My First Float in a Sensory Deprivation Tank
Weightless Float Center, Louisville KY
Well it's been two weeks at the helm of Weightless Float Center in Louisville, Kentucky and we salty as can be...in the best way possible!
Floating, for Louisville, has been incredibly well received thus far, and more and more people are coming out of the woodwork--- keen on floating for one reason or another, people's interests span the board from general curiosity to PTSD, improved mental awareness, peak athletic performance, and a want to get submerged in the slippery salts of weightlessness.
Each time someone comes in I can't help but ask how they heard about floating, how they heard about Weightless Float Center and if they've done it before. My favorite answer to any of those questions is that they've never floated before. It gives me great joy to know we're sending these vessels across the calm waters of tranquility, but there's no telling what they'll see on their trip down the river. I remember my first float very well...
I was healing from a broken bone that compromised the structural integrity of my entire body; the scaffolding of my framework had been kinked like a battered set of armour and I was almost certain I would never feel 'OK' again. I slung my sling off (gingerly), and frustratingly tried to run my good arm through my long hair as I stood in the shower, wincing at every minute movement...needless to say I was in a bit of pain.
When I stepped into the tank and slowly lowered myself into the water I was startled at how buoyant I was in the saturated Epsom salt solution. It took me aback as I shifted my weight and effortlessly popped up off the bottom of the shallow pool. "OK", i thought, "I'm into this.".
After a few moments of getting situated to my surroundings I eased my head back into the water and felt the last pangs of pain dissolve like a salt crystal in a warm bath. I was floating. And it felt so damn good.
It had been months in a sling. Months of holding my arm close to my body. Visibly uncomfortable in the most hospitable positions; again, i was certain I would not feel 'OK' for the rest of my life. Compound fractures are no joke, especially a spiraled clavicle fracture and a cracked skull from a late '80s blue Mercedes Benz at 6:30am on a busy street...but in there, in the tank, I was weightless.
I laughed. And it hurt to laugh, but I laughed harder, and it hurt more and I laughed harder still! Eventually I cooled my jets, realized how important the stillness of my body was to keeping the water placid and my brain from realizing what was up/down/all around, and let myself drift...
I was about 10minutes in, although it could have been 2min or 45min (time is a different beast in the tank), when I got a muscle twitch. It happens to me a lot, especially before bed, and it shook me from my stillness. I opened my eyes and realized I was still in pitch blackness, realized where I was and what had happened, and set my head back and began to again stare at that special place between your eyes, just above the bridge of your nose where your "3rd eye" is...I was gone.
After my 2hrs was over the owner of the float spa not only knocked on the door, he banged on the door, then sent my girlfriend in after me to see if i was alive. I was alive alright. It was the first time in months and months and months that I could lie down and be comfortable. So comfortable, in fact, that I fell into such a deep sleep that when someone is banging on the door of a room that has no ambient noise AT ALL it's still not possible to wake up...it was the most beautiful quiet, calm, serene sleep I think I've ever had.
Float life is the where it's at.
Blessed to be have the opportunity to be able to float and to provide the community with a place to do the same.
Peace.
Greg (Ellis) Ellis