What's the closest you ever came to death?

Jesus. Robbed of what? Your lunch money? Was this by another student?

Not joking, that's messed up to have both incidents be school-related. Like we got in fistfights when I was in school. Nobody was pulling weapons, but nowadays...I'm almost tempted to give my daughter a can of mace to keep in her bag.

 

I've banged myself up plenty, but none of those incidents were life-threatening, I don't think. I had a mysterious case of internal bleeding that made me feel like death, but doctors assured me that I wasn't as close to death as I felt. I think about a couple of incidents on planes—I've had one emergency landing and one strange fall from the sky until order was restored—but mostly, I think about a time I was walking in New York, head in the clouds, when a bus came of what seemed like nowhere and took off my hat. I was on the curb, and it was on the road, but I was an inch or two from getting my face knocked off. Weirdly, I can still kind of taste it. Like, it was close enough that I tasted it.

 

No, I was in elementary school, not at it. I was walking home from the library and a homeless guy (or just a really dirty person) pulled a knife on me and demanded money. I gave him the $1.40 or whatever I had in change (bus fare) and he walked away.

 

holy christ that is awful.

 

When I got appendicitis a few years ago, the doctors gave me too large a dose of fentanyl for anesthesia and I coded. Apparently, my body is overly sensitive to narcotics, which I didn’t know because I have never taken them. They gave me the recommended dosage for my size, but my body couldn’t take it. They revived me and acted like nothing happened until a nurse accidentally let it slip that night when she said, “Wow, that was close, huh?” I had no idea what she meant.

 

Taking a left turn from a neighborhood onto a busy street. Icy. I took it too quick, hit a patch, overcorrected, and spun 180 sliding down the hill. Looking right back up at the cars. Thank God there was an island. I got my front right wheel up onto it and that was enough for the car behind me to swerve enough away from me.

 

Travelling on I-5 north toward the end of summer in my Honda Civic, a rain storm came in - the first in a while apparently. I was cresting a hill and could feel my tires losing traction. Continued down the decline - a long straightaway of about a mile - didn't want to touch the brakes because I knew I'd spin so I just coasted - unfortunately the front of my car started to rotate clockwise (I was going about 65 to 70 miles an hour), did a full, but slow 720 with the front coming around again and I was drifting into the median (it was gravel with a decline to help drainage, there were no barricades, oncoming uphill traffic was about 10 yards away. Fortunately there was a four by four wood sign post that I struck just right on the left headlight area. I took out the sign and came to a stop. The airbag didn't deploy (though I'm not sure if the car had an airbag). I got out and checked the damage - it looked like someone had punched in my left headlight. Got back in the car and continued north (nobody stopped - I could only imagine how freaked out other drivers might have been seeing me in a spin at 70 mph - and just kept driving. About 20 miles later - as I continued to hear the sound of debris fall away and under my car - I began to shake realizing how easily that could have been it for me.
Every time I pass through the area (now it has those concrete barricades in the middle median) - I say a little prayer of thanks.

 

Around 8 or 9 years old, went under in a pond. Remember waking up on the beach. Don't know if anyone had to do CPR or if they just dragged me out unconscious and I woke up.

Need to go back and investigate. Would make a good story.

 

Coming home from work at 2 a.m. in a rainstorm and there was a lot of black ice on the highway. Suddenly, right in front of me in my lane appears a two-car crash, and I swerved into the next lane and barely missed it. Neither of the crashed cars had their lights on.

I then slowed down to a stop on the right shoulder l, maybe a quarter mile down the road and got out. Walked back to the scene and there were some people walking around on the highway and a couple of injured people in one of the cars. People screaming, crying and calling 911. I offered to get some blankets out of the back of my car, went and did so.

As I was coming near the scene again with the blankets, suddenly a minivan approached in the lane with the cars, swerved (like I did), lost control and started sliding sideways.

Right towards me.

I took a couple of steps to my left and jumped, and the minivan skidded right where I was two seconds earlier. When I landed on the hill off the shoulder, I slipped on the snow and fell, with the blankets flying out of my hands. I heard one of the other people yell out that the minivan just hit the guy with the blankets. I got up a couple seconds later, dusted the snow off of me, retrieved my blankets and went to the other people, who were stunned that I was OK. A cop showed up a couple seconds later to block off the lane with his car and to get the other people off the highway.

 

I went into septic shock about four years ago. Doctors treated it as leptospirosis. We were in Hawaii the week before and went swimming at a waterfall, where, of course, there were signs warning of leptospirosis. A week later, I started feeling like shit. Eventually, it became tough to breathe, and my wife called the ambulance. My blood pressure was at 75/55. The medic said, "Wait this can't be right." My liver and kidneys failed. They had already sent the staff in the ICU home, since there were no patients, so they had to call them all back in. One of the doctors treated me like a curiousity - "we've never seen this around here," he said. I spent five days in the hospital. Liver and kidneys recovered, but gout problems persist. Still I go on.

 

I'm not sure which of mine would be considered closest. As a freshman playing high school football, I had a nasty asthma attack during practice on a day with temperatures near 100 degrees. The coaches had no idea what to do. Neither did the trainer, who was an idiot. I couldn't talk, but I had to wave them off to help me get my pads off (the the shoulder pads were making it harder to breathe) and give me room. They didn't even think to get water. The only real danger was the idiocy of the adults who were supposed to be in charge.

My other one was Jan. 5, 2003. I was driving down a steep hill that let out onto a very busy intersection near my home. It had been snowing and the road was slick. I lost control, but managed to to steer the car into the curb on the side of the road and stop just before flying out into traffic. I know the exact date because I was on my way to the Steelers' home playoff game against the Browns. It was Cleveland's lone playoff appearance since getting its expansion team and the Browns blew a huge lead and lost. So I went from nearly getting into a nasty accident to the most enjoyable football game I've ever seen in person.

 

After two pages, I’d say TigerVols has the lead, followed by bigpern. Baron in third for show.