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Small blood specks in spit after 70m FIM.

Thread Status: Hello , There was no answer in this thread for more than 60 days.
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dps27a

New Member
May 4, 2022
1
0
1
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Hi DB,

Wondering if the following injury sounds familiar to anyone, and whether anyone has any advice regarding resting & healing patterns...

Last November, I dove a 69m FIM, 71m FIM, and then a 73m FIM, with the first time noticing some blood in my spit on the 73m FIM dive. I struggled to equalise in the last few meters, so exerted some strain to make it to the plate. I logged this as the cause of some blood in my spit immediately after the dive. Not much, foamy, pink, sometimes bright red depending on how hard I tried to cough.

I then had ~14 dives @ 50m-60m for 2 weeks this April, before doing a 57m FIM comfortably - and noticed nothing in my spit. However ~2 hours later over lunch, my lungs felt phlegmy, and upon a deep cough, I summoned blood. Again, not much, foamy, pink, sometimes bright red if I tried. I logged the cause as jolted turn (I missed my alarm on an open line and it spooked me a bit), and perhaps lung packing, but sad to have this return for the first time since November.

I took 10 days off, and returned to diving, with no problems, climbing back up to 67m over 2 weeks across ~14 dives, this time with no lung packing just to try to avoid any additional strain. Across these 2 weeks, when checking my spit, very slight orange/brown bits were sometimes in my spit after a deep cough.

Now on my very most recent 71m FIM - it has happened again. No blood or problems or any pain at all after the dive. It was very enjoyable, relaxed, a good mouthfill, some air left in cheeks at 71m, a smooth turn, 2'48 total which is my usual. I then took a 10 minute rest, did a 21m FRC, about 8 minutes rest, a 20m safety, another 5 minutes rest, and then helped pulled the line up from 71m to 35m - at which point I then noticed fresh blood spats in my spit. Once again, not much blood, sometimes bright red if I tried.

To describe a little more - in hope that anyone can possible comment on what's going on - There are a variety of minor sensations throughout the day, very infrequent, in my left ribcage. Some tingling, a sharp sting if I stretch and tense my stomach muscles at the same time, a slow dull discomfort if stretching my ribcage on the left hand side - all of these are not present on the right side of my ribcage.

I can also say that I'm confident my lower left rib protrudes a little more than the right hand side - people have agreed visually it appears that way.

I'll leave it at that - but my questions to the forum are:

a) does this sound familiar to anyone? and if so, what do you think is going on?
b) in terms of taking time to rest and heal - should I be treating this quite strictly (i.e. 10-14 days off, or should I be treating it as an irritation and return to diving after 1-2 days rest? blood is of course not ideal, I would rather be diving without tiny specks of blood in my spit - but this sport is good at normalising things like this - and I have no idea how fast the lungs heal or adapt, and whether to get back into the water at 30m, and start climbing up again.

Thanks in advance
 
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