I’ve got about 75 dives and am Rescue Diver certified. In my experience, there is a lot of training dedicated to donating octopuses, but very little emphasis on the muscle memory of grabbing your own octopus when you don’t have access to your regulator. In many cases, the octopus is folded into the weight belt or some other difficult to access location. I want to encourage everyone to (1) practice the reflex of grabbing your octopus, and (2) keep your regulator clipped close enough to you that you can access it even without your hands. This saved my life.

We were on a boat in Cozumel, all geared up with tanks open, when a storm hit. Things seemed largely under control sitting inside the boat but a freak wave hit it from the side, tilting the boat nearly 90 degrees and sending me backwards into the water. I slammed into the water in surprise, knocking the wind out of my lungs, and losing my mask and regulator in the process. In the swirling darkness of the stormy water with no mask, I thankfully saw the propeller cut out, but also that I was under the boat. The swirl was pulling me under the boat making my panicked kicking quite useless, while the strong waves were basically slamming the boat onto my face as I fumbled to either find my reg or get out from under the boat. I did not succeed at either.

I was pretty sure I was going to die there. The panic, darkness, strong waves, water pulling me under the boat, boat slamming into my face, and lack of air - any of these alone would probably be fine but all of it together was the classic runaway catastrophe. But then a rubber thing bumped into my face and I suddenly remembered that I had clipped my octopus to the front of my wing. I grabbed it and lived.

When I got onto the boat I looked around and saw that everyone else had their octopus folded into their weight belt. If anyone else had been the one to fall into the water they would probably have died. I’ve still got nightmares about that day but I actually feel like a safer and more confident diver after. Please keep your octopus accessible to yourself and drill needing to use it - it should be your first reflex.