I’ve posted before about the construction worker who stopped me from crossing the tracks when a train was coming. I was dead on my feet and the signals were always clanging, whether a train was coming or not. This time, one really was, though. There were multiple tracks, and I probably would have been right in the train’s path when it reached the crossing, had he not yanked me back.
More recently, a co-worker gave me CPR after I’d had a grand mal seizure and wasn’t breathing. Dunno if I really would have died otherwise, but it didn’t hurt, and I made sure to let him know it was appreciated. (Unlike some of the save-ees in the other thread!)
I knew was close once when the ER doc walked and said, “So, have you ever been intubated before tonight?” I dodged it though.
One of the other firefighters saved my husband recently. They were buddied, going into a confined space fire. I think it was like a utility hallway between hangers. Anyway, in full gear you can’t really feel if anything touches you. As he walked into a narrow space, some live electrical wires came down right where he was standing, his buddy pulled him back quickly enough they missed him by centimeters. He would probably have been DRT. (That’s a pre-hospital term… Dead right there.)
I made the guy a big batch of cookies, that hubby was to give him at work. Silly hubby ate them! I made more and took them in myself.
My dad performed the Heimlich on me when I was 9 years old and choking on a piece of Halloween candy (a jawbreaker). It was pretty scary. My mom blocked a knife-wielding guy’s access to me; he wasn’t going to stab me anyway but she didn’t know that at the time.
I cut my arms badly trying to take a window air conditioner out of the window by myself. I ended up getting 50 exterior stiches in my left arm and 19 in my right arm. If I had been alone I would have bled to death, because I went into shock when I saw the skin on my arm open up and reveal the nice shiny white tendons in there. Fortunately a friend was there and wrapped up my arms - when I woke up he already had them wrapped and was warming up the car to take me to the hospital.
Why? Did he forget the number to 911?
I’m always amazed at the people who will drive themselves or friends or family to a hospital in such dire straits they could die on the way.
I’m not critizing you, Snakescatlady, you weren’t expected to think straight. Even people in the biz do silly things like that. A nurse I worked with cut off (yes off )his thumb while playing with big boy toys and drove himself and his thumb to the ER :smack:
I’m not sure I get this. It’s one thing to drive yourself if you’re hurt, but if a perfectly healthy friend is nearby he can probably get you to the hospital faster than it would take an ambulance to show up and then go to the hospital.
I remember choking on a straw when i was very little, in the backseat of the car, and my mom hanging over the seat extracting it from my throat. But no one has ever mentioned it to me (and this was when I was like 3 or 4) so I may not have been choking, just being prevented from choking.
When i was 16 or so I nearly drowned in some rapids and a kayaker pulled me out. I think he and his kayak friends hang out in that part of the rapids to pull people out, but at the time I swore he was an angel from heaven. He had his name on the back of his lifejacket - Bob Suerte.
The house where the accident happened was way out in the country, and not easy to find even if you knew where you were going. Since he already had the bleeding stopped, it made sense to take me in rather that have me wait for hours while an ambulance tried to find the place.
Echoing Snakescatlady, for people who live out in the country, it’s probably vastly faster to drive yourself than dial 911. In my hometown, you’d have to wait for the EMTs to get the call and drive to the hospital, then for the ambulance with the EMTs to drive to you, then finally to drive you back to the hospital. Much faster to get their yourself, if possible.
This is how it used to work - not sure if they’ve changed the rules lately to require EMTs to stay at the hospital when they’re on call.
I remember when we had an accident in highschool involving my PE teacher and a golf club - while the guy sat there bleeding, I was thinking, “Put him in my car - I’ll drive him there!” It was up the hill, maybe a mile? Coulda been there in five minutes. Poor guy sat there for 15 until the ambulance finally came.
When I was 3 or so I had the flu or something and went to the hospital to get an IV drip. They gave me the wrong drug :smack: (you can see where this is going). Anyway I had a bad reaction and went into shock. I remember shivering a lot but not being cold, and having difficulty talking. Eventually my mother basically hijacked a truck and took me to another hospital where I got whatever it was that brought me out of shock. I hear it was a pretty close call.
Well, a surgeon saved my life when he un-strangulated a section of my bowel. Another couple of days, and it would have burst, and I would have died a horrible, lingering death.
At a lake with family swimming. I was wading out to deeper water and stepped off a ledge, and my sister’s girlfriend, who was right behind me, grabbed me and pulled me out. I could swim, but it took me completely by surprise and I plummeted like a stone! Had she not been there, to this day I still don’t think I would have regained my wits, and probably would have drowned.
Even people in the biz do silly things like that. A nurse I worked with cut off (yes off )his thumb while playing with big boy toys and drove himself and his thumb to the ER :smack: