What's the worst thing you've witnessed? [Content warning added by MNHQ: distressing content]

[Osidge]

Not long ago I was awoken at 3am by loud banging outside. It sounded like someone was banging on my window. I went to look and I saw three men with baseball bats hitting a car in the middle of the road. The car was revving and then I saw another man run out of the opposite house with a huge machete and a big ruckus ensued. I was absolutely terrified as I had visions of people breaking into houses.
I called the police and an armed unit came. There was chaos with people running and shouting. Police with rifles and dogs. Helicopters with beams going for hours.
I was really shaken for weeks. This was in south London so I guess not too surprising but I've never seen anything like it before.
Have you ever witnessed something horrible?

Saw a man set himself on fire. It was a very long time ago but it's quite a vivid memory.

I saw some pretty horrendous things when I worked in a psychiatric hospital, particularly the self-harm. I saw patients burn themselves with battery acid, throw boiling water over themselves, smash glass and grab the pieces to cut themselves with. I cut a few ligatures from around necks. One girl had made a long "pocket" in the flesh of her arm where she hid things like pens.

😥 how awful for you.

That’s unfair, and lacks understanding of what it is like to grow up in an abusive household especially as a child. The OP is also a victim and survivor of the abuse.

Unbelievably judgemental. The poster has explained that they were also abused and were probably terrified themselves.

Are you for real ?

@tryingtobenormalish you'll be comforted to know that we all have crippling mental and physical health problems. Clearly we deserve it.

What the abuser did was sickening, children don’t have a choice and would have been petrified. Social services are paid to deal with these situations

@tryingtobenormalish WTAF, i mean there’s victim blaming then there’s this. Have a word with yourself.

@tryingtobenormalish When you have an abusive childhood your baseline of normality isn't the same as everyone else's. You don't necessarily recognise things as abuse until much later on, often until you've had kids yourself.

Please do some research before spouting such ignorance to someone who has been through a damned hard time.

A few weeks ago I saw a man punch another man outside a motorway service station. The victim’s head hit the ground and there was a large pool of blood. He was unresponsive.

There were lots of people around (I think both men had come from the same coach), so the victim had friends/family with him, and I checked that an ambulance had been called.

I really hope that man is ok.

God there are some utter cockmuffins on this thread who are quite frankly idiots.

One wants a child who was abused to report the abuser to the police for abusing another child, not quite having the mental capacity to understand what was going off, even though the post was quite clear and the other 'wouldn't be mates' with a victim of child abuse?! I'm fucking glad you wouldn't because you'd be the epitome of a wank friend and probably still are.

@tryingtobenormalish if it helps you understand, she told us if we didn't force feed him his liver would fail and he would die. If we didn't do the bullshit "physio" we would be responsible for our sister being in a wheelchair. We believed her about the miracle cures and the necessity of it all. We were terrified, we were brutalised for ever questioning anything or having nightmares or confiding in a teacher (I only did THAT once). You have no idea.

You don't need to explain yourself to the other judgemental idiots on here.

Same thing happened when dd was 18 months old. Dd was in a shop and running off as I was paying and I caught her by her hood. I was holding her hood and she was a dead weight and stopped breathing. She was white, purple lipped and effectively ‘dead’ for a minute or two. I was on the floor in the middle of a shop near the tills with dd laying in my lap. People were just stepping over us rather than going round. The ambulance took us to hospital and she was diagnosed with reflex anoxic seizures. These are where her heart stops and automatically restart.

@sprigatito please don't explain yourself to someone so ignorant, anyone with any common sense understands that you were a child, and a victim yourself. You were NOT responsible in any way.

I was in the emergency services for a couple of years. Saw all sorts. A man burning to death, a boy who had his throat slit, a man who had lived in a wood homeless for a year and had boots full of maggots eating his feet. A 15 year old boy who died in his sleep next to his girlfriend. Drug addicts overdosing, domestic abuse involving a staple gun and metal pole.
2 years of that was enough for me.

A Scrote being rough and verbally abusive with their toddler on the train

A toddler walking down a main road wearing just a nappy when her mum was at home passed out from drinking.

Go away

Try and ignore them @sprigatito, so sorry you all went through such trauma. Victim blaming children is the mark of an imbecile

She's more than a massive arsehole. She should be locked up?

No shit Sherlock

@sprigatito wow I don't think I e ever read anything as sad as that on MN. Your poor brother, being force fed his own vomit and battered !? She should be hung!