Learning to Scuba

“It’s mind over matter,” Jeni said. It sure is. The fact of the matter is that I was learning to breathe under water. My mind said that it was both unnatural and unsafe. But Jeni said my issue was normal and that it just takes a little getting used to. “We women like breathing through our noses,” she told me.

Bedraggled but certified: Jeni and her scuba students

Jeni is my scuba diving instructor, and she was coaching me through a process that I can proudly say I completed thanks to and because of you, readers. I wanted to share it with you. As of yesterday evening, I’m officially certified to scuba dive in open water—even without a dive master present.

Like Jeni said, overcoming my mind’s fears through ignoring the suffocating mask and practicing deep, slow breathing really did help me overcome that perfectly natural fear. At the start of this week, I learned enough about scuba diving to be scared away for life. Then, I learned enough to be trusted with a tank of compressed air and responsible for my own breathing below the surface. Finally, I spent almost an hour 21 feet under water. And yesterday, I completed three open water dives, including a 60-foot dive.

That deepest dive was “worth all the scary stuff” (as I’ve been telling divers I meet here in the Cayman Islands) because we saw a sea turtle—a Hawksbill, to be exact. The scary stuff included: taking my mask off my face then blindly re-applying it and clearing the water from it, all while 20 feet under; practicing survival situations, such as running out of air and getting too tired to swim; losing my regulator (my air source) and having to recover it from near the tank behind me; and making an emergency ascent. Seeing that mature Hawksbill sea turtle munch on his lunch 60 feet below the waves hooked me on diving, which I thought was terrifying and not worth the panic until that dive.

Once, during a test, Jeni signaled that I should remove my regulator. I did. But I hadn’t waited for her full instructions, unfortunately only realizing my rookie mistake when I ran out of air. I panicked—looked at my alternate air source then grabbed at her alternate before she finally handed over her own regulator. I took a breath and gave it back so she could breathe and then used her alternate for a minute. Only, I didn’t tightly seal it with my mouth and sucked in a mouthful of sea water, even though I purged the device with a stream of compressed air. Finally, I recovered my own and took a few breaths but decided to take a break at the surface and signaled to ascend. I blew my nose, coughed, and spit above water for a few minutes while Jeni tested another student. Finally, it was my turn again. This time, I remembered to watch for Jeni’s complete instructions, signal okay, and then complete the procedure. All went as planned for the remainder of the drill.

That session proved that I do know how to recover my lost regulator, tested my ability to share air with a buddy, and revealed—through my staying under water even when my lungs were empty—just how comfortable I’ve become in an environment that terrified me just last week.

But, most of all, that session taught me that a diver has to keep her head clear and her mind focused. Up here, it’s mind over matter. Down there, a clear and calm mind means life over death.