7/13/08 scuba

we've had 2 lessons in the pool since i last managed to write.
2 weeks ago we met up with simon and his wife hillary joined us again. she pretty much just swam around and went up and down while we did our thing. in the shallow pool we went over the air-sharing drill and a few other things, then we went over to the deep end. actually, we started with a giant stride into the deep end, then swam to the shallow, then back to the deep. i got down to the bottom of the pool and we swam around, then worked some drills. simon wanted us to walk through the drill in the shallow once, to show us the final bit, so up we swim. we didn't actually ascend to the surface and then over, but went up into the shallow at an angle. i hit the wall before i was shallow enough to get over the step into the shallow, so the little extra push i did gave me a wee bit of vertigo. it was just a quick spi of 'whoa, that wasn't fun' and then it was over. we walked through it and then descended back to the depths. after everythign simon said i was a little slow on the descent, but it was good i was able to get down to the bottom. anyway, matt was the guinea pig who runs out of air and i get to save him. anyway, the drill's going well. he swims over 'in a panic' i give him my regulator after taking my spare, we hang onto each other and start to ascend. we get to the surface and the room starts spinning. and it doesn't stop. and then everything goes quiet. not sure if i closed my eyes or if everything also went black for a fraction of a second. it seemed like a couple minutes to me but in reality it probably wasn't. anyway, when the room kept spinning and i felt like i wasn't in control of anything anymore - and i didn't have my BC inflated since we had just ascended, i started to paw at matt. i tried to say 'get me to the shallow' but that just wasn't happening. simon realized something was up and swapped my secondary for my primary air supply which helped a little bit (it's harder to get air from the secondary). they helped me over to the shallow where i could stand up on my own and then i was able to tell them what happened. i got a few minutes to recover, and then we tried to descend again but i was not able to clear my ears this time.

last week we had bill, the sub, again. we met at the store and talked over what we were going to be doing in the pool. he offered a few suggestions for ear clearing to me. we get everything over to the pool and get the gear on and do a giant stride into the pool. i've done it 3 times now, and it still seems a little scary! but i can do it just fine. even in the shallow i've noticed it's a little scary 'dropping down' under water. i think it's a psychological thing about how it's not natural to breathe underwater. once i'm under i'm fine. but that initial 'get your head under the water' bit still trips me up a little. bill had brought a buoy where simon hadn't so i got ot hang onto the line as i descended this time. it was a little slow getting down compared to the guys, but i got down there faster than the week before i think. we swam around, did a few drills, tried to find my neutral bouyancy and the next thing i know i'm surfacing! oh well. bill follows me up thinking there's somethign wrong. i'm laughing and tell him i hadn't intended to surface, but it's good in teh fact that it gives me practice going up and down. think i just put a little too much air in the BC to get me off the ground. so back down we go, swim around, do some drills, then come back up slowly. actually bill wanted us to swim upwards watching our guage and keeping the bars at zero or 1 on teh ascent rate meter. i was doing great until about 1/2 way when i had to turn a corner or hit a wall then my meter just shot up to like the 'slow down!' area. bill even was waving at me to slow down. i really don't know what happened, but i managed to stop ascending, get a little lower again, and then tried again. when i hit the wall this time i jsut held on for a minute, then turned around and continued swiming up. it was great! 3 times and no vertigo! then we go back down to try the air-share drill. this time i'm out of air. we're doing a controled ascent and doing fine. i look up and can see the surface getting closer. then it hits. the pool starts spinning and doesn't stop. and it doesn't stop. everything goes quiet and again, maybe i closed my eyes but everything went black for a second as well. i manage to keep it together, but i was not liking it. after the drill i was able to report the strong vertigo, and bill said we id climb a little faster than we had ascended previously. so that slight difference might be all i need to not be too well. the good thing is i was ablet o descend again after this. i think i got down and up 5 times total within 90 minutes of class. i was really proud of myself. matt said bill told him it was like 'night and day' this night compared to the 1st night he taught us.

next week is pool night as well. then the following week i believe is tues=dry suit training 1 and thurs=dry suit training 2. thurs is the normal day, but becuase we expect i'll have some bouyancy issues, and since i seem to take a little longer to adapt to my environs, he wants to start on tues, get the weights figured and have me work out most of the kinks, and hten thurs we can really concentrate on the drills and stuff.