News Release: 40+ yr old fat broad now a Divemaster (mistress?)
Welcome to ScubaBoard, an online scuba diving forum community where you can join over 205,000 divers diving from around the world. If the topic is related to scuba diving, this is the place to find divers talking about it. To gain full access to ScubaBoard (and make this large box go away) you must register for a free account. As a registered member you will be able to:
Participate in over 500 dive topic forums and browse from over 5,500,000 posts.
Communicate privately with other divers from around the world.
Post your own photos or view from well over 100,000 user submitted images.
Gain access to our free classifieds marketplace to buy, sell and trade gear, travel and services.
Use the calendar to organize your events and enroll in other members' events.
Find a dive buddy or communicate directly with scuba equipment manufacturers.
All this and much more is available to you absolutely free when you register for an account, so sign up today!
If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact the ScubaBoard Support Team.
News Release: 40+ yr old fat broad now a Divemaster (mistress?)
Well, at last!
I've been back from Maui now for about three weeks (Big Adventure IV) and finally, I've finished the divemaster certification. Hooray!!!!!!
I started the process last spring and have been working on it a bit during each trip.
This was really a working week for me -- not too many purely 'sight seeing dives' I interned with several different instructors and worked with a bunch of students. In general, the students were fun--and it was really neat to see their excitement as they got to experience the underwater environment. I think my favorite was a Mom who was pretty nervous, but decided to do an intro dive while her
adult daughter was starting her certification class. "Mom" is a plus size woman, and I could see her relax when she saw me and realized that I would be diving with her. She did GREAT!!! At first, she was very nervous to be breathing underwater, but after a moment or two, you could see her visibly relax. By half way through the tour part of the dive she was actually demonstrating some pretty good form! I'm making a wager that the addiction may have started for her, and we may
be seeing her underwater again! Go "Mom"!!!!
I completed the mapping project. I chose a site that has not been mapped and isn't commonly thought of as a dive site. I had a great time exploring it. It is actually a pretty small reef but that seems to mean that the marine life is especially concentrated. It was fun making an informal inventory of some of the animals there. In the narrative part of the map, I suggested that this might be a really fun site for a mixed group of snorkelers and divers.
The "HELL Dive" was particularly grueling. Three instructors and one dive master from the shop that I've been training with took roles as my 'simulated' dive customers. One played the role of the Nervous Nelly and slow poke( I think she got some great sea urchin photos), another was a roamer who refused to stay with his buddy and did his damnedest to sneak away from the group (also, just for the fun of it, he sexually harassed the other guy on the dive - who happens to be his boss in real life), the third was some one who claimed to know it all, but was really unfamiliar -- and ultimately panicked, and finally the fourth diver was really obnoxious on shore (so obnoxious, in fact that strangers on the beach stopped and stared at him -- he was so embarrassed that he went around to the people staring to tell them it was a role play and that he wasn't really a jerk) and he pretended to be overweighted underwater. It seemed that each time I solved one problem, they created another. I chose to overlook some problems, simply because they were not as serious as others. In the end, I didn't lose any divers, I kept a careful eye on air consumption, I handled a panicked diver, I resolved many problems, nothing that was potentially serious or hazardous in that particular setting happened. I learned that I can multi-task. I also learned that if omeone is particularly aggressive or obnoxious I am likely to want to distance myself from them, and I may overlook a potential problem because I wasn't interacting enough to find it. So, that means, when I'm with someone I don't like, or someone who "rubs me the wrong way," I need to be especially vigilant of checking on their progress.
On a different dive, my instructor and I practiced a buddy breathing emergency ascent. It went smoothly, and was a confidence builder that I could handle that. (not that I ever intend to need to use it.).
The task that almost did me in was the complete gear exchange while buddy breathing. I swallowed more air and breathed more water than I care to think about, but eventually, I managed to complete the task. My instructor said I did well, she even was impressed with my 'problem solving' -- I still think it was pretty ugly!
Throughout the trip the whale song was wonderful... I heard it on almost every dive!
Great stuff. Hope you did something nice to celebrate.
The world will (hopefully) be joined next month by another middle-ageing broad when I do the DM course in Australia. It's nice to hear that it's not just gap year students and young snappers who do this.
It's a mid-life crisis for me and I had to escape reality for a while.
Congratulations Liz Great News! I bet Don and Rachel are very proud of you too. BTW was it Don who was the one who got "sexually harrased" heheh Despite the torture you were going thru it must have been very funny.
"I'm not a fan of summer storms. Between the lightening that might blow up my house or the tornado that might throw a cow through it, I don't sleep well." Steve_Dives
Happy to be a dork diver! www.dorkdiver.com
LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
Reply With Quote
Congratulations indeed!!
I wish you hadn't used the phrase fat broad though as all I can picture in my mind is the fat broad in the comic strip B.C.(one of my favorites)
