A whole new world

Scuba diving is a mind-blowing experience. Obviously breathing underwater isn’t natural and for me this was the biggest challenge of everything I did. Learning to breath again, literally.

In all honesty breathing underwater isn’t difficult, but what I mean is learning to chill out, relax, maybe even have a game or two of rock paper scissors. Sitting in 1 M of water I realized, that this was my challenge. After about 40 min underwater practicing safety techniques like how to clear your mask and replace your regulator we discovered I suck at breathing. For me I knew immediately that this was due to anxiety. I would inhale fast and exhale hard. Turns out you can get very far with that kind of breathing. But as things continued, I became more calm and much more efficient at conserving air. By comparison in that 1 m for 40 min I used 120 bar worth of air, my final dive, about the same actually but it was at a depth of 24.5 m.

Hold up how do you mean you became more efficient if you used the same amount of air. To sum it up and keep things basic, you require more air at greater depths. It has to do with water pressure and the air molecules being closer together.

As we continued through the open water course it was great, although I had a slip up and think I accidentally ingested some gluten.  What a bummer that was to miss the final 2 dives with my classmates and newfound friends. Curled over in GI pain I waited on the boat for them to kick butt. Fortunately I was able to finish the following day.

The next couple days coincided with a change in plans. The original plans were to hit Koh Phangan for the Full Moon Party. Due to some negligence on our behalf and unforeseen circumstances, it would have been just me going to the full moon. Instead I opted for my Open Water Advance.

Push it to the limit. Okay well not literally to the limit but pushing the boundaries for sure. I thought why stop at 18m, there is so much more to this deep world.  During the next 5 dives, I would see a WW2 shipwreck, a Jenkins Ray, 29.5m depth, finally get a better control of buoyancy and breathing and also learn to recognize specific fish, coral and invertebrate. 

For me that buoyancy and breathing is my proudest moment. On land I am very calm, slow and steady breathing and have a resting heart rate around 45-50. Underwater, I suck wind and my heart was pounding. As a result my depth could vary by a couple meters at any given time, and I could uncontrollably surface. Not good, not safe either. By the end of this particular dive lesson however, I was able to hover inverted while writing my name on a slate placed on the sand. I also was much better at hovering for my safety stop. 

Much of my life I have lived as a natural at sport. I can pick up sports quickly and play well. Water is the one that has eluded me. My swimming isn’t top notch (I certainly won’t win any races), but I discovered I could stay afloat on my own power for at least 10 min as was required, as well as I swam my first consecutive 200m.  

Take those feats, and roll with them, you never know the new things you will discover. If I had avoided diving because of my less than stellar swimming, I would be walking around with my eyes closed to the entirely awesome beautiful world.