I was staying in Tenderloin once and we were walking back to the hotel at night down what was obviously a dodgy street, and noticed figures ahead of us mucking around in the street when a gun went off. Call me a lily-livered Euro wimp but we did a quick about turn.
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I need a doctor to say how close I was to not waking up, but in my early thirties when I was starting to pay the price for a life well lived I had a gastroscopy, which is where after sedating you they get you to swallow a camera on a lead.
The first does of sedative went in and they asked me to count down from 10 to 1 slowly. I reached 1 and said, “Ok, now what?”, so they gave me a second shot which really did the trick from the little I can remember.
After the investigation they told me because of the double dose I’d had I should stay and wait for the effects to wear off, but I was as high as a kite and lived only 10 minutes walk away, so went home. I remember feeling as though I was flying along the pavement, not walking.
Almost as soon as I got home a pal rang, saying he was in a pub in town with another guy, and would I care to join them, so I put my shoes back on, hopped on a bus and within 30 minutes or so was downing a gallon or so and a few shared bottles of wine.
When I awoke the next morning expecting to feel totally wretched (eating is cheating), I was struck by how great I felt - not even the slightest sign of a headache, let alone a hangover.
I got up, had breakfast and casually read the hospital letter with details of my appointment, which was still on the table where I’d briefly read it. I was about to throw it out but noticed on the other side a large warning printed in bold red font - ON NO ACCOUNT CONSUME ANY ALCOHOL WITHIN 24 HOURS OF THIS APPOINTMENT.
lol
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The swimming stories reminded me of being on a beach alone with my kid when he was about 1. I noticed two kids in an inflatable dingy and tutted to myself at their irresponsible parents. They were swimming not that far away and the sea was flat, but they weren’t paying attention and the kids seemed to be about 7 and 4.
Next I noticed the dingy was further out, pretty damn far out considering how old they were. Plus the people I thought were responsible for them hadn’t moved and were still paying them no attention. I started worrying slightly but didn’t know quite what I could do as I couldn’t leave my own kid alone. Besides, no one lets two of their children just drift slowly out to sea, do they? Surely it was actually fine somehow?
However it really seemed a current was taking them now even further out. Then the older one jumped in and tried to pull the boat, couldn’t and also couldn’t get back in either. So at that point I picked up my kid, went down to the water and shouted to the people I’d originally figured were the parents.
(It was a big, sparsely populated beach with no reception or life guards and they were the closest people to me.)
I shouted that I thought the kids were in trouble. One of them said, “what kids?” Confirming my new suspicions that they had nothing to do with them. I pointed and the one responding eventually turned and peered in a casual, unhurried manner while the other two remained uninterested.
I started to shout that I thought he should try and help them when a guy ran past me shouting, “I’m going.” Relieved that my incompetent feeling efforts were now superfluous I just watched. He reached them quickly and got the one out back in the boat, but it took him a good five minutes or more to actually pull them into the shallows where he could stand. It included an uncomfortable period where it seemed he wasn’t actually getting closer.
As that went on maybe 5 or 6 other people drifted over to watch, but it was literally just as the kids walked out of the sea that someone responsible for them showed up. They grabbed their hands, started telling them off and didn’t give the tired looking rescuer a second look.
I’ve no idea if they were in real danger or not, though I’d guess a worried seven year old can drown in the most benign water conditions.
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Some good stories here. Jbro, wow.
Michaeldavis, sorry, that’s hard, I was around the same age as well.
For encounters with death that I have had, whew, it’s probably more times than I can even remember.
One of the closest I think I came was when I was on a new medication, and must have accidentally double dosed or something. I was on my way to see a movie with friends, and within ~2 minutes of me leaving my car, I went into a severe grand mal seizure that lasted a few minutes. I came to in the ambulance and was extremely confused even as I got to the hospital. Had it happened just a few mins before I could have died. Had I not been around anyone I could have died. I could have died from the seizure itself. I think it had happened one other time without me knowing, because a few days previous I randomly woke up on my floor with zero knowledge of how I got there and with a splitting headache. Lucky.
Another time I had a severe ulcer on my colon and lost so much blood they had to put me on the cardiac floor and gave me a few units of blood. I dont know how close I was to dying but it felt like death the entire time.
The most scared I ever was, was when I went backpacking in the sequoias and on our 8 mile hike in we hit rain. The problem was it was still winter (there was even snow on the ground still) and the air temp was about 34. I got hot from hiking so I took my jacket off, which was fine until we stopped as it got dark. Then the temp began to drop rapidly and we were soaking wet, as well as all of our sleeping bags and equipment.
It was too wet to start a fire and as I entered a stage of hypothermia I never have before (i stopped shivering and started to feel warm) and I got really scared. I remember we went into survival mode and boiled water into our canteens and shoved them into our wet sleeping bags and tried to not die. I was looking at old pictures all night thinking I wasn’t gonna make it. Lol. Never been so cold.
Another time i was 18ish and down in rosarito mexico, buying prescription meds with some scumbag friends I had. I had too many muscle relaxers + booze and apparently went into such a deep sleep that they had trouble waking me for a while. I was probably ODing and they didnt get a doctor or anything, they just started hitting me super hard in the face and balls to wake me up, which ended up working.
I can think of probably a half dozen other times in my early 20’s where I could have easily died but didnt. I have had a horseshoe up my ass my entire adult life.
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I read some last night and couldn’t remember a story and then remembered this one.
I was 12-13 at a buddy’s place and we were chilling in his bedroom. I went to the bathroom and when I came back in and walked past the corner into the room he had a 12 gauge pointed at my head. I grew up learning exactly the opposite of that shit and would never ever do that even to this day so I freaked the fuck out. He told me to relax because it wasn’t loaded. He pumped it and a shell flew out of the chamber. Dude is one of the biggest 2A dipshits I know today. I was that close to splatter.
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My first memory is my only close encounter with my death. I was three and was at a party with my family where there was a swimming pool. I couldn’t swim so was wearing the old school floaties. At some point - I decided I could swim without floaties (not sure why, maybe because I saw other kids doing it). I was out of the pool and took my floaties off to run and jump in the pool. I still have a very vivid memory of sinking to the bottom of the pool and just watching the water. Good thing kids instinctively know to hold their breach as I just remember it being very serene with no clue I was in danger. My dad jumped in pretty quickly and got me out, but he not been watching who knows what would have happened.
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One of my favorite final messages from an internet guy shortly before he passed from cancer <3
Liver cancer here, result of extreme iron-overload undetected for far too long. Metastatic now. Bad. There is nothing that can be done.
So, really anyday now. But here is the thing, we are all dying. Ever second that goes by is one second closer to it. So today, tomorrow, next week, next year…all of those moments are way more valuable than you realize. You don’t understand how short life is until you can see the end.
I’m 42. I won’t live to see my daughter graduate from high school. I won’t see go to prom, go to college, get married, have kids, all of that. I won’t be here to comfort her when she gets her heartbroken. I won’t be here to support her, take care of her, watch out for her. My wife is a wreck. Somedays it’s like I’m already dead, and she’s just lost in grief. There are no words to make her feel better. I cannot tell her everything is going to be okay because I am going to die. She knows it, I know it, there is no easy way to accept that.
Day to day? Make the best out of it. I’m not blowing money left and right because I want to leave it behind for my girls. Quit smoking. Ironic. Spend a lot of time getting my shit together for when I am gone. Who I want to have what. Insurance, bills, finances sorted out and set up to make it as easy as possible for my wife at the transition. Have written some letters for my daughter to get when she is older. Have put together a lot of home videos from when she was little, stuff she won’t remember and I won’t be around to tell her about… early birthdays, time we spent together, I want her to have those memories. Made two videos, one for my wife and one for my girl. I want them to be able to see me happy, not hurting, see my face, hear my voice. Got my shit together as far as last wishes, when I want them to pull the plug and let me go, how I don’t want a funeral. I’ve set aside money for them to throw a party as a memorial. Drink and eat and share good memories.
Other than that I go to work when I can, work from home when I can’t. Spend as much time with my girls, my parents, my sisters family, my dogs as humanly possible. Eat good steak, drink good alcohol, enjoying every sunrise, sunset, and moment in between. We all have to make the best of what we’ve got while we’ve got it. There is no better time than today, because tomorrow isn’t promised to any of us.
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My uncle drilled in our heads at a young age “You can’t beat the river”. It has stuck with me until this day.
Jbro’s story reminded me of a person I knew who died… He was an avid whitewater kayaker and died in a river. I feel like if you do certain kinds of risky activities you have to be okay with the chance of death you’re assuming. That doesn’t help much when it happens though. Another consideration of variable effectiveness is that they “died doing what they loved.” Sounds kind of like BS at times but at other times kind of helps.
The other death I can think of was a guy I knew was shot and killed by another friend. Cliffs on the story is that they were both in a hard-partying group that got into “opium” (really black tar heroin) to the point of injecting it. The victim stole the killer’s stash of money and drugs, so the killer went to his house and shot him.
A crazy twist to the story was that I had not long before been to the gun range with them and some others and fired some rounds with the exact gun (a .357 revolver) that was used in the shooting. Ugh.
My closest personal brush with death was anaphylactic shock due to a previously-unknown food allergy. I was at school and started to get covered in hives all over my torso and my face got all swollen up. I went to the nurse’s office, but she wasn’t there. While I was waiting for her my throat started to close up and I could hear the air whistling through the small opening that remained. I didn’t understand the danger I was in until the nurse came back, took one look at me, and called 911.
Fortunately I lasted until the medics got there and blasted me full of IV Benadryl (Diphenhydramine). I carried an EpiPen for years after that but gave it up because it’s a pain in the ass to tote around and they’re constantly expiring so you have to rebuy them. I’m just super careful to avoid the foods I know I’m allergic to and carry emergency blister packs of Benadryl around with me.
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Glad you did not die.
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