Caye Caulker - Day 3

Today would prove to test all my strengths - mental, physical, emotional, take me to the limit and ultimately return me to the ground a different person.

I started today diving again - though when I got to the dive shop at 9am, there was no gas for the boats (ah, the joys of the tropics) - after lots of jabbing about Iraq from the locals, we rescheduled for noon. In the meantime I hung out for the first time in a hammock by the pool reading my book, the island was definitely soaking in.

When noon arrived we headed out to our dive sites and started our first dive. Everything started just fine, I got down no problem, in fact so quickly I had to wait for what seemed like forever for everyone else, a good 5 minutes at least (which matters when you're at 70 ft). Anyway, all along I was checking my gauges, and as usual I was the first to hit half air - I signaled the divemaster and he turned us around for the return trip. I kept checking my gauges and after a while got concerned as it kept saying "1000 psi" - and then it started getting difficult to breathe out of the regulator so I tapped hard on the gauge and it dropped to 200psi!! For those of you who may not know - this is well under what you should have to surface...needless to say I was terrified. I signaled to my Divemaster (my buddy, as usual was too busy with his friends to notice) - and surfaced as slow as I could - all the while it was getting harder and harder to breathe. I tried to safety stop and after a minute (it should be three) - I got a mouth full of water as there was literally no air left. I made the decision to go to the surface and got back to the boat safely. However, I was completely wiped out - scared as hell and literally couldn't talk to anyone for like 20 minutes. I must say, as is typical with a lot of dive outfits - there wasn't much said, or support given other than - well it's good you're up here telling the story. Anyway, I decided I needed to take care of myself - and during the surface interval, I went snorkeling and made peace with the ocean and calmed down tremendously. Enough so that I decided to do my second dive (I know, crazy huh?).

My second dive was fairly uneventful other than my weight belt coming off at the bottom - miraculously the dive master saw where my weight fell and we got it sorted out. Again, ran out of air faster than everyone else and had to surface before them - this time it was a hella long swim to the boat as it was a drift dive - but at least I didn't run out of air :-).

Through these experiences I've realized some things. One - if I need more weight I will demand it. Part of the reason I was wasting all my air was that it was such a struggle to stay down, next time I will be more assertive. Secondly - the buddy you have is just critical. I will do everything I can to dive with people I know and trust, or at least convey the importance of the buddy to me when one is assigned. Finally, I am proud of the way I handled things...I did everything right even though I was scared and did panic a bit. I kept my head enough to be as safe as possible and because of that, I look forward to many more dives in the future. However, I decided not to do the Blue Hole - I just didn't feel comfortable enough. I'm really happy I did that, it felt good to take care of myself, even if I was a bit disappointed. The biggest effect of all this was that I felt humbled. I'm still a beginning diver, no matter what I *want* to be - and that is perfectly ok. A good lesson for me.

That evening I had dinner with my now increasingly good buddies Rick and Sandy - we met up with an Australian cardiologist named Karen whom they met earlier in their travels for drinks and dinner. It was lovely - and felt great to be around people after a day of feeling very alone.

While today was really tough - I think it will ultimately prove to be one of the most important of the trip - though with so much still ahead, who knows?!