So frustrated

[gymratdiver]

So...I got certified back in 09. Since then, unfortunately, it took some time to acquire my gear and as of the last year or so, I finally really started diving more regular. Still not the amount that I would like but, little by little, I am acquiring more bottom time. That being established this last outing was a real eye opener.

I went out this last Sunday and missed the time slot of choice. The current was strong and as I was OK to dive, my buddy was not. We called the dive. No problem there. I have no issue with a called dive. Since we were in the water all ready, i suggested that we do some skills stuff.

I failed miserably.

When I got certified, I got through the class just fine. Didn't enjoy taking my mask off and breathing etc but got through it. Yesterday, If I would have been in class, they would have laughed me out of there! I could not, for the life of me, make myself breathe with my mask off. I could clear it no problem. I've done that on dives. Mask gets bumped, or a leak develops. Clear it. But yesterday there was nothing in my body that i could do to convince myself to breathe while my mask was off. Mind you, we were in less than ten feet so i just shot to the top once i realized my body would not cooperate. But had I been in say 60-80 ft, and had an issue....would my body/mind fail me? My resounding answer is yes.

So, tonight, in the comfort of my own bathroom/tub i have been forcing myself to dunk my head and breathe without a mask on. My own kind of water torture i guess. Its taken a few attempts but has gotten better. I will continue this until I can get back in the water for real (hopefully this weekend or next). I also will from now on take the time to practice this skill after each dive until it isnt a problem.

I guess in all this i wonder, to the general diver....

you have 25 plus dives. 100 plus dives. your neutrally buoyant, great on air. Your a great diver. Good. But when was the last time you checked some of these skills? Would you be fine? Do you test yourself regularly? How often do you pull your knife out, just to make sure you can and could put it back without dropping it into the great abyss below? Do you reach for your octo/pony reg to do your safety stop, just so you know you can find it and use it? Anyways, these questions are some what rhetorical but also would love some input from the forum as well.

back to the tub i go...

[Don-B]

I keep telling myself I should go over some basic skills myself.
But It seems for me when I test my skills it's for real.
Like the time I took a fin to the face at 125ft at night.
It took my mask off. I was able to find it and get it back on.
Or the time I got caught on rebar and fishing line and had to take off my b.c. untangle and put it back on.
There are several more I could tell you but I will save those for another day.

what I can say is that every time something happened I fell back to my training and past emergency's.
I always stayed calm and never panicked.
How I feel about diving is that your always training yourself and practicing you skills on every dive.
If you fell you need practice or more training then do it and don't feel funny about it.
I'm sure you can find some divers on here that would be glad to help you also.
And no one will laugh at you either.

[Jeff Pack]

For my tec class last week, I had to do a 75ft swim, mask off in cold winter water. No fun at all. My face was not happy, and stung like hell.

[LCF]

Enormous kudos to you for deciding to do this, and discovering that your skills were rusty.

I can tell you that I have taken more dive training than most of the people on the planet . . . and passed some pretty strict tests. But when I haven't practiced my skills for a while, they aren't sharp at all. If you don't challenge yourself with the things that aren't easy, you lose facility with them.

The good news is that what you once knew how to do WILL come back to you, if you work at it.

It is a very good strategy to decide on one skill to practice with every dive, or at least every other dive. At the end, in ten feet of water or so, you can flood and clear a mask, or take it off (and yes, it is painful and unpleasant to do it in midwinter!). You can share gas, or disconnect your inflator hose, or practice freeing up your weights to drop. If you have trouble finding buddies who are willing to do this, come to the Wednesday evening Cove 2 dives -- among the other things, that group is dedicated to skills practice.

[renoun]

Test breathing your regs face in the water with your mask off before every shore dive is also a good way to become acclimated to mask off breathing in cold water.

[deep diver]

The mask thing is very true, I tell newer divers that all the time when I dive with them that they need to practice this. We were in Honduras and the dive masters required everyone to take their masks off and breathe while underwater before you could do any dives with them. Most of the people freaked! Why??? If you dive with a group of divers on a vacation somewhere and there is something exciting going on in one area.... eventually you are going to get kicked in the head by someone wanting to get in to see and either mask, reg or both will go flying. If you are comfortable with the process you won't freak. To me this is a number one thing you need to get used to. **** and staying back from large groups of divers when everyone is getting excited **** and that is MY 2 cents

[Norris]

I say practice everything often. I keep a spare mask in my pocket and switch them out at depth every 6th or 7th dive. I switch to my other regulator almost every dive. I unzip my pocket on my drysuit almost every dive and rezip.
Im all about questioning myself constantly and assuring that I practice things I need to do in order to keep myself alive, as well as anyone relying on me.
I applaud you for practicing what you know you should know. I know some of the people I dive with practice different scenerios...

Keep it up

[Mateo1147]

One of my good buddies still laughs every time we talk about my last BC doff and don at the T dock training line. I felt like a balloon attached to a lead weight. One arm looped through a shoulder strap and everything else pointed at the surface! A couple hard kicks and a sweep and roll solved the issue but good lessons were learned. Keep up the skills practice!

[fnerg]

When I first learned to snorkel, I had the same problem, with basically the same solution, I stuck my face in a sink full of water and forced myself to exhale through my nose. After awhile, I could do that with no problem, and when I had to do a 75 foot swim with no mask, it wasn't a big deal.

[archisgore]

I was lucky enough recently, to have fellow divers from NWDC take me out when I had my first experience 2 months ago. Since then, I usually put in one mid-week dive at only upto 15ft exclusively to go over all the drills and emergencies. Try what you did at night with no ambient lighting and it gets real scary real fast.