fear of flying

[clousseauMinnie 0]

I am new to skydiving, too, having had it on my to-do-list for about a decade. I am adventurous without being reckless, and thought that this would be something I could conquer easily, since I have had to deal with some adversity before and believe myself to be a survivor above all else. I am surprised - read shocked - at the intense anxiety I experience every time before a jump. I ride in the same small Cessna 180, I sit in the front, and I still have the same fear when the door opens 3mm from me. I experience the same recovery of mental balance once I am out, and am usually quite cool and calculating at this point, with most of my attention on perfomance. I also experienced a bad Level2 jump, not only because I had a 7 second delay on opening, but because I was really not ready for this one, and the obsession with my insecurity compounded the panic on the way up, and caused me to go through my routine in a conservative way, not committed like it should have been. What you said about the anxiety was interesting - I suffered for years from anxiety, being in a high pressure job, type A personality (I'm told). During the past two years, I have managed to get rid of this anxiety problem, my life has changed radically for the better, and then I went and chose to tackle skydiving first on my to-do-list! Now, every time I ride up to altitude, I remember the bad feeling that was my companion for so many years! About to do Level7, I ask myself constantly why I do it, and can come up with no better answer than that I am too stubborn to stop before at least the end of my course, that it feels amazing the day after (bit slow to react!) and that I just know something really good is going to come of this if I see it through to the end. I also enjoy the skills I am learning - it is a whole new area of science that I have never explored before, and although it feels a bit overwhelming to think of wind direction, wing load, altitude, landing, etc, it is an amazingly stimulating mental exercise. I am finding that I am challenging beliefs I have always had about myself (like, I'm so tough!) and I think that if I can learn more about myself, and become more realistic about my abilities, without losing my self confidence, then I'll probably show my appreciation by staying with the sport. Mindy, I am going through the same things - I thought that the squashed feeling (so clumsy, trying to get on your knees, isn't it? I hate that!!!) was just me...

[darrenspooner 0]

If its of any reassurance, I was extremely anxious until I got about half way through my consols. I allowed myself to become completely unstable in freefall and then worked out it was easy to recover. From that point on my confidence has grown massively.

Like facing anything scary, your confidence will grow and your anxiety will reduce, the more you challenge yourself and do it.

Might be worth trying to desensitise yourself before jumping next by climbing in the plane with someone else, sitting by the door, and then getting them to open and close it over and over. Better still, if you have a nice jumpmaster, good weather and caring skydivers on your load, see if you can sit by the door on your next lift and have them open and close the door all the way to exit.

Good luck.

Practice makes perfect.

[clousseauMinnie 0]

Thank you for the reply. The funny thing is, I am very comfortable in freefall, very stable, I hardly ever destabilise and when I do, I find it very easy to re-stabilise. Between exit and pull I am very OK. Apart from the nerves before the time and the door, it is pull time and malfunctions I have started to fear, since my big burble. I read as much as I can about malfunctions, so that if the time should come for me, I would have an enormous database in my head - I figure, SOMETHING is going to work, SOMETHING is going to pop into my head to do, I WON'T freeze up, etc, etc. So I am probably a bit obsessed at the moment.

Your idea about desensitising is good, but I feel that I would be embarrassed to ask for this kind of support. It has become slightly easier, not much, but controllable. Mostly.

One of the drawbacks of my situation is that I have only once managed to jump more than once a day, and I can testify that that day was different from others. Between L2 andL3, three weeks passed. Way too much.

I plan to do L7 and 8 this weekend, will let everyone know how my first solo went.

[darrenspooner 0]

Good luck this weekend.

What I do at pull time, every time, is expect a malfunction. In my head I throw, count and I'm ready to look for my handles after I count 4000.

[clousseauMinnie 0]

Good advice. I expect a malfunction every time, but I haven't looked at it as a routine procedure, the way you describe it. I'll apply that next time, thanks!