Cheating Death

[Titan!]

How have you cheated death ?

One time I had a really bad ingrown toenail and it got infected. But I manned up and cut it out with some scissors.

HA ! screw you death !

[plumpenut]

I was in an automobile accident when in high school. I was not wearing a seatbelt. The truck rolled a few times. I dont remember any of it once we hit the ditch. Only thing that happened to me was a concussion and displaced jaw. Suprisingly neither one of us were thrown from the truck.

[krystal]

Like Plumpe, in high school I was riding home with a friend. My parents live super-far out in the country and the road was twisty-turny. While going around a curve, there was a van coming towards us, driving on our side. They ran us off the road and, being a newer driver, Ashley (who I was riding with) lost control of the truck, it spun around, went air-born, and hit a telephone pole. It crushed the passenger side of the truck, causing the roof to end up halfway to the seat and the passenger side door was almost to the console. I walked away with a bruise on my elbow, a few cuts from the glass, and whiplash.


My Dad, now, has some crazy stories from when he was in Iraq if y'all want me to tell them.

[0rz0ski]

Cheating death = driving on the roads in MI during winter.

[Biff]

My Dad, now, has some crazy stories from when he was in Iraq if y'all want me to tell them.

Yes!

[landmammaldolphin]

I'm not a cheater.

[Queenie]

While on my honeymoon of my 2nd marriage in Destin, Florida, there was a hurricane off the coast causing undertows and big waves. We were playing on boogie boards when the crest of a wave caught me and drove my head into the bed of the ocean. I remember right before it happened, seeing my husband about 20 yards away. How he got to me before I drowned is still a mystery to me. I woke up lying on the beach with him and several others looking over me.

[krystal]

My Dad, now, has some crazy stories from when he was in Iraq if y'all want me to tell them.

Yes!

Okay! I'll tell them as I was told, and the way I understand it to be. All of these stories are from 2004 - 2006.

-- My Dad rejoined the National Guard when I started college and was shipped to Iraq shortly thereafter. On my nineteenth birthday he called me from overseas. (Note: this is the one and only time my Dad has ever called me on my birthday). Well somehow or another he said "I'm not in Iraq right now, but in Kuwait," to which I replied "Why are you in Kuwait?" and he says "We (he rode in a convoy) ran over a road-side bomb." "Are you okay????" "Yeah I just cut my finger."

-- I don't know the story behind it, but he was in a helicopter crash, broke his knee, and was sent to a hospital in Germany before being sent to the hospital at Fort Gordon, Georgia.

-- Dad was on leave to come home for my sister's wedding, and was on multiple flights, one from Germany to Ireland, from Ireland to New York, from New York to Atlanta, from Atlanta to Nashville. The plane was struck by lightning while going over Iceland and had to emergency land.

And lastly:

-- Somehow my Dad and some of the guys in his outfit were trapped in a dead-end alley, surrounded. Chuck, one of the guys in the outfit, somehow was able to get out. He ran back and forth, in and out of a safer, covered area, covering the guys until, one-by-one, he got everyone out. That man is my hero. He was discharged shortly thereafter for mental instability because of that and received no awards or commendations for it. That still pisses me off.

[Biff]

When I was a kid a friend and I were swimming in a pond. The pond had a huge drop off and when I went to take a step I sunk like a rock. I flayed my arms and couldn't remember how to swim. My friend grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the water.

[0rz0ski]

Okay! I'll tell them as I was told, and the way I understand it to be. All of these stories are from 2004 - 2006.

-- My Dad rejoined the National Guard when I started college and was shipped to Iraq shortly thereafter. On my nineteenth birthday he called me from overseas. (Note: this is the one and only time my Dad has ever called me on my birthday). Well somehow or another he said "I'm not in Iraq right now, but in Kuwait," to which I replied "Why are you in Kuwait?" and he says "We (he rode in a convoy) ran over a road-side bomb." "Are you okay????" "Yeah I just cut my finger."

-- I don't know the story behind it, but he was in a helicopter crash, broke his knee, and was sent to a hospital in Germany before being sent to the hospital at Fort Gordon, Georgia.

-- Dad was on leave to come home for my sister's wedding, and was on multiple flights, one from Germany to Ireland, from Ireland to New York, from New York to Atlanta, from Atlanta to Nashville. The plane was struck by lightning while going over Iceland and had to emergency land.

And lastly:

-- Somehow my Dad and some of the guys in his outfit were trapped in a dead-end alley, surrounded. Chuck, one of the guys in the outfit, somehow was able to get out. He ran back and forth, in and out of a safer, covered area, covering the guys until, one-by-one, he got everyone out. That man is my hero. He was discharged shortly thereafter for mental instability because of that and received no awards or commendations for it. That still pisses me off.

Holy shit, krys! That's amazing!

[krystal]

Story #1 is my favorite. I don't know if I should be horrified or amused by my Dad's macho-ness.

[Opus]

I don't frighten easily, but I have one time where I had a near death experience, and didn't even realize it, or feel any emotion about it til afterwards.

I was coming home one really icy night (Feb 28th 2005) from my job in Lansing. I was coming down I96 towards Grand Rapids around exit 76 when I saw a van spin out in front of me and roll into a ditch. I came to a safe stop on the shoulder right next to the van and got out to check on the driver. He was ok, just a little disoriented. I helped him get out of the vehicle and had just enough time to turn around to see a purple vehicle (turned out to be a Pontiac Sunfire) spin out and slam right into the back of my parked vehicle, sending it from a parked position out into traffic. Thankfully everybody else had slowed and were able to stop before hitting it again.

Had my car not been sitting in the exact spot it was in, the purple sunfire would have flown off the edge of the embankment and right into the driver of the van and I.

After rushing to the Pontiac and then dialing 911 as the driver was unresponsive, the adrenaline started to fade and I began to piece together what had just happened in my mind and the realization that I had almost died hit me like a ton of bricks.

I later found out that the girl driving the Pontiac spent 6 months in the hospital recovering from 3 seperate breaks in the spinal collumn. She had to do rehab to learn how to walk again.

[potthole]

About the closest I can say I've come was a little over a year ago as I was driving to work one morning. I was doing about 75 on the highway, when out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw headlights in the median. Then I could swear that I saw the silhouette of a car in my rearview mirror, against the headlights of the cars behind me.

Once I arrived to work I noticed traffic backing up on the highway, and I mentioned to a coworker what I thought I had seen on my commute. "Oh my God!" she said, "Some guy went flying across the median this morning, right where you said you think you saw that stuff!" Looks like I missed being hit by thismuch.

[Mad Dog]

One time when I was an infant I had a very high fever that turned me purple and put me into convulsions and my Mom and Dad had to rush me to the hospital so I didn't die.

One time while driving in a torrential down poor at four in the morning, I woke up bearing down on a gasoline tanker.

One time while working an oil exploration job which required me to carry dynamite and blasting caps (I had 50 of each) and a bolt of lightning shot down out of the sky and landed about 40 feet away from me. If that bolt hit me or hit close enough to send electricity my way, Nobody ever finds one scrap of me.

Another time working that same job I got to the line late so I had to walk into the woods by myself. It was spring so there was water everywhere. Wading through water that was about calf deep, I took one step and was suddenly in a hole full of water over my head. I'm guessing the hole I fell in was about eight feet deep. I can't swim and was totally alone. I suddenly remembered the words my Dad told me once that if you are ever in water over your head, to find the bottom with your feet and jump. That is exactly what I did. I sunk to the bottom and then jumped, grabbed some air, then sank down to the bottom again. I repeated this until I was able to find some weeds to grab on too, but they didn't hold, so I sunk to the bottom again. I jumped again and then I was able to grab a hold of a small sapling and It held!! I finally found something solid enough to pull my self out.

Another time my drunken best friend berated me into letting him drive his car home. Since I was living with him I rode home with him. He imediatly took off like a bat out of hell and was hitting the rural roads to the house at close to 100mph. He ran a two way stop sign. I looked and all I saw was headlights of the car that missed us by inches and I about pissed my pants. The car that almost hit us started flashing his lights, I'm sure he was claening the shit from his britches.


One time While working at 7-11 midnight shift we were waxing the floors and had the store partitioned off so people wouldnt walk through there. Two biker looking guys walked in the store with muddy boots stepped over our baracade just after I announced to them we would get anything they wanted for them
Of course they wanted beer and I was pissed because of what they did so I refused to sell any to them.
They got pissed and left, but then I got a phone call from one of them and he said "Your fucking lucky I don't have my shot gun right now or I'd come in and shoot your sorry ass" I kinda freaked then I called the cops.

[hotzester]

When I was six, I got appendicitis, but my pediatrician mis-diagnosed it as the flu and sent me home from the ER.

Hours later, when my fever spiked at 107, and I had vomiting, convulsions, and hallucinations, my parents rushed me back to the ER, where I was taken to surgery immediately. Turns out my appendix had ruptured. My parents were told that if they'd brought me in 30 minutes later, I'd have died. Spent something like six weeks in the hospital recovering. Fun times.