How Do You Experience Narcosis?

Having had done alot of deep air dives in Okinawa, as deep as 180+, I can add a few points of interest. 1) I notice that it "appears" to happen less often with the number of deep dives conducted of a short time frame. Maybe a building up process. 2) I notice that when I reach for an object, a shell or such, I misjudge the distance alittle. A dive buddy might not pick up on it but, I notice the small hints of it. 3) As I am finning at depth, I tend to "feel" the water moving over over the hairs of my arm. Kinda cool. 4) I also have had the perceptual narrowing effect.

The most noticable thing to me is visual narrowing. I generally go thru this (if it happens) around the 85-95' range. It then opens back up. I too have a self concept of not noticing it that much, but I always remember the written test my instructor gave me during Adv EANx/Deco. It was quite eye opening to see my test time and lack of quality of writing at 110' vs. 60'. So, I try to remember I am more effected than I generally 'feel'.

No way I am ever going to know what it feels like at 186'. My comfort limit is 160' planned with 170' as a 'call' point. 156' is my max logged and I have only done 16 dives below 130' and another 42 below 100'. I am in trimix training now.

I have two different sets of symptoms. One set is more anxiety based. Like it's time to get out of here. The other is difficulty with simple tasks...like clipping a reel to a bag.

Up here on the cold, dark wrecks I add He below 100fsw. So far just 32 in the caves, but I don't have any real deep experience there.

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Originally Posted by mag3

Funny you mention it. Being only Adv. Nitrox/Deco at present, when I dive deep it's to the 120-135fsw range (deepest is 141 ffw @ 40 fathom grotto). And every time I go down, I look for signs of being narc'ed. As others have said, "narrowed perception," paranoia etc. But I don't ever seem to notice them which, in itself, could be a symptom, so I've been told. I manage to do all my task management right when I should, and do the proper ascent and any required deco. Every time I aruge to other diving peers "Gee, I don't think I've been narc'ed," they fire back "Oh, yes you have!!!" So I accept their word on faith. Such is the nature of the Narc, they say.

Maybe I haven't yet experienced the "Dark Narc." And I've been doing all I can to avoid that.

So for any of you that have, what's a "Dark Narc" like?

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It's not surprising that in a class environment where you are focused on specific tasks you can "push" the narcosis away. I tend to be able to do that, too. Try that depth without focusing your mind. Just let your mind relax. You will probably feel it then.

In the 70's my brother & I went routinly to 240-280 feet on air with twin 72s. We did not have a clue what O2 toxicity was. I would do my times tables on a slate to see if I had my act togethor. We would hacksaw 2" thick black coral to sell to the dealers --this was off Lyford Cay in Nassau. The bubbles were so small, we could talk eaisily through our regulators. We were in our prime physically and we used the Navy extreme exposure tables with no problems. I recall getting emotional and almost crying for no apparent reason except things were just so beautiful and I loved my brother so..

If I stumbled on 3x18 I would ascend.

I've done a lot of nitrous for grins but don't see the relationship. I was told it was the same effect but I suppose my memory is sketchy.

So I am not diving mix yet. My youngest just got out of college and that door is going to open for me soon.

Diving since the 70's, I have had my share of "listening to the helicopters" as I believe I heard my own heart beat. Certainly experienced a loss of dexterity, and virtually all the other classic symptoms.

I will even go so far as to say there have been times WHEN I WAS MUCH YOUNGER and in open water, that I even enjoyed the buzz. At that time I had not done any real wreck or cave diving though.

Sure signs for me that I am narced, as with drinking, are feelings of anxiousness tend to become greatly reduced at depth and it becomes a conscious effort to keep track of time as my sense of time becomes warped.

On a recent cave dive to 145, when I realized I was more relaxed at 145, then at 95, I heard Jeff Foxworthy say, "You just might be narced if...."

Not so critical in OW, but in a wreck or a cave, I am much more disciplined with regards to keep track of time and reviewing all gauges every time I do so.

As mentioned in a previous post, I have had the number on the computer become less intuitive. I find if I review my gauges more frequently, then their relevance has stayed more sharply focused. Keeps the logic from becoming "fuzzy".

I fully realize this is simply a method of coping with a buzz. It is not as good as eliminating it, which I plan to do in the near future.

[QUOTE=RN;110289]Narrowed perception, slowed thinking process, slowed response time./QUOTE]

All of the above, plus a kind of passive meditative state where it's hard to remember why I'm there and what I'm supposed to do. No anxiety, just kind of a blank feeling like my cognitive activity has been turned way down. I have to focus hard to know what to do and then do it.

The deepest I have been on air in a cave is to 150 feet in Hendley's Castle. I felt great - everything was very beautiful and fascinating. But each thought came to me very slowly, and as kind of a surprise.

"At 150...deep enough...turn the dive...on the line...shouldn't I be back in that low bedding plane by now?...here it is...wow it's wide...slow and easy...everything's so beautiful..."

Then as I ascended up toward the jump my brain started working again - it was like the lights came on and everything came into focus. Not planning to do that again without helium.

Mike

all of these are 'at rest or very low workload' and dark, cold puget sound. a long long time ago, in the early 90's, before i had helium available. I rarely dive air anymore at all, much less deep.

at 68-70' on air i start to 'taste' the narcosis. I know whats coming...

at 100' all of a sudden my gear is kind of warm and snuggle, and 'fits' better (I dive a shell suit so it's not the neoprene compressing. I know i'm capable of dealing with stuff, but i'm starting to get stupid.

at 110', if i'm switching my E/O plug from primary to video lights, i've been known to plug lights into lights and not understand why the hell my lights are not turning on, and actually have it take 15-20 seconds to realize what i did. I know i'm stupid.

at 130' i get paranoid... time/depth/gas, time/depth/gas... I start worrying about my buddy being narc'd. I realize i'm rather impaired and what the fark am i doing there.

at 180' (have not done it in a long long time) everything slows down. I feel like i've spent forever doing something and i look at the timer and a minute has passed

at 240' the opposite. Holy crap where did time go.

>270 i started to get numb/prickly lips and i could hear everything VERY LOUD, like my bubbles blowing past my ears and my heart beating in my ears. vision starts to tunnel... Hmm... not good, probably Ox tox, best to head up and head up now.

back in the old days, when i was doing a lot of deep air out of necessity, i could tell without looking at my depth gauge how deep we were by the 'feeling'/progress of the narcosis. "170-180', ah, this is where i'd start seeing the deck of the Al-ind-eska Sea" and in my minds eye, i'd remember the wreck coming up out of the dark...

i can still tell 68' almost without fail. it's like a switch.
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add very high workload/CO2 and i've been known to get the tunnel vision at 100' whilst wrestling to unhook a grapnel from a wreck in high current.

add very high workload/CO2 and a cave and i've been dark-narc'd enough to thumb the dive (I really really don't want to be here anymore, i think not being here would be delightful right about now, boogieman niggles in the base of your skull) on 32% in 90'. went back to the same cave with helium a couple hours later, zero issues.

for me narcosis, especially the 'dark-narc' is very closely related to the amount of CO2 i'm building up. the more CO2, the more likely it will be an uncomfortable narc as opposed to being warm and comfey in my gear and feeling that sense of wonderment that MORGAN describes.

Great first post, Laura. Welcome to CDF!

Shirley

I notice that around 80+ feet or so my short term memory starts to drop out -- i'll start forgetting my pressure right after i checked it if i don't make a point to remember it. At 100-120 feet i usually start to get a little goofy in my thought processes and i'll start daydreaming. I haven't experienced anything deeper than 120 on air. I have heard the helicopter sounds before, but that was on dry land with the help of some N2O back in my misguided youth.

I've also had "dark narc"'s which are almost certainly CO2 hits. Since I started diving with dive #7 in Puget Sound at 100 feet in viz that was bad enough to eliminate ambient at that depth, and 48F temperatures I got to experience being in a bit over my head at 100 feet breathing heavily and building up CO2 right away in my diving career. Once you start to get some anxiety and breathe heavily and build up CO2 you'll start to circle the drain, and as the anxiety leads to more CO2 which leads to more anxiety, I can clearly see how you can wind up in the drain if you don't notice the symptoms and either ascend or control your breathing. Now that I've gotten in lots of dives at 100-120, I can easily notice when those symptoms are starting to occur and work around them -- earlier on, though, I had no idea what was happening -- I just noticed that everything would clear up above 80 feet magically.