Mom, don't read this one

I can’t think of anything worse than not being able to breathe. We do it without thinking in our day-to-day lives. It’s taken for granted. But 65 feet underwater, outfitted with full scuba diving equipment, it’s all you can think about. You hear yourself breathe in, and watch the bubbles go out. The shitty scubapro regulators we rent for each dive make these tinny noises, and you have to suck in instead of letting your breathing flow naturally.

My second dive in North Seymour, Santa Cruz, I felt trapped. Contained. I had swam just a little too fast, exerted myself just a little too hard trying to see some eagle rays. All I could think about was getting out of there. Going up. Having fresh, clean air whoosh through my nasal passages and get oxygen to my brain. I started to feel really dizzy, and I signaled to the divemaster that something was wrong. That I felt nervous. I couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened 40 minutes earlier on our first dive.

***

We were 25 minutes into the first dive of the day. It had been a great dive up to that point. We had seen rays, sharks, eels, and tons of fish. There was a manta ray about 10 feet in front of us, and we started to swim towards it. My friend, Karli, and the divemaster were about 3 feet in front of me when I heard a giant WHOOSH. I don’t know if I can describe what a free flowing regulator sounds like. It’s loud and angry, especially when it’s yours. Air was flowing out of my octopus, my auxiliary regulator at an astonishing pace. I calmly reached out and turned it upside down, which should have stopped it. It didn’t. I made as much noise as I could, but the others did not hear me. I checked my air, and saw that it was rapidly depleting. It was almost down to zero. I was panicking. My training kicked in. DO NOT PANIC. STAY CALM. Is what my brain told me. I knew I had two options. To try to swim over to them and grab one of their auxiliary regulators, or to go up.

I chose to go up. I later realized that I would have had to ditch my weight belt and tank under the water if I had run out of air on the way over to them. I’m getting anxious writing this right now. I swam up as fast as I could, putting my remaining air in my BC on the way up so I would float when I got to the top. I didn’t have the time or air to safety stop, and I wondered if I was putting myself in danger of getting decompression sickness once I broke to the surface and inhaled. I could see one boat in sight, very far away. I looked down, and I saw that Karli and the divemaster sitting together looking around for me. “Look up, look up”, is what I willed them to do. 

I stuck my face in and made as much noise as I could, but they didn’t hear me and the current was taking me out of their sight. The water was choppy, and I hoped that someone would see me before I got bashed against the rocks. The current was on my side. I swam with the current for what I know now was about 15 minutes. My gopro had been filming the entire time. I wished for a whistle, wished for a flare, and wished that I had gills for about 10 minutes until I saw our boat. I began to shout “ayudame!”, or “help me” while waving my arms to show that I was in distress. A little boat found me, helped me in, and brought me over to the dive boat where I nearly broke down in tears.

All I could think about is the fact that I could have died. I kept it together, and became angry at Rene, the chauvinistic man who we had booked the dive through. He wasn’t on the boat with us. Thank god. That morning and the day before he would not stop telling me what a great body I had, how I have a big butt and a big chest, and how he wanted to take me dancing. I asked him to stop multiple times, but he would not. All I could think about is how I wanted to murder Rene, for giving me a non-functioning regulator and for continually hitting on me.

The divemaster and Karli made it back to the boat shortly after, and I told him what had happened.  He told me I had made the right decision, and that if I had not put air in my BC, I would have had a hard time staying up on the surface. I would have had to ditch my weight belt. They looked at my regulator, told me it was broken, and said we were going to see if we could borrow another regulator from a nearby boat. Rene did not give us an extra one like he was supposed to. The divemaster saw how nervous I was, gave me his regulator, and he took the borrowed one. “Do I go on the second dive?” was all I could think about. I knew I had to. If there is one thing I’ve learned from springboard diving, it is that you have to get back on the horse right away. So I went down once more.

***

We stopped. He made me kneel on the sand, close my eyes, and breathe. In. Out. In. Out. After 30 seconds, I felt much better. His regulator was much nicer than mine. I didn’t have to pull hard to breathe, and it did not make noise each time I took a breath. The divemaster had done the right thing, to encourage me to go on the second dive. I finished the dive. We saw at least 30 sharks, if not more, including a hammerhead. I was happy that I had gone. I have had a constant battle with mental toughness since I began springboard diving 6 years ago, and I won this round.

If anyone reading this decides to go scuba diving in Santa Cruz, Galapagos, Ecuador, please do not use the agency Galápagos People, and most definitely avoid any dive shop owner named René.