When we were in Cozumel last January we didn’t do anything but shop around and eat lunch. We didn’t book an excursion and were just going to head to one of the beaches, but a rain storm came through so we decided not to waste our money. Trenton was a little bummed about this. He thinks any stop on a cruise without a beach involved is really no stop at all. Weather is not a factor.
So in order to avoid a disappointed little face again I was browsing through excursions prior to our cruise. I came across the Beginner’s Scuba Dive. The minimum age is 10 (which is the lowest I have ever seen it). I have looked at the power scuba and helmet dive type excursions before and minimum age is always 12. Not only did we meet the minimum age for this excursion… BUT it was cheaper than most of the other ones. Heck of a deal! So I pre-booked it. :) Y’all know I’m not a “pre-booker” so this was a big deal. Trenton was ecstatic and began telling everyone we would be scuba diving in Cozumel.
Now you see my dilemma. How could I not scuba dive on this trip? He was sooo looking forward to it and honestly, so was I. My fear of water … again escaped my thinking. See, most people say you forget the pain of childbirth after it’s over… that’s why you have more children. Something must be wired wrong in me. I have NOT forgotten the pain of pregnancy and child birth… hence my reason for only having 1 child. What I seem to forget each time though is my intense fear of water!! I freak out every time, but then afterwards find myself signing up to do it again thinking… “Eh, that wasn’t so bad.”
When we returned from Progreso, Mark realized something was very, very wrong with me. It is hard to hold me down at home. For me to go to bed early… with no dinner… on a cruise… I must be near death.
Mark headed to the see the ship doctor, explaining my symptoms and promising the man I in fact did NOT have the flu. Thankfully, they dispensed some meds to Mark without seeing me. Pseudoephedrine. $20 for 10 pills. A main ingredient for making crack I learned. I didn’t care. I took one of those little pills faithfully every 6 hours. Something had to give. So the morning of Cozumel I awoke and off we went for our excursion.
I put on my best “No, I am not sick face” and we checked in. First thing they did was hand us a questionnaire to fill out. We headed over to a table, set our bags down and began looking at the questions. Mark looks at me and says “Are you going to be honest?” As I scan the questions I notice the bold sentence at the top… “If you answer YES to any of the below questions you will have to be cleared by a physician and will NOT be able to dive today.” Well, that answers that. NO, I am not going to be honest. I’ll just blow my nose good one last time when no one is looking and I will be fine. I know most of you are shaking your head now… I learned my lesson, ok. It’s coming. Just keep reading.
Before you dive you have to go through a class for basic instructions of well… You know, how NOT to die under the water. They start going over how to clear the water out of your mask underwater when it starts to fill up. You do this my holding your finger on the top of your mask and blowing out hard through your nose. I am thinking Ooohhh…. This could be bad. Visions of snot flying out of my nose underwater came into my head. I felt my heart rate rising. That would be awful!! I started calculating the last time I took that medicine and determined… I should be fine. It keeps you good and dried up for 3-4 hours. It has already kicked in… I can feel it. My nose shouldn’t start running again until just about the time we get back to the boat. I relax a little and continue listening. Next, they start going over the importance of equalizing the pressures inside your body. I am a respiratory therapist. I know this. My college days start coming back to me as they are going over the importance of popping your ears as you descend. Panic washed over me. Pop my ears? My snot has sufficiently been turned to concrete on this medication. I am pretty sure popping my ears is not going to happen. Why oh why did I lie? It never turns out well! What is going to happen to me? So the man talks about the pain you will feel and if you are unable to pop your ears to come slowly back up to the surface. I thought… ok. I can TRY it. If my ears hurt I’ll just snorkel and the boys can dive down. I got this. I am super Mom you know.
The power of positive thinking is very real. I have completed the classroom instruction and completely talked myself out of every reason I should have answered YES on the original questionnaire. I’ll be fine. Can I hash tag here? …. #idiot #oldenoughtoknowbetter #therearerulesforareason… Those are fitting.
We rented a locker. They are big enough for all your things including full backpack, multiple towels and shoes. The cost was only $2. Downstairs to the beach we went. The closer I got to the water the higher my anxiety level rose. I started pacing around in the sand. Probably half due to the anxiety and the other half due to the legal crack I had been consuming. The instructor finally caught me and physically sat me down on the bench while another guy strapped on my weights and vest with tank. The only way to keep me still was to sit me down and strap enough stuff on me to guarantee I could not stand again on my own … therefore, I had no choice but to sit there. I realized my legs could still move so that’s when I started shaking them… up and down. They kept asking… “Ma’am, are you ok?” Umm hmm, yep, yes, I’m fine, no, really, I won’t pass out. I realized everyone was staring and I was making a spectacle of myself. I attempted to look normal, but y’all know that never goes well. I glance over at Mark who is standing in the sand in full gear giving me the famous “What in the hell is wrong with you stare.”
Now it’s time to head to the water and demonstrate what we learned in the classroom. It’s the make or break moment of the scuba diving excursion. Can I really blow out of my nose without making a scene? It’s silly the things I worry about. It was such an intense moment... lol. I said a little prayer... did a little sniff test and it seemed clear. I closed my eyes and successfully blew out of my nose and I felt like I conquered the world. “Oh I got this!”
Then they tell you to put your face in the water and breath. That’s a hard one. You would think it would be simple but your brain has been programmed NOT to breathe when you are under water so overriding that little natural defense mechanism was difficult for me. I was able to breath in, but when I blew out all the bubbles going around my head totally freaked me out!
Then they say… OK, let’s all sit under the water, breathe and practice our hand signals. Oh dear. First of all… these little blow up life jackets and I don’t agree so once again I find myself with my head under water and my rear end sticking up in the air. I finally got myself situated and was able to sit down and breathe and resist the urge to bat the bubbles out of my face. Geez that was hard! I passed all my tests though and out into the ocean we went.
Perhaps they do it every time… perhaps they only do it when a child is involved… perhaps only when you have an anxiety ridden and half cracked out mom… Regardless, our instructor carried a buoy that floated on the water at all times with a rope below it that we could hold on too. I really think it was meant for Trenton, but I am not embarrassed to say I had a death grip on that rope most of the time!
All in all… I survived and it was an amazing experience. Trenton and Mark were in heaven. It is truly another world down there and to see it up close and personal was awesome. Scuba certification could be in our future.
So I completed the dive. We only went down about 40 feet since we were beginners :) I attempted to pop my ears and I thought all went well. There was no pain so I figured that was a good sign. We purchased 2 pictures for $25 and took a free taxi back to the port.
Here is where the complications came into play. My little dive while I was congested left be basically deaf for 2 days!! DEAF!!! Everything I heard was muffled and unless someone was looking at me directly when they were speaking my response was “Huh?” Not smart. I appreciate my hearing and I have taken a vow never to dive sick again!
