To old to dive?

[Lee Taylor]

I am 57. Been diving for 15 yrs. Still very active.

I would not project too far out. You may not "feel" like diving 10 yrs from now.

Take it day by day. Do what you can and don't let the bastards get you down.

Dive ON brother.

 

[bowlofpetunias]

P.S. I stopped celebrating birthdays at 50

I started counting backwards at 50 so now I am 40

I am 57. Been diving for 15 yrs. Still very active.

I would not project too far out. You may not "feel" like diving 10 yrs from now.

Take it day by day. Do what you can and don't let the bastards get you down.

Dive ON brother.

I have to confess that sometimes I dive when don't really feel like it because I know once I get underwater I will be glad I dived and I am not positive how many more dives I will get to do..

I figure I should get them in when I can and hope that means A lot of dives for a long time. I don't want to get told I have to stop diving and look back and regret all the missed oportunities!

 

[Brian Sharpe]

I got my OW a couple of years ago (I was 52) and there was another student on the same course who was 64. He has since become a fairly regular dive buddy and, as his kids are all grown up, has managed to log over 200 dives (more than double what I've managed with my kids soccer schedules). He is also a DMC right now & should finish up this summer. Too old.............nah!

 

[MichiganScott]

Damn Hockeynut, I screwsd that up. I'm still diving 14 years later.

Time of death... Not brain dead, oh wait that was said about me. See what I mean.

 

[onenonlychance]

i am almost 40 and one reason that i am going through this certification is because it can give my wife and i something to do while we grow older.

 

[highdesert]

I said good-bye to 60 a coupla years ago. Some days I really don't want to get on the road bike and knock out the 30 miles, ending with a 500' elevation gain to 7000'. Then I just have to think about the tides and currents in Indonesia, and all the beautiful dives we'll be doing there again. Between that, and wanting to ski too fast and too hard in the winter, I get on the bike. I never regret it; the reward is worth it!

 

[sansky]

Definitely you are not too old! Always base your limitations on your experience though. It is not a bad idea to get Nitrox certified also. That will give you that extra safety margin.

 

[flots am]

I got into this sport 4 years ago and I really love it! Unfortunately I got into it perhaps to late to actually have a chance to accomplish some of the dive challenges I have on my "bucket list". Some of these are deeper dives on Great Lakes ship wrecks approaching 200 feet.

This is a personal decision. I'm in my 50's and have decided to no longer do decompression dives because I know that I'm in prime heart-attack territory and a heart-attack with a big deco obligation is pretty much a death sentence. (It's no bargain on a no-deco dive either but the chances of surviving are better).

Other than that, the only real changes I've made are to be more selective when comparing the dive requirements with my actual physical capabilities and being more vigilant about planning for "when the s*** hits the fan".

For example, I have no problem diving in current, but will only do so if I'm carrying a couple of SMBs and have discussed pickup with the boat captain. If I get blown off a wreck, my plan is to shoot the bag and wait for pickup, not swim a 1/2 hour against the current as it might have been when I was 20.

I have also entertained the idea of "Going Pro" as a retirement job. How realistic is that? Is being a 67 year old OWSI even possible?

"Instructor" is a nice post-retirement job if you can work somewhere that has help. On days when my arthritis kicks up, loading a boat full of tanks isn't really high on my to-do list.

Unfortunately money and time are not real plentiful right now and probably won't be until the youngest child is out of college in eight years. So fast tracking training and equipment purchases is not a viable option. Can I realistically delay the advanced training I will need until I am 60?

Wait as long as you want, and dive when it makes you happy.

flots.

 

[DuboisP]

i began at 47, was DM (a little bit more, according the french levelling) at 52 and trimix diver the same year, and do regurlarly decompression with oxygen.
next week will be diving some wrecks around 150 ft

 

[DiverLS]

I started diving at 39. Then I got my Rescue Cert at 54. Then I got an email from a fellow who asked me if I was rec or tec. I responded rec and he responded tec but I'll rec. Now I'm tec. I completed intro to cave in 11/09 and am going back in 11/10 for Apprentice. I did 11 dives in the Riveria Maya in 5/10 and now feel like I'm a tec diver. Counting backwords from when I was 50, I'm back to 39.

Our guide for the cave dives in the Riviera Maya was highly complimentary in her blog about a woman my age certifying for cave diving. :cool3: