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Zakisjumping

Fear of jumping again (AFF Done)

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Hello people,

This is my first post, aswell as my first time discovering this forum and I thought maybe I could find help in here...
My AFF experience was one full of mixed feelings...
I did my AFF in France, I bought a pack of 10 jumps. I have always been a fan of skydiving, I remember at a young age, I would come back from school, turn on my computer and spend the rest of the day watching videos of people skydiving. I knew about everything, from cutaways to the position you have to be in, from how to open to how to land.
I choose to go directly for an AFF and get my licence. My first jump was good, felt 0 pressure and 0 fear, it almost felt boring due to the fact that I was being held by 2 monitors, but I did enjoy the canopy ride a lot (mainly because I was alone and controling things by myself). It felt the same throughout all the jumps until the 5th jump, where I felt a bit uncomfortable doing a spinning ball exit, but I did it anyway and it was all good, I got my licence at the 6th jump. After that I did 2 solo jumps and its when everything changed, all of a sudden, I started feeling fear, specially after my first solo jump where I had twisted lines, nothing that was very bad, I actually always feel peaceful after jumping out of the plane and very much in control, no pressure no nothing, it's just the moment of the plane ride/exit and when I'm on the ground. But back to the solo jumps, I did 2 after I got my licence and I had twisted lines in both. At the 9th jump (since I bought a 10 jumps pack) I didn't feel good and on the plane ride, my feet were trembling, I have never felt such fear in my life as that one I had during that moment, I couldn't even move my feet due to the fear and pressure I was having and I decided not to jump. It felt horrible but I thought that I was too negative in my mind to jump, so I'd rather not. I didn't use my 10th jump yet and I left the dropzone. Also I never landed properly, I almost broke my back bone once, yes I used the radio but I never trusted the person behind it for some reason, I always used the brakes way before they announced it due to the fact that the land was starting to get pretty close to me...

It's been a month that I'm back to my normal life, work, school and sports but skydiving is always in my min 24/7. I go out, I look up at the sky and I want to jump again. I go back to my home and all I do in my free time is watch skydiving videos. The only thing that is added now is that I feel terrified just by watching a video of a person jumping out of the plane.

I feel like my problem is due to the fact that I am not confident enough for it, or rather that I have lost my self confidence totally since I was very much excited at the beginning.
I know this seems like I'm making such a big deal of it but I really want to jump again, except that I am terrified and I feel not confident about it. Is there any help I can get from a book or someone similar to my case that jumped again?

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You are not the first, and won't be the last.

Fear is not a problem. Its natural. Its instinctive.....your body is telling you falling is dangerous. Your brain knows you can handle it. Knowledge dispels fear, and you know what to do.

You've done 9 jumps, More than 99% of humans. You obviously handled them well, so why should it now be a problem?

Line twists are not a major problem.

Stick to what you've been trained to do and you'll be fine.

It sounds like you are not confident in your gear. Get an instructor to go through the gear with you, how it works, and what is worth worrying about. Practice a few EPs.

Then go and jump. You will enjoy it.
My computer beat me at chess, It was no match for me at kickboxing....

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Thank you for posting about this. I think everyone has some fear. I have 1,350 jumps but I started in 1974 and made almost 1300 of those by the end of the 1980's. This year, at 61 years old, I retired from work and began skydiving again. With my experience level, I did not really fear the equipment, the sky, or dying. But I had a lot of performance anxiety since I had not jumped in a long time before getting recurrent. I was probably more worried about going low or funneling an RW formation than you are about just jumping. But the emotion of fear is the same for humans no matter what the root of it is. For me, the desire to skydive was greater than my fear and I moved on. A few dozen jumps and a little introspection solved it for me.

I found an expert skydiver on youtube named Brian Germain. He specializes in many things in skydiving, and FEAR is one of them. I recommend that you listen to some of his video posts and see if it helps you think it thru. He also has books he has authored, although I have not read any. He is a very good public speaker and videographer on youtube.com

Now I am comfortable again and really enjoying the sport after a long layoff. I hope the same for you.

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Here is what helped me to keep going and overcome some of the fear and get my license--not sure if they give you a license right after AFF in France but I think you need many more jumps before jumping mostly alone. (for me it was mostly fear of the door, getting out of it, but also sitting right next to the open door on the way up--now it's a beautiful experience!)

1. Jump with coaches (actually my DZ requires lots of coach jumps after AFF until you get licensed)

2. Do a canopy course. This will help with the landings and, if they do it the same way as here, you'll do lots of "hop'n pops" from lower altitude: Getting out of the door stable and being able to pull right away gave me tremendous confidence (so no more fear of the door)

3. Actually, do this before the canopy course--as suggested above: Brian Germain! Watch every free video and purchase his courses as well--especially the one on landing! He's got a good video on fear as well.

4. Tunnel time: If you have an indoor skydiving tunnel, book some time there and find a coach. (One of the amazing things about a sport that is somewhat exclusive: I got to have one of the US's premier freefliers to be my coach in the tunnel--as a total beginner!)
This also helped me tremendously in trusting my body in freefall. (You can practice staying stable during the pull and that should make line-twists much less likely)
And I think the tunnels are much more affordable in France than the US.

Lastly: Absolutely trust yourself. If it doesn't feel right, don't jump. Yes: challenge your fear, if you are up for it...but no matter what anyone else says: going back down with the plane or waiting until it feels right is ok (if sometimes expensive)

I only have 50 jumps, so just talking as a fellow newbie.

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Guodian

Thank you for posting about this. I think everyone has some fear. I have 1,350 jumps but I started in 1974 and made almost 1300 of those by the end of the 1980's. This year, at 61 years old, I retired from work and began skydiving again. With my experience level, I did not really fear the equipment, the sky, or dying. But I had a lot of performance anxiety since I had not jumped in a long time before getting recurrent. I was probably more worried about going low or funneling an RW formation than you are about just jumping. But the emotion of fear is the same for humans no matter what the root of it is. For me, the desire to skydive was greater than my fear and I moved on. A few dozen jumps and a little introspection solved it for me.

I found an expert skydiver on youtube named Brian Germain. He specializes in many things in skydiving, and FEAR is one of them. I recommend that you listen to some of his video posts and see if it helps you think it thru. He also has books he has authored, although I have not read any. He is a very good public speaker and videographer on youtube.com

Now I am comfortable again and really enjoying the sport after a long layoff. I hope the same for you.



I read Brian Germain's book 'Transcending Fear' not long after getting into the sport and it helped me understand fear a lot better.

Brian seems to get a lot of hate from some on here, but I've found both that book and his many YouTube videos very helpful and informative.

Keep it up Brian
Werewolves not swearwolves

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m529gft

***Thank you for posting about this. I think everyone has some fear. I have 1,350 jumps but I started in 1974 and made almost 1300 of those by the end of the 1980's. This year, at 61 years old, I retired from work and began skydiving again. With my experience level, I did not really fear the equipment, the sky, or dying. But I had a lot of performance anxiety since I had not jumped in a long time before getting recurrent. I was probably more worried about going low or funneling an RW formation than you are about just jumping. But the emotion of fear is the same for humans no matter what the root of it is. For me, the desire to skydive was greater than my fear and I moved on. A few dozen jumps and a little introspection solved it for me.

I found an expert skydiver on youtube named Brian Germain. He specializes in many things in skydiving, and FEAR is one of them. I recommend that you listen to some of his video posts and see if it helps you think it thru. He also has books he has authored, although I have not read any. He is a very good public speaker and videographer on youtube.com

Now I am comfortable again and really enjoying the sport after a long layoff. I hope the same for you.



I read Brian Germain's book 'Transcending Fear' not long after getting into the sport and it helped me understand fear a lot better.

Brian seems to get a lot of hate from some on here, but I've found both that book and his many YouTube videos very helpful and informative.

Keep it up Brian

Failing all the above advice OP

A 4-pack beers ought to relax you before the big jump :ph34r:
Werewolves not swearwolves

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I relate to that, I did my first 13 jumps and then stopped for 6 months.

What struck to me was how little I knew, I didn't feel like I had done my homework properly or that my instruction had been sufficient to be throwing myself out of a plane. I didn't have freefall control or landing issues but all the possible malfunction scenarios scared the shit out of me. Mostly the two out scenarios.

I decided that I wasn't allowed to jump again until I read the SIM front to back and read every death report available up to date and every incident report thread at Dropzone.com. Then skiing season came (in California we jump all year round) and with combination of this fear, I just didn't have the drive to go jump again.

About June next year, I was bored after skiing season had ended and even though I hadn't read all available incident reports but I had read a shit ton of them and watched a bunch of videos and I was feeling prepared again. I came back really strong and scored 500 jumps in a year window.

Funny enough, I had a two out malfunction from a loose reserve pin on rental gear on jump number #34. But, I was very prepared for it, I had just re-watched the video of how to deal with them the night before. It's really fulfilling to survive a malfunction, know that you have the right mindset for it. So, that's my advice for you, bomb your head with information, we fear the unknown.

Best of luck, hope to see you up in the skies again.

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I struggled a lot with fear. I thought I was the only one at the dropzone that's dealing with this. I would speak about it and people would tell me, don't worry it will go away after 20 jumps. At 30 I was still terrified. I would sit in the plane and wish I was anywhere else on the planet. Then people said it would go away after 50 jumps. At 60 I was seriously considering to stop jumping as the fear was overpowering the fun and just not worth it. I would start getting scared 4 days before jumping already and have serious anxiety on the day.
I tried different relaxing techniques but nothing worked. Then I started using natural calming tablets on jumping days. It worked wonders. I realized that my fear was physical anxiety and couldn't be overcome with mindfulness. I just needed that to get more comfortable. Now on 85 jumps and the fear is gone. I still have normal fear but not overwhelming anxiety, and I actually like that fear.
Worked for me... Good luck!

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search here for other discussions on fear. Been talked about a bit. My advice has always been: why wouldn't you want to be afraid? People pay a lot of money to be afraid. Tandems, bungee jumping, roller coasters, etc. Just appreciate it.
U only make 2 jumps: the first one for some weird reason and the last one that you lived through. The rest are just filler.
scr 316

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I also did, just as you, my AFF in France in june/17.
I only could stay a week there so I left with my AFF license and 1 solo jump due to a day of bad weather. For all my jumps during AFF I had the same fear as you, the plane ride up there. Once it was my time to go out the door I could change my mindset to it and do what I was trained, but untill seconds before I was scared as hell ;)

After going back to Belgium I knew I wanted to keep jumping so I went to a DZ and registered myself. Because I had only 7 jumps and didn't do my AFF there they wanted me to take a jump with instructor. No problem, calmed me down a bit knowing that I didn't have to go out alone. That day I wasn't able to jump due to the weather.

A week or two later I went back to the DZ for the jump. Never happened, I chickened out after hanging around at the DZ. I couldn't push myself to talk to an instructor and register a slot in the plane, because I knew I had to jump then. So I drove back home, very frustrated. I felt like a loser.

But I don't give up that easely so next week I drove back to the DZ, for almost wanted to do the exact samething. Except an instructor started talking to me and asked what I came to do. So I explained the situation and he told me it's very normal and made me feel at ease. He took my card, reserved us a slot, got me my gear and took me up. And we jumped. Everithing was fine, it was awesome. He didn't have to step in or help me during freefall. After landing I felt so good and wanted to do a solo.
But then for some reason I chickened out again, no solo, and drove back home without even talking to someone. Again I was frustrated, angry at myself and felt like a big looser. I was almost going to give up.

But then a guy which whom I did my AFF in France with contacted me and asked how everything went. So I told him and he proposed to go to the DZ together. So I did. He had been quite buzy and has now 85 jumps while I had only 8. Unfortunatly the weather was not great and the jump limit was 50, so I couldn't jump. Saved by the bell :$

BUT, yesterday we went back to the DZ with some AFF friends. Because there was more then a month since my last jump I had to do a jump with instructor again. I didn't mind that for the obvios reason. The guy told me just jump and do what you want, I'll be around and monitor you . So I went out the door, relaxed and had fun. When I was falling I was thinking why the hell I'm so afraid, this is the greatest feeling ever.
I landed, grapped the canopy, got it packed and went back up. The fear was gone, just some nerves when the door opens but that's a good thing I guess. :)

I did 3 jumps yesterday and I felt great! Want to go jump as soon as possible. I guess I will have some fear again to go in the plane the first time, but I'll go with some friends. We're not allowed to jump together because I only have AFF, but I like the idea of a friendly face in the plane. It calmes me.

I talked to some instructors and other jumpers yesterday and they all told me the same. For some the fear was 'gone' at 50 jumps, other at 70. There are some guys with +200 jumps that still stress out in the ride up.
So you and I are not different then other jumpers. You just need to push trough. I did yesterday and really enjoyed it.

So I curious to know where you did your AFF and with who? Maybe it's with the same DZ/company.
If you're from BE or NL, maybe we can meet at a DZ. You can always pm me.

I have my own fear topic in here as well ;)
http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=4857713

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I think every skydiver experiences this numbing fear atleast once during his career. (fun or pro does not matter)

Some get it at the beginning, some after a few jumps, some after 30. The recipe is the same, pinpoint your fears (triggers) and force yourself to jump, you can do it. You know how to.

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