After reading Deep, by James Nestor, I developed a zeal for freediving and its healing and restorative effects. At first, I wanted to compete. Freediving is one of the few sports in the world where you can start middle-aged and become a champion. My idol and one of the greatest freedivers in the world, Natalia Molchanova, started the sport at 40 and won 23 gold medals before her tragic and untimely death. It’s considered one of the most dangerous sports in the world, but I was drawn to the serene silence of underwater submersion, my love for marine life, and the profound connection I felt with my body each time I submerged beneath the waves. I signed up for champion freediver Lance Lee Davis’s freediving and spearfishing class, excited to take my first steps in this new sport.
Freediving often appears glamorous on Instagram. In one video, I’m plunging into the transparent azure waters of Bora Bora, a seven-foot manta ray gliding gracefully beneath me. My feed is filled with svelte, lithe young women with perfectly sculpted derrieres in tiny bikinis, their long fins slicing the water as they swim alongside dolphins and other sea creatures. But freediving in California isn’t pretty. I can’t bring my carefully styled blowout, lip gloss, and winged eyeliner underwater.
My Performance Freediving International (PFI) freediving class took place in early December, and the water in Redondo Beach was about 55 degrees. I purchased an unflattering camouflage five-millimeter hooded wetsuit for the occasion, topping it off with gloves and booties for warmth.
Getting past the wave breaks was intense. I entered the frigid salt water with a five-pound weight belt strapped around my waist and long fins under one arm. At first, I attempted to jump through the wave break, which knocked me underwater, almost causing me to lose my mask. I soon learned it’s much easier to dive straight in and under the waves, swimming furiously and blindly in the murk to emerge past the break. From there, it’s a seemingly endless 15-minute swim to the diving spot.
I was exhausted after arriving at the buoy and line our instructor had dropped to measure our diving depth. My dreams of competition were quickly dashed. Although our first training session was in a 12-foot-deep pool, it couldn’t prepare us for the feeling of diving underwater headfirst into the open ocean. To pass level one, we needed to consistently hit a depth of 66 feet, about the length of a six-story building. At just 30 feet, I was quickly stumped with equalization issues, unable to do the tricky Frenzel—a complicated technique using the epiglottis to push air into the nasal cavity—to relieve the pressure in my ears and sinuses. Disappointed and frustrated, I returned home and devoted weeks to learning everything I could about equalizing. I watched videos, took classes, and read everything I could find, but I still couldn’t master this technique.
I was heartbroken until I realized that, once again, I was pushing my body for results instead of simply enjoying the practice of freediving. I was so accustomed to using my body like an object and tool, devoid of compassion or feeling for it, instead of appreciating my incredible vessel. It wasn’t so different from using my body in pinup modeling to gain validation, power, and attention from men, twisting my body into uncomfortable contortions for photos and going under the knife for further desirability. I spent years playing the part of the China doll, the dragon lady, and the hypersexualized Asian schoolgirl that fetishists desired. Growing up shy, it was the only way I managed to feel sexy, desired, and in control of my body. The result was violent objectification, both by men and by me. The brutality of my youthful fetishization choices shaped the trajectory of my life and relationships with men, resulting in trauma, depression, dissociation, substance abuse, and twisted relationships.
