lung squeeze problems, looking for advice

[haughki]

Hi All,

I think I'm getting what I would characterize as a "small" lung squeeze. The first time I noticed it was the first time I dove to 55m. This is my current deepest dive, and I'm diving constant weight, on a line, competition style, in warm water (Kona, Cayman). The first time it happened was in February. Since then, I've done a lot of training and stretching, but I tried the same dive last week, and again today, with the same results. Here's what it looks like:

-I warm up for ~45 mins. This involves a 5 min facial immersion, three pulldowns to ~20m with an ~2-3 min breath hold for each, breathing up ~5 mins for each. Then a 5-10m frc (a "real" frc, where I dive to the limit of my ability to reverse pack). I've never noticed any kind of filling or sqeeze from this type of training dive.

-The dives all feel "comfortable" in terms of my ability to get down and up. Total dive time is ~2:00.

-Breathe up on back, I pack "big" about 15 times.

-I equalize at depth by reverse packing and then frenzel. I haven't learned how to do a proper mouthfill yet (working on it).

-By about 50m, I can really feel the pressure on my lungs and trachea. Of course, I don't know what it's "supposed to" feel like, but it feels tight and squeezed for sure.

-I don't have any blood right after the dive, but I'm usually a little wheezy. Then, after about 15mins, I notice a slight gurgling sound in my chest, and when I cough, I cough up a tiny bit of blood, small steaks of red. I get one, maybe two of these, no more.

So, I'm looking for any input. I already do a lot of diaphram stretching (uddiyana bandha), and stretching in general. I also do lots of negative pressure training in the pool (at least once a week, usually more). I know that reverse packing at depth is bad news: any tips on how to practice getting a better mouthfill?

I'd love to hear especially from anyone who's had a similar problem and managed to overcome it. What did you do?

Thanks,
Hawkeye Parker

 

[4444]

I've been dealing with the squeeze issue for over a year now. I don't reverse pack but instead fill my mouth at 30m. I've been diving this way from the beginning. I can get squeezed anywhere below 60m with 75% packing (30 packs). I've been keeping a dive log for over three years and have talked about this issue with many experienced divers including instructors such as Kirk Krack and Martin Stepanek. Here are the causes of squeeze that I'm aware of:

Deep reverse pack - Ideally you want to fill your mouth above the RV. I reach RV at around 37m.

Improper warmup - Your warmup seems fine except that you reverse pack the whole way instead of using a mouthfill. (mouthfill is not the solution to squeeze. In fact, it enables you to go deeper and could potentially increase the risk of squeeze. What you want to avoid is forced reverse pack that stresses your system.

Looking Up (down?) - You already know this one. But sometimes it's hard to be aware of what you're really doing near the bottom of the dive. Have your friend watch your dive and check your head position.

Contractions at depth - This can be avoided by proper warmup (the right amount of CO2), Co2 tolerance training and relaxation. Often times the act of turning causes contractions to happen because of the shift of air pressure within your lungs/trachea. Swallowing helps some people. For me, if I'm aware and focused on relaxation this doesn't happen. If you feel the contractions coming during the ascent, relax your body and delay it till you're higher up in the water column. If the contractions happen during the ascent open your soft pallet and epiglottis(if you use a mask), suck the air from your mask simultaneously with the contractions. The mask will take some of the pressure.

Improper adaptation - At the depth you're diving you probably want to increase your depth no more than 2m at a time. I repeat the same depth several times before going deeper.

Tension - If I hold a tension during the dive I get squeezed. This is the issue I'm working on right now. When I do Frensel I tend to tighten my abs. If I'm not relaxed I get squeezed.

Genetic predisposition - Some people have weak spots in their trachea. This is rare though.

Improper turn - Don't stretch your body too much and use only your arm to turn. Don't lift the chin to look towards the bottom.

Other things you can try:

-Bring your arms down and to your sides near the bottom of your dive.
-Structural integration/Rolfing
-Yoga
-Avoid multiple deep dives in a session.
-Rest at least a week after the incident. Gradually increase the depth after the rest.


Hope this helps.

 

[haughki]

Hi 4444,

Many, many thanks for such a thorough reply. This is simply incredibly helpful.

Hawkeye

 

[cdavis]

Hawkeye,

Like you, I can't mouthfil (yet). Can't help you on overcoming squeeze, but here's my experience.

I've gotten mildly squeezed several times. For me it is definitely related not just to depth, but to my body's reaction to depth and tension. If I'm near my max depth and strain to equalize, even a little, I'll suddenly start feeling like there is a circular vise around my chest and some asshole is really cranking on it, come up coughing and squeezed. Takes months to recover. If I stay relaxed and never strain to equalize, no squeeze, and only minimal feeling of pressure, even at deeper depths.

I equalize hands free to 70-80 ft or so, frenzel from there. My frenzel includes a tiny amount of reverse packing, which keeps me going deeper and still relaxed. At some point I'll have to tense my diaphragm to make frenzel work and that is what gets me.

Just for comparison, how deep can you equalize after a full, forced exhale and reverse packing to the max on the surface? (4 meters is the most I can manage)

Connor

 

[haughki]

Hawkeye,

Just for comparison, how deep can you equalize after a full, forced exhale and reverse packing to the max on the surface? (4 meters is the most I can manage)

If I do full exhale and full reverse pack, I can't get very far. If I pre-equalize my ears, maybe 3 - 4m? but it isn't pretty.... When I do negative pressure dives like that, I usually don't push it all the way, since I don't want to injure myself training, heh.

Anyhow, many thanks for the advice and thoughts, Connor. What you say makes sense to me, and rings true for me too. I was experimenting more with it today. I think it's really clear that I'm holding a lot of tension in my stomach muscles, and not letting my diaphram "rise up" into my thoracic cavity, as I do in uddiyana bhanda. I did 40m today with no problems, and felt much more relaxed, not with the vice-like squeeze I've felt so many times before. Feels like a small break-through.

Thanks again for the help,
Hawkeye

 

[cdavis]

Now that is an interesting comment, re: uddiyana bhanda. I discovered if I do one on the way down and then relax, it seems to improve equalization at depth. Also, pics of competitions make it look like some are holding the same stretch during dives. Thoughts?

Connor

 

[Steinar]

Hi Haughki

Your equlization style and problems with squeeze remindes me very much of myself. I do reverse packing to 60 m.

Living in Norway makes it difficult to train deep diving most of the cold months. I have been doing a lot of empty lung dives with reverse packing in a 5 meter pool. On these dives I feel a much greater preassure on my lungs compared with the preassure I feel at my pb depths. Going to Dahab for BBH I felt confident that my lungs where prepared for the 50 - 60 meter dives I was aming at.

I was a bit dissapointed when I got sqeezed on just 42 meters during CNF practice. The same happened at the first comp after doing 54. But when I did 58 m at the last competition day I didnt have any symptomes of squeeze.


I belive that gradual adaptation to depth is vital and that empty lung dives in a pool cant really prepare my lungs for "real" depth.

A puls oxymeter is a nice gadget for meassuring and monitoring the severity of squeeze.



I really hope this tread will gather more thoughts on how to aviod getting squeezed.
What about the long term effect of getting squeezed?

Cheers Steinar

 

[haughki]

Thanks Steinar, for the helpful post. What you write makes sense.

I've been playing with this some more over the last few days: I'm at the Performance Freediving Deja Blue competition, so I've decided not to rest as much as I'd like.

In any case, I was able to do a 52m CNF, then 58m CWT, and a 55m scooter dive (~20s at depth), all without any lung squeeze symptoms. I had what I'd call "slight filling" on each dive (a little shortness of breath for ~15 mins after the dive). Also took O2 after the two comp dives.

I think that consciously relaxing my abdomen and drawing my diaphragm up (ala uddiyana bhanda) definitely helps. I've been using this technique very actively on my more recent, no squeeze dives, and, well, things have gone great. I also think it's very possible that I'm just getting more acclimated to the depths.

Then, I decided to do a risky 70m free immersion yesterday. My warm up was horrible (I ended up with about 2:00 to breath-up; screwing around with fluid goggles). I was definitely nervous about the dive. I had an alarm set for 40m, and I reverse packed twice after that, at ~42 and ~45. I didn't _need_ to, I was just nervous about having enough air to equalize later on. On both of those reverse packs, I could feel my abdomen contract, and after that, I kindof forgot about doing my new uddiyana bhanda trick. Right about the time I grabbed the tag, I started getting narc'd and I can't say for sure what I was doing with my abdominals/diaphragm after that. In any case, though the dive was "successful", I ended up with a nasty squeeze (much worse than previous ones).

I had absolutely no trouble equalizing my ears. Never even thought about it.

That dive had all of the hallmarks of "high squeeze potential". It was a reckless thing to do, but at least I have more clear data about this issue. Hope it can help others to make wiser decisions....

Hawkeye Parker

 

[Steinar]

Congratulation on the great FIM dive!

You probably know that most freedivers belive that doing FIM will increase the chance of getting squeezed. Its not science but I guess it makes sense.

I used to screew around with my fluid goggles too. Now I have made holes in them and it works fine because I wear contacts.

Steinar

 

[m_cosentino]

Dear All,

I'm an italian freediver and I would like to share with you my experience and ask for some suggestions.

Yesterday I was training and after a 4 warm up dives at 15/20 meters in FRC I've started some CWT dives at 40/42 meters (the day before I've been freediving in FRC mode at 24/28m and full exhale with reverse packing at 5/6 meters...I did probably 30 dives in total). Consider that my PB in CWT is 55 and my deepest dive is 63 in FIM.

The first 4 dives at 40,40.4,41,6 and 42 were ok but during the last one I've added some static at the bottom (40 sec) with perception of some soft contractions and than I started the ascent.
On the surface I felt the squeeze in the trachea and I've started spitting some blood. After 1 hour everything was back to normality.
Today I feel some kinda of pressure on the upper part of the chest but if I do a full and deep breath with some packing I do not feel any panic in my chest at all.

Conditions: Water temperature on the surface was 26 deg. while on the bottom it was 16 deg.!!!I was just shivering during the static.
Probably during the turn from the bottom I did force too much pulling on the rope with my right hand and I've stretched too much my rib-cage (which was propably not relaxed any longer due to the very cold water) before starting the ascent in CWT.

Looking forward to hear from you guys.
Thanks to you all!!

Regards

Marco http://www.freediveritalia.it

 

[fflupo]

..

i could be a high ascent speed as well

if the speed is > than the ability to shift the blood back

all the best
wolf

 

[diver87]

I don´t think that the ascent speed is the problem. Mostly it is the descent speed!
I think it happend beecause of the contractions at the bottom.

 

[cdavis]

At least in my case, time on the bottom affects the severity of squeeze symptoms. This is the case when no large degree of squeeze has occurred, but I can feel in my chest that I am very near my limit. Stay on the bottom longer at that time and I will have minor squeeze symptoms. Start up quickly and no problem results.

Connor

 

[m_cosentino]

I missed one important information regarding the last dive with static: I did pack some additional air before that dive.
I usually do not pack and if I do it I usually pack 3/4 times after the last deep breath before the dive...but in this specific dive I did pack more (at least 8/9 times) and I'm quite sure that the squeeze was in the ascent.
From my D4 I see the following:
- I've reached the bottom at 42 in 1min and 14 sec (so a slow descent)
- I've spent 40 sec at 42 meters
- It took 30 sec to reach the surface
- Total dive time: 2min and 24 sec.

Would it be possible that the faster ascent rate plus unusual packing could have caused the squeeze?

Thanks again for the answers

Marco

 

[trux]

Yes, packing is often suspected as a trigger. The exact mechanism may depend on the circumstances, but generally spoken there are several ways it can harm:

1) The packing alone already overstretches some tissue, making it so more vulnerable to the injury at depth

2) It is the duck dive after the packing that further compresses the lungs, abruptly increasing the intrathoracic pressure and leading to an injury (or weakening it as described above)

3) Although the volume of air in lungs drops little bit due to the consumption of O2 which is slightly bigger than the CO2 released back to the lungs, the lung volume is reduced by the blood rushed to the alveolar capillaries due to the vasoconstriction and bloodshift. As you ascend the blood is partially pressed back into the extremities, but due to the resistance caused by the vasoconstriction, the retraction of the excess blood is only partial. This means that near the surface the resulting pressure in lungs may be higher than initially (just before the immersion). It may also lead to an injury. If there are additionally some contractions, it aggravates the situation, of course.

EDIT: there was a good thread (with plenty of references) describing the increased risk of a squeeze at packing freedivers - look it up in the archive, it is worth of reading

 

[m_cosentino]

Thank you all for the very interesting inputs.
I'll also have a look to the old threads in order to gain more info.

Trux...your web site is amazing rofl and I registered already!


Enjoy the sea!

Marco

 

[picasso]

I'd say that you should feel confortable regardless how deep or shallow you dive. Keep relaxed and dive utill it is easy. Diving deeper with just you want dive deeper and you force to equlise leads to sqeeze :crutch.

 

[m_cosentino]

Hi Picasso,

I've never said that I forced the EQ...my EQ at that depht is quite easy and I'm not a beginner freediver
My main concern was about the possible additional variables that could have caused this squeeze: packing, ascent/descent speed, improper movements at depth, etc

However, thanks for the suggestion

Marco

 

[picasso]

Hi Marco, take it as my general rule to deep diving. I am saying nothing about anybody's level.

I read your description of dive and I'd say that staying down in colder water might cause your squeeze. I experienced similar dive and I squeezed too. One of our friend dove to 50m and his diving scooter just went off. So I dove to 50m (my PB is 93m) with scuba diving light (50m in fresh water, absolute dark) and tried to find it. Water temp there is 4 degrees. I had contractions and felt ok in such depth, but I had my bronchi sensualised and coughed a little and spit some pink stuff (expectoration) about 10 minutes after the dive. Depth was OK, I had warm up before and one dive to 60 m before. I felt cold and had contractions too. I also packed as usual.

So I think staying longer time in depth in cold water when you were shivering at a bottom is not comfortable dive. It is not only question of equalization. I also pay attention to pull rope softly close to plate during ascend with shorter pulls so I don't stretch anything much. Sorry for my English. I would express my thoughts better in my language . One more thing. I don't care what is my PB when I go for depth dives. I know that I had to be very careful first 4 days of diving after about 1+ week break. I also don't like diving when I have sore throat, because It is not right thing for bronchi, etc.

Have fun and many good dives

 

[m_cosentino]

Hi Picasso,

thanks for the very interesting feedback.
I think that my problem has been caused by improper movement at depth and particularly the very first pull on the rope when I've stretched too much my rib-cage....than probably also the packing + bloodshift gave its contribution during the ascent, as Trux said in his previous post.
I really do thank you all for the provided info and personal experience.

Enjoy the Sea!

Marco