Tell me about your near death experiences.

[Forever]

When I was in high school I was crossing a crosswalk in a foreign country and the car comes out of nowhere (wasn't seen anywhere close) and drove right behind my back I could feel it barely. For a street that small I believe it was 40 mph

Probably not the traditional post.

 

[Cloudpatrol]

In my early 20’s I started feeling increasingly tired. It was really puzzling because I was fit and active but felt like I had the energy of an 80-year old. It came on really suddenly and I had an appointment set - to see my Doctor.

A day before the appointment, I walked to my bathroom and then screamed to my room-mate as I felt myself collapse. I woke up to having the paddles used on me and our place filled with Emergency Techs.


The next thing I remember was being in ICU and overhearing a conversation between some Doctor’s. They were discussing moving me to the Pods with more specialized care and one Dr said he didn’t see the point because I ‘likely wouldn’t make it through the night’.

I couldn’t speak or move . My brain felt like it was being pinned down, but I understood everything being said. I was alone and very scared (knew my family would probably fly in as soon as they could).

It made me really angry. I started to focus on the clock and play games with the numbers. I was DETERMINED to prove the Doctor wrong. I’d pretend the numbers were people and make up stories about them. I’d ask myself math questions based on numbers in the current time…

So many times I’d feel myself falling asleep and I would fight it with everything I had.


In the morning they moved me to the pods - where the nurses were rock stars. I ended up in a motorized wheelchair for a couple years and had to do physiotherapy to be able to walk again.

A lot of people who know me now, don’t even know this ever happened.

What did happen?

I had a pulmonary embolism due to being on hormone-based birth control pills. The clot that moved into my lungs was the size of a small piece of fruit. When I was finally well enough to research it, I learned that it is not uncommon.

Sadly, I have since been told about other women who are quite young and active, who have died from this. I am VERY fortunate they were able to revive me and the second clot in my leg never moved to my brain or lungs. I had to be on blood-thinning medication for a couple years but then got a ‘clean bill of health’.

What is your definition of a near death experience?

I consider it ‘near-death’ = that I was clinically dead for minutes and was in a perilous state for the first night.

I am now a huge advocate of non-hormone based IUD’s that pose less health risks and eliminate the need for condoms (unless protecting for STD’s).


{I also experienced being almost killed by an adult (drowning, reviving, drowning, reviving etc.) several times as a child. I won’t go into more detail than that, but I will say that I think those experiences helped prepare me to F I G H T for survival as a young adult}

Were you changed after mentally or physically?

Almost dying showed me that: I am exceptionally calm and level-headed in emergencies. This gave me confidence.

An overwhelming overall belief that life is uncertain and highly valuable. I have a list of things I have done since being able to walk again and continue to ‘cross stuff off’. It’s not a bucket list, it’s a ‘becoming list’.

How did it make you feel?

Grateful.

I stopped fearing a lot of things that had previously made me antsy (flying...).

Thankful for the people who supported me. Cognizant that not everyone cares or has my best interests at heart.

A bit guilty and sad for surviving when countless other’s had not (I had to get help with this as it was irrational but truly felt).

Super attentive to: small pleasures in life, and not being afraid of embracing love/life fully, committing whole-souled to what is important.

Any other thoughts you have?

I liked the white font!

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

I choked on a peach once and no one was around so I did the heimlich on myself by pushing against the corner of a table. It was terrifying.

 

[magpie]

When I was 16 I went out into a forest and drank roughly half a water bottle of anti-freeze and a number of benadryl pills. I was found nine hours later unconscious. I remember going to the hospital and coming in and out of consciousness while having visual and tactile hallucinations. When I got to the ER intake room a nurse took my vitals and then asked another nurse if I should go to the terminal ward. I was told my liver was failing and it would be possible, but unlikely, that one round of dialysis would help. I think they thought I'd have to be on dialysis for the rest of my life. I was also supposed to go blind. It turned out though that one round of dialysis took care of things. My liver isn't failing anymore and I'm not blind. I don't know how that happened when by all rights I should've died.

That was the past event. The current one happened a week ago when I had a seizure due to a combination of low blood pressure and low heart rate and ended up in the ER again. I don't know how close I was to actually dying but it feels spiritually like I was close.

I don't really have an answer to the rest of my own questions. I'm glad so many people have replied to this thread but sad that they're able to.

 

[SearchingforPeace]

As a foolish young child, I rode my bike across a busy boulevard and hit a moving car, going at full speed. I woke up on the sidewalk, some 20 feet away. I remember nothing of the collision. I was told I landed on the sidewalk after flying through the air over the car. I had a black eye from the incident and no other damage.

The only thing I learned was to look both ways (I was about 4 miles from home and 5 or 6 years old)....I still went on long solo bike rides. Without telling my parents.

Last year I had a NDE. I should have died. I saw my life pass before my eyes. Time stopped still during the seconds, seemingly like an eternity. My body, on its own volition, saved me. I was detached from controlling my body, caught up in the mental state of knowing I would die. It felt strangely calm, as if I was going to die, any time was good.

I don't know if it changed me much. At least not on grand terms. Maybe it helped me grow and such, but that was already occurring.......

 

[ChocolateMoose123]

I choked on a peach once and no one was around so I did the heimlich on myself by pushing against the corner of a table. It was terrifying.

If I were you I would refer to this incident as the 'teaches of peaches'

 

[Flâneuse]

I was almost hit by a van when I was six. The memory is murky, but I remember the driver didn't seem to see me and I was thisclose to being hit, and would have been if my dad hadn't jumped forward and yanked me out of the way by my arm. At this point I was too young to really understand death (I think I still believed with absolute certainty that all good people immediately went to heaven, that death was basically just a continuation of life), so I didn't reflect on it much.

I was also in a car accident when I was eighteen that could have resulted in either death or some pretty serious injuries if the car had been in just a slightly different position. The driver started hydroplaning and we ran off the road, narrowly missing a huge tree that would have hit on my side. I remember being in a daze and just bracing myself for whatever happened. I was terrified on one level, and on another I was like "whatever happens happens" because I had no control at that point - it was all up to fate. I flinched when our car hit a smaller tree at the either the very front or back, abruptly changing our direction...then the car finally skidded to a stop and it was over. My fear actually sank in most deeply after, not during, the crash, because that's when I had time to clearly reflect that my life could have really ended - just like that - at age eighteen, and that I truly could die any day. I felt kind of invincible when I was a teenager, so this was a wake-up call, even if I wasn't really as close to death as I thought I was.

 

[1487610420]

If I were you I would refer to this incident as the 'teaches of peaches'

 

[ChocolateMoose123]

When I was 16 I went out into a forest and drank roughly half a water bottle of anti-freeze and a number of benadryl pills. I was found nine hours later unconscious. I remember going to the hospital and coming in and out of consciousness while having visual and tactile hallucinations. When I got to the ER intake room a nurse took my vitals and then asked another nurse if I should go to the terminal ward. I was told my liver was failing and it would be possible, but unlikely, that one round of dialysis would help. I think they thought I'd have to be on dialysis for the rest of my life. I was also supposed to go blind. It turned out though that one round of dialysis took care of things. My liver isn't failing anymore and I'm not blind. I don't know how that happened when by all rights I should've died.

That was the past event. The current one happened a week ago when I had a seizure due to a combination of low blood pressure and low heart rate and ended up in the ER again. I don't know how close I was to actually dying but it feels spiritually like I was close.

I don't really have an answer to the rest of my own questions. I'm glad so many people have replied to this thread but sad that they're able to.

I have no clue how it would feel to have my body betray me. Like, I would be in the throes of something and I couldn't will it back.

That is the difference between a life threatening illness and your life being threatened by an outside source on the regs. I've dealt with outside threats. In that respect, I can feel almost invulnerable. PTSD does that, too. But it's not everything.

But the other is a blank slate. I don't know how I would react. One you can exercise control and one you cannot. Different lessons to learn.

 

[nonsequitur]

Well. I agree, it's about the definition of "nearly died".

There was the time when I was suicidal but got help instead of acting on the impulse.

Then there was the time when I was on my bike and a cab hit me and I flew but didn't get seriously injured.

And there was the time when I had open heart surgery and they put me on a heart-lung machine, cut open my heart and sewed up my congenital defects. There was a real chance of death but I don't really consider this near-death..?

I'd say that the first time I confronted my own death with suicide, I died as a person. I'm no longer the person that I was, and I got a lot stronger because of it. The heart surgery was last year, and I now live with a furious energy and drive that I didn't have before. Life is short and I want to create as much meaning and value as possible while I can.

 

[SpankyMcFly]

...I died as a person. I'm no longer the person that I was, and I got a lot stronger because of it... I now live with a furious energy and drive that I didn't have before. Life is short and I want to create as much meaning and value as possible while I can.

I experienced something similar. I think of it as a 'golden era'. It was by far the most productive, creative, joyful, intense period of my entire life, to date. Furious energy. Exactly. That word combo is very close to how it felt and why I even bothered to quote/respond. A hot seething determination to never let something like that ever happen again.

The power of death in life I've been considering how to replicate this effect in my daughters. Initially I thought of skulls, ala the ancient Roman?/Greek method to remind oneself of our mortality. Amazing how this mindset really facilitates prioritizing.

Have you looked into Terror Management Theory since last we interacted? This topic is quite appropriate.

 

[nonsequitur]

I experienced something similar. I think of it as a 'golden era'. It was by far the most productive, creative, joyful, intense period of my entire life, to date. Furious energy. Exactly. That word combo is very close to how it felt and why I even bothered to quote/respond. A hot seething determination to never let something like that ever happen again.

The power of death in life I've been considering how to replicate this effect in my daughters. Initially I thought of skulls, ala the ancient Roman?/Greek method to remind oneself of our mortality. Amazing how this mindset really facilitates prioritizing.

I believe that my "golden era" will always be ahead of me, since I don't usually look back at things that I've done with my life. Some call this heat and determination "passion" or "drive", I call it "purpose". Living with a furious energy is only possible with health of body and mind though - so I consider myself very lucky and blessed. Even despite my ongoing medical issues. This is also why I consider it a duty to use this time when my heart is still beating to add value to others' lives. But there would be others who emerge from the same experiences with completely different attitudes.

If I had kids, I too would wish for them to seize their lives, live with a sense of agency, and gain fulfilment from working their asses off to make their (and others') lives better. I don't know that you can teach people this though. I know that before, nothing anyone said or did could've brought me to this point. It took a lot of "bad" experiences and breaking down who I thought I was at a fundamental level. Perhaps simply by living your life and being an example, children will pick up on this - but I honestly have no idea.

Have you looked into Terror Management Theory since last we interacted? This topic is quite appropriate.

Thanks for the PMs, I did look into it. It's a fascinating premise, for sure. I can see examples of it around me, but am not convinced that it's not just me picking out examples to fulfil the narrative. It's also definitely applicable to this thread. In this context, I would say that I hold my own mortality in the back of my mind when I interact with the world, but it's not in the fearful way that TMT seems to emphasise. Knowledge of my mortality moderates a lot of my experiences - what would seem the best experience/achievement to others is still good, but not to the point that I lose sight of my vulnerabilities. What would seem a catastrophe to others isn't that bad to me. The biggest changes are in my valuation of my time, my health and my interactions with others.

 

[meowington]

Technically speaking nowhere near death, but I had 2 epileptic seizures (at age 13 & 19) out of nowhere. Scary enough for me.

 

[Andy]

There's another question I want to add to the OP. People who've already answered feel free to answer again [MENTION=1206]cascadeco[/MENTION] [MENTION=8554]Andy[/MENTION] [MENTION=29715]that's not my name[/MENTION].

I stupidly forgot to ask about semantics. I should know by now that's a requisite on this site whenever you ask a question. What is your definition of a near death experience?

I was taking it as any situation that could have easily resulted in death, given a very small modification. In my case, me standing about half a meter over to the right.

 

[Cloudpatrol]

When I was 16 I went out into a forest and drank roughly half a water bottle of anti-freeze and a number of benadryl pills. I was found nine hours later unconscious. I remember going to the hospital and coming in and out of consciousness while having visual and tactile hallucinations. When I got to the ER intake room a nurse took my vitals and then asked another nurse if I should go to the terminal ward. I was told my liver was failing and it would be possible, but unlikely, that one round of dialysis would help. I think they thought I'd have to be on dialysis for the rest of my life. I was also supposed to go blind. It turned out though that one round of dialysis took care of things. My liver isn't failing anymore and I'm not blind. I don't know how that happened when by all rights I should've died.

Wow, I am so glad of the outcome all around. That you are here and not on dialysis and have sight.

[MENTION=22178]magpie[/MENTION] Were you feeling desperate and like you wanted to end pain and that was just the best way to do it? Or do you think you really wanted to die? Or instead of asking you specifics from my own brain I should just ask YOU what you were feeling (if you feel like sharing)?

That was the past event. The current one happened a week ago when I had a seizure due to a combination of low blood pressure and low heart rate and ended up in the ER again. I don't know how close I was to actually dying but it feels spiritually like I was close.

So recently! Is there anything they can do medically to ensure it doesn't happen again?

I don't really have an answer to the rest of my own questions. I'm glad so many people have replied to this thread but sad that they're able to.

 

[magpie]

I'm so glad you like the avatar I picked out for you.

Wow, I am so glad of the outcome all around. That you are here and not on dialysis and have sight.

[MENTION=22178]magpie[/MENTION] Were you feeling desperate and like you wanted to end pain and that was just the best way to do it? Or do you think you really wanted to die? Or instead of asking you specifics from my own brain I should just ask YOU what you were feeling (if you feel like sharing)?

I'd tried to kill myself twice before the incident I described. The first time with pills and the second by inhaling a mix of large amounts of bleach and windex. I did not come close to death in either of those attempts and I didn't really want to die during those attempts either. I wanted to escape pain but expected to wake up again. It's strange. The third attempt, the one I detailed here, was the one where I truly wanted to die. I sort of had to work up to it, in a way. I gave away a bunch of my belongings beforehand, read the ending of a bunch of books I'd wanted to read, and intensively mentally prepared myself for nonexistence. In the weeks leading up to it, during my preparation phase (this was not an impulsive decision) I came face to face with my own mortality in a huge way. I think that did change me, maybe more than the act of almost dying itself. For years after I felt like expired milk. I knew I was supposed to be dead. I'd expected to die, I'd meant to die, I'd been prepared to die, and then I didn't. It shook me. I've had to readjust to being alive and by readjust I mean mentally come to terms with it, just like I came to terms with death. I think some part of me still feels like my grasp on existence is tenuous. I hate to invoke mythology again, but that's what attracted me to Hel as a username. I am half alive and half dead, like she is. I have one foot in each door.

So recently! Is there anything they can do medically to ensure it doesn't happen again?

Thanks for asking. I'm not sure. My doctor thinks it was due to accidental beta blocker overdose - he prescribed too large of an amount and it built up in my system. Beta blockers slow your heart rate down, so arguably it ended up almost stopping my heart. My vitals are way more stable now than they were in the ER (I had an active HR of 50 bpm in the ER with my resting HR way lower, now my resting heart rate is 50, which is a huge difference and really good.) I'm not recovered though and I think the whole incident triggered my POTS really badly. Also, I'm still trying to figure out what a good dose of the medication would be. My quality of life went backwards and it sucks but I'm alive.

I'm glad you're here too, and that things worked out for you in the end.

 

[Virtual ghost]

As much as you feel comfortable sharing. This is a topic of interest to me I suppose. (I've had two and one was fairly recent so it's on my mind.) How did it happen? Were you changed after mentally or physically? How did it make you feel? Any other thoughts you have?

Tell me because sharing is nice and also I need to synthesize your experiences into my own and reach some sort of weird pure essence of what this means on a broad level but this is too weird to write unless I use white font. Please don't be scared away.

This is going to be awkward post but I will make it in good will.

For me death was always part of life and it is integrated to it in away that the two can't be separated.
I suppose this depends on how you define near death experiance, so I will take somewhat wider definition.



So what crosses my mind for now is:

My first such experiance was already at 6 months of age since my family had to drag me out of a burning house, in the last moment of course.

When I was a kid some older guys decieded to throw rocks at me, however since I am good dodger I managed to dodge all the rocks and get away.

When I started to go to school my country got invaded in Nazi Germany style. Therefore I had to run to the basement or the closest shelter/bunker from 3 to 7 times a day, since I lived in the range of hostile airforce and artillery. Also good chunk of my early friendships was with refugges, that lost homes and/or family members. I almost lost my parents as well in those years, in a few situations.
However when the air strike alarm goes on for the 100th time you actually stop carring about it, if they hit you they will, there is no point in making hystera about it.

Once I was in the car with my parents but we had to drive across the bridge that was hit by a couple of granades/missiles due to its strategic position. However my father decided to risk it since the bridge was still relatively stabile. (it was a large at least 10 floors high bridge)

Once there was a similar situation but we were driving slowly and withouth lights during the night, since othervise we are easy target for snipers and anything similar to that. Moonlight was of great help.

For a few times I was in various cars in which we could have all got killed: from reckles driving, collisions with trucks to flying of the clif into a canyon.

Once I got so dehidrated on vacation that ambulance had to drive me into nearby city, so in the hospital it took them a few days to restore my blood chemistry.

I had a few surgeries with complete anesthesia.

I have walked through landscales that have minefields.

Once I had a crazy professor that has led us into a artificial canyon through which a railway passes ... because of our survival training. And of course train came in so we all had to duck/lay in the trenches on the side as the train was going above us. Somewhere I should still have the picture of train going over us.

I was in the country with which we were at war when that was not 100% safe. So I didn't tell my family nothing about my "ambitious school trip".

Once I almost cut my veins by accident as I was working with tools.

Once I got stuck in a elevator.

Once I had to run from a large forrest fire when I was on vacation.

Once I saw that my shoe got itself untied, so I stoped to tie it and second later a brick fell just half a meter in front of me. It seems that it came all the way from the roof, what is 5 stories of hight.




Result: unnaturally thick skin and I often think that people are too sensitive.

 

[Yama]

I was hospitalized for a week in 8th grade for health reasons I'm not going to disclose. I didn't fully consider the real possibility of death back then, but I'm very aware of it now. Extended family came to visit me and my parents bought me presents and never left my side. I'm pretty sure they thought I was going to die.

What do I remember about this experience? Being bored all the damn time. Watching endless reruns of fresh prince. Not being able to either blow my nose or sniffle it back in because of the damn tubes was so miserable and irritating. Not being allowed to eat, not even to fast, and being hungry all the time. Rejecting jello on the 8th day because despite how hungry I was, jello is disgusting and I have standards. The constantly crying 3 weeks old baby I shared a room with whose parents were never there. Also, feeling humiliated when they insisted on helping me back to the car in a wheelchair when I was released, because I could walk on my own. And then running around all day afterwards and passing out in the shower because I wasn't strong enough for that shit yet.

Definitely wasn't a fun experience. Definitely risked death. Very glad that I'm not in that bad of a condition anymore. (Although even after all that, I keep forgetting to take my fuckin' meds...)

 

[Ghost of the dead horse]

I count a near death experience an experience where your situation, objectively assessed, would result in death with high probability. More than 50%.

If someone has had a cute near death experience where a car hit a person with the same name in a neighboring state, whom am I to argue. In my books, they may keep their near-death experience all right, if they don't mind a funny facial expression from me when they tell about it.