The thought of scuba diving has always interested me along with terrified me. What if something happened while I was 50+ feet underwater? What if something got me?! Then I began dating my current boyfriend, and who would of guessed he is a certified scuba instructor. When he began bringing up his love of scuba diving my heart would begin to race and my palms would get sweaty, the thought of him asking me to plummet underwater with who knows what, and me breathing was dependent on tanks on my back scared the S*** out of me! I manage to divert the subject plenty of times, then he began telling me his entire family is into scuba diving!! S***.
Eventually the dreaded question came up, "Crystal I haven't managed to ask you, would you be interested in learning to scuba dive?" It hit me like a ton of bricks, I felt my heart racing, sweat was starting to bead in different places and before I could stop myself, word vomit "Yeah! Sounds like a ton of fun!".......................................... S***. I was locked into it, luckily my two roommates, Stacey and Kelly, both wanted to learn. So with that began out diving adventure!
The first day was filled with anxiety, thoughts raced through my head and all I wanted to do was run away, but I already paid for the class and began buying gear. We met up, all 10 of us, introduced ourselves and began listening to my boyfriend talk about the different gear and what we would be needing for the class.
The first couple of dives are pool dives to show you the ropes and get you familiar with the gear. So the big day was here, I would be putting on my
BC attaching the
regulator and getting under the water! When I first got strapped in I nearly fell over, the weight of all the equipment on is around 50lbs, very heavy. With all of it on I slow crawled into the water and bobbed around for a bit, after a detailed briefing from my boyfriend on how to breath underwater and the correct technique he gave the signal and everyone around me began diving underwater. I hesitated maybe for a minuet or two then eventually gave in put the regulator in my mouth and began my decent.
The first breath underwater was the most amazing feeling I have yet to experience. I was able to be fulling submerged underwater and breath! From there I was hooked and wanted more, now don't get me know all the fears I started out with were/are still there but the experience of being underwater was so great I wanted, I needed, to work past it.
After the dive we packed up and headed home, I began talking to my boyfriend about the dive and decided I would do whatever it took to work past my anxiety. He listened to my fears and worries, no judgement, he reassured me those are natural feelings but if I wanted to keep learning how to scuba dive he would be there to help me.
I am currently not certified, I have one more open water dive left but the adventure so far has been an amazing one!
