Unreasonable fear of depth

Does anyone else out there, or would they admit it if they did, have a fear of diving deeper, than say, 60 ft? And, to complicate things further, only at times.

I LOVE diving, I am passionate about it. Although I am new to diving I have always been fascinated by it and wanted to do it. I read about it, think about it and dream about it when not actually doing it...yet...when I actually think about going below 60 ft. I almost break into a sweat.

Sometimes when doing a deep dive, if there is interesting things to see and the water is murky enough to not be able to tell my depth by looking up I have been fairly comfortable at 70, 80 and even 90 feet. It's when I can look up in clear water and see all that water on top of me and the surface light so far away, knowing I have to maintain a certain ascent rate to safely get through it and if I NEEDED to GET TO THE SURFACE like, right now, I wouldn't be able to, nor would I be able to do an emergency OOA ascent (I know my lungs, I had a hard time with the 30 ft. required for class), that I feel like I would rather be back on the boat than diving.

I do my best shore diving, shallow stuff, at around 30 ft. What is wrong with me that makes me lay in bed with my heart pounding at the thought of doing a 90 ft dive? Does anyone else have this problem? I'm not a coward, I do night dives even, it's just this depth thing. And any suggestions for getting past it would be appreciated.

Why do you need to get past it? There's nothing wrong with doing the dives you're comfortable with and leaving it at that.

Rachel

Fuzzmutton:

Does anyone else out there, or would they admit it if they did, have a fear of diving deeper, than say, 60 ft? And, to complicate things further, only at times.

I LOVE diving, I am passionate about it. Although I am new to diving I have always been fascinated by it and wanted to do it. I read about it, think about it and dream about it when not actually doing it...yet...when I actually think about going below 60 ft. I almost break into a sweat.

Sometimes when doing a deep dive, if there is interesting things to see and the water is murky enough to not be able to tell my depth by looking up I have been fairly comfortable at 70, 80 and even 90 feet. It's when I can look up in clear water and see all that water on top of me and the surface light so far away, knowing I have to maintain a certain ascent rate to safely get through it and if I NEEDED to GET TO THE SURFACE like, right now, I wouldn't be able to, nor would I be able to do an emergency OOA ascent (I know my lungs, I had a hard time with the 30 ft. required for class), that I feel like I would rather be back on the boat than diving.

I do my best shore diving, shallow stuff, at around 30 ft. What is wrong with me that makes me lay in bed with my heart pounding at the thought of doing a 90 ft dive? Does anyone else have this problem? I'm not a coward, I do night dives even, it's just this depth thing. And any suggestions for getting past it would be appreciated.

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There are a couple of issues. The first is that your regulator may not be up to the task. As you go deeper, it needs to be able to deliver much denser air at a higher pressure to compensate for the ambient pressure at depth. If your regulator is malfunctioning or just can't deliver the needed air without extra breathing resistance, you may feel anxious without being able to identify the cause.

Another issue is that you might be anxious because you think that an emergency ascent is your only way out of trouble. If you're not certain that your buddy is up to the task of handling any emergency right where you are, and think you might have to "bolt for the surface" if something happens, your anxiety is well-founded, not irrational and not something to "get over". In this case what you need is a good, regular dive buddy and more training for both of you, so if something goes wrong, you can be confident of easily handling it right where you are.

With an unknown or unreliable/untrained buddy, a CESA might be your only option in an emergency, and that's certainly something to be nervous about as you go deeper. A CESA from 30' is almost certainly not a problem. A CESA from 130' is much less of a sure thing.

There's absolutely no shame in not wanting to go any deeper than you're trained for and are capable of handling safely.

Terry

I think you should just forget about diving very deep for now. Do lots of shallow dives and just gradually work on getting a little deeper on every other dive.

I usually dive "murky" water and my comfort zone is there. I sometimes get agoraphobic in really clear water. Once, it happened in a pool that was so clear, I could count the tiles on one side of the pool from the other. I had an irrational urge to hide in the deepest, darkest part of the pool. I also wanted to scream underwater, but we won't get into those details. I held it together, which was fortunate since I was DM for an OW class.

All in all, there's nothing wrong with diving within your comfort zone. It's s'posed to be fun.

As far as overcoming your fear, I think more experience and diving will help. It might also help to practice buddy skills and air sharing skills so that you know you have other options. Lastly, you could also find an instructor to help you practice emeregency OOA ascents/CESAs/ESAs so that you have some confidence in your self rescue skills. Note that I am not suggesting doing a CESA from 250', but rather "mastering" the skill so that you feel confident that you could perform it if necessary. An instructor will be able to give you reasonable guidance.

I might have been a little uncomfortable my first couple of deep dives, but it is something that I outgrew. If you want to be more comfortable with the deeper dives my advice would be to just do more dives to the deepest you are comfortable with, and when you feel ready go a bit deeper and keep diving at the new depth until you are comfortable with it. Just keep on building up your comfort level until you are happy with it. If you are concerned about going OOA you might consider getting a pony bottle; 40cf would be my suggestion, but I'm sure that you have read those threads. I personally sling a 40 on my left side. I've only dove it a few times now; I can definitely tell that its there, but it doesn't get in the way and it isn't bothersome. Just my 2psi.

What you describe is true to a lesser degree with my wife. When we tried talking through it we identified that she felt it was harder to breath the deeper we went. We will try a different regulator next time to see if this makes a difference, but in reality, most of the stuff that we like is well above 80 feet so far. And another benefit of not going deep is that you use your air up slower hence a longer dive.
Where do you dive?
[Just checked your profile.. Your regulator seems up to the task]

Where do you live? How often do you dive? What's the depth pattern of your dives?

Fuzzmutton:

Sometimes when doing a deep dive, if there is interesting things to see and the water is murky enough to not be able to tell my depth by looking up I have been fairly comfortable at 70, 80 and even 90 feet. It's when I can look up in clear water and see all that water on top of me and the surface light so far away, knowing I have to maintain a certain ascent rate to safely get through it and if I NEEDED to GET TO THE SURFACE like, right now, I wouldn't be able to, nor would I be able to do an emergency OOA ascent (I know my lungs, I had a hard time with the 30 ft. required for class), that I feel like I would rather be back on the boat than diving.

Click to expand...

I was all set to answer your question until I realized I had exactly the opposite problem. When I first started diving, I did so in murky (1 - 5 ft vis) water. I would constantly look at my depth gauge and worried about going deeper to places I couldn't see from 30'. Heck, even 30' gave me pause until I was down there.

Then I went to Cozumel and dove deep with 100'+ vis and ended up getting very comfortable! Being able to see where I was and what was around me calmed me down to the point that I knew (not just text-book knew, but knew in my own mind) that there was nothing to fear.

I don't suppose that story helps you much, but perhaps you should do some more quarry diving! Good luck!

Hey guys! I first want to say that I was trying to work on "getting over this" because I didn't want to be relegated to the shallow end of the pool all my life If there was something at 75 ft. that I just had to see, I want to be able to see it without being scared sick over it.

I have a decent regulator, it's an Aqualung Legend LX acd, and the only problem I've ever had is if I roll "belly up" in the water and face the surface, for some reason it breathes "a little" harder, not much.

My buddy is my husband. He is very intelligent but I'm going to guess that he might panic in a real bad situation. That is just a guess. I read as much as possible about emergency situations, what to do for a good outcome, and practice in my mind what I would do if I were in X situation and needed to get out of it. I try to go back over basic skills on a regular basis to brush up as well. Also, I have signed up for a Rescue Diver course. I'm trying to build up my skills and confidence!

Walter, I WAS living in the Bay Area of CA diving Monterey regular for awhile. Easy shore dives, around 30-50 ft. Some night dives thrown in, a couple boat dives, and a one week trip to MX. I was those deep boat dives that did me in! Also, I discovered for "some strange reason" I had an aversion to long surface swims off the CA coast. HMMMM...could start a whole new thread with that paranoia, heh heh.

Marchand, I've actually thought about carrying more air but I'm not even completely sure that that would do it. I don't know exactly what my fear is, getting trapped, technical difficulties, getting bent or what.

Fuzz