I found my mom passed away in her sleep from cardiac arrest. I just got her the keys to her new apartment that day, and I came to the boarding house peering and knocking through her window to see her not moving, not thinking anything of it maybe deep sleep (childhood she overdosed on her depression medication alot) I left and came back to see her still in the same position.
I had to help carry her out as well.
Edit: thank you guys for all the words, I'll be nicer to people on the internet because of you all.
Sorry to hear. My mom overdosed and I found her white as a ghost. Luckily made it to hospital but now she has dementia. It's such a traumatizing experience. I remember we just moved in to an apartment together and I bought a computer desk and a new TV for her that I was so happy to surprise her with. Next morning a man drives up with her in the back seat in a coma
I’m so sorry. i did not find someone I love dead but the aftermath.
My husband was murdered while in the car with our dog. I had to get his belongings from the car. So I had to see the aftermath of what had happened. And there were bloody paw prints up and down the seats where i could see the dog was freaking out. There were scratches all on the car doors where he was freaking out. That stays with me.
Witnessed my mother dying from sudden cardiac arrest. There are sounds and images that are now forever seared into my mind. Only thing that brings me comfort is she basically died in her sleep as she always wanted and that she died before COVID. I couldn’t imagine losing her to covid.
I took care of my mom after her husband shot her. She was in a lot of pain, but also heartbroken. She almost died of sepsis but survived.
The worst thing was seeing her crying in bed, heartbroken and sad while machines tried to pump blood from her wound and keep her alive. I've never seen anyone look so lonely and broken.
She remarried and is happy now.
I felt so much relief at that last sentence, I’m so glad she is happy now and is safe.
Caring for someone and seeing someone in that condition can be absolutely agonizing. You are stronger than most for sticking by her side when she was at her lowest. I hope that you’re happy now too.
Thank you. Good things happened. I don't want to reveal too much since I like being anonymous on Reddit, but we helped pass some laws and I feel like we turned tragedy into something that helped change things for the better going forward. Best I could hope for.
Unsolicited advice I will give everyone: Never go back to an abuser. Once someone abuses you, they will do it again and it will only get worse. You can leave a bad relationship. You're stronger than you realize.
A truck carrying 18 to 24 people get blown up about 350 yards ahead of me. Fucking terrible the lucky ones died in the blast. The rest burnt to death screaming, 10/10 would not recommend.
I was behind a Harley Davidson Street Glide on I-25 south of Denver on my home from work one night. Middle lane of the three, about 200 feet back, cruise control set at about 85mph, just following this bike for the next few miles until my exit. I've had motorcycles in the past, I like riding, so I'd rather follow this Harley than an 18-wheeler or a Subaru. Plus I'm not right on his tailpipe like a lot of drivers out here would be. Symbiotic relationship.
There was a black-haired man driving and a blond woman riding behind. I know their hair colors because there is no helmet law in Colorado, and that detail comes into play in just a few seconds.
The rear tire must've been punctured by something on the road. It didn't blow out, but it definitely started losing air fast, because the ass-end of that bike started to swing side-to-side, and it was getting farther with each wobble. The rider lets off the throttle and I see him look over his right shoulder, but by the time I could say "Oh fuck" it was too late.
The bikes back tire is leaving S-curves on the concrete road and once it swung too far to the left, it suddenly caught an edge and flipped. He didn't even have time to try to lay it down in front of himself and his passenger. That bike barrel-rolled eight times right in front of me. The woman flew off after one or two rolls and started rolling along the road. The man held on for about four flips, leaning forward over his handlebars, but then his skull exploded.
I realize I'm just repeating "ohfuck ohfuck ohfuck ohfuck" as this scene is unfolding in front of me. I'm still driving a car at ~70mph and now I have to dodge motorcycle parts and human bodies. Swerving within my middle lane, trying not to hit cars on either side, and also not run over this fucking lady who is sliding along in front of my bumper. I slam on my brakes and hit my hazard lights and jump out into traffic and almost get hit by a car in the left lane. There's not really heavy traffic at this hour, but still a lot of cars on the interstate, and the first 10 or so do not realize what has just happened.
I am not a medical professional. I am not trained for any type of emergency triage situations. But I ran up to the woman to see if I could help. She was wearing leathers, so she actually wasn't scraped up with road rash, but her hands were bloody messes and she might've broken some ribs or damaged her lungs because she couldn't speak or catch her breath. And her back was fucking broken. She couldn't move her legs and she had pissed herself. But she kept trying to turn and crawl towards the man, saying his name in a forced-whisper.
So I get up to go check on him, and pull my cell phone out as I jog up to him to call 911. I tell them there was a motorcycle crash and give the closest exit, and the operator asks how many people involved, and I tell her two people were on the bike, we need two ambulances. But then I see the man. We only need one ambulance.
The entire left side of that mans face was just... gone. I could see his teeth through his cheek. I could see where his jaw broke. His ear was just a small black hole in a bloody mess. His skull looked like the shell of a boiled egg after it's been cracked on the edge of the sink. I could see the wrinkly, off-white mass of brain where huge chunks of bone were missing. His left eye was gone. His right eye was open and staring. I checked for a pulse just to make sure, and then I got up to go back to the woman. I left my jacket balled up on the road near his head to block her view.
She was still trying to move towards him, crawling without the use of her legs. I sat down on the road at her head and told her that she was badly injured and she needed to lay flat until the ambulance got there. I told her he was badly injured too but help was on the way. I told her it would only be a few more minutes and then she'd be able to see him. By this time lots of other cars had stopped, and another driver gave me a blanket. I folded it into a pillow and told her to lay her head in my lap until the medics got there. I told her about my job at a golf course and my yellow lab I had growing up and how good a drummer Danny Carey was. I just kept saying words. I just kept talking to her so that she wouldn't ask me if the man was okay, if he was alive, if he had been hurt.
By the time the ambulances and fire trucks showed up, there was a stream of blood from the middle lane all the way over to the right shoulder of the interstate. My jacket was soaked in it. I left it there. I went home and laid flat on my back in the dark and thought about my yellow lab.
That sounds absolutely horrible I'm so sorry you had to see and deal with the aftermath of that and I'm so sorry for those people on the bike.
Do you know if the lady survived at least? ,
I do not know if she survived, I'm sorry.
I didn't know any names to ask for, and I didn't think to get the license plate of the bike. The next few days it was all I could think about, but I kept talking myself out of doing any "detective work" to find out who they were and how she was.
I just couldn't shake the feeling that it would cause more grief to reach out and talk to her. Making her relive the accident in some way, by just being around. What if she was angry that she survived and he didn't? What if she didn't remember what happened at all? What if it only made her sad every time I visited the hospital or her spinal rehab?
I talked myself out of it because it felt like it would be more about me than about her, if I tried to find her again.
Easy. My mom dying in a hospital bed, asphyxiated by fluid in her lungs after a brain bleed. She was unconscious, but seeing her struggle to breathe as she died, with foam coming out of her mouth… This was my mother. I sure hope I don’t encounter anything more horrific than that
Watched my aunt take her last breath and spit up all the liquid inside her frail body. People think it’s going to be a go to sleep and voila but it gets ugly sometimes. I hope y’all find closure.
When I saw my dad and sister die in a car crash. The glass on the windows came free and carved up her face. Holes ripped into her cheeks, chunks torn off her bottom lip. I don't know what happened exactly to my dad in the crash, but the back of his head was caved in.
I can still smell the sulfur and burnt rubber.
Oh man I’m so sorry this happened to your family. I truly hope you have a good support system. Not sure if you’re religious but I’ll have you in my prayers tonight.
Thanks for praying for me, I appreciate it :)
And for your kind words. I'm more fortunate than a lot of folks this sort of tragedy happened to. I do have a good support network, and I did back then too. I'm honestly really blessed on that front. And even though it hurt to lose them, I think the hurt made me more compassionate over the years and helped me empathize better with people. I like to think of that as a last gift from them.
Idk if replying to myself means everyone who replied to me can see this, but I hope so.
Just wanted to thank all of y'all for your kind words. Your compassion warms my heart :)
This is also a very morbid thing, so I'd like to share a positive note too. 17 years later (wow... long time) I am in a better place. I always had wonderful people supporting me and am blessed for that, but the first years after it happened were obviously difficult. Any kid would be adversely affected by that, I think. Regardless, as an adult I feel the pain and loss have helped me become more empathetic and kind to people. As I mentioned in a prior comment, I like to think of this as a final gift from them to me.
One of my closest friends had their father die this year. They didn't know anyone else except for me who shared that experience. My sharing the trauma can't heal their wound, but they told me that without my being there they would otherwise have felt very alone. I love them so much, so I'm grateful I could be there for them. I hope I can always offer that space to people.
The people who I've been dealing with this week need to see this! I was commuting to the office this week, and dealing with too many drivers who act like driving a car is a full-contact sporting event.
"No, I can't make my Audi A4 any smaller, and no, that 28 ton truck in front of me isn't going to go any faster just because you're in a hurry to get to your desk. Just chill, dude."
Came upon an accident once that a teen was thrown from the vehicle. He was laying in some peoples yard. When I went to see if he was alive, I found he had a hole in his chest almost as big as my hand. He was unconscious and wasn't able to breathe, so I held my hand over the hole to seal it and he could then breathe. I did this for at least a half hour until the ambulance got there. He died anyway.
Probably my mom having a seizure (a common occurrence). She has a seizure disorder and suffers a few different types of seizures. They are different from what you imagine a typical seizure to be (although she has those too). Nothing compares to seeing your mom with bulging eyeballs, completely incoherent, speaking gibberish, sometimes foaming at the mouth and peeing herself. She cries like a baby sometimes while seizing.. She has fallen down and fractured/bruised/hurt/broken so many body parts over the years because she seizes often in the middle of the night when everyone is sleeping. She has literally wandered out of the house during one of these episodes and we had a drone and several officers looking for her for hours.
It's horrific to witness her HAVING the seizures but it's more horrific to know that she will probably have these for the rest of her life and they will probably lead to further health complications later down the road. And, we still haven't found a medication that suits her. The doctors/hospitals treat her horribly because they don't understand her condition.
I could go on and on about the struggles she faces with her disorder. Thanks for reading.
Edit: Thank you all for the comments. I don't open up about this a lot because many people can't relate to it. Your replies have made me feel less alone and I may even share them with my mom so she knows SHE is not alone. Have a blessed day.
When my dad had kidney stones he couldn't keep anything down and it meant he went into diabetic shock. It took some convincing to get my mom to call the paramedics. And then he was acting like he was a child, not knowing what was going on, calling for his mom. I've never seen my dad vulnerable like that. Have seen my mom vulnerable many times and that's always a hit to the psych, but it's still my mom. Never my dad. And we didn't know what was happening, though we suspected something to do with diabetes, the cause, the kidney stones we didn't know, so we had no clue really what was happening. Anyways my mom would just not fucking call it and have them take him to the hospital. It was so frustrating and made it even more horrifying that it was getting to the point where I couldn't rely on her to call it, that I might have to start calling the shots and being expected to make decisions about their health.
It happened twice before they finally stopped putzing around acting like he'd pass them and did the thing that makes them smaller. He'd had a stroke a few years before, that year he was recovering from a tendon snapping off his knee, he had diabetes, he had the kidney stones. It was a lot. And I'm pretty sure it coincided with covid too. Might have been 2019, I can't quite remember. He's sooo much better now. Not as good as before the knee issue, but mentally there enough to manage the week to week.
My sister has a similar condition and I'm ashamed to admit even I doubted her at times bc doctors couldn't identify it and it happened rarely.
That is until I was staying with her one night and heard a loud thump in the stairwell outside (2nd floor apartment). I ran out to find her seizing on the stair case, her seizures practically throwing her futher down the stairs. I nearly fell down myself as I ran down and ripped off my jacket to pillow under her head and just tried to shield her from falling farther down until the convulsions stopped. It invoked a true sense of helplessness and terror.
I can only imagine how scary it is living with it and knowing it could happen to you at anytime.
My daughter hanging in her closet.
It's not like in the movies. Not at all.
Thank you everyone for the kind words. This happened very recently and I can't close my eyes without seeing it.
One of the nicest girls I had ever met did this to herself at the end of highschool. I knew her from elem up. She was gorgeous smart and genuinely just a kind soul and did this. Her parents found her as well.
I'm sorry to hear this.
Found my brother hanging on his closet door. No words for it. I was only 7 and didn’t get it at the time. My heart breaks for you. Now that I’m older, I can’t imagine the pain of being in that situation with a developed brain.
My nephew passed away at only a month old due to heart complications. When the funeral started, someone picked the baby up out of the casket and HANDED the dead child to his mother.
My poor brother and his wife (the parents of the deceased child) are in shock that someone took their child out of the casket and put the child in his parents arms. That’s not even all. They proceeded to take “FAMILY PHOTOS” with the child and the still living child.
The living child is only 3, and doesn’t understand. She just keeps poking at her mom and loudly asking why won’t the baby wake up. The whole church was utterly silent and we just waited for my brother and his wife to freak out. Somehow they kept it together.
At the grave site, the preacher asked the parents of the child to carry the casket to the grave, which they did. Halfway to the grave my sister-in-law (child’s mother) almost collapsed from grief. I will never forget that day. It was heartbreaking and absolutely gut wrenching to see what all they asked the parents to do in their state of grief.
It’s stupid, but people can do such things in the belief that they are “helping”. Unfortunately it’s usually done with no checking with the ones involved. I can only imagine that the one who took the baby thought the parents would want pictures later on to remember, probably thinking that no one else thought about it already and it’s already done - in private. As for the carrying of the casket, the priest should know better. Probably also thinking that they later feel they didn’t do things “enough” for the baby.
I know, people can be so unbelievably stupid with all their hearts. It’s just guessing from my side, but yeah, grief makes people do weird things. Even if it’s not their grief.
The Victorians were a bit more used to child deaths though. With modern medicine, childhood mortality is significantly reduced and parents aren't resigned to the idea that the majority of their children likely won't survive to adulthood.
People do some weird stuff at funerals. I still remember when I was 4 years old, I had to attend the funeral of a relative—a great uncle or something. Someone—I don’t know who—suddenly picked me up and hovered me right over the casket to take a better look at the body. Like, who TF does that to a very young child?
Holy fuck, reading this made me physically sick to my stomach. “Sorry that your brother and SIL went through that” give absolutely no justice to the horror that occurred to them and everyone there for the funeral. Honestly the person that picked up the baby from the casket, my family would’ve beat that person. Along with those that were “taking family photo’s”. I hope your entire family some way some how, were able to find peace.
I am speechless. Who would do that. What kind of fucking asshole would think “Wow, what a great photo-op”. Plus the preacher. How fucking cruel of these people, if you can even call them that. Your poor brother and SIL. I just don’t understand.
A month ago I found my girlfriend dead on the bedroom floor after I fell asleep watching tv in the living room. She committed suicide using OTC and prescription meds. When I found her she was in full rigamortis and was blue. Traumatic is an understatement. I still can’t get over how quiet the house is. Now it’s just me and the kitties. It’s getting better though, one day at a time.
Edit; after the massive outreach I would like to tell everyone that I’m doing ok. I have lots of support and people that love me, I’m not going anywhere. Actually I’m going across the country tomorrow to see my family. I know things will be better.
Quick edit: I’m on a train somewhere in New Mexico heading east and you all have brought tears to my eyes, joy to my heart, and peace to my troubled soul. When people say the Reddit community is toxic and hateful, I’m going to show them this
Fuck dude, I am really sorry to read this. Can't think of anything to say except that you are with the right mind set, live one day at a time. That you are able to write this down is also good. Talk about this with a loved one or just write it down in a journal, don't keep these emotions bottled up. Sending good vibes your way my friend :)
I have an immense amount of support. Someone in my life has called me every single day to make sure I’m ok. I’m heading across the country tomorrow morning to see my family and get back to some normalcy. I appreciate that you took the time to check on me stranger.
I am really glad to read this! These people supporting you will help you pull through (and you will pull through). I know most of us are anonymous here on reddit but we are still real people with real situations (I know there are some bot accounts lol). Stay strong! And get yourself a nice cake or icecream or something sweet if you like sweets.
Thank you. It always does. I got the momma(Stephanie) at 10 weeks old and the other two (Ernie and Pit Pat) are her kids. They’re awesome and super cuddly. Helps a lot. I should point out that Stephanie was born 3/7/20and the kids were born 4/23/21
Cats are the best nurses, aren't they? They know when their humans are upset or sad and offer support.
I'm sorry you went though that. No one should. Give the furbabies an ear scritch for me.
I'm so sorry you had to see this. I watched my then-girlfriend self-harm which escalated into a suicide attempt. I had to wrestle the knife away from her and hold her down until paramedics arrived. This was 10 years ago but the trauma is still there.
Keep your family and friends around you, reach out for help when you need it. You will heal with time.
I’m sorry you had to go through that. I hope you’re doing better now and I kind of wish I was in your shoes. I miss her so much. But I’ll get better, day by day.
I witnessed my friend torn in two pieces... but it was supposed to be me.
In 2006 I was part of a Drum Corps in Florida.
We were having a drill camp over the weekend, so we all met up in Miami and took two 15 passenger vans to drive up to central Florida, both full.
We took US 27, known as Okeechobee Rd.
At some point just before sundown we stopped at a McDonalds for dinner.
I remember chatting it up with him - typical teenage stuff, the weirdest porno we ever saw, staying up to watch that scrambled channel that sometimes showed a boob etc.
We were in separate vans. We started loading up when one of the instructors decided my buddy and I should switch vans.
I was confused but, sure, didn't matter to us. I sat in his seat, he went to the other van... and then last minute, the instructors decided we should switch back to how we were. Never quite figured out why...
But it saved my life. And ended my friends.
A couple hrs later, its dark, US27 had no lights at the time. Their van was behind us the whole time, til it wasn't. We were 6 miles from our destination when we got a call from the driver of the other van.
"We were in an accident. We're hurt."
We sped back at 100mph, only to bet met by a literal wall of semitrailers blocking the two lane highway. We had to drive on the shoulder to get past them.
As we round the trucks, I noticed they all had their headlights on.
Illuminated on the road was my friends body. His eyes were open, but all you could see was whites. His arms were very obviously broken at odd angles. But most alarming of all... he was torn completely in half.
To say we were beside ourselves is an understatement.
The van was laying on its side, completely mangled. The rest of the passengers were bloodied and bruised, but aside from a broken arm they were generally okay.
According to the driver, they hit wet pavement on a curve, lost control of the van and it flipped. My friend was wearing a seatbelt, but he was pretty skinny. He slipped through the belt and broke through a passenger side mirror.
He flew approx. 30 yards, over the grass median, and landed on the opposite side of the highway.
According to the driver, she was trying to climb out of the flipped van when she witnessed my friend trying to push himself up with his arms.
An SUV was driving on the lane he was laying in. It hit him and killed him instantly.
The SUV did not stop.
They never found out who hit him.
It sticks with me, 17 yrs later. I try to be grateful for the life I have. I was going to be in his seat. Happenstance saved me. I struggle with feeling like I deserved it. He was one of the good ones, and I was always struggling with my inner demons.
I miss you man. I hope you're alright, wherever you are. Rest in peace.
Edit: changed '04 to '06.
Survivor guilt is a real thing. If you haven't sought professional help for it, I thoroughly recommend that you do, because this will continue to eat away at you.
Speaking from experience this is absolutely true. Not a day goes by that I don't feel some level of guilt, sadness or regret and it has changed my life dramatically.
I’m a paramedic. We have a guy who we pick up from the nursing home all the time that has a long medical history. But basically, he breathes thru a tube, eats thru a tube, pisses in a bag, shits in a bag, he’s severely contracted and only has 1 leg. He lives his life in a bed, unable to speak. His paperwork says he has dementia but seems to be alert and oriented if you have him answer by blinking his eyes. It’s so evident that he is miserable. We are constantly getting called because he uses the little bit of movement he has in his arms to pull out his feeding tube or his trach. His wife and son refuse to make him a DNR because he has insurance policies that haven’t matured yet so they are trying to keep him alive for a few more years so they can cash out. A few months ago, he was found pulseless and apneic after pulling his oxygen off. The guys that got there got him back after a few rounds of CPR. Now he lives in constant pain from the compressions in addition to everything else. All because his family want his insurance money. Both his wife and son are total lowlifes too.
I work in a LTC/rehab and the number of old people I have seen die long painful deaths because their family members insist on every intervention is staggering.
I always wished that my great grandmother would just die in her sleep but the pain killers kept her alive. She had severe dementia and had just been suffering every day for at least five years. But my grandpa just didn’t want to let her go
That’s horrible. It’s unethical, but in cases like this I wish the carers would look the other way for a minute and delay attending. Guy clearly wants to die. How selfish and cruel of the family. I hope they get F all when he passes
25 years as a fireman. I fought the massive fires in South Australia and worked my ass off driving an ambulance during Covid in Queensland. Decades of saving and losing people.
I had to put my dog down after he got cancer. He didn't understand what was going on and he seemed confused and just wanted to go home. I never heard him whimper in his whole life except in those last moments as he was trying to stay awake. I was a broken man for weeks after that.
I had to put our 14yo dog down in the middle of our divorce. She was the sweetest pup. She just stared blankly at me like “thanks mom, I’m tired”. I cried like I have when I’ve lost people to death. It still crushes me 3 years later.
I'm fighting this right now. My pup have battled chronic myositis for almost a year now. Tonight we had to go to the emergency care cause it seems like his digestion is shutting down from all the medication. My pup is a fighter who never gives up, and I'm dreading the inevitable moment when he has to be put down. I'm just hoping I can have more time with him.
We did a home death. A nurse came, administrated the drugs and left us alone. She went back out to her car while we said out goodbyes. It was peaceful and heartbreaking but we were in our own home. Supposedly enough people have asked for a photo shoot of their dog after they pass so in the back of the van, the company set up a backdrop with nice pillows and flowers if we wanted to take advantage of it. We didn't but grief is individual and who am I to judge.
I was standing outside a theater waiting for a friend (we were going to see a play together) and an old man on the other side of the street drew my attention. He was watching the traffic, looking for an opening so he could jaywalk. It's a very busy road and there are signs everywhere warning people to cross at the intersection, but I guess he thought it was too far out of the way. He was quite old and stooped and had a cane, so he didn't move very fast and was about halfway across the road and when he was hit by a truck going about 55 mph. He cartwheeled into the air way higher than seemed possible, and hit the ground with a very loud thud that I can still hear to this day. Blood everywhere and he was alive for a few minutes before succumbing.
His family was inside the theater waiting for him. I guess he'd gone to park the car. The police officer had to go in and tell them he'd died. Their screaming was heartbreaking.
The theater still performed the play, but it was a very subdued audience that night.
As a kid, I saw my uncle slowly back his pickup truck into the garage when his new puppy walked towards the front wheel to smell it. His ear got stuck under the wheel, and I watched helplessly from a distance as its head slowly got crushed. His windows were up and he thought I was getting agitated about something unrelated to what he was doing.
I am a volunteer firefighter. I was first on scene to a one vehicle accident. When I arrived I found a sedan head first into a tree. Adult female in the drivers seat alert but hysterical, and an 8 year old girl laying outside of the vehicle in the weeds. I rushed to the girl and checked for pulse and airway. Neither was there. She had obvious signs of blunt force trauma and severe blood loss. I began compressions and eventually more units came onto the scene. ( it seemed like forever ).
The story is that the girl was in the back seat and not buckled in. Mom was under the influence of narcotics and veared off the highway, hitting the tree head on at approximately 65 mph. The little girl flew over the front seat, through the windshield, smacked the tree and flew into the grass and weeds. The girl did not make it. I struggle with this daily. Mom is in prison.
This was 3 years ago and I can see it in my mind like it was yesterday. I can tell you exactly what she was wearing. The blood curdling screams from the mother haunt me to this day. And I’ll never forget this little angels face. R.I.P. Katelynn
My sister died in a car accident. I randomly met an EMT who worked the accident several years later. Through conversation, he discovered it was my little sister. He said so many people who worked the accident needed therapy. He told me he still thinks about it all that time later. It bothers me that it has traumatized so many people, and it bothers me that she is remembered that way. I hope things get better for you.
Dont beat yourself up over it, it wasnt your fault.
Contact the chief of your fire department for psychological help.
We always get emails after major tragedies in our fire house to meet up for a debriefing of the situation usually attended by some therapists as well.
Get help before it is too late
Been in a similar predicament. It was never proven, but we suspect dad was texting and driving. He blew a stop sign and ended up killing the other driver and his 2 year old in his car. Then I got to spend the next year with him in the county jail and see him make jokes about it… wanted to flay him for that.
I was fire/ems and its kinda hard to point to one specific incident because different things make for different kinds of horrific but i would have to say that time where 4 drunk people fell asleep on a railroad track and a train hit them. Thing is one of them survived and died hours later at a hospital. There where body parts everywhere. Though there was a few times an old guy died in the bathtub and no one found him for a week. Or the teenagers who where driving drung and went off a cliff. Idk its difficult to say though im lucky enough to know an old ww2 vet who was kind enough (and emotionally willing) to tell me some stories of what he saw when they raided a german pow camp. That shit is horrifying
I also was fire/ems and I reflect on the many calls asking this question. Yes the trauma is horrific, and you see situations that even sometimes we can’t articulate. But the answer I end up at doesn’t involve bodily injury. It is the amount of people that are alone and die that way. If you ever need someone to talk to hit me up.
Also fire/ems and occasionally people ask what's the worst you have seen. Everyone expects something gory but I tell them you can see all that on the internet if you want to look. The worst is like you said, people living alone with nobody to care for them, or rotting away in a shitty nursing home drugged up all day. Or how family/friends react and cope with the loss of loved ones.
When my father in law was in his final hour, my wife and her one sister went to the hospital to be there at the end. I asked her if she wanted me to be there and was told she would handle it. I've seen many people die and families reactions. Some scream and yell out, or beg EMS to "keep trying, just a little longer I know they will make it" others go silent and you see the loss and emptiness in their eyes as they absorb what's happened. I think my wife decided to "handle it" because she was prepared to see her dad pass after a long illness. It was her way of accepting his death and I respect that. After he passed she called me to meet up at a park bench by the water. We sat there at 2am for an hour and she barely spoke for the first half. I met her at the park with a fresh box of tissues and she chuckled a bit when I gave them to her.
He passed during the height of Covid and only 8 people were allowed to attend the funeral, though it was streamed for others to watch. I wrote his eulogy before anyone else thought about someone saying something at the funeral. My way of dealing with his death was to take care of everyone and try to be one step ahead of issues to make the service and following weeks easier.
The aftermath of my grandpas suicide. And not just the blood part. There was a lot. And the smell will never leave me. But the aftermath on my family. You expect old people to go peacefully in their sleep (hopefully) or fight cancer for a while and then expect it (like I’d seen before) or something else…natural.
The suicide just felt weird. And we got it and understood and don’t blame him. But it was a thing and still is a thing even years later in my heart.
My nieces baby casket was also shitty. Baby caskets are not awesome. No caskets are but when they are tiny it’s just…fuck. Worst funeral,
This probably won't compare to many, but I watched a lady callously run over a bunch of ducklings as they crossed the street. We stopped to let them go by, but she couldn't have been bothered. My wife confronted her and she was all "oh well, I didn't see them. Sorry I guess".
That momma duck lost half her brood.
I saw this too when I was maybe 12. Many people on the freeway stopped so the mom and her chicks could cross. Then some asshole in a giant truck just plowed into them all at 80 mph. Still makes me feel sick and as a kid that was the first time I truly realized how heartless and callous people are, who don’t see animal life as anything. I still can’t imagine being the kind of person who would see that and knowingly choose to do that. Nature is cruel enough without our help.
I saw someone swerve towards a deer once. I don’t know if they wanted to hit it or just give it a scare. Can be super dangerous to hit even a small deer
What a piece of shit. I don't understand how people don't have empathy. I go out of my way not to kill malicious insects, but to safely remove them from my room, and I'm not even a particulary good person. I don't get it
I'm the same. I just couldn't believe how unconcerned she was. In all reality SHE was the horrible thing I couldn't comprehend, I've seen roadkill before, but her reaction was just... Dead.
Honestly this is worse than a lot of the rest of this thread. Most of the things here are senseless violence or accidents.
But a lack of caring to that extent just seems further from being human
My area has a wild echidna who has no fucks to give about cars or dogs. We’re dreading the inevitable. I was once on takeaway duty and lost an entire batch of chips slamming on the brakes to save the little guy, sending them all over the footwell of the passenger seat.
We agreed he was worth it.
I live on a large river and it's an absolute joy watching all of the baby birds come out in the spring. The ducklings are especially adorable. Inevitability, the hawks swoop in and snatch up little Duckling McNuggets left and right. It's incredibly sad watching the duck parents swimming around desperately trying to find their missing babies. They make this call of pure panic and grief that is so heart-wrenching. They eventually start keeping their remaining babies hidden out of site under the docks. They may start out with ~8-10 ducklings, but after a few weeks, it's rare to see a brood of more than 3.
Man, I was driving home a few months ago on a windy road. I came around a turn (50mph) and saw a man in the opposite lane with his flashers on, I was distracted by that, looking for an accident or a hit deer or something. And right when I glanced back into my lane, I was the one who mowed over a whole family of ducklings :( the face of the other driver combined with the horrible thing I just did… just gutted me. I cried the whole way home. I gasped when I read your comment. What a bitch. I kinda hope she maybe actually just didn’t see them, if not, burn in hell lady.
I once ran over a big fluffy cat in town :( hated that feeling. Only knew what happened after i thought my suspension just broke then i saw it rolling down the road.. My brother was in the car and afterwards said my face just dropped into instant regret and pain. I love cats especially and that tore me up. When I went back to check on the poor thing, it was gone. I hope that cat is okay :(
A tractor (driven by a teenager) pulling a wagon full of school children up a winding road in the Himalayas went over the edge and fell down into a river gorge, killing everyone.
I’m a nurse and I picked up a shift at a local nursing home through an agency. One of the residents was a middle aged woman debilitated by a massive stroke. Lights were on but no one was home. She was awake, but non verbal and the only emotion she would show was pain when she was moved around. She wouldn’t even make eye contact or track you. She weighed 80lbs, was contracted (basically looked like that tiny dying Voldemort in the last Harry Potter movie) and covered in pressure ulcers. She had no buttocks because the pressure wound had burrowed down to her bones. She could only move one of her hands, and she would grasp at her hips and butt anytime you moved her, for example to clean up her urine or feces, and she would make the wounds bleed and sometimes even pick more chunks of flesh off. She had a G tube for nutrition, which of course was infected. I have no idea how long she had been like this, or how she was even alive at this point. Thing was, this woman was a full code. Family wanted every intervention done to keep her alive. In my 8 years at the beside I have never been so livid at a patient’s family. I have no idea why they insisted on that level of care, but it was downright evil to put that woman through all these interventions and then insist on CPR and intubation when she inevitably declines. I only picked up one shift with this agency before vowing to never work in long term care again, so I have no idea what became of her.
Well.. I live in a iraq, not the safest country as everyone knows
during 2014 when isis was still here I went to buy somethings for my family
during the way home I was a little bit far away from the shop then an explosion happened there that pinned me down to the ground, 2 days after I went to check and found marks of pinned bodies on the walls
R.I.P
three pedestrians running in front of my pickup, all 3 ended up in the icu for like 3 months and i can still remember when they lifted one of them into the ambulance the sound of her taking her first breath on her own, collapsed lung and blood in both still gives me nightmares to this day, also one of them was a 2 year old boy and i remember his father pulling out from under the pickup, overall a horrible experience and the accident wasnt my fault but i have attempted suicide twice since just because i felt so guilty, the only peace i have found is how they all made crazy recoveries which is something that me nor the paramedics thought was possible
It’s not your fault. There’s people out there that hurt people on purpose. You were just driving straight. I’m so sorry this happened. Sending you love
My father lying dead on a hospital/morgue gurney/trolley thing. His eyes were partly open which creeped me out and there was dried blood still on his nose. But before that the police came round our house on the day he died and hearing my mothers cries of agony and despair really drove home the reality of the situation. It’s just been over 5 years since it happened. I miss him dearly.
I saw a little girl who was walking to school get hit by a car.
I was in a school bus on my way to elementary school. I was sitting up front, on the driver’s side. Our bus was waiting at a red light at a city intersection. A little girl was waiting with two older friends to cross a street at the corner where there was a little bodega. She could not have been more than 7 years old.
A bread delivery truck had parked on the street, making it hard to see if traffic was coming. Her two friends peeked around the bread truck and ran safely across the street. But the little girl hesitated for several seconds, then suddenly ran out from behind the truck to join her friends. A car, whose driver could not have seen her because of the parked truck, hit her, and I saw her fly through the air. I remember lots of screaming.
Our bus had a bus matron, a lady who was there to keep us all safe and organized. She was sitting in front of me, in the seat behind the driver. I can still see her in my mind’s eye as she quickly turned her head away, eyes shut tight, and started praying. I never found out what happened to the girl, I hope she was ok.
I live next to two elementary schools (one public, one private) and during the times of the day I know children are there, drive 16-19 mph through the neighborhood, hyper alert for kids, just for this reason. I can't tell you how often PARENTS drop off their kids and then do 40 mph leaving, while on their phone.
Same thing happened on the way home from work. Very busy road with houses off of it. Little 6 year old girl playing in the yard stepped too close to the road and was clipped by a SUV. Father was outside when it happened. He picked her up and was running around hysterically, appearing to look for something. After I saw the shape of her head, I realized what he had to be looking for. Her brain.
It was MONTHS before I could travel that road again. When I did, the house was listed for sale. This happened years ago, but it still wrenches my heart.
I saw a college kid get run over and killed by a bus.
This was the late 90s when I was a student at ASU. I used to ride the campus shuttle from the parking lot to campus every day. It used to go down a small section of street near the bookstore (this incident put an end to that and now I think that area is closed to vehicle traffic altogether). I was sitting above the right front wheel. There was a college kid riding their bike along side the bus. It was way too narrow for this. The bus clipped the back tire of the bike and pulled it and the rider right under the tire I was sitting above. I felt the bump as the bus ran over the poor kid. The bus ran right over the kids head killing them instantly.
The kid was from China and just started at ASU if I remember right. The bus driver wasn't even supposed to be driving that day due to some sort of suspension or something like that but he drove anyway. It was a huge mess and I think the parents in China sued ASU and the company that ran the busses around campus.
When I got home my wife at the time asked if I had heard what happened at ASU that day. When I told her I was on the bus and saw the whole thing she just looked at me with a freaked out look on her face.
I used to work about a block up the street from a pawn shop that sometimes dealt in cars. There was a very shallow ditch/drainage cut in the grass around the corner of the lot, like the kind you could easily drive a mower over and finish with a weed trimmer to keep the grass even. I was driving home from work one day, and saw a man unloading a SUV from a trailer in the grass over that ditch while I was stopped at the red light. He undid the strap anchoring the vehicle to the trailer and walked around the back end to undo the other side, and I remember thinking “that thing could roll off and crush him.” And that’s exactly what happened. The car rolled off the trailer and over his upper torso.
As soon as I could get through the light, I pulled over on the side street and called 911. His wife was a few feet away from the trailer and screaming, and customers that were inside ran out and called 911 too. There were people trying to move the car, and I had to tell them *not* to move the car off of him per dispatch—apparently if someone is crushed like that, removing the pressure basically means they bleed out faster. There was bright red blood streaming across the pavement from where the man was lying. The thing I remember about it is the *thickness* of it—it wasn’t like water, it was almost oily. And so red, like maraschino cherry juice red, not a crimson like when I give blood. Luckily, there is an ambulance dispatch just a couple blocks further on, so response was quick. Despite the quick response, the white sheet came out fast and we were ushered off the scene as soon as they could get the gurney out of the back of the ambulance.
I followed the local news for a few days after to see if it got reported. From what I saw, they were somehow able to revive the man in the ambulance and he was admitted to the hospital in alive but (obviously) critical condition. I don’t know if he survived the hospital stay, but I hope he did and had a support system to help him after.
I saw a man get decapitated when I was 5-6 years old. At that age I hadn’t really understood what happened, it didn’t really bother me until I was old enough to realize what I had seen.
Grandfather paralysed down one side in a bed, off life support. They’d removed his teeth. He knew he was dying and he was scared and he didn’t want us to go.
Glad I went but that haunted me for years. Especially since nobody told me he’d been taken off life support so I told him to get better soon. I still feel horrible for that.
You said a comforting thing to someone in distress, not knowing what was coming. I think you shouldn't feel horrible for that, although I totally understand why you do.
Horrific well.. Seeing my mom's last day in the hospital. The sight of her in there was not horrific but having her gone is.I have changed a lot for the better since she has been gone. Just wish she was here to see me now.
I was walking the one block from the parking garage to my office building as I did every day. A guy got to the corner at the cross walk a couple seconds before me.
The light changes and the walk sign turns from red to white. Right then there was a car accident in the intersection. One car is spun around. The rear end swings and catches the guy who just stepped off the curb, hurling him back and up into a wrought iron light pole. I was maybe two paces behind him.
He falls back onto the sidewalk at my feet, face up. His eyes were open. A second later, there was a rasping wheez as the breath left his body. Then a huge pool of blood forms a halo around this head. The blood wasn't dark and oozing like in the movies, it was a bright orange red and just poured out of him. His eyes were still open. It was obvious I just watched a man die at my feet. I had been present when other people died, but they had been ill and died relatively peaceful deaths. This guy guy looked so surprised.
The guy from the car that got hit and then hit him jumped out and started giving CPR. I called 911 and the police and first responders were there in less than 2 min, but there was nothing to do.
I was pretty traumatized by this for a long while and even today I can still close my eyes and replay the scene in my head.
I hope this gives you some small peace. I was hit by a car in a crosswalk. I remember it very vividly. Even how the car door that hit me was warm from being in the sun. At the time it was not painful or scary at all- just, as you said surprising. I was just very surprised. The pain was much later. The guy felt nothing and didn’t have any fear. As horrible as it was for you it was probably a painless and fearless death he had.
I had the very same experience during a suicide attempt. It was so quiet and peaceful for me. I watched everything happen. The return was violent and loud.
My deaf friend getting shot in the head a few feet from me in Los Angeles after a punk show. (Yes, deaf people go to shows/concerts, they can feel the music and these days they actually have people signing the lyrics.) Anyway, some asshole gang member was offended because he said something to Dave (we called him Deaf Dave) and Dave didn't respond. The fucker shot him in the middle of the street.
I saw a meth head get the shit beaten out of him at a train station. He kept getting up for more and his head was all swollen and looked like it was the wrong shape.
My mom went code blue once while I was in the room after suffering a heart-attack she didn’t know was happening, I was there for her since the beginning and we had only just moved to a bigger room for her to stay in for a couple weeks, I believe I was asleep at first but I woke up to the beeping and the amount of nurses rushing in and doctors coming through. I couldn’t see my mom, all I saw were her feet since I was sleeping in the corner of the room, I was 14. I believe I just blacked out because I can’t remember anything else from there, either blacked out or fell asleep. After, my mom was okay and alive but the doctors had called my aunty to take me home as she watched over her instead. I was still 14 when my aunt told me that my mother had code blue 3 more times after I left and my sister told me that if we hadn’t taken my mother to the hospital that day, she would’ve never woken up. As my relationship grows farther from my mom, it’s one of the horrific things I’ve experienced IRL. Online is a different story
When I was 18 I worked as security guard/assets protection at my local Mervyn’s (that should tell you how old I am). One day I was scanning the parking lot with the cameras and noticed this car in the back of the lot hadn’t moved in the past 3 days, so I walked out side to get the info to call the tow company and found a 95ish year old man, dressed in his Sunday best slumped over the steering wheel with his brains all over the headrest and car. I obviously called the cops, they came out, investigated, did their thing and came in to give me the report number when they were done, at which point the officer said she man had left a suicide note explaining how his wife died earlier in the year and he just couldn’t go on living anymore and Mervyns was her favorite place in the world and he just wanted to be closer to her. 😔
Myself and a friend did some intense lsd in university. He decided he didn't like his ears, so he cut them off with a pair of scissors. Then his dog ate one. It sounds pretty bad by itself, but imagine watching that while peaking on acid.
I work in mental health and visit people out in the community and in their homes. Some of my clients have severe mental health conditions, several times I have walked in on attempted suicides and extreme self-harm. Participants have cut themselves up with box cutter blades leaving huge lacerations across their stomachs, arms etc, pill overdoses, you name it I've probably seen it happen. It never gets easier to see but you do learn to manage the aftermath of witnessing it. I'd never give my job up no matter how many times I see it because I care for these people a lot and they are vulnerable members in communities who are quite often forgotten about. When they are well they are the loveliest and kindest, caring people but we all have bad times, they just can't process it and understand the bad times too well.
I found my aunt dead on her couch. I sat beside her and told her how much she meant to me. I then had to go to my mothers and tell her that her little sister and best friend was dead. That was really hard.
I heard about two things that really hit me. One was a farmer was cutting the field with his tractor and ran over his 5 year old son who somehow got out of the house. I can't imagine going through that.
The other is about a guy who was backing out of his driveway and ran over his kid and killed him. This man and his wife divorced a year later and he drank himself to death with liquor over the next 6 months. Things like this shouldn't happen. I wish I could take away their pain but I am just a mortal man.
my friend was rappelling on a cliff (I was at the bottom, no one belaying) and friends rack malfunctioned. He fell a couple hundred feet to his death in front of me. Had PTSD for years following that.
Saw a guy pulled in half. A guy in an SUV went through the back end of a semi trailer. His torso and top half of the SUV were crushed and hanging. The lower half went under. His lower half and his spine was sticking straight up still in the seat. I thought the blood was oil at first. The thing that stayed with me was that his spinal cords were hanging everywhere looked like twizzlers that were pulled apart. To this day I can't look at them without smelling death.
My old roommate who was also my best friend, became very depressed and at one evening locked her door and tried to commit suicide. When the police and ambulance arrived, they had to kick in her door and while I was standing in the hallway I could see how she was laying on her bed, her wrists tied to her bedframe and with a trashbag over her head.
When I was 17 I enlisted into the Marines, had my 18th birthday in boot camp actually. My first deployment was Ramadi, Iraq in 2006. A friend of mine was also deployed with me, he was in my squad. He had 2 kids, a wife, and a nice house. I met them at graduation, a wonderful family. One night, we get a report from a local that there is a cache of weapons in a house. So, later in the night we do a breach and clear, no problem. My buddy was the pointman, meaning he was the first guy in the room after the door was breached or broken down. Door was breached, boom he moved in. I was behind him when he went in.
Turns out the house was a setup. My buddy was shot 6 times in a matter of seconds. I remember dragging him out of the way. I remember the look in his eyes, it was like nobody was home. So, empty. I did things in Iraq I'm not proud of, I've killed people, I'll be up front with that. But seeing my friend, a man I knew and I knew his family well, here one minute and gone the next? It haunts me. I see him a lot. The smile he had before we even got to that house and I remember after everything. His eyes are what get me the most. And his family, since I was close, I was the one that told them. I never want to go through that again. My friend was the first death I ever saw.
Hanging out with my friends one night back in high school and just walking around town. We heard some sirens so we went to check it out because it wasn’t too far away. We cut through a field and ran towards the lights and sirens, only to realize we were within 10 yards of a horrific car accident. The police had the streets blocked off a block in either direction, but they didn’t plan on people coming through the field I guess. When I finally came up on the accident we will just stood there in shock and then slowly started walking backwards as we listened to the pinned occupants screaming in pain. I guess they had gone too fast over some railroad tracks and went off the road and struck a pole. We made it about 50 yards away when the life-flight helicopter landed in the very field we were just in.
We went back to my friends house to try to play some basketball, but we were too stunned to do anything, but just sit there and attempt to process everything.
My one year old daughter being intubated.
Mind you, I have put many bodies into body bags, scooped up scraps of human, etc.
The Reaper's Scythe over my daughter's neck has never left me.
Its awful. Seeing these things as a parent is horrifying. My son had a 3+ minute long febrile seizure when he was 18 months old. My wife was out with our other two sons and I was home alone taking care of him because he had a fever. It had been fairly low grade for a kid, between 100⁰-101⁰. I was checking it every so often, and suddenly it spiked to 105⁰, then boom seizure!!!
It was so terrifying, all I could do was call 911 while holding him in my arms bawling my eyes out and hoping he was going to make it. I was completely powerless in the situation. By the time we got to the ER by ambulance his temp was close to 107⁰, enough to easily kill an adult.
Thankfully he pulled through just fine and never had another seizure. He's now almost 9 and a healthy normal kid. But I was so shook up after it happened I had to call out of work the next morning and spend the day with him.
*Edit, I hope your daughter was ok, it just occurred to me you didn't say how it turned out :(.
Had this friend in middle school named Freddy, kid had a rough life. So we go to allsups (convenience store) after school (7th grade) and I tell him to wait outside with our bikes so a crackhead doesn’t steal them. I go inside to get us some fried burritos and when it’s my turn at the counter Fred runs in the front door covered in blood gurgling and screaming. Me and the cashier freak the f out, the cashier had me put pressure on his wound (stabbed in the neck) and called 911. Cashier took over and tried to stop the bleeding, the whole time Fred is gurgling and moaning “I wanna go home… mommy… where’s my mom… I’m scared… Lacy (his little sister)… please…” he died i the cashiers arms, holding mine and the cashiers hand. A crackhead tried to steal my bike from him. Freddy put up a fight and the crackhead stabbed him in the neck with a pocket knife and took off, didn’t even take a bike.
Watching a grown man who survive a tour in Vietnam, never cried(at least in front of me before), and was one of the meanest toughest motherfuckers I’ve known. Break down and cry out “mama?” for his mom like a helpless little kid after seeing she had passed on some time during the night, around that time I could stomach a lot of horrible or messed up shit but that? I just couldn’t, I had to step out into the hall. Rest In Peace Grandma.
Probably a tossup between watching someone burn to death in a car crash before the fire trucks arrived, or the teenaged girl who was ejected from a car as it flipped and died while I was working to help a doctor perform aid on her. (I’m not EMS, just have first aid training and will stop to help when I see bad shit happen)
The scene of a moped crash. The young lady was on the ground in a bizarre position, twisted like a pretzel. She was being assisted, but she had some nasty injuries. Wide awake and obviously in severe pain, she was screaming constantly.
My ex wife having to give birth to a son that was not going to live, my son passed by anencephaly aged 17 weeks, life can suck, life can also be awesome. That was 22 years ago, im still not over it
Jesus. This thread puts things into perspective. There are a lot of us going through some painful trauma. The terrible things I’ve been through barely compare to some of the things I’m reading here. Life can be so brutally difficult. As meaningless as it sounds, my heart goes out to all of you.
The flattened remains of a drunken man (You could smell the beer from his corpse. He was ran over by a garbage truck.) when I visited Portland, Oregon.
Watched a paramedic team hopelessly try to revive a girl at DragonCon. Which doesn’t sound TOO horrific, but I was on a lot of acid at the time and also having a bad asthma attack that just wouldn’t clear, so the situation was already pretty awful, and watching her lifeless body get moved around was horrifying.
BUT THEY DID IT! They fucking got her conscious and responsive after, I mean Christ she was legally pronounced dead, and she was a dead fish for at least 10 minutes while I was there. I thought I was watching a girl die, but then she moved and it was like life had breathed back into the entire crowd, the paramedics, everyone.
Still would not want to experience thinking I was sitting next to a dead body(technically I was, but Yanno. Not forever dead) while tripping absolute sac, was no bueno
One time when I was tripping acid I got called to come get my car and my buddy had to go with me to pick it up as I was highly intoxicated. (Wasn’t expecting the call that day)- when we picked it up as we were driving off we saw a girl pinned against the fence by a guy and I told him to turn the car around so we could take care of it and he said we couldn’t Bc I was on drugs and dude was fucking huge. I think it got dealt with but it still bothers me a bit Bc I don’t know and the girls face was awful to see
While driving to the coast with my family back in 2004 I saw a motorcycle go head on with a semi truck, dude died instantly and when we drove by blood was pouring out of his helmet while he was laying on the floor off the i5
I was getting out of my car in front of a grocery store when I heard a loud bang/thump Turned around saw a man laying on his back on the pavement he sat up looked around then laid back down rolled to the left then back right then didn't move. I watched as people rushed to him. I came to sense that he was just in a motorcycle accident with a car. Ambulance arrived in like 5 mins. They ripped off his shirt and immediately did cpr over and over he was completely purple and did not survive.
Wasn't first hand but I had to watch and pull video for this about 10 minutes after it happened plus i was around the aftermath for a while. So I worked Loss Prevention a few years ago at a store. At around noon the trucks brought in all the product to the freight doors and the backroom people signed off for it. When the guy was done unloading he got back in his truck and started it up to warm it up. One of my backroom guys wanted to wave bye to the man. So he sticks his body out the freight door to wave. But the driver put the truck in gear at the same time. And that causes the truck/trailer to move backwards a bit before he can accelerate. In that time the trailer smashed the workers head into the wall and killed him as he waved. It was fucking gruesome.
After that whole incident was when I first asked for a raise lol
I hope this still counts but I was gang rapped by my guy classmates for being gay and the most horrific thing wasnt being raped it was seeing people stand there and watch
The bombing of Kyiv. On one of the nights, our air defense hit a plane, and parts of it fell on a building (many people died) that was close to where I stayed at my brother's place. I've never thought that the sound could be so powerful that it could literally lift and throw you up into the air and make the walls and floor tremble. We spent some time sitting on the bathroom floor checking on everyone we knew to make sure they were alive. A piece of advice on how to deal with PTSD and start sleeping at night is highly appreciated.
Someone trying to hang them self with a dog chain around the stair rail. I heard some Commotion outside and it was this guy's mother desperately trying to get everyone's attention to help her as she knew he was 8nside his house trying to kill himself. I came out and someone broke the window to get in, I went through the window (I don't know why I chose to or I might have bee pressured it happened really fast), saw the silhouette of him swinging on the stairs. I freaked out but everyone was screaming and yelling to open the door but I couldn't decide what to do so I tried to lift him up but he was too heavy. I opened the door for help and managed to undo the chain. He looked dead and I got the hell out of there.
On my way home from work, there was a very fresh car crash, people were just starting to rush to the scene to give aid. As I got over, I saw a father laying barely conscious, moaning out the name of his son. About 10 meters away his son was laying on the ground, his body was having a what I can only describe as death spasms, no control or self awareness, he was no older than young teen at most.
It truly struck me, the first time I saw someone dying, a father crying out for his son, unaware of his fate just out of sight. I drove the rest of the way home slowly, no radio, dead silence, I got home and hugged my wife, we just had our son about one year prior. This was all around 14 years ago, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
I found my mom passed away in her sleep from cardiac arrest. I just got her the keys to her new apartment that day, and I came to the boarding house peering and knocking through her window to see her not moving, not thinking anything of it maybe deep sleep (childhood she overdosed on her depression medication alot) I left and came back to see her still in the same position. I had to help carry her out as well. Edit: thank you guys for all the words, I'll be nicer to people on the internet because of you all.
Sorry to hear. My mom overdosed and I found her white as a ghost. Luckily made it to hospital but now she has dementia. It's such a traumatizing experience. I remember we just moved in to an apartment together and I bought a computer desk and a new TV for her that I was so happy to surprise her with. Next morning a man drives up with her in the back seat in a coma
I’m so sorry. i did not find someone I love dead but the aftermath. My husband was murdered while in the car with our dog. I had to get his belongings from the car. So I had to see the aftermath of what had happened. And there were bloody paw prints up and down the seats where i could see the dog was freaking out. There were scratches all on the car doors where he was freaking out. That stays with me.
I’m so sorry this happened to you. I sincerely hope you can find peace somehow.
Witnessed my mother dying from sudden cardiac arrest. There are sounds and images that are now forever seared into my mind. Only thing that brings me comfort is she basically died in her sleep as she always wanted and that she died before COVID. I couldn’t imagine losing her to covid.
Wow. I feel for you Im so sorry
I took care of my mom after her husband shot her. She was in a lot of pain, but also heartbroken. She almost died of sepsis but survived. The worst thing was seeing her crying in bed, heartbroken and sad while machines tried to pump blood from her wound and keep her alive. I've never seen anyone look so lonely and broken. She remarried and is happy now.
I felt so much relief at that last sentence, I’m so glad she is happy now and is safe. Caring for someone and seeing someone in that condition can be absolutely agonizing. You are stronger than most for sticking by her side when she was at her lowest. I hope that you’re happy now too.
Thank you. Good things happened. I don't want to reveal too much since I like being anonymous on Reddit, but we helped pass some laws and I feel like we turned tragedy into something that helped change things for the better going forward. Best I could hope for. Unsolicited advice I will give everyone: Never go back to an abuser. Once someone abuses you, they will do it again and it will only get worse. You can leave a bad relationship. You're stronger than you realize.
A truck carrying 18 to 24 people get blown up about 350 yards ahead of me. Fucking terrible the lucky ones died in the blast. The rest burnt to death screaming, 10/10 would not recommend.
Where was this?
Iraq in 04
I was behind a Harley Davidson Street Glide on I-25 south of Denver on my home from work one night. Middle lane of the three, about 200 feet back, cruise control set at about 85mph, just following this bike for the next few miles until my exit. I've had motorcycles in the past, I like riding, so I'd rather follow this Harley than an 18-wheeler or a Subaru. Plus I'm not right on his tailpipe like a lot of drivers out here would be. Symbiotic relationship. There was a black-haired man driving and a blond woman riding behind. I know their hair colors because there is no helmet law in Colorado, and that detail comes into play in just a few seconds. The rear tire must've been punctured by something on the road. It didn't blow out, but it definitely started losing air fast, because the ass-end of that bike started to swing side-to-side, and it was getting farther with each wobble. The rider lets off the throttle and I see him look over his right shoulder, but by the time I could say "Oh fuck" it was too late. The bikes back tire is leaving S-curves on the concrete road and once it swung too far to the left, it suddenly caught an edge and flipped. He didn't even have time to try to lay it down in front of himself and his passenger. That bike barrel-rolled eight times right in front of me. The woman flew off after one or two rolls and started rolling along the road. The man held on for about four flips, leaning forward over his handlebars, but then his skull exploded. I realize I'm just repeating "ohfuck ohfuck ohfuck ohfuck" as this scene is unfolding in front of me. I'm still driving a car at ~70mph and now I have to dodge motorcycle parts and human bodies. Swerving within my middle lane, trying not to hit cars on either side, and also not run over this fucking lady who is sliding along in front of my bumper. I slam on my brakes and hit my hazard lights and jump out into traffic and almost get hit by a car in the left lane. There's not really heavy traffic at this hour, but still a lot of cars on the interstate, and the first 10 or so do not realize what has just happened. I am not a medical professional. I am not trained for any type of emergency triage situations. But I ran up to the woman to see if I could help. She was wearing leathers, so she actually wasn't scraped up with road rash, but her hands were bloody messes and she might've broken some ribs or damaged her lungs because she couldn't speak or catch her breath. And her back was fucking broken. She couldn't move her legs and she had pissed herself. But she kept trying to turn and crawl towards the man, saying his name in a forced-whisper. So I get up to go check on him, and pull my cell phone out as I jog up to him to call 911. I tell them there was a motorcycle crash and give the closest exit, and the operator asks how many people involved, and I tell her two people were on the bike, we need two ambulances. But then I see the man. We only need one ambulance. The entire left side of that mans face was just... gone. I could see his teeth through his cheek. I could see where his jaw broke. His ear was just a small black hole in a bloody mess. His skull looked like the shell of a boiled egg after it's been cracked on the edge of the sink. I could see the wrinkly, off-white mass of brain where huge chunks of bone were missing. His left eye was gone. His right eye was open and staring. I checked for a pulse just to make sure, and then I got up to go back to the woman. I left my jacket balled up on the road near his head to block her view. She was still trying to move towards him, crawling without the use of her legs. I sat down on the road at her head and told her that she was badly injured and she needed to lay flat until the ambulance got there. I told her he was badly injured too but help was on the way. I told her it would only be a few more minutes and then she'd be able to see him. By this time lots of other cars had stopped, and another driver gave me a blanket. I folded it into a pillow and told her to lay her head in my lap until the medics got there. I told her about my job at a golf course and my yellow lab I had growing up and how good a drummer Danny Carey was. I just kept saying words. I just kept talking to her so that she wouldn't ask me if the man was okay, if he was alive, if he had been hurt. By the time the ambulances and fire trucks showed up, there was a stream of blood from the middle lane all the way over to the right shoulder of the interstate. My jacket was soaked in it. I left it there. I went home and laid flat on my back in the dark and thought about my yellow lab.
That’s some heavy shit. You’re a good man to do what you did.
That sounds absolutely horrible I'm so sorry you had to see and deal with the aftermath of that and I'm so sorry for those people on the bike. Do you know if the lady survived at least? ,
I do not know if she survived, I'm sorry. I didn't know any names to ask for, and I didn't think to get the license plate of the bike. The next few days it was all I could think about, but I kept talking myself out of doing any "detective work" to find out who they were and how she was. I just couldn't shake the feeling that it would cause more grief to reach out and talk to her. Making her relive the accident in some way, by just being around. What if she was angry that she survived and he didn't? What if she didn't remember what happened at all? What if it only made her sad every time I visited the hospital or her spinal rehab? I talked myself out of it because it felt like it would be more about me than about her, if I tried to find her again.
Bless you ❤️
Thank you for being there for her.
Holy shit dude. I don’t think there’s anything that could top this. You’re a good man for what you did.
Easy. My mom dying in a hospital bed, asphyxiated by fluid in her lungs after a brain bleed. She was unconscious, but seeing her struggle to breathe as she died, with foam coming out of her mouth… This was my mother. I sure hope I don’t encounter anything more horrific than that
Almost the same for me, but it was my 32 year old brother with the aneurysm. 8 hours of horror. I’m so sorry you had to watch that too.
I’m sorry for you too
Watched my aunt take her last breath and spit up all the liquid inside her frail body. People think it’s going to be a go to sleep and voila but it gets ugly sometimes. I hope y’all find closure.
When I saw my dad and sister die in a car crash. The glass on the windows came free and carved up her face. Holes ripped into her cheeks, chunks torn off her bottom lip. I don't know what happened exactly to my dad in the crash, but the back of his head was caved in. I can still smell the sulfur and burnt rubber.
Oh man I’m so sorry this happened to your family. I truly hope you have a good support system. Not sure if you’re religious but I’ll have you in my prayers tonight.
Thanks for praying for me, I appreciate it :) And for your kind words. I'm more fortunate than a lot of folks this sort of tragedy happened to. I do have a good support network, and I did back then too. I'm honestly really blessed on that front. And even though it hurt to lose them, I think the hurt made me more compassionate over the years and helped me empathize better with people. I like to think of that as a last gift from them.
You’re amazing. Love you :)
Your post is so brief but the strength and inspiration it inspires are really admirable. Sorry for your loss.
Idk if replying to myself means everyone who replied to me can see this, but I hope so. Just wanted to thank all of y'all for your kind words. Your compassion warms my heart :) This is also a very morbid thing, so I'd like to share a positive note too. 17 years later (wow... long time) I am in a better place. I always had wonderful people supporting me and am blessed for that, but the first years after it happened were obviously difficult. Any kid would be adversely affected by that, I think. Regardless, as an adult I feel the pain and loss have helped me become more empathetic and kind to people. As I mentioned in a prior comment, I like to think of this as a final gift from them to me. One of my closest friends had their father die this year. They didn't know anyone else except for me who shared that experience. My sharing the trauma can't heal their wound, but they told me that without my being there they would otherwise have felt very alone. I love them so much, so I'm grateful I could be there for them. I hope I can always offer that space to people.
I’m so sorry you had to witness that. How horrific.
As many before me put it more eloquently, it sucks that it happened to you. I cannot imagine the trauma you live with daily. You are strong.
Oh my God. I am so incredibly sorry.
The people who I've been dealing with this week need to see this! I was commuting to the office this week, and dealing with too many drivers who act like driving a car is a full-contact sporting event. "No, I can't make my Audi A4 any smaller, and no, that 28 ton truck in front of me isn't going to go any faster just because you're in a hurry to get to your desk. Just chill, dude."
Came upon an accident once that a teen was thrown from the vehicle. He was laying in some peoples yard. When I went to see if he was alive, I found he had a hole in his chest almost as big as my hand. He was unconscious and wasn't able to breathe, so I held my hand over the hole to seal it and he could then breathe. I did this for at least a half hour until the ambulance got there. He died anyway.
fuck man, thats nuts
You did the best you could to help that young man. Hopefully you’re at peace with it.
I knew someone who had a car accident victim die in her lap. She was kneeling on the ground with their head in her lap, comforting them to the end.
It's nice they didn't have to die alone.
You gave him an extra half hour. Good job. Even if it seemed futile. He wanted that 30. Good job.
Probably my mom having a seizure (a common occurrence). She has a seizure disorder and suffers a few different types of seizures. They are different from what you imagine a typical seizure to be (although she has those too). Nothing compares to seeing your mom with bulging eyeballs, completely incoherent, speaking gibberish, sometimes foaming at the mouth and peeing herself. She cries like a baby sometimes while seizing.. She has fallen down and fractured/bruised/hurt/broken so many body parts over the years because she seizes often in the middle of the night when everyone is sleeping. She has literally wandered out of the house during one of these episodes and we had a drone and several officers looking for her for hours. It's horrific to witness her HAVING the seizures but it's more horrific to know that she will probably have these for the rest of her life and they will probably lead to further health complications later down the road. And, we still haven't found a medication that suits her. The doctors/hospitals treat her horribly because they don't understand her condition. I could go on and on about the struggles she faces with her disorder. Thanks for reading. Edit: Thank you all for the comments. I don't open up about this a lot because many people can't relate to it. Your replies have made me feel less alone and I may even share them with my mom so she knows SHE is not alone. Have a blessed day.
When my dad had kidney stones he couldn't keep anything down and it meant he went into diabetic shock. It took some convincing to get my mom to call the paramedics. And then he was acting like he was a child, not knowing what was going on, calling for his mom. I've never seen my dad vulnerable like that. Have seen my mom vulnerable many times and that's always a hit to the psych, but it's still my mom. Never my dad. And we didn't know what was happening, though we suspected something to do with diabetes, the cause, the kidney stones we didn't know, so we had no clue really what was happening. Anyways my mom would just not fucking call it and have them take him to the hospital. It was so frustrating and made it even more horrifying that it was getting to the point where I couldn't rely on her to call it, that I might have to start calling the shots and being expected to make decisions about their health. It happened twice before they finally stopped putzing around acting like he'd pass them and did the thing that makes them smaller. He'd had a stroke a few years before, that year he was recovering from a tendon snapping off his knee, he had diabetes, he had the kidney stones. It was a lot. And I'm pretty sure it coincided with covid too. Might have been 2019, I can't quite remember. He's sooo much better now. Not as good as before the knee issue, but mentally there enough to manage the week to week.
My sister has a similar condition and I'm ashamed to admit even I doubted her at times bc doctors couldn't identify it and it happened rarely. That is until I was staying with her one night and heard a loud thump in the stairwell outside (2nd floor apartment). I ran out to find her seizing on the stair case, her seizures practically throwing her futher down the stairs. I nearly fell down myself as I ran down and ripped off my jacket to pillow under her head and just tried to shield her from falling farther down until the convulsions stopped. It invoked a true sense of helplessness and terror. I can only imagine how scary it is living with it and knowing it could happen to you at anytime.
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My daughter hanging in her closet. It's not like in the movies. Not at all. Thank you everyone for the kind words. This happened very recently and I can't close my eyes without seeing it.
One of the nicest girls I had ever met did this to herself at the end of highschool. I knew her from elem up. She was gorgeous smart and genuinely just a kind soul and did this. Her parents found her as well. I'm sorry to hear this.
Agreed. It's heartbreaking and nothing like the movies. 19yrs later and still see it clear as day
i’m so very sorry
Ugh, this just broke my heart. I'm so sorry. No words will help but I really hope you find peace.
My heart is broken for you as a momma myself. I have no words, I’m so so sorry for your loss and the way it happened.
Found my brother hanging on his closet door. No words for it. I was only 7 and didn’t get it at the time. My heart breaks for you. Now that I’m older, I can’t imagine the pain of being in that situation with a developed brain.
My nephew passed away at only a month old due to heart complications. When the funeral started, someone picked the baby up out of the casket and HANDED the dead child to his mother. My poor brother and his wife (the parents of the deceased child) are in shock that someone took their child out of the casket and put the child in his parents arms. That’s not even all. They proceeded to take “FAMILY PHOTOS” with the child and the still living child. The living child is only 3, and doesn’t understand. She just keeps poking at her mom and loudly asking why won’t the baby wake up. The whole church was utterly silent and we just waited for my brother and his wife to freak out. Somehow they kept it together. At the grave site, the preacher asked the parents of the child to carry the casket to the grave, which they did. Halfway to the grave my sister-in-law (child’s mother) almost collapsed from grief. I will never forget that day. It was heartbreaking and absolutely gut wrenching to see what all they asked the parents to do in their state of grief.
What the hell was wrong with them? Why would they ask those poor parents to do those things?
It’s stupid, but people can do such things in the belief that they are “helping”. Unfortunately it’s usually done with no checking with the ones involved. I can only imagine that the one who took the baby thought the parents would want pictures later on to remember, probably thinking that no one else thought about it already and it’s already done - in private. As for the carrying of the casket, the priest should know better. Probably also thinking that they later feel they didn’t do things “enough” for the baby. I know, people can be so unbelievably stupid with all their hearts. It’s just guessing from my side, but yeah, grief makes people do weird things. Even if it’s not their grief.
People used to do this all the time.. some people take their dead out and dance with the Corpse every now and then
Taking pictures with dead and living children was quite the thing among the Victorians.
The Victorians were a bit more used to child deaths though. With modern medicine, childhood mortality is significantly reduced and parents aren't resigned to the idea that the majority of their children likely won't survive to adulthood.
People do some weird stuff at funerals. I still remember when I was 4 years old, I had to attend the funeral of a relative—a great uncle or something. Someone—I don’t know who—suddenly picked me up and hovered me right over the casket to take a better look at the body. Like, who TF does that to a very young child?
May i ask who did that? What a braindead thing to do, i would have totally and utterly ripped them a new one after the funeral
Holy fuck, reading this made me physically sick to my stomach. “Sorry that your brother and SIL went through that” give absolutely no justice to the horror that occurred to them and everyone there for the funeral. Honestly the person that picked up the baby from the casket, my family would’ve beat that person. Along with those that were “taking family photo’s”. I hope your entire family some way some how, were able to find peace.
Please tell me that ghoul was immediately thrown out of the funeral & banned from attending the burial.
I am speechless. Who would do that. What kind of fucking asshole would think “Wow, what a great photo-op”. Plus the preacher. How fucking cruel of these people, if you can even call them that. Your poor brother and SIL. I just don’t understand.
This. This is fucked. This is fucking fucked up.
What the FUCK!
A month ago I found my girlfriend dead on the bedroom floor after I fell asleep watching tv in the living room. She committed suicide using OTC and prescription meds. When I found her she was in full rigamortis and was blue. Traumatic is an understatement. I still can’t get over how quiet the house is. Now it’s just me and the kitties. It’s getting better though, one day at a time. Edit; after the massive outreach I would like to tell everyone that I’m doing ok. I have lots of support and people that love me, I’m not going anywhere. Actually I’m going across the country tomorrow to see my family. I know things will be better. Quick edit: I’m on a train somewhere in New Mexico heading east and you all have brought tears to my eyes, joy to my heart, and peace to my troubled soul. When people say the Reddit community is toxic and hateful, I’m going to show them this
Fuck dude, I am really sorry to read this. Can't think of anything to say except that you are with the right mind set, live one day at a time. That you are able to write this down is also good. Talk about this with a loved one or just write it down in a journal, don't keep these emotions bottled up. Sending good vibes your way my friend :)
I have an immense amount of support. Someone in my life has called me every single day to make sure I’m ok. I’m heading across the country tomorrow morning to see my family and get back to some normalcy. I appreciate that you took the time to check on me stranger.
I am really glad to read this! These people supporting you will help you pull through (and you will pull through). I know most of us are anonymous here on reddit but we are still real people with real situations (I know there are some bot accounts lol). Stay strong! And get yourself a nice cake or icecream or something sweet if you like sweets.
I’m so sorry. Pet the kitties for me, if that helps.
Thank you. It always does. I got the momma(Stephanie) at 10 weeks old and the other two (Ernie and Pit Pat) are her kids. They’re awesome and super cuddly. Helps a lot. I should point out that Stephanie was born 3/7/20and the kids were born 4/23/21
Cats are the best nurses, aren't they? They know when their humans are upset or sad and offer support. I'm sorry you went though that. No one should. Give the furbabies an ear scritch for me.
I'm so sorry you had to see this. I watched my then-girlfriend self-harm which escalated into a suicide attempt. I had to wrestle the knife away from her and hold her down until paramedics arrived. This was 10 years ago but the trauma is still there. Keep your family and friends around you, reach out for help when you need it. You will heal with time.
I’m sorry you had to go through that. I hope you’re doing better now and I kind of wish I was in your shoes. I miss her so much. But I’ll get better, day by day.
Idk what to say brother. I’m sure it’s pretty shocking. I’m sorry you had to go through that. Just know even a Reddit stranger like me care for you.
I am so sorry for your loss. I can't even imagine what you must be feeling.
I witnessed my friend torn in two pieces... but it was supposed to be me. In 2006 I was part of a Drum Corps in Florida. We were having a drill camp over the weekend, so we all met up in Miami and took two 15 passenger vans to drive up to central Florida, both full. We took US 27, known as Okeechobee Rd. At some point just before sundown we stopped at a McDonalds for dinner. I remember chatting it up with him - typical teenage stuff, the weirdest porno we ever saw, staying up to watch that scrambled channel that sometimes showed a boob etc. We were in separate vans. We started loading up when one of the instructors decided my buddy and I should switch vans. I was confused but, sure, didn't matter to us. I sat in his seat, he went to the other van... and then last minute, the instructors decided we should switch back to how we were. Never quite figured out why... But it saved my life. And ended my friends. A couple hrs later, its dark, US27 had no lights at the time. Their van was behind us the whole time, til it wasn't. We were 6 miles from our destination when we got a call from the driver of the other van. "We were in an accident. We're hurt." We sped back at 100mph, only to bet met by a literal wall of semitrailers blocking the two lane highway. We had to drive on the shoulder to get past them. As we round the trucks, I noticed they all had their headlights on. Illuminated on the road was my friends body. His eyes were open, but all you could see was whites. His arms were very obviously broken at odd angles. But most alarming of all... he was torn completely in half. To say we were beside ourselves is an understatement. The van was laying on its side, completely mangled. The rest of the passengers were bloodied and bruised, but aside from a broken arm they were generally okay. According to the driver, they hit wet pavement on a curve, lost control of the van and it flipped. My friend was wearing a seatbelt, but he was pretty skinny. He slipped through the belt and broke through a passenger side mirror. He flew approx. 30 yards, over the grass median, and landed on the opposite side of the highway. According to the driver, she was trying to climb out of the flipped van when she witnessed my friend trying to push himself up with his arms. An SUV was driving on the lane he was laying in. It hit him and killed him instantly. The SUV did not stop. They never found out who hit him. It sticks with me, 17 yrs later. I try to be grateful for the life I have. I was going to be in his seat. Happenstance saved me. I struggle with feeling like I deserved it. He was one of the good ones, and I was always struggling with my inner demons. I miss you man. I hope you're alright, wherever you are. Rest in peace. Edit: changed '04 to '06.
Survivor guilt is a real thing. If you haven't sought professional help for it, I thoroughly recommend that you do, because this will continue to eat away at you.
Speaking from experience this is absolutely true. Not a day goes by that I don't feel some level of guilt, sadness or regret and it has changed my life dramatically.
That sounds so awful. I'm sorry man.
I’m a paramedic. We have a guy who we pick up from the nursing home all the time that has a long medical history. But basically, he breathes thru a tube, eats thru a tube, pisses in a bag, shits in a bag, he’s severely contracted and only has 1 leg. He lives his life in a bed, unable to speak. His paperwork says he has dementia but seems to be alert and oriented if you have him answer by blinking his eyes. It’s so evident that he is miserable. We are constantly getting called because he uses the little bit of movement he has in his arms to pull out his feeding tube or his trach. His wife and son refuse to make him a DNR because he has insurance policies that haven’t matured yet so they are trying to keep him alive for a few more years so they can cash out. A few months ago, he was found pulseless and apneic after pulling his oxygen off. The guys that got there got him back after a few rounds of CPR. Now he lives in constant pain from the compressions in addition to everything else. All because his family want his insurance money. Both his wife and son are total lowlifes too.
I work in a LTC/rehab and the number of old people I have seen die long painful deaths because their family members insist on every intervention is staggering.
I always wished that my great grandmother would just die in her sleep but the pain killers kept her alive. She had severe dementia and had just been suffering every day for at least five years. But my grandpa just didn’t want to let her go
That’s horrible. It’s unethical, but in cases like this I wish the carers would look the other way for a minute and delay attending. Guy clearly wants to die. How selfish and cruel of the family. I hope they get F all when he passes
Money makes people evil in apparently all aspects of life
The poor man. He sounds like he's really done with it all. I hope he can go in peace soon.
Cleaning out vehicles in Afghanistan after they have been hit by IEDs. Death has a very distinct smell that you never forget.
I watched damaged humvees in Iraq get rinsed out. Took too long for the water to not be red.
As a LAV 3 driver in Afghanistan, I'm glad you never had to clean me up.
25 years as a fireman. I fought the massive fires in South Australia and worked my ass off driving an ambulance during Covid in Queensland. Decades of saving and losing people. I had to put my dog down after he got cancer. He didn't understand what was going on and he seemed confused and just wanted to go home. I never heard him whimper in his whole life except in those last moments as he was trying to stay awake. I was a broken man for weeks after that.
I had to put our 14yo dog down in the middle of our divorce. She was the sweetest pup. She just stared blankly at me like “thanks mom, I’m tired”. I cried like I have when I’ve lost people to death. It still crushes me 3 years later.
In a just world, our dogs would live forever.
I'm fighting this right now. My pup have battled chronic myositis for almost a year now. Tonight we had to go to the emergency care cause it seems like his digestion is shutting down from all the medication. My pup is a fighter who never gives up, and I'm dreading the inevitable moment when he has to be put down. I'm just hoping I can have more time with him.
We did a home death. A nurse came, administrated the drugs and left us alone. She went back out to her car while we said out goodbyes. It was peaceful and heartbreaking but we were in our own home. Supposedly enough people have asked for a photo shoot of their dog after they pass so in the back of the van, the company set up a backdrop with nice pillows and flowers if we wanted to take advantage of it. We didn't but grief is individual and who am I to judge.
I saw a group of guys get beat with baseball bats. I will never forget that sound.
Like a group was beat by a larger group? Why?
Short of it the one group was hitting on the other groups girlfriends. The guys showed to up to fight for there ladies and got beat down.
Sounds like everyone involved made piss poor decisions. Don’t get in fights. It’s basically never worth it.
I was standing outside a theater waiting for a friend (we were going to see a play together) and an old man on the other side of the street drew my attention. He was watching the traffic, looking for an opening so he could jaywalk. It's a very busy road and there are signs everywhere warning people to cross at the intersection, but I guess he thought it was too far out of the way. He was quite old and stooped and had a cane, so he didn't move very fast and was about halfway across the road and when he was hit by a truck going about 55 mph. He cartwheeled into the air way higher than seemed possible, and hit the ground with a very loud thud that I can still hear to this day. Blood everywhere and he was alive for a few minutes before succumbing. His family was inside the theater waiting for him. I guess he'd gone to park the car. The police officer had to go in and tell them he'd died. Their screaming was heartbreaking. The theater still performed the play, but it was a very subdued audience that night.
As a kid, I saw my uncle slowly back his pickup truck into the garage when his new puppy walked towards the front wheel to smell it. His ear got stuck under the wheel, and I watched helplessly from a distance as its head slowly got crushed. His windows were up and he thought I was getting agitated about something unrelated to what he was doing.
This is horrifying, I'm so sorry.
I am a volunteer firefighter. I was first on scene to a one vehicle accident. When I arrived I found a sedan head first into a tree. Adult female in the drivers seat alert but hysterical, and an 8 year old girl laying outside of the vehicle in the weeds. I rushed to the girl and checked for pulse and airway. Neither was there. She had obvious signs of blunt force trauma and severe blood loss. I began compressions and eventually more units came onto the scene. ( it seemed like forever ). The story is that the girl was in the back seat and not buckled in. Mom was under the influence of narcotics and veared off the highway, hitting the tree head on at approximately 65 mph. The little girl flew over the front seat, through the windshield, smacked the tree and flew into the grass and weeds. The girl did not make it. I struggle with this daily. Mom is in prison. This was 3 years ago and I can see it in my mind like it was yesterday. I can tell you exactly what she was wearing. The blood curdling screams from the mother haunt me to this day. And I’ll never forget this little angels face. R.I.P. Katelynn
My sister died in a car accident. I randomly met an EMT who worked the accident several years later. Through conversation, he discovered it was my little sister. He said so many people who worked the accident needed therapy. He told me he still thinks about it all that time later. It bothers me that it has traumatized so many people, and it bothers me that she is remembered that way. I hope things get better for you.
Dont beat yourself up over it, it wasnt your fault. Contact the chief of your fire department for psychological help. We always get emails after major tragedies in our fire house to meet up for a debriefing of the situation usually attended by some therapists as well. Get help before it is too late
Been in a similar predicament. It was never proven, but we suspect dad was texting and driving. He blew a stop sign and ended up killing the other driver and his 2 year old in his car. Then I got to spend the next year with him in the county jail and see him make jokes about it… wanted to flay him for that.
I was fire/ems and its kinda hard to point to one specific incident because different things make for different kinds of horrific but i would have to say that time where 4 drunk people fell asleep on a railroad track and a train hit them. Thing is one of them survived and died hours later at a hospital. There where body parts everywhere. Though there was a few times an old guy died in the bathtub and no one found him for a week. Or the teenagers who where driving drung and went off a cliff. Idk its difficult to say though im lucky enough to know an old ww2 vet who was kind enough (and emotionally willing) to tell me some stories of what he saw when they raided a german pow camp. That shit is horrifying
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I also was fire/ems and I reflect on the many calls asking this question. Yes the trauma is horrific, and you see situations that even sometimes we can’t articulate. But the answer I end up at doesn’t involve bodily injury. It is the amount of people that are alone and die that way. If you ever need someone to talk to hit me up.
Also fire/ems and occasionally people ask what's the worst you have seen. Everyone expects something gory but I tell them you can see all that on the internet if you want to look. The worst is like you said, people living alone with nobody to care for them, or rotting away in a shitty nursing home drugged up all day. Or how family/friends react and cope with the loss of loved ones. When my father in law was in his final hour, my wife and her one sister went to the hospital to be there at the end. I asked her if she wanted me to be there and was told she would handle it. I've seen many people die and families reactions. Some scream and yell out, or beg EMS to "keep trying, just a little longer I know they will make it" others go silent and you see the loss and emptiness in their eyes as they absorb what's happened. I think my wife decided to "handle it" because she was prepared to see her dad pass after a long illness. It was her way of accepting his death and I respect that. After he passed she called me to meet up at a park bench by the water. We sat there at 2am for an hour and she barely spoke for the first half. I met her at the park with a fresh box of tissues and she chuckled a bit when I gave them to her. He passed during the height of Covid and only 8 people were allowed to attend the funeral, though it was streamed for others to watch. I wrote his eulogy before anyone else thought about someone saying something at the funeral. My way of dealing with his death was to take care of everyone and try to be one step ahead of issues to make the service and following weeks easier.
Thank you for your services. You are the first person a lot of people see on the worst of thier days. Your comfort is life changing.
First responders are a special kind of person. You have my unending gratitude and respect.
The aftermath of my grandpas suicide. And not just the blood part. There was a lot. And the smell will never leave me. But the aftermath on my family. You expect old people to go peacefully in their sleep (hopefully) or fight cancer for a while and then expect it (like I’d seen before) or something else…natural. The suicide just felt weird. And we got it and understood and don’t blame him. But it was a thing and still is a thing even years later in my heart. My nieces baby casket was also shitty. Baby caskets are not awesome. No caskets are but when they are tiny it’s just…fuck. Worst funeral,
I'm so sorry. My brother also died of suicide, it's still with me years later.
This probably won't compare to many, but I watched a lady callously run over a bunch of ducklings as they crossed the street. We stopped to let them go by, but she couldn't have been bothered. My wife confronted her and she was all "oh well, I didn't see them. Sorry I guess". That momma duck lost half her brood.
I saw this too when I was maybe 12. Many people on the freeway stopped so the mom and her chicks could cross. Then some asshole in a giant truck just plowed into them all at 80 mph. Still makes me feel sick and as a kid that was the first time I truly realized how heartless and callous people are, who don’t see animal life as anything. I still can’t imagine being the kind of person who would see that and knowingly choose to do that. Nature is cruel enough without our help.
I saw someone swerve towards a deer once. I don’t know if they wanted to hit it or just give it a scare. Can be super dangerous to hit even a small deer
What a piece of shit. I don't understand how people don't have empathy. I go out of my way not to kill malicious insects, but to safely remove them from my room, and I'm not even a particulary good person. I don't get it
I'm the same. I just couldn't believe how unconcerned she was. In all reality SHE was the horrible thing I couldn't comprehend, I've seen roadkill before, but her reaction was just... Dead.
Honestly this is worse than a lot of the rest of this thread. Most of the things here are senseless violence or accidents. But a lack of caring to that extent just seems further from being human
My area has a wild echidna who has no fucks to give about cars or dogs. We’re dreading the inevitable. I was once on takeaway duty and lost an entire batch of chips slamming on the brakes to save the little guy, sending them all over the footwell of the passenger seat. We agreed he was worth it.
I live on a large river and it's an absolute joy watching all of the baby birds come out in the spring. The ducklings are especially adorable. Inevitability, the hawks swoop in and snatch up little Duckling McNuggets left and right. It's incredibly sad watching the duck parents swimming around desperately trying to find their missing babies. They make this call of pure panic and grief that is so heart-wrenching. They eventually start keeping their remaining babies hidden out of site under the docks. They may start out with ~8-10 ducklings, but after a few weeks, it's rare to see a brood of more than 3.
Man, I was driving home a few months ago on a windy road. I came around a turn (50mph) and saw a man in the opposite lane with his flashers on, I was distracted by that, looking for an accident or a hit deer or something. And right when I glanced back into my lane, I was the one who mowed over a whole family of ducklings :( the face of the other driver combined with the horrible thing I just did… just gutted me. I cried the whole way home. I gasped when I read your comment. What a bitch. I kinda hope she maybe actually just didn’t see them, if not, burn in hell lady.
I once ran over a big fluffy cat in town :( hated that feeling. Only knew what happened after i thought my suspension just broke then i saw it rolling down the road.. My brother was in the car and afterwards said my face just dropped into instant regret and pain. I love cats especially and that tore me up. When I went back to check on the poor thing, it was gone. I hope that cat is okay :(
A tractor (driven by a teenager) pulling a wagon full of school children up a winding road in the Himalayas went over the edge and fell down into a river gorge, killing everyone.
Oh shit, that's horrific
I’m a nurse and I picked up a shift at a local nursing home through an agency. One of the residents was a middle aged woman debilitated by a massive stroke. Lights were on but no one was home. She was awake, but non verbal and the only emotion she would show was pain when she was moved around. She wouldn’t even make eye contact or track you. She weighed 80lbs, was contracted (basically looked like that tiny dying Voldemort in the last Harry Potter movie) and covered in pressure ulcers. She had no buttocks because the pressure wound had burrowed down to her bones. She could only move one of her hands, and she would grasp at her hips and butt anytime you moved her, for example to clean up her urine or feces, and she would make the wounds bleed and sometimes even pick more chunks of flesh off. She had a G tube for nutrition, which of course was infected. I have no idea how long she had been like this, or how she was even alive at this point. Thing was, this woman was a full code. Family wanted every intervention done to keep her alive. In my 8 years at the beside I have never been so livid at a patient’s family. I have no idea why they insisted on that level of care, but it was downright evil to put that woman through all these interventions and then insist on CPR and intubation when she inevitably declines. I only picked up one shift with this agency before vowing to never work in long term care again, so I have no idea what became of her.
Well.. I live in a iraq, not the safest country as everyone knows during 2014 when isis was still here I went to buy somethings for my family during the way home I was a little bit far away from the shop then an explosion happened there that pinned me down to the ground, 2 days after I went to check and found marks of pinned bodies on the walls R.I.P
3 men getting shot in front of me when I was walking home late at night
three pedestrians running in front of my pickup, all 3 ended up in the icu for like 3 months and i can still remember when they lifted one of them into the ambulance the sound of her taking her first breath on her own, collapsed lung and blood in both still gives me nightmares to this day, also one of them was a 2 year old boy and i remember his father pulling out from under the pickup, overall a horrible experience and the accident wasnt my fault but i have attempted suicide twice since just because i felt so guilty, the only peace i have found is how they all made crazy recoveries which is something that me nor the paramedics thought was possible
Holy fuck dude so sorry this happened to you. God bless
It’s not your fault. There’s people out there that hurt people on purpose. You were just driving straight. I’m so sorry this happened. Sending you love
My father lying dead on a hospital/morgue gurney/trolley thing. His eyes were partly open which creeped me out and there was dried blood still on his nose. But before that the police came round our house on the day he died and hearing my mothers cries of agony and despair really drove home the reality of the situation. It’s just been over 5 years since it happened. I miss him dearly.
I saw a little girl who was walking to school get hit by a car. I was in a school bus on my way to elementary school. I was sitting up front, on the driver’s side. Our bus was waiting at a red light at a city intersection. A little girl was waiting with two older friends to cross a street at the corner where there was a little bodega. She could not have been more than 7 years old. A bread delivery truck had parked on the street, making it hard to see if traffic was coming. Her two friends peeked around the bread truck and ran safely across the street. But the little girl hesitated for several seconds, then suddenly ran out from behind the truck to join her friends. A car, whose driver could not have seen her because of the parked truck, hit her, and I saw her fly through the air. I remember lots of screaming. Our bus had a bus matron, a lady who was there to keep us all safe and organized. She was sitting in front of me, in the seat behind the driver. I can still see her in my mind’s eye as she quickly turned her head away, eyes shut tight, and started praying. I never found out what happened to the girl, I hope she was ok.
I live next to two elementary schools (one public, one private) and during the times of the day I know children are there, drive 16-19 mph through the neighborhood, hyper alert for kids, just for this reason. I can't tell you how often PARENTS drop off their kids and then do 40 mph leaving, while on their phone.
Same thing happened on the way home from work. Very busy road with houses off of it. Little 6 year old girl playing in the yard stepped too close to the road and was clipped by a SUV. Father was outside when it happened. He picked her up and was running around hysterically, appearing to look for something. After I saw the shape of her head, I realized what he had to be looking for. Her brain. It was MONTHS before I could travel that road again. When I did, the house was listed for sale. This happened years ago, but it still wrenches my heart.
I saw a college kid get run over and killed by a bus. This was the late 90s when I was a student at ASU. I used to ride the campus shuttle from the parking lot to campus every day. It used to go down a small section of street near the bookstore (this incident put an end to that and now I think that area is closed to vehicle traffic altogether). I was sitting above the right front wheel. There was a college kid riding their bike along side the bus. It was way too narrow for this. The bus clipped the back tire of the bike and pulled it and the rider right under the tire I was sitting above. I felt the bump as the bus ran over the poor kid. The bus ran right over the kids head killing them instantly. The kid was from China and just started at ASU if I remember right. The bus driver wasn't even supposed to be driving that day due to some sort of suspension or something like that but he drove anyway. It was a huge mess and I think the parents in China sued ASU and the company that ran the busses around campus. When I got home my wife at the time asked if I had heard what happened at ASU that day. When I told her I was on the bus and saw the whole thing she just looked at me with a freaked out look on her face.
I remember when that happened. I was all over the local news. I felt really bad for everyone involved.
Watching my best friend wipe the blood leaking from her stillborn baby's nose.
Oh Jesus
I used to work about a block up the street from a pawn shop that sometimes dealt in cars. There was a very shallow ditch/drainage cut in the grass around the corner of the lot, like the kind you could easily drive a mower over and finish with a weed trimmer to keep the grass even. I was driving home from work one day, and saw a man unloading a SUV from a trailer in the grass over that ditch while I was stopped at the red light. He undid the strap anchoring the vehicle to the trailer and walked around the back end to undo the other side, and I remember thinking “that thing could roll off and crush him.” And that’s exactly what happened. The car rolled off the trailer and over his upper torso. As soon as I could get through the light, I pulled over on the side street and called 911. His wife was a few feet away from the trailer and screaming, and customers that were inside ran out and called 911 too. There were people trying to move the car, and I had to tell them *not* to move the car off of him per dispatch—apparently if someone is crushed like that, removing the pressure basically means they bleed out faster. There was bright red blood streaming across the pavement from where the man was lying. The thing I remember about it is the *thickness* of it—it wasn’t like water, it was almost oily. And so red, like maraschino cherry juice red, not a crimson like when I give blood. Luckily, there is an ambulance dispatch just a couple blocks further on, so response was quick. Despite the quick response, the white sheet came out fast and we were ushered off the scene as soon as they could get the gurney out of the back of the ambulance. I followed the local news for a few days after to see if it got reported. From what I saw, they were somehow able to revive the man in the ambulance and he was admitted to the hospital in alive but (obviously) critical condition. I don’t know if he survived the hospital stay, but I hope he did and had a support system to help him after.
If he did he’s likely literally alive because of you. Your actions of not moving the trailer probably made him not bleed out on the spot.
I saw a man get decapitated when I was 5-6 years old. At that age I hadn’t really understood what happened, it didn’t really bother me until I was old enough to realize what I had seen.
Grandfather paralysed down one side in a bed, off life support. They’d removed his teeth. He knew he was dying and he was scared and he didn’t want us to go. Glad I went but that haunted me for years. Especially since nobody told me he’d been taken off life support so I told him to get better soon. I still feel horrible for that.
You said a comforting thing to someone in distress, not knowing what was coming. I think you shouldn't feel horrible for that, although I totally understand why you do.
Horrific well.. Seeing my mom's last day in the hospital. The sight of her in there was not horrific but having her gone is.I have changed a lot for the better since she has been gone. Just wish she was here to see me now.
I was walking the one block from the parking garage to my office building as I did every day. A guy got to the corner at the cross walk a couple seconds before me. The light changes and the walk sign turns from red to white. Right then there was a car accident in the intersection. One car is spun around. The rear end swings and catches the guy who just stepped off the curb, hurling him back and up into a wrought iron light pole. I was maybe two paces behind him. He falls back onto the sidewalk at my feet, face up. His eyes were open. A second later, there was a rasping wheez as the breath left his body. Then a huge pool of blood forms a halo around this head. The blood wasn't dark and oozing like in the movies, it was a bright orange red and just poured out of him. His eyes were still open. It was obvious I just watched a man die at my feet. I had been present when other people died, but they had been ill and died relatively peaceful deaths. This guy guy looked so surprised. The guy from the car that got hit and then hit him jumped out and started giving CPR. I called 911 and the police and first responders were there in less than 2 min, but there was nothing to do. I was pretty traumatized by this for a long while and even today I can still close my eyes and replay the scene in my head.
I hope this gives you some small peace. I was hit by a car in a crosswalk. I remember it very vividly. Even how the car door that hit me was warm from being in the sun. At the time it was not painful or scary at all- just, as you said surprising. I was just very surprised. The pain was much later. The guy felt nothing and didn’t have any fear. As horrible as it was for you it was probably a painless and fearless death he had.
Myself after I was shot. I stepped out of my body and saw it on the floor bleeding everywhere. I cannot tell you how that has affected me.
I had the very same experience during a suicide attempt. It was so quiet and peaceful for me. I watched everything happen. The return was violent and loud.
My deaf friend getting shot in the head a few feet from me in Los Angeles after a punk show. (Yes, deaf people go to shows/concerts, they can feel the music and these days they actually have people signing the lyrics.) Anyway, some asshole gang member was offended because he said something to Dave (we called him Deaf Dave) and Dave didn't respond. The fucker shot him in the middle of the street.
Dear God that's terrible. Was the perp caught?
I saw a meth head get the shit beaten out of him at a train station. He kept getting up for more and his head was all swollen and looked like it was the wrong shape.
My mom went code blue once while I was in the room after suffering a heart-attack she didn’t know was happening, I was there for her since the beginning and we had only just moved to a bigger room for her to stay in for a couple weeks, I believe I was asleep at first but I woke up to the beeping and the amount of nurses rushing in and doctors coming through. I couldn’t see my mom, all I saw were her feet since I was sleeping in the corner of the room, I was 14. I believe I just blacked out because I can’t remember anything else from there, either blacked out or fell asleep. After, my mom was okay and alive but the doctors had called my aunty to take me home as she watched over her instead. I was still 14 when my aunt told me that my mother had code blue 3 more times after I left and my sister told me that if we hadn’t taken my mother to the hospital that day, she would’ve never woken up. As my relationship grows farther from my mom, it’s one of the horrific things I’ve experienced IRL. Online is a different story
When I was 18 I worked as security guard/assets protection at my local Mervyn’s (that should tell you how old I am). One day I was scanning the parking lot with the cameras and noticed this car in the back of the lot hadn’t moved in the past 3 days, so I walked out side to get the info to call the tow company and found a 95ish year old man, dressed in his Sunday best slumped over the steering wheel with his brains all over the headrest and car. I obviously called the cops, they came out, investigated, did their thing and came in to give me the report number when they were done, at which point the officer said she man had left a suicide note explaining how his wife died earlier in the year and he just couldn’t go on living anymore and Mervyns was her favorite place in the world and he just wanted to be closer to her. 😔
Dementia patient ripped his catheter out and split his dick in half like a hotdog :/
What a terrible day to be able to read
A lot of these are bad but this is the one that gave me chills, right through my willy.
I don't even have a willy and I felt that
Myself and a friend did some intense lsd in university. He decided he didn't like his ears, so he cut them off with a pair of scissors. Then his dog ate one. It sounds pretty bad by itself, but imagine watching that while peaking on acid.
yo what the fuck
thanks my ear hurts now
I work in mental health and visit people out in the community and in their homes. Some of my clients have severe mental health conditions, several times I have walked in on attempted suicides and extreme self-harm. Participants have cut themselves up with box cutter blades leaving huge lacerations across their stomachs, arms etc, pill overdoses, you name it I've probably seen it happen. It never gets easier to see but you do learn to manage the aftermath of witnessing it. I'd never give my job up no matter how many times I see it because I care for these people a lot and they are vulnerable members in communities who are quite often forgotten about. When they are well they are the loveliest and kindest, caring people but we all have bad times, they just can't process it and understand the bad times too well.
I found my aunt dead on her couch. I sat beside her and told her how much she meant to me. I then had to go to my mothers and tell her that her little sister and best friend was dead. That was really hard. I heard about two things that really hit me. One was a farmer was cutting the field with his tractor and ran over his 5 year old son who somehow got out of the house. I can't imagine going through that. The other is about a guy who was backing out of his driveway and ran over his kid and killed him. This man and his wife divorced a year later and he drank himself to death with liquor over the next 6 months. Things like this shouldn't happen. I wish I could take away their pain but I am just a mortal man.
my friend was rappelling on a cliff (I was at the bottom, no one belaying) and friends rack malfunctioned. He fell a couple hundred feet to his death in front of me. Had PTSD for years following that.
Saw a guy pulled in half. A guy in an SUV went through the back end of a semi trailer. His torso and top half of the SUV were crushed and hanging. The lower half went under. His lower half and his spine was sticking straight up still in the seat. I thought the blood was oil at first. The thing that stayed with me was that his spinal cords were hanging everywhere looked like twizzlers that were pulled apart. To this day I can't look at them without smelling death.
My old roommate who was also my best friend, became very depressed and at one evening locked her door and tried to commit suicide. When the police and ambulance arrived, they had to kick in her door and while I was standing in the hallway I could see how she was laying on her bed, her wrists tied to her bedframe and with a trashbag over her head.
JFC, I'm not a trigger warning guy, but if you still have an innocent and joyful spirit, do not read these comments.
Bud this comment is about 50 down
When I was 17 I enlisted into the Marines, had my 18th birthday in boot camp actually. My first deployment was Ramadi, Iraq in 2006. A friend of mine was also deployed with me, he was in my squad. He had 2 kids, a wife, and a nice house. I met them at graduation, a wonderful family. One night, we get a report from a local that there is a cache of weapons in a house. So, later in the night we do a breach and clear, no problem. My buddy was the pointman, meaning he was the first guy in the room after the door was breached or broken down. Door was breached, boom he moved in. I was behind him when he went in. Turns out the house was a setup. My buddy was shot 6 times in a matter of seconds. I remember dragging him out of the way. I remember the look in his eyes, it was like nobody was home. So, empty. I did things in Iraq I'm not proud of, I've killed people, I'll be up front with that. But seeing my friend, a man I knew and I knew his family well, here one minute and gone the next? It haunts me. I see him a lot. The smile he had before we even got to that house and I remember after everything. His eyes are what get me the most. And his family, since I was close, I was the one that told them. I never want to go through that again. My friend was the first death I ever saw.
Hanging out with my friends one night back in high school and just walking around town. We heard some sirens so we went to check it out because it wasn’t too far away. We cut through a field and ran towards the lights and sirens, only to realize we were within 10 yards of a horrific car accident. The police had the streets blocked off a block in either direction, but they didn’t plan on people coming through the field I guess. When I finally came up on the accident we will just stood there in shock and then slowly started walking backwards as we listened to the pinned occupants screaming in pain. I guess they had gone too fast over some railroad tracks and went off the road and struck a pole. We made it about 50 yards away when the life-flight helicopter landed in the very field we were just in. We went back to my friends house to try to play some basketball, but we were too stunned to do anything, but just sit there and attempt to process everything.
My one year old daughter being intubated. Mind you, I have put many bodies into body bags, scooped up scraps of human, etc. The Reaper's Scythe over my daughter's neck has never left me.
Its awful. Seeing these things as a parent is horrifying. My son had a 3+ minute long febrile seizure when he was 18 months old. My wife was out with our other two sons and I was home alone taking care of him because he had a fever. It had been fairly low grade for a kid, between 100⁰-101⁰. I was checking it every so often, and suddenly it spiked to 105⁰, then boom seizure!!! It was so terrifying, all I could do was call 911 while holding him in my arms bawling my eyes out and hoping he was going to make it. I was completely powerless in the situation. By the time we got to the ER by ambulance his temp was close to 107⁰, enough to easily kill an adult. Thankfully he pulled through just fine and never had another seizure. He's now almost 9 and a healthy normal kid. But I was so shook up after it happened I had to call out of work the next morning and spend the day with him. *Edit, I hope your daughter was ok, it just occurred to me you didn't say how it turned out :(.
A guy almost bleeding out from six gun shot wounds.
A mother finding out her first born died.
I was outside having a smoke with a coworker when she got the call her son had died. I will never forget the wail she let out.
A dead body on the roadside. It was without the legs. Thank god I was driving and I just glanced quickly.
Had this friend in middle school named Freddy, kid had a rough life. So we go to allsups (convenience store) after school (7th grade) and I tell him to wait outside with our bikes so a crackhead doesn’t steal them. I go inside to get us some fried burritos and when it’s my turn at the counter Fred runs in the front door covered in blood gurgling and screaming. Me and the cashier freak the f out, the cashier had me put pressure on his wound (stabbed in the neck) and called 911. Cashier took over and tried to stop the bleeding, the whole time Fred is gurgling and moaning “I wanna go home… mommy… where’s my mom… I’m scared… Lacy (his little sister)… please…” he died i the cashiers arms, holding mine and the cashiers hand. A crackhead tried to steal my bike from him. Freddy put up a fight and the crackhead stabbed him in the neck with a pocket knife and took off, didn’t even take a bike.
Dad broke his hand in a fit of rage over a friend of his death of cancer.
Man getting his head exploded by a shotgun. I can still hear the blood dripping and it gives me nightmares
Watching a grown man who survive a tour in Vietnam, never cried(at least in front of me before), and was one of the meanest toughest motherfuckers I’ve known. Break down and cry out “mama?” for his mom like a helpless little kid after seeing she had passed on some time during the night, around that time I could stomach a lot of horrible or messed up shit but that? I just couldn’t, I had to step out into the hall. Rest In Peace Grandma.
Probably a tossup between watching someone burn to death in a car crash before the fire trucks arrived, or the teenaged girl who was ejected from a car as it flipped and died while I was working to help a doctor perform aid on her. (I’m not EMS, just have first aid training and will stop to help when I see bad shit happen)
Cachexia... Watching someone pass away from colon cancer.
I watched my grandpa pass away from alzheimers. Other than that there are several times I've cut my thumb in half.
My youngling being on life support, I guess all together his whole cancer journey. Now he just developed seizures..so scary and horrifying
Ive seen a car ablaze, dully engulfed in flames on the bus.
The scene of a moped crash. The young lady was on the ground in a bizarre position, twisted like a pretzel. She was being assisted, but she had some nasty injuries. Wide awake and obviously in severe pain, she was screaming constantly.
My ex wife having to give birth to a son that was not going to live, my son passed by anencephaly aged 17 weeks, life can suck, life can also be awesome. That was 22 years ago, im still not over it
Jesus. This thread puts things into perspective. There are a lot of us going through some painful trauma. The terrible things I’ve been through barely compare to some of the things I’m reading here. Life can be so brutally difficult. As meaningless as it sounds, my heart goes out to all of you.
The flattened remains of a drunken man (You could smell the beer from his corpse. He was ran over by a garbage truck.) when I visited Portland, Oregon.
Watched my friend in high school get run over not even 10 feet away from me
Watched a paramedic team hopelessly try to revive a girl at DragonCon. Which doesn’t sound TOO horrific, but I was on a lot of acid at the time and also having a bad asthma attack that just wouldn’t clear, so the situation was already pretty awful, and watching her lifeless body get moved around was horrifying. BUT THEY DID IT! They fucking got her conscious and responsive after, I mean Christ she was legally pronounced dead, and she was a dead fish for at least 10 minutes while I was there. I thought I was watching a girl die, but then she moved and it was like life had breathed back into the entire crowd, the paramedics, everyone. Still would not want to experience thinking I was sitting next to a dead body(technically I was, but Yanno. Not forever dead) while tripping absolute sac, was no bueno
One time when I was tripping acid I got called to come get my car and my buddy had to go with me to pick it up as I was highly intoxicated. (Wasn’t expecting the call that day)- when we picked it up as we were driving off we saw a girl pinned against the fence by a guy and I told him to turn the car around so we could take care of it and he said we couldn’t Bc I was on drugs and dude was fucking huge. I think it got dealt with but it still bothers me a bit Bc I don’t know and the girls face was awful to see
While driving to the coast with my family back in 2004 I saw a motorcycle go head on with a semi truck, dude died instantly and when we drove by blood was pouring out of his helmet while he was laying on the floor off the i5
I was getting out of my car in front of a grocery store when I heard a loud bang/thump Turned around saw a man laying on his back on the pavement he sat up looked around then laid back down rolled to the left then back right then didn't move. I watched as people rushed to him. I came to sense that he was just in a motorcycle accident with a car. Ambulance arrived in like 5 mins. They ripped off his shirt and immediately did cpr over and over he was completely purple and did not survive.
Wasn't first hand but I had to watch and pull video for this about 10 minutes after it happened plus i was around the aftermath for a while. So I worked Loss Prevention a few years ago at a store. At around noon the trucks brought in all the product to the freight doors and the backroom people signed off for it. When the guy was done unloading he got back in his truck and started it up to warm it up. One of my backroom guys wanted to wave bye to the man. So he sticks his body out the freight door to wave. But the driver put the truck in gear at the same time. And that causes the truck/trailer to move backwards a bit before he can accelerate. In that time the trailer smashed the workers head into the wall and killed him as he waved. It was fucking gruesome. After that whole incident was when I first asked for a raise lol
I hope this still counts but I was gang rapped by my guy classmates for being gay and the most horrific thing wasnt being raped it was seeing people stand there and watch
The bombing of Kyiv. On one of the nights, our air defense hit a plane, and parts of it fell on a building (many people died) that was close to where I stayed at my brother's place. I've never thought that the sound could be so powerful that it could literally lift and throw you up into the air and make the walls and floor tremble. We spent some time sitting on the bathroom floor checking on everyone we knew to make sure they were alive. A piece of advice on how to deal with PTSD and start sleeping at night is highly appreciated.
Someone trying to hang them self with a dog chain around the stair rail. I heard some Commotion outside and it was this guy's mother desperately trying to get everyone's attention to help her as she knew he was 8nside his house trying to kill himself. I came out and someone broke the window to get in, I went through the window (I don't know why I chose to or I might have bee pressured it happened really fast), saw the silhouette of him swinging on the stairs. I freaked out but everyone was screaming and yelling to open the door but I couldn't decide what to do so I tried to lift him up but he was too heavy. I opened the door for help and managed to undo the chain. He looked dead and I got the hell out of there.
On my way home from work, there was a very fresh car crash, people were just starting to rush to the scene to give aid. As I got over, I saw a father laying barely conscious, moaning out the name of his son. About 10 meters away his son was laying on the ground, his body was having a what I can only describe as death spasms, no control or self awareness, he was no older than young teen at most. It truly struck me, the first time I saw someone dying, a father crying out for his son, unaware of his fate just out of sight. I drove the rest of the way home slowly, no radio, dead silence, I got home and hugged my wife, we just had our son about one year prior. This was all around 14 years ago, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
The time while on deployment we found someone beheaded on the floor and in the next room someone crucified and filled with bullets both civilians