I am new in a freediving world, less than a year, and I decided to share with you my experience during my PB static in order to receive a feedback, to read your personal experiences, comments, critics, and suggestions.
It’s 9 pm, I’m in the warm pool (31°C) with my 5mm wetsuit, the lights are down and I can enjoy really relaxing atmosphere. After a few static warm up with my friends and instructors I get ready for my static.
-2:00 I’m laying down, facing the water and breathing through my tube. I feel more comfortable breathing with my face in the water rather than holding my head out. I try to concentrate on my triangle breathing so I inhale nice, exhale slowly and hold my breath shortly, this kind of technique is relaxing me and I can feel my heart beat slowing down. It’s a nice sensation.
-1:00 I can hear my instructor telling us the remaining time and this is not disturbing me particularly, I’m not getting nervous or similar sensations rather, I try to analyse if I am completely relaxed. I am checking if my arms and legs are relaxed as well as my neck and my head, and I’m letting myself completely to the water. In the distance, I can hear the countdown 9, 8, 7, 6… I take a big nice breath and I remove my tube.
0:00 – 3:25 My place, my home, my peace, my everything. My eyes are closed and I am not checking my computer. I feel comfortable laying down and imagining myself falling down through the water. I always imagine this in my bed when I cannot fall asleep (it always works: Zzzzz). It’s hard for me to imagine a happy place or happy memories so I’m looking into my happy place, myself. I like to hear and feel all the sensations that are happening in my body, so I imagine my blood cells carrying my O2/CO2 through my body like in “la vie” kids cartoon (probably because I’m biologist), I can also hear my heart beat and I wonder which is my heart rate and that I should measure it next time. I suddenly realize I’m overthinking, and also overthinking about my overthinking, and also wondering again what my time is now, this makes me laugh in my head a bit, so I just decide to relax again.
I start imagining again my blood cells and a red colour, red relaxes me, it keeps me warm and safe and I’m still feeling nice. Suddenly something strange happens, I’m swinging left and right and I can feel a warm hand on my back. I figure out is my instructor’s hand checking me and swinging me like a little baby. The sensation is amazing, it leads me back in time and it brings me back to a strange feeling, something I already felt a long time ago. After a while I wonder again what my time is, not because of the time itself but because I haven’t felt any contractions yet so I ask myself if this is a normal condition. Right after this thought, I feel my first contraction that burns as a hell so I decided to take a look at the computer to know the exact time I felt it (3:25).
3:25 – 4:04 I don’t know if the decision to check my comp was bad or right (probably bad). I try to calm again and the pain of the first contraction is fading now but I know that everything is happening very fast. I try to imagine my blood cells, it works again, shortly, because they are not traveling all happily around as before, but running fast to my chest. I start to feel warm and “full of blood” in my upper body. I feel another contraction, it doesn’t hurt as much as the first one, the pain is bearable and I decide to continue. I try to imagine myself falling down into the blue in order to relax but it is a complete fail because I am heading to the moon like a space rocket. My body is starting to give me a lot of signals and information, I feel hungry, I need to pee, I’m thirsty, I’m nervous my ears are burning, a million of fast information. The contractions are getting faster and leave no pauses in between and I’m losing the control of it. Now it’s not easy to have happy thoughts, I feel that I’m losing my concentration and for a moment I wonder if I’m punishing myself. I’m not feeling comfortable, negative thoughts annoy me and I decide to get out and breathe.respirare.
4:04 I expel the small amount of CO2 and take a nice deep breath, I hold it for a while and I repeat the breathing. I’m feeling good, I’m happy, almost euphoric, satisfied and a bunch of nice emotions fulfilled my body. I went home happy and celebrated my PB with a healthy salad and a nice cold beer.
Thank you for reading my story and I hope you enjoyed it!
Just a small fish in the sea
Megiston