting with instructors, divers, and dive shop owners, I got the impression that most of the people I've met just jump in and do it without really analyzing every nut, bolt, and screw. I've had potential instructors tell me that I'm crazy to even be wondering whether DIN is a better choice than Yoke; it's way too advanced for me. I should just do whatever they say, I guess. The owner of one successful dive shop, when I asked why they didn't stock something like Spare Air, said "Why would you want that? You're a recreational diver. You'll have a buddy with an octopus." See? Don't think, just dive.

 

[mikeguerrero]

Tomahawk,

I'm a believer that the human mind is extremely complicated and is in fact our best friend or our worse enemy.

Humans by nature are born with the flight or fight response; we are curious of the fear of the unknown.

If we always knew what was at each corner our lives would be much calmer yet this is not the case.

When we dive in the ocean it is a vast wilderness and we are under those rules of nature.

When you took up your pilots license you never know if all the elements of weather will be on your side, you also don't know what mechanical failures will occur that are beyond your control, yet you still took the challange.

There is a great fear in the ocean but it's such a beautiful adventure that each dive just makes the fear go away.

I use to be afraid of flying commerically but with time the flights got better and better and I got more conditioned to accepting future flights.

I'm a new diver and wish I had started at your age because I feel I let so much time slip past met. My advice is make yourself comfortable.

Do this by asking all the question you have, get them answered, make your own choices, get all the equipment you want that make you feel safe, that is what I did.

Everyone will tell you about their equipment and tell you what is best,, but only you will know what is best for you.

Not until you get all your questions answered will your apprehension start to fade, once they do you will become more comfortable with your open water dives.

Imagine if you never took to the skys to fly and only did simulated flights via simulators for commercial pilots; is it the same?

Probably not, well the pool and DVD training videos are only a fraction of the overall experience that you will get from the real deal.

But just make sure you continue asking all the questions you have and only then you will move forward; remember to take your time, this is not a race but rather a marathon were you will say I completed the adventure, there is no 1st place for someone that races through scuba faster than he is ready to do.

Best of luck in what ever decision you take.

MG

 

[Tassie_Rohan]

Tomahawk: name one activity that's 100% safe but also fun?

It seems to me that fun is inversely proportional to perceived safety.

There’s many divers out there reading this thread who would be scared sh$tless flying.

(Then again - my definition of what is fun is: “would it make my mother cry?” But others may have different criteria )

A life lived without any risk is not worth living. And the risks of diving are, once you have basic training, very small indeed.

Cheers,
Rohan.

 

[fallcreek196]

Hi Tomahawk. You mentioned it yourself when you spoke of your fear you conquered when you began your pilot training....you overcame your fear through repetition of skills, practice and mentally preparing for all the possible scenarios you could think of. Scuba is no different. The biggest hurdle to overcome is pyschological. As mentioned above, I agree with the choice of instructors makes a huge difference. What you're instructor at age 12 did, was, IMO, wrong if he did not let you know what he was about to do. It is a scary feeling to all of a sudden be out of air. The worse thing you can do as a pilot and a diver is to panic. Stop, think, breathe is what I was taught in both cases. I had initial fears in diving when I began, and have always loved being in the water, but through good instruction, practice and more mental toughness, I have become a more relaxed diver. I wish you the best in your class and remember to go at your pace, don't feel pressured to go beyond your comfort level. If you relax, practice and breathe it will all fall into place!