Armed robbery at work. Depressed skull fracture with subdual hematoma.
By random accident, a co-worker dropped by to chat on his way home from his second job, and called the cops before I bled to death. The surgeons cut my head open, vacuumed the blood clots out of my brain, and put in a metal plate to hold the pieces of my skull together.
Over a decade later, the busted thumb gives me more trouble than the busted skull.
I had 2 serious bouts of Rheumatic Fever when I was a kid.
I had burst appendix and a bowel obstruction at the same time when I was 12.
I had severe blood poisoning which of course put me in the hospital on the 4th of July.
I had a mastoid operation when i was about a 4 year old. That was serious back in 1948 or so.
Such frightening stories. I guess I just lead a dull life. Never been in an airplane crash, car crash, bike accident or anything like that. Never been a boat that capsized. So I guess the nearest was 46+ years ago when I had a heart attack, but survived. For a while anyway.
I was in the back of a truck, coming back to the barracks from time out in the field, while in the Army in Korea. Truck tipped over on it’s side, off of the elevated road, when the edge of the road crumbled. Those of us in back were tumbled around with all the heavy equipment and something could have easily squashed us, but we all got lucky, nothing more than strains and sprains. Scary as hell though, time stretched out oddly. It couldn’t have taken more than a few seconds, but it felt like the fall went on a long time.
Mine was at 880 in the units Americans use.
This is really mild compared to most people’s, but hey:
I used to be a pretty decent trampoliner. One day I was just warming up, not even doing the fancy stuff yet, and I threw a crash dive. This is when you go up, turn over in midair, head towards the bed head-down with your arms above your head, and then tuck in your chin at the last minute so you land on your back. It looks scary but it’s very far from high-level stuff.
Only this time I didn’t turn over far enough, so I realised I couldn’t make the back drop. Instead I figured I could land in a front drop (on my stomach), so I pulled in my hands to my chest, which is how you land in a front drop. So I didn’t even have my hands to break my fall when I hit the bed smack on the back of my head, just above the top of my spine.
I still remember thinking, perfectly clearly and calmly, ‘So this is it. This is the big one that everyone’s afraid of.’ Apparently I nearly gave the rest of the team a heart attack; they were sure I’d broken my neck. They caught me when I came flying off and made me lie very still for a few minutes until everyone realised that, somehow, I hadn’t done anything serious. I had a vicious sore neck for a week or two, and I was never too keen on crash dives afterwards, but that was it.
I didn’t tell my mother until after I’d stopped trampolining, though.
You know everytime I see your user name I remember you’re the one that happened to.
The most vivid incident was my crash a few years ago - I’ve mentioned it here before: I was laking a left-hand turn onto a highway, and was t-boned by an XTerra going at least 70mph. The impact was just forward of the front door, and shoved the engine over by about 3 feet. If they’d hit me 12 inches back, I’d have lost a leg; 24 inches back and I’d be dead.
The EMTs told me they were sure that I’d have at least some broken bones when they saw my car, and were surprised that I left the car under my own power (actually, I did a Duked of Hazzard out the driver’s side window when someone yelled at me that my car had caught fire - I can’t imagine how my fat ass fit through the window).
But when I really think about it, quite possibly the closest I came to death was about 16 years ago, when my wife (then-girlfriend) and I were at a party, both completely wasted, and jumping around on a friend’s huge outdoor trampoline. I came down a split second before she did, and she launched me at a 45-degree angle, about 15 or 20 feet. I landed in a perfect tuck-and-roll (despite no gymnastics training whatsoever), and bounced to my feet, giggling like a schoolgirl, no worse for wear other than some mud on my back.
When I looked at my landing spot (clearly evident in the muddy yard), I’d landed about two inches past a gnarly, huge, concrete paving block. If I’d have under-rotated, and gone just a tad shorter, I’d have cracked my skull for sure, if not broken my neck.
I knew I talked about it too much! 
When I had my back surgery (3 total) the surgeon nicked my dura. That is the gooey sack that surrounds your spine and holds in all your spinal fluid. Didn’t know it right away, so they send me home. I get the worst headache that I can every imagine. It was so bad, that I actually wished I was dead. Went to the ER. They had me in the ICU for 2 weeks. Told me that if I moved and the dura burst, I would be a gonner.
Funny, but at the time I was so out of it on pain meds (demerol) that the thought of being in grave danger didn’t bother me. The only thing that bothered me was that I wanted a damn cigarette (don’t smoke any longer).
The other time that sticks out was going down the highway at 65mph and I crest a hill and some ahole is coming the wrong way at a high rate of speed in a giant Cadillac. I was driving a little Toyota MR2. The guy missed me by 2 or 3 inches. I actually stopped after he passed and was shaking.
i knew somehow this thread would turn into a competition.
Swimming with two of my boys a few years ago in the Atlantic off Nags Head, N.C., and got caught in a rip tide. Just barely made it back into shore towing them. Very, very scary.
When I was 6 weeks old, I apparently stopped breathing and had no pulse for a while. I was diagnosed with SIDS. I always wonder if that might be the reason for my seizure disorder.
Probably not entirely applicable, but when I was in college and living in South America, a friend and I caught a ride from a guy in an off-duty cab. My friend was hammered and I had a bad feeling about the guy. I didn’t want to get in, but my friend was determined, so I got in, too, because I didn’t want her to get raped or something. The guy promptly stopped by a liquor store, picked up a few friends who crammed into the back seat on either side of us and started groping us and pulling at our clothes while the driver headed toward the mountains. My friend managed to get the car door open and we both started screaming. We were thrown out of the cab in the foothills and left to walk back to town. I shudder to think of what could’ve happened if they hadn’t decided we weren’t worth the trouble. At the time, people disappeared occasionally in that region and were never heard from again.
When I was a baby my parent’s cat (they had him for 2 years before they had me) woke up my Mom and was pacing between our bedrooms. She checked on me and I wasn’t breathing properly. There is a history of crib death (now known as SIDS) in my family so I’m positive that if their cat hadn’t woke up my Mom I’d have died.
When I was about 14 I was walking along the train tracks on my way home one day. I was deep in thought and wasn’t paying any attention to the train whistle that I was so used to…until I looked behind me and realized that the train was only like 5 blocks away. Stepped carefully off the tracks and never walked along active train tracks again.
A few years ago I was in a taxi in Hamilton, ON going to a friend’s house. I didn’t know where his house was but I had a Google Map. I handed the map to the taxi driver and he glanced down at it and said he’d look at it when he was stopped. We were approaching a green light and he looked back up in time to see a car SPEEDING…I can’t emphasize SPEEDING enough - through the red light. He was able to slam on the brakes in time. If he had looked at that map a second longer…
That’s just nasty. How was your vision? Never mind reading a book, I could no longer watch TV. Yet somehow I convinced myself that I was OK because I’d seen a doctor (I was misdiagnosed at first).
And then there are guys who are turned on by scars… 
When I was about 7 or 8, I convinced my brother (don’t ask me why) to get into a wooden drum, with a hinged door on the top (we had it as some type of storage container that was empty at the time), with me. He, 4 years younger, got in the drum first then I followed. When we both got in it was very tight in there but I think that was the point that, to see, if we can fit in there and hide if we had to, for example, in hide-n-seek situation etc.
Once I swung closed the top door, that was attached with a hinge at one end and a latch for hasp on the other end, I realized the latch arm that was attached to the door naturally swung down and latched on the loop of the hasp: the door was locked (though without the padlock) and I could not push it open with my head. I could sense my brother knew something was wrong in his silence but there wasn’t enough room for us to communicate anything at all as we couldn’t move and it was dead suffocating. Out of sheer panic I hit the door with my head a number of times until I was dizzy but the door did not budge and this totally unrealistic yet too real doom set in. Then I gave a few more hit with my now numb head. The final hit flung open the door.
We didn’t say anything when we got out nor did he say anything to Mom which was an extremely odd thing as he was the ultimate snitch and mother’s boy. I would’ve got hell from Mom if she found out. He never missed any chance to get me in trouble but this time not a word; I guess that freaked him out enough that he didn’t even want to acknowledge the possibility of what could’ve happened. I don’t even remember how my head was…
Now that we are adults we still don’t utter a word about the incident to anyone or to each other but we know it was a point in our lives. Can you imagine what my mother would have found?
I ran across this picture of a child found in a crate after missing for six weeks:Do Not Click-Gruesome Picture (6th photo). There is this very strange vibe I get from the image and it’s not all repulse and fear… that I never want to look at it again yet I also want to save it; it’s more of an attraction… something of a kinship… or a kindred soul like feeling and acknowledgement or sorts like… ‘yeah, you there and I, here’…
[quote=“brittekland, post:77, topic:595328”]
“Once I swung closed the top door, that was attached with a hinge at one end and a latch for hasp on the other end, I realized the latch arm that was attached to the door naturally swung down and latched on the loop of the hasp: the door was locked (though without the padlock) and I could not push it open with my head. I could sense my brother knew something was wrong in his silence but there wasn’t enough room for us to communicate anything at all as we couldn’t move and it was dead suffocating. Out of sheer panic I hit the door with my head a number of times until I was dizzy but the door did not budge and this totally unrealistic yet too real doom set in. Then I gave a few more hit with my now numb head. The final hit flung open the door.”
Wow brittekland…when I was reading this I was cringing. PHEW! Close one! Glad to hear that you didn’t give up and that you kept hitting the door with your head. I was really curious about the link you posted. I wanted to open it, but decided not to. I’ve had a nice day and I don’t want to end it with an image such as that. Your writing is terrifically descriptive.
Last July 14th my cardiologist discovered that I had a 90-95% blockage of my LAD (they call it “the Widowmaker”). They took me right into surgery, do not pass go, pay 180,000 dollars…
I was once in the same room as Chuck Norris when he was angry.
Sorry, I got nothing