How Do You Experience Narcosis?

[Six Feet Under]

Deepest I've ever been on air is 105 feet. Things may have been considerably slower going through my mind, but I'm not 100% sure as I didn't have any way of testing it (math puzzle or something similar).


Shortly after that I got my nitrox card and I don't see a point in diving air unless I have to or I'm doing something super shallow. I always feel more tired after diving all day breathing air than I do when I do the same dives for the same length of time on something like 28%.

[WEPIV]

I thought I had responded to this years ago when it was first started but I couldn't find that I had.
In a one word answer to the question -- happily. (As long as I'm not in the overhead.)
I used to dive to around 200 feet on air once in awhile but haven't in recent years. I confess to loving that warm fuzzy feeling but again, not while in a cave or wreck.

[Nitrogenius]

Narcosis is a tricky one..
For a long time I thought Narcosis would not affect me very much.
I always felt ok, I was always up with my game and diving.


The first time I "realized" narcosis was on a dive in a dark quarry at 150 feet at 39 degrees F water temp..
We had a nice dive.. all was in order.. I felt well and in great shape as always..
I had a buddy with me who had a camera..
We passed this empty beer keg with an attached tap, so I thought that makes a great picture posing like actually drinking out of it..
To do so I would have to invert myself, stabilize myself hovering under the kegs tap and take my reg out of my mouth..
Surely not a too easy task diving but also not that hard, I knew I normally could do that easily..
I took three attempts to do it to finally give up on it.. My motoric skills were not there..
This is when I realized this was the impact of being narced..


After that I got very aware and sensible to the onset and impact, but only after I had that experience..


Another eye-opener was in the beginning of my breather days..
I was at the red sea on my first dive trip after CCR certification. Before my Tech Intro cert had been the Advanced Recreational Trimix with IANTD..
So when you have the ART cert IANTD allows within the standards to also use hyperoxic mix on the breather even during MOD 1 phase.. Essentially it gives you the same "frame" on the breather as under the ART ticket..
So on that first trip I was diving with my former instructor and we did the first dive on air.. 25 Min Bottom time at 130 feet, then decompression and back up.. Followed by a shallower dive later in the day..
The next day we did the exact same profile, same dive spot, but on 21/35 as Dil rather than air..
Wow! What a difference.. There was just sooo much more detail I was able to catcht at that dive and everything was so crystal clear..


Ever since I switch to mix quite shallow.. At least when diving my CCR

[AB8CD]

My first awareness of narcosis was on air at about 186fsw. I had done the math problems in a cold quarry on a platform at 100ffw with no measurable effect. But on a bounce dive with an experienced Navy diver we dropped to 150fsw (prearranged depth) in Cozumel and I didn't feel any noticeable effect. We agreed to drop to 175fsw and recheck. We both stopped and he questioned up/down and I recall looking at my computer and thinking, "What do these numbers mean?" It just took seconds but I needed to excercise my concentration... that's the best way I can describe the experience... and focus in mentally. At that point I rechecked my computer and first checked my tank pressure (about 2700psi and change) and thought, I'm OK there. Then I checked my depth which was 186fsw and I thought, it's time to ascend. I was negatively buoyant and had a flash of anxiety but quickly set that aside and started to pay the slight deco obligation, continued to drift and ended up coming back over the shelf and reconnecting with the group that we had left above. This excursion had been preapproved by the dive master and we OK-ed each other (the DM) as we made eye contact on the shelf. We then finished the dive with the group.

[AB8CD]

OK... So the fact that I responded to this thread not realizing that I started it some years ago indicates a dry narcosis!

[MikeT]

Narcosis induces you to respond to your own thread from six years ago

[WEPIV]

I recall people joking about some memory loss from excessive deep air dives. Joking aside here, anyone think there's anything to it...?

[MORGAN]

Not long term memory loss, but at 150 feet on air I kept looking at my SPG every couple of minutes because I couldn't remember what it said.

[Benderr]

I describe it as removing RAM from your computer. Everything mostly works, but slower.

Exertion is more a factor than depth for me. I've been narced stupid at 80-85ft fighting a big fish, and mostly clear-headed at 175ft. The difference was work, and breathing. I've even been narced at a certain depth, stopped, got my breathing under control, and significantly reduced the impairment on the same dive. Anything deeper than 120-130 in open water is a trimix dive for me now.

[Garth]

I get narced all the time sometimes in as little as 90-100 ft of water when the water is really cold like 40-45deg. Usually I start thinking about how awesome my life is and how everyone should literally be diving and experiencing what I'm experiencing. Once it passes or gets better I usually mellow out a bit and stop being so overly euphoric.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk