When faced with mortality, how can you ever look at things the same?
Life and death experiences are teaching tools—pay attention.
Redditor CrownedBird wanted to hear from everyone who was lucky enough to be able to tell us their close call story.
They asked:
“What moment made you say ‘Yep, I’m definitely dead,’ but survived with no major injuries?”
Shattered
“Not me, but my mom before I was born.”
“She was riding in a convertible with a friend of hers.”
“They came to an intersection and the friend wasn’t paying attention and lost control of the vehicle.”
“There was a big rig going through the intersection and they went right under the trailer.”
“My mom ducked, the driver didn’t not.”
“Driver was decapitated, my mom was lucky and only ended up with a scalp full of glass and some serious psychological trauma.”
“She had to get over 200 stitches in her scalp, but nothing else significant.”
“I think about it all the time and think how close I came to never being born at all.” ~ Laszerus
Taking the Bend
“I was at the end of a 2 hour journey about 10 mins from home, pretty rural and I was probably complacent because I took that road everyday.”
“I took a bend at 40MPH (legal limit was 60MPH so wasn’t breaking any speeding rules) which I’ve done many times before, probably faster which looking back was really reckless.”
“Didn’t see until it was too late that a car had spun out on the other side of the corner and another car had pulled up to help.”
“I slammed on but I wasn’t going to stop in time before hitting the cars pulled up/crashed.”
“I was hurtling straight towards the other cars and people who where stood in the road from the other crash.”
“It was like time slowed down and I was at a cross roads; in my mind I had three choices.”
“Continue on my path and hit the other cars and people, veer to the right and go into a field but there was oncoming traffic and there was a chance I’d hit them or veer to the left and fly into a wooded area.”
“I chose the last option, and in that moment I knew the chances of me surviving or not being seriously injured after a 40MPH head on collision to a tree in a 10 year old Ford KA was pretty slim.”
“I just felt a complete peace come over me, turned the wheel and woke up slumped over the steering wheel to some poor man shouting ‘OMG I THINK SHES DEAD!!’”
“Turned out I passed out from shock or something before the impact so when I hit the tree I was completely floppy and this contributed to me having no serious injuries.”
“The front of my car was completely disintegrated, after coming to I tried to put my clutch down to take the car out of gear out of habit and my foot hit the tree trunk.”
‘The tree was absolutely fine. I drove past that tree everyday for years after and you could see the chunk my car took out of it.” ~ Comfortable-Pie8349
Falling to Doom
“I had an idiot friend and we were hiking.”
“We got to this waterfall and he goes ‘dude let’s climb it!’”
“I said no f**king way.”
“He says ‘well I’m gonna do it and if I fall and die it’s on you for not coming.’”
“So I climbed it with him.”
“Got stuck halfway up on a slick a** rock.”
“Pinched a nerve in my shoulder, so my right arm was useless.”
“I thought I was certain to slip off the rock to my doom, but we managed to get me unstuck.”
“That was the beginning of the end for that friendship.” ~ blindfire40
Rolling in the Deep
“I survived a car crash that wrecked my car.”
“Rolled twice, landed upside down, learned the hard way that I didn’t have airbags (or at least they didn’t deploy).”
“Did have my seatbelt on though, that probably saved me.”
“Paramedic said he hadn’t seen a wreckage like that and have it end well.”
“Not even a hairline fracture.” ~ Chempenguin
Well this is it…
“I went out for a surf on a stormy day and thought to myself, ‘no one else is out, those idiots.’”
“Before being held down by 2 waves after eating it on the first wave of the set.”
“First wave of the session.”
“Was thrown down and held under and while being tossed around my leg rope wrapped around both my legs and one of my arms so I was probably being held at around 5ft under with only one arm free while my board tombstoned.”
“Board tip is barely visible at the surface but floats vertical like… a tombstone.”
“Finally managed to catch a breath between sets before taking another 3 or 4 on the head and for sure just thought… well this is it.”
“No ones out, fishermen will find my body or my board.”
“Managed to get my other arm free and got to shore very quickly and then avoided the ocean for a few days even though the waves were absolutely perfect.”
“There’s a reason no one was out, everyone else was 10 minutes down the road at another beach where the waves were smaller and cleaner.” ~ Gigiskapoo
In Air Issues
“Parachute deployed but failed to open.”
“That was one of those moments, than training kicked in.”
“Cut away failed chute, deploy secondary.”
“But for a brief moment life was about to be over in my mind.” ~ GREYDRAGON1
Hanging in the Balance
“Tire popped going over a two lane road with steep drops on both sides.”
“My car jerked to the side hard, and my car went sideways.”
“Half my car hung over the side and luckily it’s low so it bottomed out.”
“I climbed into the back seat and jumped out the back door.”
“Some dude in a truck pulled me out and I drove on a flat to the other side and swapped my tire out.” ~ pineappledaddy
How Am I Alive?
“I was driving in the left lane of a highway going 80.”
“A car didn’t check their bond spot and merged into me.”
“I was run off the road and lost control of the car.”
“It flipped and dragged along the highway for 200 feet.”
“I remember the sparks flying up at me in slow motion.”
“The only damage to be was cuts on my arm from done glass.”
“My girlfriend just had a few cuts on her leg.”
“When I look at the photos of the car it doesn’t look like anything could have survived that.” ~ ImpressivelyLost
From the Rear
“I was driving down a highway, doing 65 MPH, and suddenly my car started to shake.”
“I tapped the brakes in reflex and my entire car flipped 180 degrees.”
“I’m now facing oncoming traffic, including a semi truck.”
“I was so close I couldn’t see the driver compartment.”
“I screamed and jerked the wheel, bringing me in front of a sedan with two people screaming as they watched me appear out of nowhere.”
“I kept screaming and floored the gas pedal.”
“Made it to the side of the road and cried for a long time.”
“I had blown a rear tire. Hitting the brakes was a terrible terrible choice.” ~ AhFFSImTooOldForThis
Bad Highways
“I was driving home from college on one of those highways with only one lane in either direction and no shoulder.”
“A guy in the oncoming lane didn’t see me as I was in a small car.”
“He thought he could pass 4 18 wheelers in one go and pulled into my lane going at least 90.”
“There was no where for me to go.”
“He flew off into the ditch to avoid hitting me head on, likely did severe damage to his car, but I lived!” ~ pilatesse
That is a lot to process.
I never want to get in a car again and skydiving is definitely out.
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