What was your closest brush with death?

[workerbee]

My closest brush came in mid-January 2001 when I held a bottle of antidepressants in my hand for — hours?? — until I finally convinced myself not to swallow all of them. It was a very frightening time.

[Sam's Army]

My mother and I walked into our house one late and cold winter night in the 1970's when I was about 9 years old. I discovered a man was hiding behind our coat rack. I stepped away and told my mother, in a rather calm manner: "There's a man in the house."

She saw him at about that time and screamed for me to run. We went barreling out the back door, tripped running away from the house. I remember him saying "Don't worry, I'm not gonna hurt you". We ran into a restaurant that was close by, my mother in hysterics begging for the staff to call the police.

He was well gone by the time the police arrived. He was however picked up hitch-hiking a few miles down the interstate and brought to the station for us to ID him.

He was wanted for murder in California.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Dude!!!

[MissH]

that was great - glad you made it!

[Shimmer1]

Who says he wasn’t serious??????

[Charles Henrickson]

Ten years ago, I had had a little scab on the back of my calf that did not heal up. One day, in June, I started getting chills. I went to bed and fell asleep. I woke up hours later drenched in sweat. I thought I had a 24-hour virus. That night, though, I noticed some redness on the back of my leg.

The next morning the redness has spread up and down my leg. I was standing at the sink shaving and passed out. I had our teenage daughter call my wife at work, who in turn called our doctor. He told her to get me to the ER immediately.

I had one of those often-deadly staph infections. I had a 104-degree fever for a week. I got septicemia, blood poisoning. I got pneumonia. They told my wife I came close to dying. (They didn't tell me.)

After a week, I was on so much antibiotics, I developed an allergic reaction and got a rash all over my body. I now am allergic to all forms of penicillin.

I was in the hospital 13 days. I lost 15 pounds in that time. (I call it the near-death diet.) When I came out, I could not walk and had zero range of motion in my right ankle. Physical therapy for several weeks thereafter fixed that.

That was my near-death experience.

[Soul of the South]

Barely survived a plane crash.

[Old Yeller]

My mother caught me alone In the house with a Glamour magazine.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

I cant top that

[HangnJudge]

Caught in underwater ledge while whitewater canoeing ~ 25 yrs ago
felt my brain split, as if it was all so fascinating
Including a “Terror Ball” that I could see, but was no longer “Me”

[marsh2]

German measles age eleven. Coma for a week.

[Shimmer1]

Oh wow, that was scary just hearing about it!

[wally_bert]

Back in the mid 80s, I was in a Jeep by myself just turning into another street in a school zone.

I saw a white blur hit connect with the front fender and then a brief instance of rolling around. The next thing I remember was crawling out of the wreckage and seeing people looking very surprised.

There were no doors and no seatbelts installed.

The guy that hit me was a fellow I had known since kindergarten and was a real quiet fellow. I later found out he had a history of reckless driving. That come to mean a lot at the court case. The judge was just about to throw it out when he walked in with his crew and the judge looked up and exclaimed “you’re the guy who ran me off the road last week.”

[piytar]

Anaphylactic shock. Minutes away from dead.

[expat1000]

“When I got to the top, I realized I was standing on an overpass up to my knees in the unstable snow overhang. I could have dropped right through and plummeted to my death.”

I’ve read of people dying in very similar circumstances. You were lucky.

[jughandle]

For aviation enthusiasts...
More than fifteen yers ago, flying a Piper Arrow IFR, entered some freezing rain and started to get ice on the airframe rather quickly. Got clearance to land at Trenton Mercer County airport about ten miles away. I found the pitot tube heater kept tripping the circuit breaker, then finally failed completely. The static instruments froze, no airspeed, no rate of climb....
I recalled with basic flight training and kept a constant power setting and the aircraft level, descended with known pitch and power settings, and added a little more power because I could see ice on the wings. After seemingly an eternity, I landed with about 1/2” ice visible on the airframe, didnt know how much had melted off already. Just sat in the plane for almost twenty minutes in front of the FBO, finally letting go of the yoke, thanking The Lord and my flight instructor and cursing myself for getting into that situation.

[Rides_A_Red_Horse]

Jeez...I wouldn’t know where to start!

[rintense]

HA! When I was a teenager, I call my mom a b!tch.

[gfbtbb]

Lung full of N2O4 at about 3PPM.

[PistolPaknMama]

I was driving home after dark one night, a long dark road. Suddenly this voice inside my head told me I was about to die. I wasn’t afraid, didn’t panic, but I did slow down. When I reached the point around a curve that dropped sharply toward the river, a car was speeding across a two-lane bridge in my lane passing slow cars. If I’d not slowed down when I heard that “small still voice” I would have been close, or on, that bridge and probably would have met that car head on in my lane.