About 25 years ago when I was still in college I thought it would be cool to get a motorcycle. I rode it around for about a year with no problems until one day I was riding down this mountain road near where I lived and a deer ran out in front of my bike and I swerved to avoid it, I flew off my bike and into a ditch on the side of the road and was knocked out, my bike fell off the other side of the road and down a sheer cliff face. It was not obvious anyone has ever been there or that there was an accident. I laid there for almost a two days until people started looking for me after missing work. When I came to my legs were messed up, I had broken an ankle, elbow and wrist and couldn't move. I sat there for hours convinced I was going to die. I was pretty upset about it but after a while the anxiety washed away and I just went completely numb. My next memory was waking up in a hospital.
Thank god I was wearing a helmet.
How about you?
I put a gun to my head, ready to end it all.
Woke up in a hospital. No drugs involved.
I drove myself there. The gun was in the glove compartment. Apparently, I self admitted through ED.
I remember NOTHING from gun to my head to waking up in the hospital.
Not sure if that qualifies as near death, but I think I was.
I am better now. That was years ago, I came close again recently, but this time I have answers about myself and a place to start.
A bunch.
Two while snowboarding. First time I hit some rocks that were hidden in fresh snow. When I checked my helmet, a rock had pierced it in the back of my head. It was easily a fatal hit had I not had my helmet on. The second time I accidentally rode off a cliff (took the wrong line). I landed on my back in powder but a snapped branch was sticking up two inches below my left arm pit. Had I fallen four inches to the left, it would have impaled me through the heart.
I lost count how many while surfing. Lost a surfer I was trying to rescue and almost drowned myself.
Oddly, never while downhill skateboard racing.
Twice while riding a motorcycle.
Once in a car. A pickup hydroplaned on the interstate right ahead of me. It went in the ditch, overcorrected and came right at my door at speed. I turned my wheel into it so it wouldn't t-bone me but instead I missed it entirely and all I got was mud on my car and in my underware.
Blockage in three of my four main heart arteries. Two were 99% blocked. It required four emergency stents in my heart. I should be dead for sure from that one but a little voice in my head told me to skip the boat trip and go to the ER because I felt "funny".
Stage 3 cancer. Beat it but lost my singing voice. Fuck cancer.
Thrice, all a long time ago:
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Driving back alone from a group camping trip. Got stuck in a freak snowstorm in the mountains, without chains. Stalled and started sliding back towards a really deep ravine. Hit the brakes, but it kept skidding through the sleet. Had the car door open, ready to bail. The car came to a stop, barely inches from the edge.
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Walked out of the shower in a towel. Faced a tweaker with a gun standing in my apartment. Demanded my wallet. Took out the cash. Wasn't much. He paused, trying to decide what to do next. I really wasn't sure which way it would go. He left.
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Flight instructor had checked off on doing a solo, then left town. Was nervous, but he had told me to put in the flight hours in his absence. Practicing short take-off/landings and go-arounds. Little single-engine trainer. On the first touch-and-go, I forgot to take off full flaps, which meant maximum drag on the wings. Got barely 1000 ft above ground, then the engine began to sputter. The plane stalled, and started a slow-mo, nose-down spin toward the ground. I remember stopping breathing. Then the brain kicked in. Figured it out. Recovered from the spin way too close to the ground. The most sphincter-clenching, stupidest moment of my life.
I have next to no experience but from the few times I went on those planes I can say the G forces are much more then you expect. It's not just "oh cool I feel lighter", it's " oh god I'm falling to my inevitable death"
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I fell out on fent twice, both times I ended up in the ICU. I experienced the exact same shit I felt from a MeO-DMT trip. And both times a clockwork elf literally put their long weird arm on me and said "it's not your time yet friend." Then I felt felt extreme whiplash and despite not being fully conscious I distinctly remember hearing the pulse monitor beeping and knew I wasn't dead.
Sober from all drugs except weed and nicotine. Literally turned down opiates in the hospital after I got stabbed repeatedly.
clockwork elf
Every time I've had a nightmare, it's usually involved a wolf with glowing red eyes appraising me followed by a wizard in blue robes kindly waving his wand to wake me up. It's a recurring motif in my life
Lights turn green, I step on the road, I have no words for this other than spidey sense tingles, I step back, car shoots past me.
I believe god was with me that day because I did not see or hear the car approaching it was that fast.
That is so scary. Whenever I visit the US I feel like this is going to happen to me when I have to cross a street, glad you got the spidey sense!
Nearly drowned once falling into a lake and not knowing how to swim. I didn't think about death, it was more "how do I get out". Luckily someone else got my hand.
According to my brain, every time I have to interact with a stranger.
I.... I just died in your arms tonight...
"Oh ffs Farid, you can't keep doing this! You're getting too heavy!""Do we... do we call an Ambulance?"
"No, we call his sister who will pick him up and yell at him."– No, don't call my mother, she'll be so mad! She told me that if I die I shouldn’t come back home for dinner...
Overdose (Xanax and Alcohol)
I was meeting a friend from out of the state and got a bit big for my britches trying to show off how cool I was and made some poor judgment.
Somehow ended back in my apartment with a bunch of medics checking me out, I don’t even remember getting home from the bar.
First and only time ever using Xanax
Yeah, I had a similar but less severe experience with my first and last time trying xanax. I started to flip out a bit but definitely not remembering what was going on. I ended up picking a fight with a friend of mine who punched me in the face to get me to stop wiling then dragged me into my home and put me in my bed. I never thanked anyone for punching me in the face before or since lol
This must be how kids feel when they fall asleep in the car and wake up the next morning in bed. "Huh? Did I die and teleport here?"
I have two from when I was a kid. Once I was waiting at a traffic light with my mom. The light turns green and I jump out onto a street without looking. Not even half a second later a car whizzes by just centimeters in front of me. It went by so fast I have no doubt it would have killed me had it hit. That was probably 20 years ago and I still always look both ways even when the light is green.
Another one was at the beach. I couldn't swim (still can't) so I was walking parallel to the shore in water up to my shoulders. At one point there was a drainage pipe or something and the current from it seems to have eroded the bottom, so as I'm walking the ground suddenly goes out from under me and I feel like I'm getting pulled deeper in the sea. Luckily my mom was nearby and pulled me out pretty quickly. I don't like going deeper than waist height into the sea since then.
I also had a more recent scary moment, which wasn't really near death, but could have easily been very bad if there was an oncoming car. Get good tyres and don't fuck around in the rain, kids: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXTThHtUqLk
Kid me was pretty stupid. My mom, sister, and I went on a trip to Hawaii with my mom's coworker. At that time, I was really bad at swimming. One of the beach trips we went to snorkel. I was left unsupervised for a while and ended up following a sea turtle way too far out. I ended up getting water in the breathing tube, and I panicked. I think I was flailing around for about two minutes going up and down the surface of the water until my mom's coworker noticed and dragged me back to shore. Was pretty sure I would've just drowned if no one noticed.
Got SIBO from a liver or gallbladder issue. Went through 1 to 4 bottles a month of antibiotics. 2 for 2 weeks then next 2 weeks 2 different ones. Done that 15 times. Was given 4 to 8 weeks max to live losing 2 to 4 pounds a week at 105 pounds. Still not sure how I beat it. I'm still struggling but doing a bit better. Hospitals are shit, most Dr.s are shit. Health is wealth!
Found out I'm allergic to a medicine after being administered via IV in one shot, luckily for me I was already at the hospital and the nurses figured out what was happening.
A few, 7yo appendicitis which ruptured in surgery. 15yo Fell from 3 story high scaffolding and landed on my back. 11yo an adult repeatedly slammed my head onto a wooden floor: maybe not a near death but I had thought that that was the end. 18yo big hill at night friends figgered we would ghost it, brakes off keys out of the ignition, find break don't work and scrabbling to put keys in ignition.. I was drunk so I don't remember much else but we all survived car had a dent on the bumper.
