ScubaCatgirl:
Why have you had to grab octos twice?
We do have procedures for out of air situations. Learning them well can, of course, save us when we lose our breathing gas but having to use those procedures should certainly phase you.
Shaking off anxiety after bad experience. Need advice.
- Thread starter annlaur
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Why have you had to grab octos twice?
We do have procedures for out of air situations. Learning them well can, of course, save us when we lose our breathing gas but having to use those procedures should certainly phase you.
Don Wray:
Removing your buoyancy control without removing your weights isn't a good idea. You have seen the potential results first hand. Were you told to do it that way?
Fortunately standards also require the sudent to remove and replace their weights at the surface which conveniently lets you remove the weight belt before removing the BC. With a weight integrated BC, you can of course do both at the same time.
Anne-Laure,
I think you had the right idea in the first place. The skills we learn are learned to avoiud problems and deal with then ones we fail to avoid. So...the better we are at them, the fewer problems we have and the more prepared we are to deal with them. Then we're confident.
Going out pleasure diving if you have doubts about your skills isn't addressing the problem and might even just be ignoring it until it comes back to bite you.
Get the skills down and do them until you KNOIW they are down.
I think you had the right idea in the first place. The skills we learn are learned to avoiud problems and deal with then ones we fail to avoid. So...the better we are at them, the fewer problems we have and the more prepared we are to deal with them. Then we're confident.
Going out pleasure diving if you have doubts about your skills isn't addressing the problem and might even just be ignoring it until it comes back to bite you.
Get the skills down and do them until you KNOIW they are down.
newbie_diver
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annlaur:
the red sea???? wow...im in Jeddah right now and the dive site in nakhil beach is WILD!!!! I hate murky water(thats what I thought it would be...but hell no,its blue and shallow..thats how I like it),anyways...my uncles(all 4 of them)asked me if i wanted to try diving....thats how I got started..anyways..I remember of having a bad experience my self in the red sea (see,those bad experiences I had were on my open water dive,not confined)...well,its stupid...we were at 25 ft when the DM signalled me to not make any sudden moves...I turn around and all i find is a school of small-medium sized sharks circling closely...as usual...I paniced so I swam upwards but looking down..the DM was telling me to stop...as I reached for the surface...I look straight ahead and find 2 boat motors infront of me(about 5 feet infront of me) starting up....I was like:"oh god...Im going to get chopped by my own dive boat" so after that...I preffered swiming with spearguns handy(the DM wouldnt even let me touch the gun...he looked like vin diesel with that spear gun when he was walking on shore)
Hi Mike, Yep, I followed instructions as given. We had already done weight belt removal and replacement. I now have weight integrated which I use 4 1/2 lbs. in a 3mm. I had 16 lbs. on then. That was fsw and the new weight has been in fsw.
Thank you all for the support and advice. I really needed it.
These past few days, I've been daydreaming about another dive trip as I might have some time off work in the fall, but then as I picture myself hanging with the fish, I imagine something going bad (my mask being kicked off, my reg not working...) and me starting to panic and not being able to cope with the situation (maybe I should stop reading the posts in the "Accidents" and "Near misses" forums :huh: )
Going in a pool or the shallow part of the ocean with a buddy on a regular basis is not an option right now as I live in Paris (no ocean, no friend with a pool) but I'll follow Mike's advice and sign up with a diving association. There are several in town, they meet once a week in a public pool during closing hours, so I should be able to practice my skills over and over until I (hopefully) shake off the anxiety.
Plus that should be a good workout, which I really could use. I'm not overweight by any means, but besides working as a PT waitress, I don't exercise at all, so I need to get my heart into shape.
To answer your questions, Don Wray, the factors that led to that bad experience were many. Most of them my fault (although it took me a few posts in SB to realize it was my responsability this thing happened).
Here's the long story of what happened :
I only had 15 dives in my log-book whan I went to Egypt. I hadn’t been diving for 11 months (and hadn't read anything about diving either :shakehead ) so I told the dive-op that worked with my hotel that I wanted a refreshing course before actually going on a «real» dive but they told me not to worry, all dives are led by certified DMs and instructors, and we always do a briefing during the 1-hr boat ride and so on… Well, somehow I thought the briefing would include the reviews of all the signals, safety measures, equipment check, as that's the way my OW instructor led all of his dives.
So I book for 6 dives, rent the equipment (surprise : I get a BCD filled with salt water… that’s reassuring) and get on the boat with 30 other people. There were 2 briefings :
1- Take off your shoes and don’t get inside the boat while wet.
2- OK, reef’s in front of you, go this way, at this depth, turn around when tank is half empty, you, you, you and you, come with me. Get your suits on and let’s go.
No buddy assignment, no signals review, no mentionning surface procedures as there are 10 boat surrounding ours...
I should have called the dive, but didn't even think of it for a second.
Next thing I know, everyone is in the water but me, as I’m frantically checking my gear for the 4th time. Plus I'm breathless from trying to put on socks and fins that are not my size...
By the time I get into the water (while the DM keeps on urging me to hurry up and stop stressing), I’m actually quite stressed out. I descend slowly, partly because my BCD has trouble emptying itself (yes, I had taken the water out of it before hand), partly because my mask has a small leak and I have to empty it regularily.
When I reach the DM’s depth, I’m already lagging behind the group and feeling a bit nervous. I have trouble staying buyant and since I’m tiny, my jacket doesn’t quite fit and the tank keeps rolling left to right on my back. I use my arms a lot to keep my balance and keep up with the others, who are just flying. They're young guys and it's like they're racing or something. But I don't let anyone know I'm not comfortable. I think I'm just having minor problems, I'm ashamed as I'm obviously not as good as these guys, and, most importantly, I've forgotten everything I know about overexertion. So everytime the DM turns around and signals are you OK, I finger OK back to him…
Until I have trouble breathing and start to panic and think : I’m f*ing gonna die!!!!!!!!
:icon10:
I stayed with that thought for what seems like a minute, trying to catch my breath, until I pictured my folks being told their daughter had drowned in the Red Sea (didn't consider ascending, I was too damn scared of corking to the surface).
Eventually, I managed to reach the DM and grab his fin and he calmed me down, held my hand thru the rest of the dive and it was OK.
I did dive with the same DM in the afternoon, because I feared if I didn't get back in the water that same day, I might never do it again.
This dive was OK, as was the next morning one with a different DM (except for incidents like people having trouble with the dive-op's equipment). I was nervous but no big deal.
Then on the fourth dive with this op, one of the guys went almost OOA (which apparently happened to him all the time). There were only three of us in my group, the DM whom I'll call Cindy, that diver and me. We'd been down at about 20 m (60 ft) for 30 minutes (total BT) when it happened. All of a sudden, Cindy asked me what my air level was (I still had plenty, over 1000), I signaled the answer to her and motionned me to follow the two of them as they were ascending. I got to the surface as slowly as I could. I was scared as I had no clue what was going on (I hadn't seen the low on air sign of the guy and they were not sharing air on the way up). So we surfaced right by the emerging reef, with crashing waves, she again asked me what my air level was and yelled "OK, let's go down to loose some of that nitrogen and hurry back to the boat !!! This guy is out of air again !"
She sounded like she was in a panic and that really made me nervous. They shared air all the way back to the boat while I followed feeling anxious and wondering why the hell she had made us surface when she could have shared air with him underwater (I found out the answer later while eavesdropping on a conversation between two DMs : she was trying to locate the boat, as she didn't have a clue where it was !!! )
Anyways, that was the last time I dove with them. I was shaking and had a terrible headache that whole evening and night and didn't know if it had something to do with our surfacing or was just due to anxiety. For weeks afterwards, just mentionning this trip made me shake and shiver.
So that's the whole story.
Obviously I made some huge mistakes and have learned important lessons from them (no more trust dive for me - I even thumbed a 20 ft dive one morning in Marseille with the instructor) so please don't jump at me telling me how stupid I was. I know that already !!!
Funny thing is, I started this thread because I was confused about why I was so nervous now in the water and wanted someone to give me some advice that would allow me to get back to that wonderful pre-bad-experience frame of mind when I was absolutely fearless underwater. But now it's all very clear to me that I'll never feel that exact same way again : I just was being unaware. The only way for me to feel safe while diving is to master the skills.
I'm definitely signing up with a diving association in September. Even if that means spending months looking at the bottom of the pool.
Thanks again for the advice and sorry for the length of that post.
Anne-Laure :07:
Edited for spelling mistakes
These past few days, I've been daydreaming about another dive trip as I might have some time off work in the fall, but then as I picture myself hanging with the fish, I imagine something going bad (my mask being kicked off, my reg not working...) and me starting to panic and not being able to cope with the situation (maybe I should stop reading the posts in the "Accidents" and "Near misses" forums :huh: )
Going in a pool or the shallow part of the ocean with a buddy on a regular basis is not an option right now as I live in Paris (no ocean, no friend with a pool) but I'll follow Mike's advice and sign up with a diving association. There are several in town, they meet once a week in a public pool during closing hours, so I should be able to practice my skills over and over until I (hopefully) shake off the anxiety.
Plus that should be a good workout, which I really could use. I'm not overweight by any means, but besides working as a PT waitress, I don't exercise at all, so I need to get my heart into shape.
To answer your questions, Don Wray, the factors that led to that bad experience were many. Most of them my fault (although it took me a few posts in SB to realize it was my responsability this thing happened).
Here's the long story of what happened :
I only had 15 dives in my log-book whan I went to Egypt. I hadn’t been diving for 11 months (and hadn't read anything about diving either :shakehead ) so I told the dive-op that worked with my hotel that I wanted a refreshing course before actually going on a «real» dive but they told me not to worry, all dives are led by certified DMs and instructors, and we always do a briefing during the 1-hr boat ride and so on… Well, somehow I thought the briefing would include the reviews of all the signals, safety measures, equipment check, as that's the way my OW instructor led all of his dives.
So I book for 6 dives, rent the equipment (surprise : I get a BCD filled with salt water… that’s reassuring) and get on the boat with 30 other people. There were 2 briefings :
1- Take off your shoes and don’t get inside the boat while wet.
2- OK, reef’s in front of you, go this way, at this depth, turn around when tank is half empty, you, you, you and you, come with me. Get your suits on and let’s go.
No buddy assignment, no signals review, no mentionning surface procedures as there are 10 boat surrounding ours...
I should have called the dive, but didn't even think of it for a second.
Next thing I know, everyone is in the water but me, as I’m frantically checking my gear for the 4th time. Plus I'm breathless from trying to put on socks and fins that are not my size...
By the time I get into the water (while the DM keeps on urging me to hurry up and stop stressing), I’m actually quite stressed out. I descend slowly, partly because my BCD has trouble emptying itself (yes, I had taken the water out of it before hand), partly because my mask has a small leak and I have to empty it regularily.
When I reach the DM’s depth, I’m already lagging behind the group and feeling a bit nervous. I have trouble staying buyant and since I’m tiny, my jacket doesn’t quite fit and the tank keeps rolling left to right on my back. I use my arms a lot to keep my balance and keep up with the others, who are just flying. They're young guys and it's like they're racing or something. But I don't let anyone know I'm not comfortable. I think I'm just having minor problems, I'm ashamed as I'm obviously not as good as these guys, and, most importantly, I've forgotten everything I know about overexertion. So everytime the DM turns around and signals are you OK, I finger OK back to him…
Until I have trouble breathing and start to panic and think : I’m f*ing gonna die!!!!!!!!
:icon10:
I stayed with that thought for what seems like a minute, trying to catch my breath, until I pictured my folks being told their daughter had drowned in the Red Sea (didn't consider ascending, I was too damn scared of corking to the surface).
Eventually, I managed to reach the DM and grab his fin and he calmed me down, held my hand thru the rest of the dive and it was OK.
I did dive with the same DM in the afternoon, because I feared if I didn't get back in the water that same day, I might never do it again.
This dive was OK, as was the next morning one with a different DM (except for incidents like people having trouble with the dive-op's equipment). I was nervous but no big deal.
Then on the fourth dive with this op, one of the guys went almost OOA (which apparently happened to him all the time). There were only three of us in my group, the DM whom I'll call Cindy, that diver and me. We'd been down at about 20 m (60 ft) for 30 minutes (total BT) when it happened. All of a sudden, Cindy asked me what my air level was (I still had plenty, over 1000), I signaled the answer to her and motionned me to follow the two of them as they were ascending. I got to the surface as slowly as I could. I was scared as I had no clue what was going on (I hadn't seen the low on air sign of the guy and they were not sharing air on the way up). So we surfaced right by the emerging reef, with crashing waves, she again asked me what my air level was and yelled "OK, let's go down to loose some of that nitrogen and hurry back to the boat !!! This guy is out of air again !"
She sounded like she was in a panic and that really made me nervous. They shared air all the way back to the boat while I followed feeling anxious and wondering why the hell she had made us surface when she could have shared air with him underwater (I found out the answer later while eavesdropping on a conversation between two DMs : she was trying to locate the boat, as she didn't have a clue where it was !!!
)Anyways, that was the last time I dove with them. I was shaking and had a terrible headache that whole evening and night and didn't know if it had something to do with our surfacing or was just due to anxiety. For weeks afterwards, just mentionning this trip made me shake and shiver.
So that's the whole story.
Obviously I made some huge mistakes and have learned important lessons from them (no more trust dive for me - I even thumbed a 20 ft dive one morning in Marseille with the instructor) so please don't jump at me telling me how stupid I was. I know that already !!!
Funny thing is, I started this thread because I was confused about why I was so nervous now in the water and wanted someone to give me some advice that would allow me to get back to that wonderful pre-bad-experience frame of mind when I was absolutely fearless underwater. But now it's all very clear to me that I'll never feel that exact same way again : I just was being unaware. The only way for me to feel safe while diving is to master the skills.
I'm definitely signing up with a diving association in September. Even if that means spending months looking at the bottom of the pool.
Thanks again for the advice and sorry for the length of that post.
Anne-Laure :07:
Edited for spelling mistakes
Anne-Laure
Read your story and thought I needed to say something.
You didn't make any huge mistakes, I haven't actually seen any evidence in your post of you doing anything wrong, aside from allowing yourself to be talked into something wrong, even then I wouldn't blame you for that. What I read was that you used a dive op that wasn't very good and that wasn't your fault, nor is it something you should beat yourself up for. So in my opinion, you aren't stupid and I thought I should tell you that.
This is my opinion on what went on from your post.
1) You wanted to do a refresher or a check out dive, the operation didn't want you to and managed to talk you out of it. This is the only mistake you made. Even then it's not your fault, they shouldn't of done it.
2) You being nervous took your time getting in. I get nervous before dives. The day before I don't enjoy myself, it's normal and not your fault.
3) The group moved faster than you, I was taught to believe that you move at the speed of the slowest member. The DM kept on trying to hurry you up, thats a bad dm and made you stress out, thats not your fault.
4) You had concerns about the equipment before the dive, you'd noted things about how it was maintained that made you not quite trust it. Overexertion probably made you feel air-starved and because of that your stress level started to rise up, you breathed harder and a panic cycle started. Thats not your fault, it's a natural human response.
5) The decisions Cindy made, well they weren't your fault and Cindy getting lost I can't see any way why that should be your fault.
While it's true that your safety is your own responsibility and ultimately it is your decision to dive, one thing that is often overlooked is the effect of peer pressure and especially the effect it has on new divers. You may think that something is bad, but if someone with a professional rating and some bells and whistles tells you it isn't, who do you believe? I don't have any doubt that if you were in the same position now, you wouldn't dive with a centre like that. While you may not of been forced into it at gunpoint, you can't say you weren't pressured and thats where the problem really lies. It was a very bad centre and there are more than a few of them out there.
The best advice is simple and you've said your going to do it anyway so I don't need to say it. Just remember it wasn't all your fault and after having read all that, the only other thing I can say is simple, once you've done that refresher I would dive with you.
Read your story and thought I needed to say something.
You didn't make any huge mistakes, I haven't actually seen any evidence in your post of you doing anything wrong, aside from allowing yourself to be talked into something wrong, even then I wouldn't blame you for that. What I read was that you used a dive op that wasn't very good and that wasn't your fault, nor is it something you should beat yourself up for. So in my opinion, you aren't stupid and I thought I should tell you that.
This is my opinion on what went on from your post.
1) You wanted to do a refresher or a check out dive, the operation didn't want you to and managed to talk you out of it. This is the only mistake you made. Even then it's not your fault, they shouldn't of done it.
2) You being nervous took your time getting in. I get nervous before dives. The day before I don't enjoy myself, it's normal and not your fault.
3) The group moved faster than you, I was taught to believe that you move at the speed of the slowest member. The DM kept on trying to hurry you up, thats a bad dm and made you stress out, thats not your fault.
4) You had concerns about the equipment before the dive, you'd noted things about how it was maintained that made you not quite trust it. Overexertion probably made you feel air-starved and because of that your stress level started to rise up, you breathed harder and a panic cycle started. Thats not your fault, it's a natural human response.
5) The decisions Cindy made, well they weren't your fault and Cindy getting lost I can't see any way why that should be your fault.
While it's true that your safety is your own responsibility and ultimately it is your decision to dive, one thing that is often overlooked is the effect of peer pressure and especially the effect it has on new divers. You may think that something is bad, but if someone with a professional rating and some bells and whistles tells you it isn't, who do you believe? I don't have any doubt that if you were in the same position now, you wouldn't dive with a centre like that. While you may not of been forced into it at gunpoint, you can't say you weren't pressured and thats where the problem really lies. It was a very bad centre and there are more than a few of them out there.
The best advice is simple and you've said your going to do it anyway so I don't need to say it. Just remember it wasn't all your fault and after having read all that, the only other thing I can say is simple, once you've done that refresher I would dive with you.
Thanks Dave
(especially for writing you'd dive with me after I get some more training. Hey, I'd dive with you too... but rather in the warmish Med than in the cold Channel).
Well, I'm aware that the dive op sucked and that I am not responsible for their poorly maintained equipment and not very good DMs.
BUT... I did make mistakes.
Should not have gone on a dive trip without at least buying and re-reading an OW manual.
Should have asked more questions about that "briefing" they were gonna give me instead of a refresher's course.
Should not have jumped in the water no matter how they pressured me to (as a matter of fact, should have called the dive BECAUSE they were putting pressure on me).
Should have signaled I was not feeling OK to the DM before I started to panic (better safe than "proud").
Should have looked for another dive op when noticing their gear was poorly maintained, or at least after the first dive with them...
I know there's no point in beating up myself and indulging in guilt-trip (can't help it, still shaking off that catholic ed they gave me
) but the fact is I made mistakes. One thing that makes me really happy though is that I never tried to rush to the surface. I think I got that one pretty well engraved in my mind : IF I STILL HAVE AIR, I STAND A CHANCE DOWN THERE.
Thanks again.
Cheers
Anne-Laure
(especially for writing you'd dive with me after I get some more training. Hey, I'd dive with you too... but rather in the warmish Med than in the cold Channel).
Well, I'm aware that the dive op sucked and that I am not responsible for their poorly maintained equipment and not very good DMs.
BUT... I did make mistakes.
Should not have gone on a dive trip without at least buying and re-reading an OW manual.
Should have asked more questions about that "briefing" they were gonna give me instead of a refresher's course.
Should not have jumped in the water no matter how they pressured me to (as a matter of fact, should have called the dive BECAUSE they were putting pressure on me).
Should have signaled I was not feeling OK to the DM before I started to panic (better safe than "proud").
Should have looked for another dive op when noticing their gear was poorly maintained, or at least after the first dive with them...
I know there's no point in beating up myself and indulging in guilt-trip (can't help it, still shaking off that catholic ed they gave me
) but the fact is I made mistakes. One thing that makes me really happy though is that I never tried to rush to the surface. I think I got that one pretty well engraved in my mind : IF I STILL HAVE AIR, I STAND A CHANCE DOWN THERE.Thanks again.
Cheers
Anne-Laure
Darnold9999
Contributor
I think your instructor is right. Some very easy relaxing dives, keep it shallow and fun. Don't think the idea of pushing drills etc. in a pool is the next step - get comfortable in a very safe environment doing nothing but diving once you recognize that this is again a fun activity - then do the drills to get your skills up so that if you get in a bad situation again the training will be there to lean on, but in my albeit limited experience pushing drills will push your comfort level at a time when you need to just get wet. It might be a pool, but just go down and blow bubbles - work on boyancy - nothing stressful for a couple of times. Just my 2 cents.
Sounds like you did the right thing by getting back in the water as quickly as possible. That next dive is the hardest. The next hardest is the one ofter a long layoff - so put that one off by keeping diving.
Sounds like you did the right thing by getting back in the water as quickly as possible. That next dive is the hardest. The next hardest is the one ofter a long layoff - so put that one off by keeping diving.
Crawl79
Contributor
`You definetly need some more relaxing dives, I like to visit places with less people per boat. I go to St. Kitts often for this reason, I have a good dive shop owner who dives with me and this keeps my confidence up.
While I have never had a true panic attack I have come close and I know its scary but you just have to get back in the water. The only time I came close was on a simple dive but I hadnt dove in almost a year. So your idea to do a refresher is right on. After the first dive of the year I''m always ready to jump in experience all the ocean has to offer.
While I have never had a true panic attack I have come close and I know its scary but you just have to get back in the water. The only time I came close was on a simple dive but I hadnt dove in almost a year. So your idea to do a refresher is right on. After the first dive of the year I''m always ready to jump in experience all the ocean has to offer.
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