Lost Confidence in diving

[aftershock109]

Hey long time reader first time poster, I have a bit of a Dilemma at the moment I am diving 12 months and have 70 dives under my belt and I love it, it’s such a fantastic sport so much to see enjoy and get from the sport, I started diving in Egypt last year did my open and advanced there and swiftly came back to Ireland and started diving regularly over here and continued to get more certifications to gain experience and explore further into the underwater world. I than did my rescue course which was really enjoyable and very eye opening to the reality of what can happen.
Soon after the Rescue course we were diving in a new location that was well known for its currents and we ended up on a drift dive which was part of the plan, and deployed our Dsmb’s and continued to drift for a few minutes and surfaced normally, unknown to us we had surfaced at lease 700m away from our Dive boat and we drifting extremely fast away from the boat we drifted about 5 miles away and were picked up by another boat that heard the mayday call from our skipper, we all made it back to land safe little shook up but safe none the less, an unfortunate incident that really was nobody’s fault but gave me a scare, However got over that fairly quick and was just allot more cautious on future dives.
Couple of weeks after that I started to train as a Divemaster done all my pool sessions and the likes was really enjoying the experience and working with the students. Not long into the training we were down at a Quarry to do some deep training to practice for an upcoming weekend away, there was a few students around taking part in a number of different courses, I was asked to help out of a Deep cert as part of my training, and I had no problems doing so I felt competent and ready, we all swam to the shot line to descend to 25 meters swim through a swim through down to 33meters there was four divers 1 very experienced instructor, myself trainee Divemaster, and 2 students, we all descended down the shot together and we reached the 25 meters mark and started the swim towards the 33m mark our positions were instructor leading the way 2 students directly behind him and me hovering slightly above the two students, when one of the students seemed to be very un comfortable under the water, Had had gotten a free flow due to the low temp in the Quarry, he was attempting to breath the reg but was start to show signs of panic in his face so I immediately offered up my octo which within a couple of seconds has caused both my regs to free flow the instructor at this stage was beside me and I tool his alterative and unluckily both his started free flowing causing a mess under the water bubbles were everywhere and we could see noting at some stage the reg that was in my mouth was knocked out and my mask was badly flooded I started to Panic, All the training in the world I just couldn’t cope with the mess that has started, short of breath and unable to retrieve my reg I preformed a CESA assent (I know it was too deep but at this stage i Just had to get to the surface. We all made it to the surface and the forth diver was still down there but had sent up his dsmb from 5meters to say he was okay and was just doing his safety stop. We all went onto O2 and were DCi free we were very lucky that the incident happened as soon as we dropped down the whole dive was 6minutes from descent to breaking the surface.
A week or two on a did 2 dives one shallow @10m and one @27m and they went well was very aware of the previous incident but was reasonably confident after practicing all my drills over and over to try help me and others out if a situation ever arose like before, The following weekend I went on a dive and dropped down the shot and was feeling like i couldn’t get enough air and wasn’t liking it, i was on the verge of panicking again i reached the bottom @26meters said to my buddy i want to surface so we surface normally and done our 5m safety stop and broke the surface didn’t want to keep the dive going and get into panic when i knew i didn’t feel comfortable and endangering me or my buddy so taught it was best to end the dive.
My problem is now i am a bit of a nervous wreck I really want to get back in to the water and continue the sport i love and enjoy, but i am a bit afraid and don’t know how to overcome this, how to gain my confidence back in my equipment and myself has anybody any suggestions, I don’t want to end my diving here, I need to get over this for my own sake and the sake on my sanity. I really would appreciate peoples suggestions and past experiences and ideas on how to overcome this

I hope somebody can help me

Thanks in advance

 

[Crush]

Hi aftershock109,

I am glad that you didn't get injured. Having experienced near-panic before during a dive, and being a cold-water diver, I have a few comments:

1. Stress is a normal human reaction to being placed in abnormal, stressful environments (such as being underwater). If not interrupted, stress can lead to panic. I would encourage you to keep diving, but scale back your dives and treat them seriously: (a) talk to your dive buddy about your previous experience so that s/he understands that you are trying to get back into it; (b) plan your dive and dive your plan. The scripting of the dive will help you to relax. Be sure that you discuss and plan what you will do in the case of stress - how will you resolve it (before it becomes panic) underwater (this is up to you, but breathe, stop, and think is a place to start). Thumb the dive before stress becomes panic; and (c) keep it shallow, keep it simple. Practice trim, different kicks, and safety drills with your buddy in no more than 3 meters of water. The shallow depth should relax you, and concentrating on skills will keep your mind from getting too worked up;

2. My experience with stress approaching panic was resolved underwater. The DM and I discussed how we would handle stress. Our solution was that I would settle on the (sandy) bottom on my knees and we would take a few minutes to breathe before we did anything else. After a minute (he timed us) he asked me what I wanted to do. I indicated that I would like to proceed with the dive. All went well thereafter;

3. Your reaction in the case of a free-flowing regulator was incorrect and exacerbated the problem. One of the main reasons for this error was likely that you were trained in warmer water where free-flow is not an issue. The simplest solution to a free-flow is to immediately thumb the dive and keeping the free-flowing reg in your mouth make a normal ascent to the surface. Begin Edit: the following applies if you caught the free-flow while it was still a trickle and you are not gushing air rapidly: Watch your pressure - you may have enough air to do a safety stop. However, do not risk going OOA - a safety stop is not mandatory if you have not gone into deco. End edit here. There is absolutely no reason to stop breathing off the free-flowing reg unless you are diving doubles with an isolation manifold and want to switch regs, isolate the free-flowing reg, and swish it about the water for a minute so as to melt the ice crystal (assuming a 2nd stage freeze-up). You can of course follow the same procedure using a buddy's octo (i.e., turn off your tank and swish your reg about in the water while breathing off an octo), but you run a real risk of causing his/her gear to free-flow as well owing to the larger demand for air; and

4. If you purchased gear in warmer climes, check to see that your regs are cold-water compatible. Get them serviced and indicate that they free-flowed. The technician might be able to adjust the pressures to help minimize the chances of this recurring.

 

[scorpiofish]

Your experiences aren't common, but they are not unique, at least in a general sort of way.

Unplanned events don't happen that often. When they start happening more often than they should, the mind takes over. In the back of your mind, you start thinking that some weird and not good event will happen when you get in the water.

An analogy would be one who experiences an event traveling by plane. Even though the odds of an event are 1 in a million, it happened to that person in one of x number of flights that they took (could have been their first flight). It is not easy for them to get on another flight.

From a diving perspective, what I have seen that seems to work is to go on a dive trip. It needs to be the easiest diving known to man. The water needs to be clear and warm with little current and shallow dive sites. Eliminate the potential causes of anxiety. What you need is to have lots of event free dives. Make diving as easy as possible.

I know people who have gone through the same process. The source of the anxiety was a little different, but the recovery process was the same.

BTW, taking students to deep dark cold waters for deep training gave me great anxiety. The dry suit is rotted. The doubles and stages have cobwebs. The rebreather is sitting on a shelf. After a 1,000+ dives, all my diving is in pool like conditions. Life is good.

 

[DandyDon]

Why are you going thru the DM course? Why not just enjoy diving? Good answers here already, but I'll add mine...

1: Carry SMB, mirror, dive light, and compressed air whistle on every dive to make finding your easier. I also carry a white trash bag for a night time too; fill with air and shine light into it.

2: Enjoy easier dives.

3: Dive with a good buddy when you can; a pony bottle helps too.

4: The Return key makes paragraphs; use often.

 

[vshearer]

Umm, what kind of regulators were these? Just curious.

Overall, sounds like you did really well with the situations though.

 

[TSandM]

So THREE different regulators went into freeflow on this dive? Yikes! Sounds like some regs need adjusting, or folks have the wrong regs for the conditions.

I've been in one major freeflow incident, and it was very disorienting and stressful to be surrounded by bubbles, so I couldn't see, and subjected to the incredible NOISE. You had three divers tied together (always a bad idea) with all three of you free-flowing -- that had to have been pure chaos. Still, especially as a dive professional, it's your job to stay calm and THINK; as stated, the appropriate action would have been, once your reg freeflowed as well, to thumb the dive and make an expeditious ascent. You only have about 90 seconds of gas, once a full free-flow is in progress, so things have to be handled efficiently.

Did you debrief this situation with the instructor who was leading the class? What did HE do when his reg freeflowed?

As far as regaining confidence, I think it's like anything else. Start back with something that's absolutely non-challenging -- even pool time, if you can get it. Very gradually add complexity (depth, viz, etc.) as your confidence allows.

 

[SeaHorse81]

As far as regaining confidence, I think it's like anything else. Start back with something that's absolutely non-challenging -- even pool time, if you can get it. Very gradually add complexity (depth, viz, etc.) as your confidence allows.

Excellent advice from all. There is a very specific way to pace your re-entry back to any activity/experience that has come to be associated with anxiety, and which certainly applies here. You start, as has been stated, with easy experiences that give you no anxiety at all -- none. You do NOT want to practice additional anxiety at this point, because you're already getting too good at it, in a way.

After an experience (or two or three, whatever it takes) that involves no anxiety, notch up the challenge level to something that has just a bit of emotional edge to it, but which you feel confident you can manage successfully. You're bringing yourself to a level of wary alertness, but not anxiety. Stay at that level until it feels kind of boring, then notch up the challenge to whatever it is that now brings you again to wary alertness, but not anxiety. Repeat as necessary until you get back to where you want to be, and don't rush it. Better to have a great recovery that takes a tad long than to go too far, too fast and make the anxiety worse.

It sounds like you love this enough to get through it and have it be worth the effort. A passion is a terrible thing to waste. You also might find that enjoying this sport in a different manner than you initially intended might be right for you. You don't necessarily have to keep pressing boundaries, going for bigger, better, more novel, etc experiences. You might find yourself quite content to just go to a certain level and stay there, enjoying it fully.

Best of luck sorting it all out.

 

[robint]

I hope you do get back into the water, but I would stop the DM training for now. You need to get comfortable underwater again, and should not be watching another diver in the process. Glad to hear you were uninjured in the incident, too.
(BTW - my last dive, a few weeks ago, I had a regulator decide to free flow. First time in 10+ yrs and 400+ dives. I did a safe ascent, even did a 5 minute safety stop, watching my gauges the whole time. My reg was checked out at the dive shop the next day and they found alot of small sand particles in the 2nd stage. They rinsed it out, and I have it now ready to check out again. Our best guess is that I didn't get it soaked long enough after my last dive trip)

robin

 

[Tigerman]

I think that confidence in your gear is important, however it seems to me like youve been having TOO MUCH confidence in your gear. 3 sets of regs all freeflowing sounds to me like theive been either badly maintained or is just not the correct regulators for the conditions and badly maintained regulators or regulators used outside of their "are of operation" is not to be had confidence in..

 

[Crush]

3 sets of regs all freeflowing sounds to me like theive been either badly maintained or is just not the correct regulators for the conditions and badly maintained regulators or regulators used outside of their "are of operation" is not to be had confidence in..

So THREE different regulators went into freeflow on this dive? Yikes! Sounds like some regs need adjusting, or folks have the wrong regs for the conditions.

I may be wrong, but in my opinion the only unexpected free-flow was the first one. Once you start breathing off someone's octo in cold water at depth you more than double flow through the first stage regulator (owing to rapid respiration since you are panicked). The air, which is normally cold exiting the first stage, is now even colder. The second pressure drop at the second stages allows even more cooling to occur. Ice crystal formation becomes increasingly likely at each step.

You may want to ensure that your air supplier does an extra good job ensuring dry air fills during the cold months.