How did you deal / not deal with the loss

[koppel 5]

This is probably aimed at people who have been in the sport a little longer than myself.

I heard today that someone I knew went in on a BASE Jump. The reason for this is not important, the loss I feel is.

Three months ago another person ( who I knew a little from a DZ I jump at occasionally ) was lost to us from a landing (swooping) incident.

I recognise that we take part in an activity that is not considered to be safe. As an Instructor I believe that it can be made as safe as most activities that we can partake in, be it riding a bicycle, driving a car or walking across the road. It is the way that we approach it that makes it as safe or as dangerous as it is.

My question is how have people coped with the loss of people that they knew very little / people that they knew from the DZ / people that were good friends.

What was it that helped you deal with the loss that you felt.

It probably doesn't help that my partner is dealing with a parent that is dying at the moment but I put the question out there anyhow.

My thanks to your responses

I like my canopy...


...it lets me down.

[freefalle 0]

Death, is a part of life, we are all going to die, but you already know that. I have a strong faith in God, and I believe when is my day to die it will happen in the manner God sees fit. I don' t know why some people leave us in the manner and time they do but it's not for me to know. When people I know pass I grieve as does anyone else, in there own way. Then I remember the good times I had with that person and thats what I try to hold on to until the pain of their loss subsides. I refuse to stop doing things in my life that I enjoy because they might be "dangerous" When its my day to die It will happen.

[skybytch 273]

There's an old drinking toast - I was told it came from the British military - that sums it up well for me. "To absent friends."

Whether they have died or simply moved far away geographically, as long as we remember them our friends are always with us.

[AFFI 0]

Learn from their mistakes and teach others not to make the same mistakes since many a fatality stemmed from:

1) Lack of proper training and continued training.

2) Stupid mistakes made (likely as a result of the absence of #1).

Mykel AFF-I10
Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat…

[skypuppy 1]

I don't have any answers, but the last time I lost a friend I spent a lot of time thinking about it. I wrote a 2000 word article for our magazine after that death, but the ending went like this.....

Jo and Felix died through no particular fault of their own. It was an accident. Accidents happen. The accident report states they were not even sure who was flying at the time the glider went down. Maybe if he hadn't gone out that morning, if he hadn't started gliding, Jo wouldn't have died. But that wouldn't have been Jo;( Would it?

That afternoon
We sat drinking
Thinking of Life.

The next day
The sun came up
And we jumped again.

We jumped.
It was fun
Under the hot sun.

When someone dies
All you can do, really,
Is go on.

It's what
He would have wanted.
Isn't it?

So we jumped again
Under the hot sun
And it was still fun.

Jo was many things; a competitor, a teammate, a coach, a video geek, a rigger, an instructor, a mentor, and a leader. Most of all, though, for a few hundred others, maybe a few thousand -- and for me -- he was a friend and an inspiration. I will miss Jo, but when I think of him, I will smile.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

If some old guy can do it then obviously it can't be very extreme. Otherwise he'd already be dead.
Bruce McConkey 'I thought we were gonna die, and I couldn't think of anyone

[airtwardo 7]

You miss them and you move on.

Just as they would, if it were you that is gone.

You remember them more clearly, for a while, when the subject comes up, as it has here.

You sometimes wonder if they really knew the stakes.

You sometimes wonder if YOU do.

But it's in your blood...so you miss them, and move on.

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

[Icon134 0]

Like a lot of people have said you miss them, grieve for them and then move on...

I have also known people to leave the sport after knowing someone someone who died.

Ultimately, we all deal with death in our own way...

Livin' on the Edge... sleeping with my rigger's wife...

[FrogNog 1]

I only have a small handful of "absent friends" I've known from skydiving but I have so far found that the ones that die while jumping are not necessarily more painful than the ones that die while not jumping.

That doesn't address coping directly, but I guess it means I would (and do) cope with friends who die jumping the same as friends who die not jumping.

-=-=-=-=-
Pull.

[Ron 10]

Really good question.
No really good answer.

I have seen people run the gambit from never flinching, to quiting the sport.

I have had friends seek professional help, some had to take meds.

One of my friends quit and tried to get me to quit also. He told me that he was not sure he could lose me as well.

Some people quit and cut all ties to the sport. They try to put distance between themselves and the pain.

In truth, it changed the sport for me. I always claimed I knew the sport was dangerous...But in truth I was an idiot. And I found that out the first time I got "The Call". My friend told me to sit down he had some news. I told him I was sitting, but I was lying, I was standing in my bedroom. When he told me it was like a ton of bricks hit my shoulders and someone took out my legs at the same time. I fell. My entire soul was sucked out, my heart imploded.

The sport changed for me that day. I used to be a young immature idiot. I liked to say, "I would quit skydiving right after a wet thud". I was an idiot.

I would love to say that after the first one it gets easier.....Nope. When my teammate died I thought I had it all together, I remained stoic until I got to the funeral. Then I lost it, and the world spun. I had just delayed it, not avoided it.

I would say that the major change that I went through is I am now a "saftey NAZI". Having been through it, I would save as many people as possible that pain....And these folks were not even family to me...I can't imagine how hard it is to lose a family member to a sport. I now really hate to listen to "know it alls" with a few jumps and a "It can't happen to me" complex.

It gets me into trouble, but the thing I find is that my inbox is filled with people who once thought I was being a jerk who now understand. Unfortunately it often requires blood on the ground to grow some peoples maturity in this sport....something I have tried to fight as best I can. Its a shitty way to grow up.

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[btucker 0]

feel for you - that is a big shit sandwich life is asking you to eat.

My partner had the same issue in December with her mum, who sucome to her illness after Christmas. It has a very difficult time for both of us. It does take abit of time, but it will get better for both of you.

It's a cliche; Alot of our love ones have died, only the lucky ones died doing what they love.



To finish my post on a high note, someone from DZ.com used to have as a sig "I want to die like my grandfather, peacefully in his sleep. Not yelling and screaming like the other people in his car".

Blue Dreams Benno

[Eiley 0]

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It's a cliche; Alot of our love ones have died, only the lucky ones died doing what they love.

Huh? My partner died in a canopy collision at age 27.

I can't help thinking it would have been much luckier for him to have been able to keep skydiving and then die at 101 - even if it meant dying while doing something he hated, like having a rectal exam or eating pumpernickel bread.

nothing to see here

[Zenister 0]

as opposed to dying at 28 in a car wreck?

you cant control the moment, but your actions can affect the manner...

everyone dies.. would you rather have spent the last moments of your life doing something you truly enjoyed or simply commuting to work??

its not how much time you have that counts.. its what you DO with the time you have...

____________________________________
Those who fail to learn from the past are simply Doomed.

[mirage62 0]

I just ignore it.

Works for me

Kevin Keenan is my hero, a double FUP, he does so much with so little

[katzurki 0]

If you've read Glen Cook, it'll click: Soldiers live. And wonder why.

[Eiley 0]

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as opposed to dying at 28 in a car wreck?

If it was as quick as the canopy collision? Yes please. The extra year would have been nice.

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you cant control the moment, but your actions can affect the manner...

everyone dies.. would you rather have spent the last moments of your life doing something you truly enjoyed or simply commuting to work??

Um... I'd be worm food. I'd have no "rathers" about it. I'm pretty sure in the few seconds between hit and death he wasn't thinking "Well, at least I'm going to die skydiving".

Quote

its not how much time you have that counts.. its what you DO with the time you have...

Sure. And if he'd had the extra 60 or so years that he should've he would have DONE a whole lot more than he did in his 27 years.
You seem to be making a somewhat erroneous assumption that just because someone lives to a ripe old age they haven't "really" lived.

I have an 81-year-old regular at my DZ who sure would dispute that.

nothing to see here

[bozo 0]

In the first ten years I spent in the sport I lost 3 friends. Not really close friends but close enough.
I was affected....digested the loss and drove on.

If you look at the Bonfire you will see a thread, "It's Been Five Years" The person in that thread became as close to me as anyone in 26 years skydiving.

We fought, we teased....we hated one another and loved one another... but most of all we understood one another.
When I got the call from Lodi that she had gone in, it was as if someone had kicked me in the stomach. I had never dealt with this.
The next day I went to the DZ and made a solo ......to think and reflect.Five years later I'm still jumping.
People die....we go on.

bozo

bozo
Pain is fleeting. Glory lasts forever. Chicks dig scars.

[cocheese 0]

Deal or No deal ?


We make new friends when we jump.
It hurts however/whenever they die.
But it's easier knowing that they lived the dream of human flight.

[RandomLemming 0]

I lost quite a few friends and family members in the 2 years before I moved to the UK, and I didn't deal with at all at the time. I laughed it off, toughed it out and became a workaholic.

10 years later I'm finally paying for it. I've turned 30 and realised I wasted the last 10 years of my life hiding from my feelings and from death. I used to climb, bungee jump and race cars when I could. Then when my mom went, I packed it all in. I moved to sitting in front of a computer 12 hours a day making money.

I guess what I'm saying is that maybe I would have felt like a moron for balling my eyes out and wailing like a girl, but it would have been healthier to deal with things then, rather than leaving them this long and dealing with them in the ways I have been for the past few years.

re-reading this, I'm not putting it right I guess... Hopefully this makes sense to someone :)

[rickjump1 0]

There is one consolation here: they died doing something they loved. They would want you to go on. Do so. When you get old, instead of counting sheep, you count dead people and wonder why you are still here.

Do your part for global warming: ban beans and hold all popcorn farts.

[Ron 10]

Quote

re-reading this, I'm not putting it right I guess... Hopefully this makes sense to someone :)

Made perfect sense, thanks for sharing.

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[Eiley 0]

Quote

Quote

re-reading this, I'm not putting it right I guess... Hopefully this makes sense to someone :)

Made perfect sense, thanks for sharing.

What he said.

nothing to see here

[kallend 2,148]

Just before the 2001 Nationals we lost two members of our 10-way team in a canopy collision.

We held an open meeting at the DZ the next day. Friends who had not intended to compete volunteered to go to Eloy if we still wanted to go, so we decided to go ahead and compete anyway. I think all of us had the distinct impression that our lost teammates were with us there on every jump.

As it happened we won the Godfrog trophy (picture attached), and we engraved our team's plaque on the trophy with the names of our lost friends. We felt that our link to them and their link to skydiving was cemented in this way. Their names are displayed at some DZ or other, wherever the Godfrog trophy goes.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[darnknit 0]

my first twenty-one years on the planet were pretty easy on me when it came to people "shirking their mortal coil".

the last nineteen years have been a little different. one of my brothers(my hero) is dead, so is my mother, as well as tons of skydiving friends( and i do mean that literally).

although every loss to me has been different in terms of the way i experience it, one thing has always been constant. i have always taken a moment to be grateful for the fact that i got to know the person i will never see again.

a planet full of billions of people, and yet, this one person decided to become part of my life.

that's like winning the lottery, because they were going to die sooner or later anyway, and they chose to spend some of that precious time with me.

it doesn't make the pain go away, but it does help me.

the only other thing i can offer is a quote from my sister-in-law regarding my brothers death.

"this isn't something i will get over, it is something i will go through."

blue stuff,
p.j.

pulling is cool. keep it in the skin

[Trae 1]

in reply to "How did you deal / not deal with the loss "
.....................

Lost count now Koppel although I used to see their faces all the time now most have receded into warm memories.
Thankfully most were not close friends so the personal impact was lessened.

I deal with it by speaking up and not tolerating blatantly irresponsible stupidity when I see it.

If it makes it seem like smartarsery --tough titties.
I KNOW I've saved a few along the way .

Myself included

[tbrown 26]

One of the reasons I hung it up back in 1981 (I eventually returned in 2003), was that too many friends had gone in or had close calls. I had a feeling that all I had to do was keep jumping for another season or two and my number would come up. That and I got married, my wife never asked me to quit but life has its chapters and I was ready to turn the page.

Since coming back there have been some deaths here in So. Cal. Not anybody I knew especially well, really I only ever ever met one of them just once. But when I hear about people getting hurt or dying I can't help but think, "Oh God, here we go again, this is one part of the sport I didn't miss at all when I was out". No matter what other people say, I personally believe the sport is safer than it used to be, even with new hazards like hotter canopies. But if a close friend were to go in I don't honestly know how I'd feel about it. It's never easy and in my experience back in the old days there was always somebody who gave it up every time somebody else went in. This is a hardball game we play, thankfully bad things really don't happen very often. The decision to jump and to keep on jumping is always a deeply personal decision that you have to make and which nobody can judge you for.

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !