I regret my very first OW dive after certification.
My (now ex-)g/f and I did our OW certification together. 1 month later, we went down to Playa del Carmen for a week. Before our OW training even started, my g/f told me that she did not want to dive in water too deep to see the bottom (from the surface). During our OW training, my g/f (and I) learned that breathing underwater made her feel claustrophobic. I give her big props, though. She was very independent and always had a "Can Do" attitude. She was doing OW training because she wanted to, not because I pushed her. She told me "I will do it with you and see how I feel. Once I finish, if I don't like it, I won't dive. If I do, then cool." And she did finish the OW training just fine.
Before our trip to MX, I called and emailed around to find a dive operator. I explained that we were brand new divers and my g/f was anxious and we needed our first dive day to be somewhere very easy and no deeper than 30 feet or so because she wanted to be able to see the bottom. I found an operator that seemed to totally "get it" and assured me that he was going to match us up with a very experienced instructor who was very good with new divers like us.
We arrived in Playa. The night before our first dive day I got a call from the dive operator. He said there was no pressure, but he had a Bull Shark dive going out the next day and would upgrade us for no charge if we wanted to do that. And that was where I made my major mistake.
My g/f was very independent and I figured she would be pissed at me if I said no on her behalf. And I thought for sure that she would say no. So, I told the guy to hang on and I asked my g/f. To my shock, she said "sure. That sounds cool." She was the kind of woman that was not afraid of anything, in general. Well, except for deep water...
When she said that, I was stunned, but I immediately thought, "I know how to put the kibosh on this." I asked the dive operator "how deep will this dive be?" He said it would be about 70' (it was really 85'). I told my g/f that it would be 70', thinking that then she would say "oh, never mind." Again, to my amazement, she said okay. So, I told the dive operator that we were in. I felt totally fine with the plan for myself. I was worried about my g/f, but there was no way I was going to try and tell her what to do. I stressed repeatedly that it was totally fine with me to stick to the original plan. I was worried that she was only saying yes because she thought it was something I would want to do. I did everything I could to talk her out of it short of just saying "I really don't think we should do this." I felt like that would just be taken as "I really don't think YOU should do this" and she would not respond well to that.
The next day, everything went exactly the opposite of what I wanted. We met our guide down by the beach. He told us to put on our wetsuits and then we carried our gear down to the beach. The boat pulled up to the shore and we got in. Meanwhile, another shop's group had showed up. Our group was the 2 of us plus one other customer and then our guide. The other shop has about 10 people. They showed up already fully kitted up, wearing their BCDs just with no tanks yet. We just had our wetsuits halfway on and all our gear in mesh bags.
The boat ride was only about 10 minutes to the dive site and while we were gearing up on the boat as quickly as we could our guide explained to us that once we got on site, we needed to jump in and descend immediately so that we didn't drift past the area where the bull sharks would be. So, pressure, pressure, pressure on us to hurry everything we were doing. All this for our very first dive ever outside the quarry where we did our OW training.
My g/f was a trooper and got ready, as did I. We splashed "on time". But, we only descended about 5 feet before my g/f pulled the plug, went to the surface and, when we joined her there, told us she couldn't do it and was getting out. Which she did. Once she was back in the boat, the guide, the other guy, and I proceeded on and did the dive and had a few bull shark sightings. We hit a max of 85'.
My g/f did get in for the second dive, but only after much cajoling by our guide. It was a pretty shallow reef site with the worst reef I've ever seen (in hindsight). She never did another dive. And that is why I really regret that first dive. I really wanted it to be a dive day that was totally easy, pushed none of her buttons, and left an impression of great enjoyment. Instead, it turned out to be the opposite and that really sucks.
more than a valid reason
