Helping a nervous new diver

[Manika104]

Hi I need help from the SB community!

I have a good friend who was OW certified last year with her husband. She loves water and all water sports except is nervous diving maybe even a little claustrophobic. Anyway she really wants to enjoy diving and her husband REALLY wants her to enjoy diving. They have a trip planned in January.

My plan is to spend some time in the pool over the next few months to help her relax and enjoy the experience.

Other than practicing the obvious breathing techniques and OW skills is there anything else anyone can think of that that we can do in the pool to help her?

Thanks

 

[Hawkwood]

...Anyway she really wants to enjoy diving...

This part is okay.

...and her husband REALLY wants her to enjoy diving...

This part sends up "red flags".

Do the practice without her husband.

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edit: I read your post more carefully. Make sure you are objective. Obviously you like diving and want her to like it as well. She might feel pressure from that. It might even be best that someone else go in the pool with her. Less "pressure" for her. No matter how much you think you are being objective, she still may feel the "need" to enjoy it.

The Alberta Underwater Council has their Scuba Pool Fun nights at Edmonton's Kinsman's Deep Dive Tank over the winter months. That could be a very good opportunity for her to see if she can get comfortable.

 

[blinkswiler]

Girls day only. Open water if possible.

 

[NorCalDM]

She needs to do it for herself not her husband! When your in the pool with her make sure her husband has something else to do the nervousness may be because she is trying to please him. I've worked with so many couples that one is doing it for the other and it never works out well so we usually spilt up couples and parents. Working on skills is good but also have her breath without a mask on first just standing with her face in the water then sitting on the bottom. Also have her take the reg in and out of her mouth and purge it. If she gets comfortable with these she will know what to due if her mask or reg get bumped while diving. New divers seem to stress about these two skills and being comfortable with it may put her at ease.

 

[pasley]

What Harkwood said. Redflag is that her HUSBAND REALLY wants her to dive. I will wager that if she is candid she would tell you she is not interested and claustrophobic and does not want to dive. Claustrophobia is an issue with diving. Some people can get past it, many do not. This can lead to panic (often) and serious consequences.

Talk to her in private and ask her why she wants to SCUBA dive. and if she is not in love with the idea, then she probably should not be diving. Try asking what she likes best about SCUBA diving and what she does not like, or what makes her nervous.

 

[FinnMom]

There is a real simple guide for this acclimation: diving is supposed to be fun. It's OK to be nervous and yeah, sometimes you might be a little cold and the gear is heavy etc., but you know what I mean => being scared is genuinely not fun. Most importantly scared divers are dangerous and on a more everyday level scared divers (esp. women) are not going to to feel greater enthusiasm for the sport.

She should be evaluating this question: am I still having fun?
Scuba diving is great because if you aren't having fun you are doing it wrong. So take it slow & keep it fun.

More time in the water is a wonderful idea. Sending hubby to the movies while you two go diving is also a good idea, at least at the beginning ;-)

 

[lidja]

OK, you've heard what the boys think. Here's what another girl thinks.

Girls learn differently than boys (yes, my background is in education). Girls tend to need a more "forgiving" or "relaxed" environment where they feel comfortable taking the time to assimilate all the information and make meaningful connections. Up front, they look more reticent, but they are just needing more time to acclimate themselves to the situation. This does not mean they are "slow" or "dumb." It means they feel more comfortable when they have a good grasp of the big picture before they jump in. (I know this sounds sexist and derogatory, but it's not, it's proven. Not all girls are like this, but many are. I definitely fit this model, even though I do all sorts of "dare-devil" stuff.)

Create a stress-free environment (invite the husband to stay away for awhile), ask lots of questions, talk through all of her responses and help her *practice* skills a lot before she is tested on them. Have her teach the concepts to someone else. These are ways that will help her master it all. Once she has mastered it, then respect and support her decision as to whether she wants to continue or not. Don't throw in the towel and decide "she probably should not be diving" just because she isn't as enthusiastic as someone thinks she should be.

My two cents.

 

[divin'dog]

... I have a good friend who was OW certified last year with her husband. She loves water and all water sports except is nervous diving maybe even a little claustrophobic. Anyway she really wants to enjoy diving and her husband REALLY wants her to enjoy diving.

If she feels claustrophobic, it may be a hard thing to get over. I would suggest her getting in the water and making sure hubby is not adding to any pressure/distraction to "enjoy" diving. Let her take her own time, as much as it takes, to get totally comfortable and used to diving.

Without knowing specifics, try just getting in with only mask and snorkel in the shallow end of the pool and let her get comfortable just going under with that at first. If she's comfortable with that, try just breathing off scuba in the shallow end so she feels in control and does not feel threatened by depth. Even if she is only waist deep, she can try putting her face in the water just below the surface. Let her explore the feeling to get comfortable. She may not have had the time to do that in her training. Remember to always breathe esp in shallow water.

She needs to feel comfortable at her own pace and take small steps as she approaches what makes her nervous. Getting familiar with the feelings and sounds at a slow, non-threatening pace may help. A friend of mine is fine snorkeling, swimming and going under the water with a mask but he cannot do scuba for whatever reason... Don't force it, if she's not ready. If she makes small improvements, great! You may want to end each session on a "good note" if possible. Don't do too much on each session.

 

[TSandM]

I'd ask her what makes her nervous. If it's mask skills, spend some gear-free time working on that until it's effortless. There are lots of ideas for approaches in the many threads on mask skills in the New Diver section.

If it's instability, take a good look at the gear she is using. Does it fit? Is the tank stable on her back? Does the gear balance reasonably? Poorly fitted or unstable gear definitely increases diver anxiety. My personal thing is to get divers out of split fins as well, when they are new. Paddles help stability a ton. They can always switch to splits later if they want them.

I worked a while back with a woman who had had a scare underwater, and developed a problem with anxiety. Turned out static instability was her biggest issue, and once we corrected that and lowered her baseline anxiety level, she could handle the other things that had frightened her before just fine.

 

[jadairiii]

Two things that will work wonders for a new "nervous" divers.

Get her in the pool, with no gear but a mask, have her flood her mask and just stand in the shallow end with her head above the water and get comfortable with a flooded mask. That is normally 99% of the fear when I hear claustrophobic. Then work her into gear, still standing in the shallow end and breath from the regulator, above the water and keep flooding the mask. Keep working on that skill till she can do it underwater.

Then, when on the dive vacation, let her dictate the dives. If hubby wants to go deep, let him go by himself. Keep her shallow. Had a close friend that both he and wife were divers. She was a wreck every time we would dive until one day I told her to skip the first (deeper) dive, no choice, just told her she was not diving, second dive we did a little reef in 20' of water with crappy coral and milky visibility. Came up telling us it was the best dive of her life. He was pushing her beyond her comfort level. My own wife did all her diving 30' or shallower, she had no interest in diving deep. Her policy was, flat calm, clear and shallow, if not she was happy to run the boat.