When you wish somebody to get decompressed on their vacation, make sure you are not talking to a diver. Unfortunately, no matter how careful you are with your dive profile, you may still get DCS (decompression sickness, or bends). There's a very sinister dive doctor here in Cozumel (Dr. Piccolo), whose favorite expression seems to be: "If you dive, getting bent is just a matter of time". Last summer, when I took 20 rides in the hyperbaric chamber for my migraines (which seems to have worked by the way), I started to share his attitude as I witnessed many "undeserved" cases of decompression. At least 5 times my scheduled chamber ride would get postponed due to an emergency treatment needed. And every single time the dive profile looked completely kosher, according to the computer records they check as part of the standard procedure in case of bends.
It is widely believed that dehydration is the main reason for "undeserved" DCS (it's almost an official term for bends that happen without any apparent dive profile screw-up). That is why the boats are stocked with coolers full of water bottles and they almost force you to drink as much as you possibly can before you go on a dive. You should also try to refrain from drinking coffee / tea the morning before your dive, and of course no hang-overs! That is the reason for the pretty quiet night life on the island - divers usually quit drinking early in the evening and are in bed by 9-10PM to make sure they sleep any alcohol leftovers off. Of course, there are other factors, both physiological and psychological, that play a role in it as well - period, sleep deprivation, indigestion, anxiety, etc. Each diver must definitely know their limits and never succumb to any peer pressure or - what's even worse - internal pressure to get another dive in at any cost. The price may just be too high: although DCS is really not that big of a deal in recreational diving - you can treat it with a couple of hyperbaric chamber sessions - but then you deprive yourself of diving for the next 6 months (at least, that is usually the time limit doctors set). The best policy, according to the sinister Dr. Piccolo, is to have this schedule - take 1 day off for every 3 days of diving, and to always listen to your own body's messages. And, I guess, always knock on wood while simultaneously trying not to obsess with it:).
This time, in the 16 days of my trip, I personally have already witnessed 2 cases.
George is around 50-60, a very experienced diver, got decompressed on his first dive here in Cozumel this season. Go figure. What is worse, he didn't have the DAN insurance, and apparently every hour in the hyperbaric chamber is $1,000 when it is decompression related (interestingly enough, each of my migraine session hour cost only $100 - and I thought that was too expensive...). So for one day of DCS treatment, which is usually 4.5 hours, he had to pay $4,500 out of pocket, and it is very unlikely his regular insurance will reimburse him. DAN insurance, on the other hand, is just $70 a year...
Ana is a French girl in her 30s, who came here for a month from Paris, got decompressed after about a week of diving. She is taking it pretty well, considering... Now that she cannot dive but still has a couple of weeks here left, we might actually go to Belize together. She is a copy editor for a magazine in Paris and took some time off before her new 6-month contract starts. She doesn't have DAN either, but of course the French medical insurance covers 100% of costs without any further ado. Surprise.
At the same time, there are people who are "unbendable". My dive instructor Mateo participates in some research that is aimed at studying the physiology of DCS. DAN conducts experiments to see what conditions people respond to better or worse. Apparently, there are some people (usually, students in need of money) who are willing to say "Yes" to an invitation "Would you like to try and get bent this weekend?" Mateo has been doing it for years just for the sake of the science, and so far has been unbendable. His favorite saying though is: "There are only 2 ways of not getting bent: either don't go down, or don't come up". Also, the studies show that people who dive all the time (dive masters, commercial divers, etc.) get bent much more rarely - their bodies somehow get used to the nitrogen bubbles, and they are reported to get DCS mostly only after a long vacation.
Anyway, while feeling very bad for my fellow divers who got decompressed, I ensure that I continue my underwater adventures uninterrupted by drinking gallons of water, taking days off diving, sleeping a lot, and eating oh so extremely well:). So I hope I'll be fine. But I also make sure that I renew my DAN insurance regularly and remind myself that in the unfortunate event of me getting bent, there are a lot of other things I can enjoy doing in the next 6 months:).
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