Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Original poster

What's the most dangerous thing you have survived?

365 replies

AbsentmindedWoman · 01/11/2018 15:34

Curious about all kinds of narrow squeaks, really. I find it fascinating because they can be dramatic or terrifying like a car accident or being held up at knifepoint, or something that happens in the blink of an eye and death/ serious damage is averted thanks to sheer good luck! I seem to have had a fair few of the latter experiences (falls off horses, best friend pulling me out of the way of a bus by a hair's breadth, etc) but no big event.

I love how tough human beings are and what we can survive. What's the maddest and baddest thing you have survived?

OP posts:
HungryChocoHippo · 01/11/2018 16:29

Earthquakes and tsunami in Japan.

anniehm · 01/11/2018 16:29

Oh and 6.8 earthquake but thankfully was in open parkland at the time and USA has good building codes. Again was scary even though no real danger

yawning801 · 01/11/2018 16:31

Like a PP I survived scoliosis surgery with only one lung, they had to deflate it to gain access to my ribs. That's the only thing I could think of though, some of these stories are truly harrowing

chickensaresafehere · 01/11/2018 16:32

Mental illness & pre-eclampsia.

theboxofdelights · 01/11/2018 16:34

Born 8 weeks prematurely 50 years ago, fractured skull at 4, pyelonephritis and sepsis at 21, broken neck (c2) at 28, burst appendix at 48.

Artus · 01/11/2018 16:35

Got a piece of gristly steak stuck in my throat when alone in the house. Completely unable to breathe. Managed to put fingers down my throat and pull it out. I am completely certain I would have died there and then if I hadn't managed to reach it, and would have been completely aware it was happening.

pumpastrotter · 01/11/2018 16:36

Lorry on the motorway T-boned my mothers car when I was child - not a scratch on me even though I was lying down on the back seat.

Several suicide attempts in my teens which should have killed me yet somehow I'm still here (albeit, with liver and forearm tendon damage).

weleasewoderick22 · 01/11/2018 16:37

These stories are heartbreaking, glad you all survived 

I had a gun pulled on me once, when I walked in on a drug deal being done. I had no idea my ex friend was involved in anything shady. I've never run so fast out of there, needless to say she's not my friend any more!

Ruddle91 · 01/11/2018 16:37

Suicide attempt

Dextrodependant · 01/11/2018 16:38

My marriage. Abusive EXh, I left after having my head glued back together.

ladybee28 · 01/11/2018 16:40

My relationship with my ex.

Also (can't give too many details as this is pretty outing) I got abandoned in the Sahara by a guy I was hitching a ride with. No sign of another person for miles around. Was the most sure I've ever been that I was going to die. Luckily got passed by a truck 2 hours later and managed to bargain a lift - they originally wanted an obscene amount of money but I haggled them down, still very dehydrated and utterly terrified.

IceniSky · 01/11/2018 16:43

I swallowed a marble aged 11 and felt it in my pipe. Somehow I managed to push it back up.

Falling out of a glass window.

sijjy · 01/11/2018 16:45

When I was younger probably about 8 or 9 I went swimming with brownies. I could touch the floor in the 3ft bit so decided 6ft wouldn't be that much deeper. Off I jumped right in and couldn't get to the top. I was thrashing around taking in water. Someone jumped in hooked me on the side and swam off. I only know they were female and probably not a adult. I wish I could thank them. The worst part is a lifeguard was sat right near and hadn't even noticed.

Bonkersblond · 01/11/2018 16:47

At my parents friends country house, we’d all been out for a walk, I was first back and only little and couldn’t swim yet I’d jumped into an inflatable in the deep end of the pool but went straight through it and ended up on the bottom, I can remember the bubbles as I was going down. My brother who was next back didn’t see me jump in but was looking for me and noticed I was on the bottom of the pool and saved me.

meow1989 · 01/11/2018 16:48

Sepsis, hopefully that's the only one I'll ever have to say!

hellokittymania · 01/11/2018 16:50

When I was living in Vietnam, a neighbor of mine who used to run the café and was always getting into fights, enough to break glass, literally. And her name is Bich. You don’t pronounce it like that in Vietnamese, but all of the high school kids know what bitch means in English so we used to just call it anti-bitches café. You needed to always be careful if you ate there the day after a fight because people would find bits of glass in their soup. I had a very hot chili pepper in my mango shake. The actual name of the café at one point was brown eyes, and an Australian pointed out that brown eyes in Australia was when you bend over and show somebody your bum

FantasticHarryPotter · 01/11/2018 16:51

I'm very risk adverse so luckily the only close to death experiences have been childbirth (first PE and second ooh 2000ml).

My husband survived being born 4 months early at 20-24 weeks in the mid 80s.

DonkeyPunch88 · 01/11/2018 16:52

Choked on a malteaser chocolate when I was really little, my dad had to swing me by my ankles to get it out as hitting my back wasn't working.

Got hit by a car aged about 8, I walked across a crossing and he was drunk driving. He hit me hard enough that I landed on the bonnet of the car behind him but I walked away without a scratch!

Suicide attempt at 15

PP haemorrhage with my DD1.

hellokittymania · 01/11/2018 16:52

sorry, visually impaired moment. Wrong thread.

For me though, most dangerous would have been a flight that had to make an emergency landing in Vietnam back in 2thousand eight and there was something seriously wrong with the plane. I have been scared of flying ever since.

swapsicles · 01/11/2018 16:53

3 car crashes all write offs but walked away unharmed.
Stuck underwater but pulled out pretty quick 3 times( I can see a pattern! Confused)
Held by my throat against a wall by an ex can't remover what he was shouting about can only remember thinking of dd who was upstairs at the time.

hellokittymania · 01/11/2018 16:53

Although saying that, being visually impaired and eating at auntie bitches café could have been pretty dangerous as well. Thank God I never had glass in the food, I wouldn’t have been able to see it.

Peridot1 · 01/11/2018 16:53

Just missed a bomb going off in Dublin in 1972. Was with my grandmother and we had walked up past where the bomb went off to get our bus. We had to cross a road and the traffic was being controlled by a policeman who let us cross. We walked a bit further on and were sitting on the bus when we heard an explosion. I was 8 and I don’t remember too much about it. I did remember people on the bus talking and some got off to see what had happened.

Thebluedog · 01/11/2018 16:55

Motorbike accident, actually several of them. One of them I fell off on track at over 100mph, walked away with only a broken wrist.

My ex had a breakdown of sorts and I was held hostage in my own home, I managed to phone the police on a phone he’d forgotten about (he’d broken all the other phones), I still to this day don’t know where it would have ended if I’d not remembered we had a phone in the bedroom that we never used.

LostontheWestway · 01/11/2018 16:58

Slipping on some wet leaves and nearly going head first over a balcony. A friend grabbed my hood (thank god for hoodies!)

Slipping on some compacted ice whilst doing a glacial hike and nearly falling into a water filled ravine. My camera strap being grabbed by my husband saved me that time.

Maybe I should stop slipping on things 🤔

SnugglySnerd · 01/11/2018 16:58

Sepsis. Some really scary stories here Sad