Freefall stability

[Mike111 0]

Glad it all worked out for you, thats a great photo and a really heart warming story to hear.

Thanks man,

Mike

[etannenb 0]

I figured I'll just answer your questions one-by-one:

1. Do you value their opinion so much that it alters your own?

-- No.

2. Are you scared that they will be mad at you and perhaps stop talking to you?

-- No. They would never do that sort of thing.

3. Are you looking for ways to blame others for not taking the course because perhaps you don't really want to do it yourself?

-- No. I won't pretend like I'm not scared, but I do really want to do the course. I did a tandem last year, and really enjoyed it, but I had a massive adrenaline rush, and couldn't remember that much from the jump. I thought I would never jump again. This year, I only went because a good friend of mine really wanted to go. The experience was much better. I had total awareness during the freefall, and even had the presence of mind to look up after the parachute deployed to make sure everything was normal. Since then, I can't get skydiving out of my head (which is bad, because I have a day job :-)). I'm on dropzone.com every single day, and I've been reading reviews on equipment, deployment methods, pretty much anything I can get my hands on!

4. Do you simply desire everything to be on the up and up?

-- This is closer to the truth. Like I said before, the final decision rests with me, but from conversations I've been having with my dad it seems like I won't get approval per se, but understanding.

Anyway, like I said before, I'm already signed up for the AFF course in December. And another aspect of my personality is that I don't like backing out of anything.

[etannenb 0]

That's an awesome picture!

[skydiveress 0]

hi there.

you will never know if u will spin or not, unless u go up there and do it. i never span once through my training, or after.
i started on static line, then converted to AFF.
i do know a girl that span out of control, but the instructor was there, and he stopped her.
dont let the thought of spinning stop you.

and as for family members, my family have just got used to he idea now, id always said i was gonna do it from a very young age, but i guess they thought i never would.
i actually think they like the idea now, cus there always telling people what i do.
ive been skydiving until i am 4 months pregnant and my family are ok with that now aswell. they come round.

you could cross the road and have an accident, but u still cross the road. so go get urself booked onto and AFF course.

ONLY THOSE WHO TAKE RISKS TRULY LIVE.

sar

[etannenb 0]

Quote

hi there.

you will never know if u will spin or not, unless u go up there and do it. i never span once through my training, or after.
i started on static line, then converted to AFF.
i do know a girl that span out of control, but the instructor was there, and he stopped her.
dont let the thought of spinning stop you.

and as for family members, my family have just got used to he idea now, id always said i was gonna do it from a very young age, but i guess they thought i never would.
i actually think they like the idea now, cus there always telling people what i do.
ive been skydiving until i am 4 months pregnant and my family are ok with that now aswell. they come round.

you could cross the road and have an accident, but u still cross the road. so go get urself booked onto and AFF course.

ONLY THOSE WHO TAKE RISKS TRULY LIVE.

sar

I'm already signed up for the course! Anyway, that's pretty amazing that you were skydiving until you were four months pregnant. I wonder if skydiving during pregnancy aids in later child development? Is there any way to do a study and test that? I bet you could get it published in the New England Journal of Medicine: Take a control group of 1,000 pregnant women who didn't skydive during pregnancy, another group of 1,000 women who did skydive, and see what happens to the kids eighteen years down the road .

[brianfry713 0]

I think the spinning question has been covered already, but I thought I'd ad my family situation. I did one AFF when I was 18, and then started back up again last year at age 25.

I only told my parents about a month ago, and that was mainly because I just did a couple of BASE jumps. My main reason for not telling them was financial, and I pretty much already knew how they felt about skydiving. The best part of the conversation was when my mom asked me "so why don't you just go jump off a bridge", and I said "ok, I'm doing that next weekend".

My parents reacted pretty much as I expected and are still upset about it, as well as now I'm struggling to make payments on things they used to help me out with. I'm still glad I told them, mainly in case anything went wrong I'd want them to know that it was my decision to jump and how I feel about it and prepare for it. I've invited my parents to the drop zone but they haven't made it out there yet. I got my sister to do a tandem and showed that video to my parents.

Good luck in the AFF course, listen to your instructors and I'm sure you'll do fine. I expect a constant battle with my parents over it, but it's still worth it for me.

BASE 1224, Senior Parachute Rigger, CPL ASEL IA, AGI, IGI
USPA Coach & UPT Tandem Instructor, PRO, Altimaster Field Support Representative

[etannenb 0]

Hi, thanks for the input. I honestly feel a bit embarrassed at this point that I made the family issue a much bigger deal than it deserved to be (I was a lot more concerned about the spinning issue). As things stand now, I'm signed up for the course at the end of the December, and I'm really looking forward to it. And from conversations with my father, it looks like I'll have understanding, if not agreement, which is the best I could hope for (I doubt my parents will come to the dropzone, so that they're not witnesses to anything if something happens. But there's always the video afterwards ).

[woodpecker 0]

Have you gotten your jumps in yet??

SONIC WOODY #146

There is a fine line between cockiness and confidence -- which side of the line are you on?

[etannenb 0]

No, I'll be travelling in the U.S. for almost all of November, so I'm only starting the course December 20th. It'll be a while, but I'll definitely keep you posted once the course starts how things proceed

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