Taking Mask off

[starfish365]

Hi

which agency are you training with e.g. PADI, BSAC, SSI. Swimming with no mask and no air sounds scary to me!! It is certainly not a standard within the PADI Open Water Course.

Bubblesdame: PADI OW indeed does have mask clearing and removal as part of the skills you must learn in order to pass your Chapter one in the book.....better go back to class...the thread isn't mentioning swimming without air.

 

[PBDiver]

As I understand, and I am certainly no authority, the problem you are describing, and others share, is a reflex. It is triggered by sensory nerves under your eyes. My instructor called it the "mammalian reflex", which I do not think is correct, after doing a google search, but I bought into his theory anyway. His solution was to trian your body to react before preforming the skill test and as a good practice, train yourself before each dive till you can control the reflex. To train yourself, simply hold your face under the water, without submurging your entire head. First doing this while holding your breath. Once you feel comfortable with that, then do the same with the regualtor in your mouth. Breath in this fashion for 1 minute. Now your body will be less likely to "freeze-up" when to water hits your face. I have found this to be a good excersize before most dives, especially colder ones, to assure I have no problems under diving conditions.

Good luck.

Chris

 

[Mitzi]

You've got some great advice in this thread! I'll give you the same advice: go slowly! First of all I don't think you should be diving at all if you're uncomfortable having your face in the water. Diving means that you're going to be completely surrounded by water
with the surface 10 or 20 meters or so above. You need to
trust and love water before you go into something like that. And you wrote yourself that you're "just starting to like water".
If one of you're issues is being uncomfortable in water then you should take a break. I'm not saying that you're NEVER going to
be able to dive - because you will! But right now you should skip dive class and go to the pool or to the sea and just start swimming. Swim at the surface, swim close to the bottom, swim upside-down - have fun! Then, when you feel completely comfortable in the water - with your face in it and no goggles - then you can go on with diving. I'm not a diving instructor just an ordinary swimming instructor. But I know for sure that I wouldn't try to teach a kid how to swim if they're afraid of putting their head under water.

If you feel like you have more of a "nose-breathing-problem" than a "panicking-under-water-problem" then ignore the earlier lines. Breathing like you have a cold is what it's all about. Swimming (especially free-style) is also great to learn to control your breathing in water.

Good luck!

Sorry Tess I will have to disagree with you. When I first learned to dive I could not swim more that 25m on my front and was not confident in the water at all, if someone splashed me I would get out. Through going to the pool every week my confidence in the water has grown enormously. I will never trust water but I respect the power it has. I am proud of my achievement in water and if I took your advice I would still be paddling my feet in the sea and missing out on what it has to hold. I still hate mask clearing etc but I can do it. I agree with you on taking it slowly but I will never swim upside down, along the bottom etc without my scuba gear on. Scuba gives me the pleasure under the water that you obviously get from swimming. Don't give up, take it slowly and you will come out at the other end feeling the buzz.