Pieter invited me out for an early dive Wednesday 18 and it took me for a nine dive ride. Too bad I was under hydrated at the start. The first dive went great with vis at 25 feet or more. It was a great night dive. OK! Lots of time at between 60 and 70 feet looking for critters and max depth of 85 at the I-beams. Total time of 50 minutes. Then, spent 61 minutes topside before sinking. Again no liquids for either. You know how pesky that P factor gets. The second dive ended up being deeper than first,97 ft, which seems like no big deal at the time because we both knew that we had to cut the dive much shorter than usual.  I got lazy and didn't check my gauge frequently, like I used to do. So I didn't notice when the first warning of getting close to no deco limit on the second dive. Hey those are big prawn size spot shrimp out. A dozen were gathered around a dead salmon. Grunts, and other sculpins. This was a great night dive. When I finally did decide to look at my computer it indicated that I need a stop at 20 feet and was that right - 20 minutes. "Awe NUTS!" and made my way up to the 20 foot mark. I had about 800 to 1000 pounds left in my tank so I waited and did a long safety stop for 10 minutes. My computer counted down from 20 minutes to ten and my pressure gauge went down to "close to empty". In hind site I could have stayed down for another minute or two, but loathed the idea of having to make an emergency ascent on one breath of air.

Once out of the water and drysuit off I joked with Pieter that blowing off 10 minutes of deco was probably going to be a trip to the chamber and miss the dive next Monday. Doh! bad joke.  Fifteen minutes out of the water and on my way home.  Well folks, my inner ear told me I was driving on ice as I went home. Denial said 'your tires are as bald as your head and it's raining'.  My brain knew that was a lie and suspected DCS.  And things got a little worse as time went on.  I knew to take it easy and not push my equilibrium button.  So on the way home those bumps in the road set off alarms in my brain via my damaged equilibium.

I wanted to get home and make the call for an ambulance because I was bent. About two miles from my house is a big curve going up hill for about 1/8 mile. The dizziness set in with a vengeance and those reflective lenses in the road really bothered me. My vision started to get blurry.  Grrr! Hang on just a few more seconds.   I pulled over and parked on a power line access road. Then, put on the flashers and waited patiently.  After a few futile attempts at flagging people down, in pitch black drizzle, I remembered that I had a towel in the car. I went for shelter in my truck in between the attempts for flagging down people. So the last attempt was made to stumble the extra 10 feet from my truck to the sidewalk and use the towel to flag down help. About 10 to 20 minutes later someone pulled over and offered to make a call. I mentioned that I needed medical treatment and to call the state patrol and let them call for an ambulance. I didn't know it was 10 PM until the paramedics came.  The guys by my house don't specialize in dive related accidents.  Then Medic One took me to Harbor view emergency where a few slots were open. Wow! Those doctors and nurses, medics sure take care of a lot of crazy people with all sorts of different urgencies. Any way back to me...

It seemed like I was only at H.V. for half an hour before they transferred me to Virginia Masson. More waiting, while the people on call could come in for the event. It was about 2 AM, to the best of my wrinkled, trauma memory before we started the Navy table 6 dive. Remember it this way. Navy table 6 = 6 hours at 60 feet. (Dive number 3, with Earl, for the day. ) My symptoms were dizziness and nausea. Nothing else. Just an inner ear hit where the equilibrium center.

Then, they transferred me to an icu bed for a few hours, and more sleep went by. Then finally up to room 1656 with a great view to lake union. I was on mandatory bed rest and too unbalanced to take two steps to the window and enjoy the view. One of my bracelets said 'fall risk'. My next dive was with the 1:30 patients recovering from various other treatments. Maria brought in a menu among other items. Finally I get to eat after two days without food. Yea, I was fasting that first day. I kept my meal to a salad and soup.  Then, two dives more on Friday with symptoms clearing up. They let me go home. My parents put me up for the night and dad drove me in for another treatment on Saturday, 8:30 AM dive. I received another treatment at noon to make sure the symptoms weren’t improving.  Rule of thumb is if the treatments are helping then you keep getting them. So now I can walk and drive. But doing a heal-toe walk gets me a little off center. So I am not at 100 percent yet and it will take at least a month, maybe more, before I am cleared to go diving.

"Stay hydrated and use the P-factor as an advance notice for surfacing during repetitive dives." No I didn't say pee in your dry suit.

Stay safe and enjoy that great vis without me.

Cost for a hyperbaric dive is about $1000 per hour.  Yes, I have DAN insurance. And I am pretty sure DAN wont drop me like a nuclear hot item the way it is rumored that other insurance companies throw out people for various things. 

 Brian Heath