Basejumper.com - archive

Has anybody on here quit base? I know it sounds stupid to ask since they may not visit here anymore. But I must admit, I thought about the recent fatatlity, that if it was a certain person I knew, I might quit. Not for any other reason but that I jived well with them in their fun but also caution and respect for the sport.

I've always had the mindset that I know the risks of our sport. Putting all macho manly shit aside, I wonder if I really do sometimes.

No disrespect meant to anyone, just having some thoughts that outsiders might not understand.

yah I think about quiting all the time.
quiting being an asshole
quiting whoreing around
quiting mis speling evrything
quiting drugs
quiting being the coolest fucking ninja ever
but REHAB IS FOR QUITERS and im not going to rehab no way no how

by the way we are all gonna die anyway.so I might as well piss a bunch of people off when i go in. it would be so cool to splater in front of a bunch of torrist

Just starting to skydive myself with the intent of a BASE jump or two someday, so I have no experience in this sport to go on. I did, however, spend almost 15 years in a sport where I lost several good friends and had the misfortune to watch a couple of them die in front of me. When something like that happens you just take a step back, ask yourself if the rewards are worth the risk, and go from there. If they are then you say a prayer for the departed, drink a toast to them and move on without dwelling over it. If not, then maybe it's best to take some time off. In a sport that prides itself on free choice and individualism nobody can critique you for choosing either path.

I hope this helps in some way, and I also hope you are never faced with the situation you mentioned.

when i started skyjumping, i thought about never starting to base. but i got lost in it. i got lost in the beauty of the sport. i think about my best freind from the 1st grade who is my hardcore jumping partner, and i think about him going in. and it scares the hell out of me, i talk to him about it seriously, and it seems as if we both agree. maybe we are just macho talking, but it feels real to me. i dont want to quit now, and we both understand the risks, we both have had very close freinds die doing the things we love, even i had a very near death injury in febuary, and that made him quit paragliding, but i dont know if he would quit base had that injury been base.

I like BASE, it is just another thing I do that could kill me, and I dont Drive Motorcycles. so i think its going to be ok.

Yeah, well after shattering my right tib/fib and a year of recovering before I could walk without a limp or run faster than a lopsided jog; after having people I cared about die; after having people go in right in front of me; after experiencing the TRUE fear you get after knowing how badly it can be when it goes all pear-shaped; after watching my freezer door fill up with photos of deaders, the comets of our sport doomed to die too soon; after changing careers and finally discovering I wasn't so keen on dying now that I had a good living ahead of me; after finally admitting the risk and reward were not adding up the way they did in the beginning; and the final blow, Darcy...


I quit.


I did my last jump at Kjerag in July 2005, in memory of Darcy. I haven't wanted to put on a rig and jump anything since...and it took all this time to even be ok with not WANTING to jump. I had so much of "who I was" wrapped up in jumping I couldn't visualize "who I would be" if I wasn't a BASE jumper. Then after all the mental masturbation you can possibly imagine, I finally came to the place where I was at peace with not wanting to jump. It's ok to decide your life no longer is worth one fracked-up BASE jump. And I'm no less strong or free than I was when I jumped off stuff regularly. I only have decided I have many things in life worth living for, and so for now I'll live those things.

Of course, I still have my Prism and FLiK 293 in the closet....you never know when a trip to Norway will come up and I'll be wanting to run off #6 full tilt screaming my fool head off...

So I say "I'm in retirement", and look at Nick DG... back out of retirement and making a better show of it than Ozzy...

I may jump again, in fact, I probably will, but for now I'm learning to be a Healer and who knows? Maybe someday I'll be healing y'all after a baddass weekend of BASE...

And I still love it all, and most of you jokers as well (there's no accounting for taste), and I hate wondering "who's next?"

Peace,
Karen

it sounds like you healed up Karen?
I never did

I will quit the day i dont get what i want from this spoprt,it might be tomorrow perhaps i die old in a wheelchair just angry that i cant jump anymore.. i dont know.

I cant blame people for stop jumping,its the same as climb down admitting that this aint you,atleast for now...

I’m “retired” as well. Karen’s post sums up a lot of my thoughts, but the biggest thing for me was the risk vs. reward issue. For me, BASE was a choice and like most big choices in my life I looked at all the variables, pros and cons, etc. (I guess that’s just the analytical engineer in me.) At first, the rewards didn’t seem big enough to outweigh the perceived risks, but after I did some ground crew for a few friends and went to bridge day just to watch, I finally understood the risks better and realized that the rewards were a lot more significant than I had originally thought.

I loved every minute of my short lived BASE “career” and every one of my 90 jumps was “worth it”. That was a different time in my life though and the variables have changed since then. I had to re-evaluate where I was at in life and what I wanted. I started really questioning if the risks were still worth the rewards, not because the rewards were any less (in fact they were only getting better), but because I was risking a lot more. In the end I determined that all the good things I got from BASE weren’t worth the potential for bad things. That was my call. It’s what worked for me. Just like my decision to start, I had to make my own decision if/when to stop based on the variables that affected me. BASE is all about personal decision, just like life. You have to choose what you want to do then stick with the good and bad aspects of that choice. I still think about BASE a lot and still have a big desire to jump. I miss the trips and adventures that make those one-of–a-kind close friendships. Fortunately, most of my BASE friends were skydiving friends before and we’re still all really close. We’ve always respected (or at least put up with) each other decisions both in jumping and in life, so they don’t look down on me for “leaving” or “giving up”. I may jump again someday if the variables change again, but for now I've made my choice and I'm sticking to it. Whatever you choose, it’s your choice and as long as you’ve given it a lot of thought, those around you can’t really judge you.

Maybe that old saying bout “BASE is to skydivers what skydiving is to wuffos” should have another part about how BASE jumpers see retired BASE jumpers the same as wuffos see skydivers?

I quit and was only 40 jumps into my career. It's hard to give up the friends you make and the good people you get to meet and especially all the good times on the base trips. The hardest part also was thinking that I wasted my mentor's time (who by the way did excellent training and is a very good jumper), but it was a decision i had to make. I made 1 minor mistake on a 250' foot SL jump (and was lucky enough to walk away with only a sore back and knee), but only by sheer luck!! It was a very simple and very stupid oversight on my part. It was amazing the millions of thoughts that ran through my head in the milli-seconds in took for me to decide that I was going in. Just by sheer luck and probably a higher power, my chute opened about 6 feet from the ground. But after the fact, laying in the grass, the only thing going through my mind were those thoughts and i simply decided it was not worth it to me anymore......I was not ready to go out that way.

Wouldn't take back any part of my short lived jumping career, but i'm not ready to start it again either......and don't regret my decision either.

mind sharing what happened?

It's as simple as that. If someone is okay with the chance of themselves dying during a jump, then they will continue to jump. For those who have decided that they didn't want to die while jumping, then they will quit. Everything else concerning who, what, when, where and why are all irrelevant.

Very simple: Grabbing the slider up rig instead of the slider down

which led to poor body position (wondering what was taking so long) which led to a whole freaking bunch of line twists which trapped the slider about 3/4 the way up. This ensued into alot of kicking and flailing and just plain sheer luck.

i hear this alot, and have to disagree... i dont want to die , while jumping.
i dont want to die in a car wreck.
i dont want to die period.
does this mean i should stop jumping, because of all the what ifs?
what if i go in?>
what if what if what if..

we all die eventually. it is the only true constant.
once you truly come to terms with that, then
who what why where become irrelevant..

all we have are our human connections. make them count

I pretty much agree with wat Bryan said. I reailze I could die doing many of the things I do, however I don't actually think I'm going to die anytime soon. I also realize I could die in some obscure manner like cancer or a plane crashing into my house.

While I'm not ready to die, I do feel my life is very complete. If I wasn't participating in life as I wanted then I would feel dead. That participation is entirely personal. For some it's playing golf and hanging at the clubhouse on weekends. For me it's jumping off or out of things, among others. To each their own.

I've always assumed I would see friends broken or killed jumping and I have. I really didn't think it would happen to me, yet I broke my leg a couple of weeks ago. Does it make me reconsider? You better believe it! Does it make me want to stop? Not yet.

That ability to rethink what you're currently doing and take a different direction, if you choose, is one of the ultimate freedoms. Exercise your freedom as you desire and don't regret your decision. Besides if you really regret the decision you can always start jumping again.

no dout Brian these cry babies make me sick why there safe in there beds tonight ill be leaping from tall building's and my heart will race and ill be alive
but the rest of u can have fun watching reruns of mash and getting fatter and fatter with every show
if u want to run with the big dogs some times u have to eat dog shit

& then there is the concept of base saving one's life ...

one more question. was it just pure mistake you grabbed the wrong rig, and you actually thought you had the s/d rig.. or were you questioning yourself at any point (ride there/exit/etc) - "hmm. this IS my s/d rig... right? ... uh... yah. it is... see ya"?

.. just curious.

Nathan

Never even questioned myself.....because really I thought they were both packed slider down. Realize that if i can make a mistake like this, what else could i do if distracted or something.

what is all this about dieing?

base for me is about living, when base dont give me more life. ill quit....

im affraid of dying.. it would be the worst not seeing my kids grow up..

But jumping makes me feel alive,and feel that i have a great life...

why i keep jumping? becourse i like it out there...