Where is the line between minding my own business?

[jupitermermaid]

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ......oh, wait a minute! I can't relax yet! I'm working....LOL.

 

[jupitermermaid]

I think you have accomplished that simply by bringing up the matter and calling attention to the fact that she has had problems before.

Wise divers will now be wary about hooking up with her as a buddy, something they may have had no warning about before your post. That's really all you can do.

As for the unwise divers... well, there will always be those, and nothing you can do will protect people from themselves.

What's unfortunate is that all it takes is one irresponsible diver in the area to cramp everyone's style. That is, a bad diver with serious problems doesn't just negatively impact their own buddy, but often everyone else on their dive boat - like in your situation. Or even sometimes people on other dive boats in the whole area.

For example, I was out on a dive boat off West Palm Beach one time when a diver on another boat came up suddenly with problems, and their boat had to rush them back to the dock while their other divers were still in the water. Back on our boat, we were just about to put in when the captain heard the call on the radio, so we had to pull up and go pick up their divers as they came out of the water since their own boat obviously wouldn't be there. Ultimately we were delayed about two hours before we could get our own diving in, but obviously it could have been much longer - or even cancelled.

Now, I don't know if in my situation the ailing diver was being irresponsible. But what it demonstrates is how, if a diver is acting irresponsibly, it can negatively affect not just their own buddies, but the entire local diving community. So, for all our sakes... don't hesitate to call a recalcitrantly irresponsible diver out on it!

>*< Fritz

Unfortunately, a few divers do get hurt (or worse) once in a while, even when they do everything right. It impacts everyone who is diving at the time. Luckily (? if you want to call it that), we were shore diving, so it was only the 5 of us that were put out of diving for the day, but that was a full day of Bonaire diving that we lost out on, plus the last day sitting in the clinic waiting for her follow up visit, rather than visiting the preserve. I'm thankful that it happened on the last day and we only missed one day of diving rather than happening in the beginning of the trip, so there was SOMETHING positive about the incident. I would rather it didn't happen at all, but that was out of my control (on THIS trip).

I have no problem diving with people who have had accidents or been bent. Accidents happen. My problem arises when divers feel they can behave irresponsibly and have no qualms about putting their so-called buddies at risk or in a position to get them out of the trouble they put themselves into. I take having a buddy seriously and only dive with others who feel the same way.

 

[Scott M]

Yeah, but does the carpet match the drapes? Bwah ha ha

Edit; Never mind. lol

 

[barkeep3514]

You were very right to question her. Sounds like she is about as hard headed as anyone I have ever known. She not only puts herself in danger but may very well place any dive partner's in danger as well any dive operation that take's her out on a dive trip should be made aware of her action's as it sounds like she may become a statistic and that will be very sad. Someone should pull her aside and make her go back to begining OW class to refresh her on how to dive safely
She is the type of diver that make insurance rates sky rocket for dive operators. I only hope she doesn't hurt herself or someone else very bad.

 

[pmlee]

I for one would be thankful of the post. You brought to anyone's attention that she could pose a danger not just to herself, but to any potential dive buddy too. Insta-buddy's are a calculated risk on a dive boat; a trip with someone that you do not really know can obviously have bigger consequences. Thank you for your honesty and integrity.

 

[scubadiver888]

I didn't want to be mean or hurtful; this person obviously has some problems, denial, antisocialism, and rudeness being the least of them. Nothing I say to her will change the way she thinks or behaves (I spent a week with her....I know......lol). I just wanted to get word out to others who might think they may want to dive with her (and who knows??? There may be people who don't care, but at least they know ahead of time what they're getting into, and they'll be doing it with eyes wide open).

You're a better person than me. I have no patience for someone like this. But then I have close family members like her. Tried being nice for years and it made no difference. Now I go for mean and it seems to make a little bit of a difference.

 

[MBren]

Without a doubt, you did the right thing...

 

[8thElementDiver]

Tom, the Countess has answered your question.


"I think the question at hand is, how long is 2 months...I went by 8 weeks, not 60 days. I am going to a doctor on September 23 and I expect he will give me the ok to dive. If he doesn’t, I have no problem waiting. I also researched alot about what happened (which I plan to blog...just taking a while to sit and write it) and it was pretty random. The "bends" was a secondary diagnosis. My primary condition was an air embolism in the central nervous system, which can be caused by ascending too fast. I uploaded my fancy dive computer profile, and it showed I did nothing differently that dive than I had on others, and in fact, there had been several dives where I went up much faster before this with no consequence! Much of what I read has proven that this "accident" was arbitrary, and the best thing I can do is dive close to a buddy (who can watch for a recurrance)...something I need to practice!!!"

Wow. Her explanation speaks loudly about her reckless stupidity and inconsideration of others. Not only is she playing Russian Roulette, but she's discounting the severity of the time when the gun actually fired the bullet. So she's going to play, play again--but in the future she's going to make sure that a buddy is nearby to rescue her.

I'd sooner tend to a bleeding victim of Ebola than go diving with her. You absolutely did the right thing in bringing this to the attention of other potential buddies.

 

[vladimir]

Not only is she playing Russian Roulette, but she's discounting the severity of the time when the gun actually fired the bullet.

Good analogy. "Whew, it only grazed my temple...let's do it again!"

 

[jupitermermaid]

And don't forget the fact that she's still questioning if she actually HAD a "hit." I didn't mention earlier because I didn't think about it, but she claims that she had "issues" because she drank some coffee that morning (for two days she said that someone must have put something in it, and that caused her to lose consciousness).