Panic?

[NW Dive Dawg]

I posted a recent thread about an out of gas incident I had this past weekend. I don’t expect anyone to read that entire thread but at least the first post will help to explain how and why I feel that the general subject of Panic is a worthwhile discussion to have here in the “basic scuba” forum. And since I might have the most recent experience of actually approaching or reaching a state of Panic, it's probably worth discussing as a dedicated and separate thread while it’s all fresh in my mind. My hope is that comments about equipment configurations and my bad pre-dive decisions can be kept in the other thread and that here we can just discuss Panic.

Tried to Kill Myself but Failed!

So I’ve been on the fence on whether or not to post this……because it’s really hard to openly and publicly admit when you do something totally stupid. But then I thought more about it last night and figure that if it might provide some productive and positive food for thought and discussion…..or...

scubaboard.com

Even though I have always considered myself as person who can “handle” situations, I also now know that am not a “Chatterton” that will just automatically go into “zen” mode while holding my breath for 3 minutes as I calmly think and work the problem.

As I replay the events of this dive, it literally scares the crap out of me when I think about how it could have so easily gone differently, and I am embarrassed and disappointed in myself when I think about how it was preventable and never should have happened.

As I go through it over and over and over…..I don’t feel that I “panicked”……. and so I think that I was incorrect in using the term “first stage of panic” in the thread. After my experience, I now believe there are no “stages” of panic. It’s more like a switch or a circuit breaker that gets flipped and there are no other options or “levels” other than the switch is either on or off. I believe that I was very, very close to flipping that switch.

My first thought when experiencing that very first feeling of reduced gas flow is probably best described as…..”hmm…that’s weird”…..and I would call it a level 1 or 2 concern. When I exhaled than went to inhale and there was nada…..I feel that I then went right to a level 9-10 concern……. but not Panic…because my immediate thought was still to simply go to my redundant source pony 2nd. When I didn’t immediately find it where it was supposed to be I went right to a level 5 anxiety and then moments later when I was still unable to find it I went into immediately a high level WTF, Oh Sh@t anxiety and my very next thought was ESA. What’s really weird is that I distinctly remember thinking ESA and not CESA. I also remember thinking I’m at 60ft and I can do this. I also remember thinking how “f’d” up this would be for my wife if I didn’t make it. It’s literally amazing how many thoughts can go through your mind in a second or two.. But I also believe that if a person is still “thinking” , they have not yet flipped the switch.

Then…. and what actually may have saved my bacon….. is I grabbed my Air 2 for the sole purpose of holding the oral inflate / deflate button and having that as an option to “rebreath” into my BC on the ascent. I remember thinking that it’s only 60ft to the surface……just two boat length’s…… I remember thinking that I was thinking!

Once I had the Air 2 mouthpiece in my in my mug, my uncontrolled reaction was to inhale and then there was sweet compressed gas available along with that wonderful sound of delivery. After two or three deep breaths, my mind slowly moved away from the “switch” and the needle on my high anxiety meter very slowly started moving down from that 9.9 level.

My conclusion is that panic is a strange and unpredictable thing. Maybe you can plan for it or train for it or prevent it, but you can’t really practice it and I don’t believe that all the training in the world can let someone know exactly what they’ll actually do if they ever flip that “switch”.

 

[Belzelbub]

My conclusion is that panic is a strange and unpredictable thing. Maybe you can plan for it or train for it or prevent it, but you can’t really practice it and I don’t believe that all the training in the world can let someone know exactly what they’ll actually do if they ever flip that “switch”.

Thanks for posting both threads. The first was definitely eye opening.

Yeah, panic is sudden and you don’t really know how you’ll react until you are in it. All we can really do is practice. That way, even if your mind is not helping, muscle memory may take over.

So practicing switches and other scenarios can help where you are faced with an actual issue.

I read part of your other thread, and had a thought. Make it hard to make a mistake. While a regulator is a regulator, and your pony reg will still fit in your mouth, you can make it distinctive. Others mentioned colored hoses. That will certainly help, but only if you see the color, which can be tough with a mask on your face. What about the mouthpiece? I use a SeaCure on my primary reg. It feels a lot different than a standard mouthpiece. So maybe swap with a SeaCure or Comfobite on your primary and use the most basic uncomfortable mouthpiece for your pony. I have to think it’s one more chance for you to think something is different, before you splash.

 

[Kendall Raine]

I posted a recent thread about an out of gas incident I had this past weekend. I don’t expect anyone to read that entire thread but at least the first post will help to explain how and why I feel that the general subject of Panic is a worthwhile discussion to have here in the “basic scuba” forum. And since I might have the most recent experience of actually approaching or reaching a state of Panic, it's probably worth discussing as a dedicated and separate thread while it’s all fresh in my mind. My hope is that comments about equipment configurations and my bad pre-dive decisions can be kept in the other thread and that here we can just discuss Panic.

Tried to Kill Myself but Failed!

So I’ve been on the fence on whether or not to post this……because it’s really hard to openly and publicly admit when you do something totally stupid. But then I thought more about it last night and figure that if it might provide some productive and positive food for thought and discussion…..or...

scubaboard.com

Even though I have always considered myself as person who can “handle” situations, I also now know that am not a “Chatterton” that will just automatically go into “zen” mode while holding my breath for 3 minutes as I calmly think and work the problem.

As I replay the events of this dive, it literally scares the crap out of me when I think about how it could have so easily gone differently, and I am embarrassed and disappointed in myself when I think about how it was preventable and never should have happened.

As I go through it over and over and over…..I don’t feel that I “panicked”……. and so I think that I was incorrect in using the term “first stage of panic” in the thread. After my experience, I now believe there are no “stages” of panic. It’s more like a switch or a circuit breaker that gets flipped and there are no other options or “levels” other than the switch is either on or off. I believe that I was very, very close to flipping that switch.

My first thought when experiencing that very first feeling of reduced gas flow is probably best described as…..”hmm…that’s weird”…..and I would call it a level 1 or 2 concern. When I exhaled than went to inhale and there was nada…..I feel that I then went right to a level 9-10 concern……. but not Panic…because my immediate thought was still to simply go to my redundant source pony 2nd. When I didn’t immediately find it where it was supposed to be I went right to a level 5 anxiety and then moments later when I was still unable to find it I went into immediately a high level WTF, Oh Sh@t anxiety and my very next thought was ESA. What’s really weird is that I distinctly remember thinking ESA and not CESA. I also remember thinking I’m at 60ft and I can do this. I also remember thinking how “f’d” up this would be for my wife if I didn’t make it. It’s literally amazing how many thoughts can go through your mind in a second or two.. But I also believe that if a person is still “thinking” , they have not yet flipped the switch.

Then…. and what actually may have saved my bacon….. is I grabbed my Air 2 for the sole purpose of holding the oral inflate / deflate button and having that as an option to “rebreath” into my BC on the ascent. I remember thinking that it’s only 60ft to the surface……just two boat length’s…… I remember thinking that I was thinking!

Once I had the Air 2 mouthpiece in my in my mug, my uncontrolled reaction was to inhale and then there was sweet compressed gas available along with that wonderful sound of delivery. After two or three deep breaths, my mind slowly moved away from the “switch” and the needle on my high anxiety meter very slowly started moving down from that 9.9 level.

My conclusion is that panic is a strange and unpredictable thing. Maybe you can plan for it or train for it or prevent it, but you can’t really practice it and I don’t believe that all the training in the world can let someone know exactly what they’ll actually do if they ever flip that “switch”.

I read your previous post (bravo for posting it, BTW), but decided to respond to this one because you're now discussing the mental aspects (panic) of your event, which are the the real essence of the issue.

While most of the responses to your other post focused on equipment oriented solutions/preventions, to me your problems (picking the wrong reg, not checking the SPG before going OOG) were examples of failure of situational awareness/procedures. It happens to everyone, but please see it for what it was and recognize that modified equipment configurations aren't the end of the preventative evolution. Attitude is. Things like setting up your gear the same way every time, establishing a pre-dive check routine and taking the time before you splash to run through your checks (e.g. do I have my gas on, are my hoses routed correctly, have I plugged in my dry suit inflator, am I breathing the right reg), are the best way to profit from your near miss. Contrivances like colored regs/hoses, different mouth pieces or other aids are an invitation to an argument: at best, a backup to proper situational awareness; at worst, a crutch which prevents you from fully adopting the mental attitude and practices that prevent problems before they happen (you come to rely on the contrivance/back up instead of integrating habits that prevent you from ever needing them). I think avoiding the contrivances/crutches (e.g. my regs are all exactly the same no matter how many stages/deco bottles I have) actually forces me to rely on an established routine and taking the time to follow procedures/maintain awareness every time. Others (like scuba equipment manufacturers/sellers) will disagree. This extends beyond your equipment and goes to planning (is the dive plan something we should do v something we can do? Are my buddy and I completely on the same page about the plan and contingencies?).

All my mistakes underwater (too many) can be traced back to not thinking things through (I was distracted, complacent, in a hurry, task loaded, blah, blah) and were preventable. Even equipment problems (stuck inflator, blown DIN o rings) resulted from sloppy pre-dive behavior/maintenance. After each event I tried to retrace the contributing factors and change the way I do/think about/plan things. Sometimes it meant changing out a piece of equipment but in each case warning signs (process/mental short cuts) had been ignored meaning that it was an awareness failure.

As for panic, and the sudden realization you've made a big mistake, I completely empathize with your thoughts about how your wife would deal with the consequences of your mistake if you didn't make it. Reminds me of a navigational mistake I made in a cave years ago and the vision that came to me of my kids standing over my grave. In the vision my son turns to my daughter and says "What an a hole." Very focusing. "Not today" was my next thought. I spent a lot of time afterward thinking about all the things (the "event cascade") that led to my mistake and made tactical changes to how I deal with jumps and T's, but the real evolution was in slowing things down/making sure my head is in the right place throughout the dive.

Again, thanks for posting about this.

 

[BlueTrin]

I had a semi failure where I could not get full breaths out of my rebreather a few weeks ago and had to bail out at depth.

Like you I didn’t panic but I felt a bit anxious when I switched: my buddy didn’t seem to understand the situation when I said my loop is broken and when I said thumbs up, he thought I asked a question and replied to go around one more time

When I switched to my BO, I thought this is gonna be really annoying if the reg does not deliver air and I happen to have a double failure and I remember feeling quite anxious.

I remember also pausing multiple times just to calm myself because I was thinking that I am getting a bit stressed.

In the end, it was pretty uneventful, I switched the BO and we ascended together (he explained that he thought I was practicing once back on the boat)

Although I am not sure that you can train for panic, I think you can still practice protocols, so that instead of panicking you will fall back onto one protocol, you are familiar with, to deal with the situation you trained for.

 

[happy-diver]

I don’t believe that all the training in the world can let someone know exactly what they’ll actually do if they ever flip that “switch”.

Let's call it a fluster-ing and the more of these flusterings you experience, the more experienced you become

I have never trained for anything, I just go and do, with everything, always flustering and then back in control

So get off your own back get out and do and give yourself a few more sphincterings they make you feel alive

Just remember that outcome may not necessarily be the same, as this is the diving we do, with no guarantees

 

[Nemrod]

Anyone and everyone can panic. Let a wasp get near me and you will see a full on phobia induced panic .

In about 1984, before octopus regs were common and ubiquitous equipment, drifit diving in WPB, my wife and we were given an (insta) buddy who was not a very good buddy. She kept swimming up current and I had the buddy team buoy to tow. One minute I had plenty of air, the next I got nothing. My wife was 30 feet away and I signaled her I was OOA. She rushed to me and we began buddy breathing. We began our ascent from about 80 feet and I could tell she was getting stressed though handling it like a champ. She had only been diving for about four years. At about 60 feet or so I gave her the okay signal and released her and moseyed on up to the surface on my own. At that time I was very much an accomplished free diver and just drifted on up, no big deal, no panic.

But, two years ago nearly now, I had 1500 psi, was about to close with my buddy group and head to the surface, all normal, A-okay, then the next breath I got nothing but seawater. Yes, it got in my larynx and into my lungs and my larynx did the mammalian reflex thing and closed up. No amount of will power would allow me to breath. Stressed, that is an understatement. The urge to head to the surface is tremendous, another understatement. But I did not. And incurred deco then and then my computer quit. And yes I went to my secondary but I could not inhale. There seemed to be no good way out of the predicament, damn if I do and damn if I do not. Since I could not breath I used that time to futz around with securing my Nauticam Sony camera rig and managed that barely, with my shield or on it. And then I passed out after about 3 minutes or so with no air.

And I will add, the futzing around with securing my camera occupied my mind and allowed me to suppress the panic and the desire to bolt for the surface.

 

[berndo]

My conclusion is that panic is a strange and unpredictable thing. Maybe you can plan for it or train for it or prevent it, but you can’t really practice it and I don’t believe that all the training in the world can let someone know exactly what they’ll actually do if they ever flip that “switch”.

I think you it's normal to get very stressed/ feel panic in your situation.
When you went for the 'pony reg' and it wasn't there you where left with no plan and not much time to think. I don't think you can really avoid panicking to some extent when you feel you have not good options and you might die.

One fix for this is to make your gear more error proof. Basically what people said in the other thread. Put the pony reg on a necklace and take time before you get in the water to make sure both regs are functioning and that the tanks are full. Think about and vizualize what your specific actions are in case of an specific issue. Freeflow of a reg, blown hose, cramp, empty tank due to an leak that went unnoticed, etc. How much time do I have, would I be ok with the situation, what's the alternative...

In your example the issue really was not taking enough time before the dive and a gear setup that let you make a mistake more easily. Many accidents happen due to stuff that happened before the dive... it's just that you're getting the bill during the dive.

I'd say definitely change your configuration and make sure you don't rush into the water in the future. I'd probably change to a small set of doubles (and pratice shutting valves down) instead of the pony/single setup.
I also check my SPGs early on every dive just to see if my consumption is as expected.

 

[happy-diver]

Many accidents happen due to stuff that happened before the dive... it's just that you're getting the bill during the dive.

Magnificent!

 

[blueskies_up_ahead]

But, two years ago nearly now, I had 1500 psi, was about to close with my buddy group and head to the surface, all normal, A-okay, then the next breath I got nothing but seawater. Yes, it got in my larynx and into my lungs and my larynx did the mammalian reflex thing and closed up. No amount of will power would allow me to breath. Stressed, that is an understatement. The urge to head to the surface is tremendous, another understatement. But I did not. And incurred deco then and then my computer quit. And yes I went to my secondary but I could not inhale. There seemed to be no good way out of the predicament, damn if I do and damn if I do not. Since I could not breath I used that time to futz around with securing my Nauticam Sony camera rig and managed that barely, with my shield or on it. And then I passed out after about 3 minutes or so with no air.

And I will add, the futzing around with securing my camera occupied my mind and allowed me to suppress the panic and the desire to bolt for the surface.

Wow, do I understand this right, you passed out underwater? You obviously survived... Why did you not surface? Too deep? Did your buddy bring you up? Was the reg in your mouth?

 

[scubaozy]

Yep I am also a little puzzled, with mammalian reflex, right thing to do would have been surfacing and removing the mask, when face and eyes gets in contact with air, breathing reflex will be re-triggered.