David Wang

Now I have an answer. Because I can fly!

Just a quick update - college is going well. Engineering is hard but I'm maintaining good grades in all my classes. I'm going to shoot for Aerospace when I choose my major at the end of this year (If I can't get in, I will try Mechanical, and I can still get into aerospace industry with a ME degree) Sometimes I really miss California's weather but can't complain haha. Looking back I believe that I made the right choice, and thanks to everyone who pushed me. I think right now I'm learning something meaningful, and will do something meaningful in the future. About skydiving... well, I still think about it and my past experiences from time to time, but not as much as before. After my accident I always had that urge of 'immediately' getting back to it but now that has decreased a lot. I will jump again when I'm fully ready after a few years. Blue Skies and stay safe out there

Welcome to the sky! Your first AFF experience brought back memories of my first jump - I had line twists on Level 1, too! Good times.... I miss it. Have fun, stay safe and fly high!!

Publicity/attention/money is also a reason why people believe in conspiracies, like flat earth. One example is Mad Mike - he raised money from other people and built rockets at home and tried to go to space( to see for himself if earth is sphere or flat) He eventually died in a rocket crash and his representative said he actually was not a flat earther, the whole rocket thing was a PR stunt for publicity. What's funny and ironic is that Mad Mike actually wasn't invited to the flat earth conference. "Many in the flat-earth community, which has grown in the age of YouTube and includes hundreds of thousands of adherents, were not happy about Hughes’s rockoon plan. If he went up to the Kármán Line and (inevitably) proved that the world is a sphere, that could end the gravy train for flat-earthers who make money from merchandise, books, conferences and the like." (from the article linked below) https://www.huffpost.com/entry/mad-mike-hughes-flat-earth_n_5e597924c5b60102211080c8

As a new jumper I think I actually got a lot of help from people on dz.com... maybe because I posted a lot of questions here in the past.

I've also watched a similar video on YouTube: Debunking moon landing conspiracies with Maxwell and VXGI. They developed this technology in recent years. They possibly could fake the moon landing in recent days but it'd be impossible to fake moon landings in 1960s. Also, in my opinion, flat earthers are some of the dumbest people alive. I joined a flat earth discord once because I was curious about what they were saying and it was a total chaos. They said the most ridiculous things I've ever heard, like space doesn't exist, our sun is not real, etc etc. I asked them where the sun is and one of them said "I know where it is I'm not telling you where it is." if the earth was actually flat, I think they would say earth is round, just to be different from anyone else.

MRI with contrast detected that I had an anterior labral tear and SLAP. I underwent surgery (shoulder arthroscopy) on August 25th this year and currently am 3 weeks post-op. However, during the surgery, my surgeon found out that my "SLAP" tear wasn't serious enough to be fixed - in his own words, he said it wasn't even a tear and that part of labrum does not contribute to the stability of the shoulder. So he only fixed the anterior labral tear which caused my anterior shoulder dislocation last year. I'm required to wear a sling for 6 weeks (3 more weeks to go) And I started PT after the first week. Currently working on Passive Range of Motion (PROM). The risk of dislocating my shoulder again after surgery is 10%. My shoulder is expected to be fully healed and ready (to the level of jumping again) in 5-6 months. You might need to sleep in a recliner at first. And then you can adjust how you sleep based on your own comfort & pain level. It's an individual thing and there are no strict rules. For me sleeping in a recliner totally sucked because I had no sleep quality at all. Right now I'm sleeping flat on my bed with no pain. Wear your sling when you sleep. Keep walking everyday. It helps speed up the blood flow and reduce constipation. Pain meds cause constipation. Follow your surgeon's instructions. PT is an important part of recovery. Do exactly what your PT says. Find a good PT who knows what he's doing. Think about it like this - fixing your labrum is like planting a seed, and doing PT is like helping the seed grow.

waiting is a part of skydiving, especially when you are a student. Accept it. if you want to jump badly enough you would wait and utilize the time. I once waited at Perris for all day long to do AFF level 2.

I have some questions... I understand that sometimes "things just happen", but can diligent packing and good body position when deploying prevent most hard openings? is the chance of having a hard opening on student canopies smaller than having one on smaller canopies? And if I exercise neck/spine muscles and make them strong, why don't you think they can't mitigate the effects of hard openings? one of the main goals in the next few years is to make my body strong just in case I need to deal with these kind of stuff in the future.

wait... If there were tears inside the shoulder joint, only PT wouldn't fix them. Did they even try surgery or did they just quit the sport entirely after PT failed?

I saw a photo of wing suit tandem on FB this morning and today a thread about wingsuit tandem came up on drop zone.com lol.

Yeah, I posted this on drop zone.com to look for opinions and advice because I couldn't decide what I should do myself. Thank you guys so much for all the opinions and advice. Those really helped me make my decision to accept their deal, even though it was a really tough decision to make. So, my sincere thank you, really. A side thought - I'm sure that there are a lot of people who have had more severe injuries than me and still jump. Even paralyzed people can skydive. Dan BC was in a coma for months, and his doctors told him he could never skydive again, but he got back in the sky and won several skydiving championships. And I also know that there are a lot people who have had shoulder dislocations and still jump. I'm lucky that I'm still here, and also lucky that no doctors have told me I couldn't jump again and I still have the chance to get back to doing what I love. I refuse to let my injuries prevent me from doing things I love. Yeah maybe some people would just quit the sport if they went through what I did, but quitting is not how I deal with my accident. You fall of the horse, and you get back on and try again, right? Overcoming injuries, getting back up when life knocks me down and flying again. This is my way. I will use these 3 years off to make my body strong and healthy to prepare for my future skydiving career. I'm young so I heal faster than most people, and I'm grateful for that. Blue Skies.

My grandfather was a mathematician. Both of my parents are not engineers. My mom chose the engineering major for me. I didn't choose it for myself because at that time I didn't know what I want to do in life. And right now I still don't. I'm glad I've found my passion - skydiving. I only need to figure out what to do as a career. But in general I'm a science guy.(good at math, science, etc but bad at history, geography, biology, etc. Hope you know what I mean.) I do not know if I will like engineering, we will have to see how my freshman year goes. Every engineering student at Purdue goes through a program which is called "First Year Engineering (FYE)". It's a tough program, and if I successfully go through the program and figure that I love engineering I would declare my major in my sophomore year (mechanical, chemical, civil or aerospace engineering, etc) If I don't then I would change my major... I'm a bit interested in aerospace engineering...I mean working at NASA or major aerospace companies would be pretty cool, right? lol. just a thought. We will have to see. Thanks for sharing your experience and advice. Those help.

Hey CoolBeans, how's jumping going? how is your shoulder holding up?

this sounds great!!!