Perforated eardrum...Yikes!

[dfreeman]

I did this in my foolish youth and after a period of time (a few months) it healed and I have done a lot of diving since.

My daughter Megan ruptured her ear drum on her first OW check-out dive in 3 feet of water while equalizing.  Blood from the ear and the whole shot.  She was 14 at the time and I think she handled it better than you did.  Toughen up.

A year later, she got certified.

When she was 18 she did it again while equalizing in Bonaire.  This was about dive number 50.  As you can tell, she is a warm water diver, but she was also very cautious about diving with congestion and being rushed like on a dive boat.  However she did go on a great trip in the Bahamas on Blackbeards just before this incident.  Pictures are somewhere on this site.

We have since developed a regime of dive profiles to get her ears clear and avoiding this problem.  She did 20 dives in one week on Bonaire this spring and can not wait to go back.  Pictures of the Bonaire trip are also on this site.  She has found her method to equalize and is now very comfortable in the water.  She did some of the harder dive sites (if there is such a thing) on Bonaire with no problem.

So, let it heal and be careful.

Doug