Scuba diving in Key Largo was something Nick Scott thought was out of the question after a car wreck left him a paraplegic five years ago.
Yet, in July 2002, he was in full scuba gear, floating and gliding with exotic underwater creatures in the Florida Keys.
A year later, he was mentoring other people with disabilities.
“It’s freeing in a way,” said Scott, 21, of Ottawa, Kan. “The opportunity was just phenomenal. It gives you the motivation to try other stuff.”
That’s what Jim Elliott was thinking in 2001, when he established Diveheart Foundation, a non-profit group based in his Downers Grove home that takes people with disabilities on scuba-diving expeditions.
He has made two trips so far and is planning four next year–all at no cost to the disabled divers.
“When they do it, it’s so out of the ordinary for someone with a disability that it catches them off guard,” said Elliott, 46, a scuba diver since 1976.
It only takes training, minor gear modifications and two certified scuba “buddies” for those with disabilities to scuba dive, perhaps one of the most effective therapies they can receive.
Kristen Johnson, an Aurora University assistant professor and scuba diver who volunteered as a diving buddy on the two Diveheart trips, called the experience “an amazing vehicle” that can motivate teenagers to become more independent.
“We challenge people to go out of their comfort zone, get a little nervous and then process it afterward,” Johnson said. “We’ve seen kids figure out that just because they are injured doesn’t mean they are unable.”
Sara Klaas, director of care coordination at Shriners Hospital for Children in Chicago and the person who orchestrates the trips, said they give young people “the message that no obstacle is too challenging or too great. For us, it’s really about getting kids back to a quality of life that’s as good as it can be.”
Parents learn a lesson too, Klaas said.
“The ripple effect is wonderful,” she said. “It helps families to be able to say, `It’s OK to let go of my 16-year-old.”‘
Greta Neimanas, 15, of Chicago, will be taking her first trip this summer.
In recent weeks, she’s been training at area pools. She is missing her left arm below the elbow.
“It’s not really that difficult,” said Neimanas, a sophomore at Whitney Young Magnet High School who also enjoys water skiing and snorkeling. “But it’s a lot of fun. It’s really gratifying to be able to breathe underwater and know what you’re doing down there.”
Elliott came up with the idea for Diveheart through a personal experience. His daughter, now 24, was born blind and grew increasingly alienated by teasing from classmates.
Elliott’s solution was to become an instructor for blind snow skiers and then to teach his daughter to ski. He recalled that “it turned around her life.”
After he took up scuba diving, Elliott thought the same benefits could be achieved by teaching that skill to people with disabilities. He quit his job in advertising sales to become a full-time scuba instructor in 1997 and “started talking to everybody I knew” about teaching scuba to the disabled.
In April 2001, he established Diveheart, started contacting hospitals and rehabilitation centers. Each trip runs about $15,000 and the organization raises money from individual donations and, most recently, from a “Luau in Lisle” dinner-dance that netted $9,000.
Although scuba diving is what Elliott calls “equipment intensive,” few modifications have to be made for divers with disabilities.
Diveheart works with divers who are paraplegic, who are missing limbs or who have diminished use of limbs–disabilities that present the fewest complications. But Elliott said he is planning to expand the types of disabilities Diveheart can accommodate. The first trip was in July 2002, when a group of six patients from Shriners Hospital for Children in Chicago and 15 buddies traveled to Key Largo. Another group of six went in July this year.
“I was a little nervous,” Scott acknowledged about his first trip underwater. His powerful upper body, compensating for his weakened legs, worked extra hard and used more tank oxygen than an ordinary diver would.
“But I always like to push myself to my limits. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.”
Once he was in the water, he found “a whole new world,” Scott said. “The colors are so vivid. It’s just so beautiful.”
Besides, he said, the volunteers are “phenomenal.”
The volunteers said they feel the same way about the clients. The trips help sensitize them to the needs of the disabled and often convert the volunteers to advocates.
“Sometimes, I think the volunteers get just as much out of it as our kids,” Johnson said. “At the end of the trip, they’re crying. The kids are crying. Everybody’s overwhelmed.”
