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Bloody ear: not broken ear drum

Thread Status: Hello , There was no answer in this thread for more than 60 days.
It can take a long time to get an up-to-date response or contact with relevant users.

azapa

51% freediver 49% spearo
Jan 31, 2007
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474
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OK this happened 12 days ago, just had the second ENT visit and want to share to the Deeperblue knowledge base.

I too scanned DB with my symptoms, and saw a great post from Eric Fattah that gave me hope.

So: shaved head, open cell suit. No ear holes in suit. Lovely day, new place, camera, only one hour to dive, rushing, clear water. Had a few shallow dives, left ear feels a bit strange, but those first few dives always do until the snot is blasted out. About the 4th dive, arrived at bottom 15m looked in a cave and "shhhhhhooooooooooopp" noise in felt ear. Then it felt great.

No pain, no vertigo, no water inside head feeling. Just felt strange. I carried on diving for 30 mins without problems (unwisely). Hoping in the boat, I take my hood off and blood in left ear. Bad, I was sure I had blown an ear drum. Again, no pain, no dizzies, but quite some blood. Never happened before.

I call a buddy doctor and he tells me not to rinse and not to wet ear at all. I even FB Carla :)thankyou huge thanks and respect) and she tells me not to worry. Next morning I wake up with quite a bloody pillow.

ENT visit 1 on (5 days after): he cleans dried blood and looks, can't see much
ENT visit 2 (12 days after): he confirms was NOT a busted drum :friday

Conclusion: bad suit hood squeeze, the suction effect was released when I twisted ny head, and the blood vessels near the ear drum burst. Eric had this too.

It was a very scary week, that could have been the end to my deep dive plans (bahamas in July and Vertical Blue in 2012) but it ended up well.

The ironic thing is all my older suits were given the hot nail treatment. I guess I had got cocky: and hand full of humble national records and an AA instructor title. I really should have known better. I just "forgot" to let water in my hood. I do it all the time spearing, but this time I had a camera and no gun. That's my excuse.

Hot nail holes in all suits. ALL. I was dumb, I confess, I hope this post makes someone less dumb.
 
How in the heck do you get a squeeze bad enough to blow your blood vessels outside the eardrum and not destroy the drum?????????????????


Sure glad you are ok!

Connor
 
quite easy if you are dumb! Eric or some other smart person may be able to explain the maths behind it.
 
Azapa-- Will you post the link to the thread about hot nail treatment? I am not sure what this is and am not able to find it in a search. I usually do some drops face up when I get in the ocean so that any air in the suit bubbles up and out through the hood, but I don't ever intentionally let water into the suit unless I am overheated. My 5mm open cell seals very, very tight and rarely lets any water in. Glad your ear is not permanently damaged.
 
ninja, thats just the problem YOU MUST let water into your ears. Put your suit on and have a buddy mark the center of your ear with a pen. Heat up a small nail on the fire, and poke it through to make a hole. Ideally you would take the hood off first ... ;) (joke) that will let just a small amount of water into your ears to avoid the sealing effect. It does not change water out, so once warmed you won't even notice it.
 
Here is my fun experience with a hood squeeze in the same fashion as azapa. To answer your question Connor, a 6.5 mil suit can only give so much and will win over an eardrum or blood vessel in short order. I forgot to put water in my left ear under the hood after a break and went down to 60'. I thought the pressure was a lack of equalizing but no frenzel maneuver would fix this situation. Eardrum did not give so a blood vessel ended up breaking. Below is a time-lapse of 3 month recovery. Gave it a few weeks and continued to dive very gently at shallow depth without problems. Hearing never appeared to be affected and only mild soreness.
Image_2021-06-01 13_57_17_782.JPGImage_2021-06-04 21_13_11_739.JPGImage_2021-06-16 20_06_37_131.JPGImage_2021-06-28 19_28_32_770.JPGImage_2021-07-10 13_40_20_692.JPGImage_2021-08-06 08_28_09_702.JPGImage_2021-08-19 19_36_50_041.JPG
 
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