What is an experience you never want to experience again in your lifetime?

[sooo4455]

The most stressful time in my life started about 7 years ago and went on for 2 years and my mental health took an absolute battering and im still not over it. And now im super paranoid about it happening again.

I had bedbugs and a rat problem under the bath at the same time and pest control were useless.
i had a toddler at the time and their was 7 of us and I was advise to put everything we owned (twice) in the garden while they tried to get the bedbugs under control. I had to wash every soft furnishing and beds, draws, wardrobes had to be emptied and placed outside in bags in the sun. Only thing that was allowed in the house was furniture. I had postnatal depression at the time and I just remember sitting in the garden with everything we owned (twice). With the rats they were running around under the bath and were huge. My bathroom is downstairs and they’d chewed from the outside in, the smell was not normal and the noise all day from them scurrying around 🤮
It finally got resolved after 2 years but at that point I was shot to bits. I don’t think people realise how traumatic it is the live with a bedbugs. I’m so paranoid about getting them again I try and stay away from public transport and hotels or I will research the shit out of them before booking and even then I’m hyper vigilant and can’t sleep.

What is something you never want to go though again?

So sorry for everyone else and what you have experienced.

It just goes to show how amazingly resilient humans are - some of the things I have read on this thread, I am amazed that you managed to survive them.

Especially those who have lost a child. I don't know how you can recover from something like that. So, so sorry for the pain you went through and still no doubt go through.

If it was a thread for people to share their stories of stillbirths and you came on saying “oh my birth was absolutely wonderful, best experience of my life, I know lots who felt the same” do you think that would be appropriate?

My 8 week prem twins catching RSV and stopping breathing. Happy ending as they’re both now in their 30s and perfectly fine.
And my 96 year old father dying recently from heart failure. A horrible way to go.

My husband having 2 bad strokes in the space of 4 months, leaving him physically and mentally disabled, nd then having to adjust to looking after him at home. He was fit and healthy then came home from hospital needing help with everything. He now can hardly talk, and cannot do anything for himself, and my life was turned upside down and I’ve been a full time carer for 4 years now. Never again!

Being shot 7 times by a jealous partner who I had told to leave. I obviously survived, he didn[t. That was in 1981 and I went on to have a great career, became a mountaineer and trekker.

School dinners and breaking my wrist.

Losing my gorgeous dog 2 weeks ago. I stayed with him until the very end. 3 days before I stopped crying . I miss him so much

Losing my brother to suicide over 27 years ago. Such a dreadful waste of a life and the loss does not get any easier.

Flying in a plane.
Still haunts me 42 years later.

The loss of every German Shepherd Dog I’ve ever owned over the last 50+ years… so many times I’ve been heartbroken by their passing.

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Anorexia. Suicidal depression. I'm pretty confident I won't experience the first one again (touch wood) but pretty certain I will experience the second one again as it comes round every 18 months or so.

I hear you on the bed bugs OP. We had them and it was horrific.

This thread really needs to be split into 'lighthearted' and 'serious' versions. Any chance, Mumsnet?

11+ preparation.

Miscarriage and subsequent infertility. I’ve never felt so utterly alone and helpless.

I never again wish to have the experience of an abusive marriage, so that means I will never consider another marriage. It's left me crippled, I might be able to have surgery but psychologically knowing I'd be having it because of what that bastard did puts me off lots of other abuse physically and emotionally and threats to kill me. I'm out now but it took so long because he engaged in 'lawfare' and continued abuse from afar. I learned that he'd engaged in CSA, including my sister. Because I felt I had to contact the police about the others she has cut me off, completely, she wouldn't have been forced to be involved, it brought it all up again and she just couldn't cope. I blame him 100 percent for that and I hope that one of the others comes forward and that the info I gave them about where he lives and what organisations he has to do with children, helps nail him. At very least I don't think that he will ever be able to get a DBS. It is a very isolating thing to know about, who can I ever talk to about it, so I have to shut off the knowledge of it.
Other experiences , I've known so many friends of my children or children of friends who had had premature deaths, accidents, illnesses, suicide, murder. All those young people who should still be with us, never experienced anything like that myself, it gives me so much anxiety about my children.
Travel sickness, cluster headaches, appalling migraines, thankfully not as often as in previous years, I hope I never have any again
Periods where I lost so much blood every time, thankfully no womb any more so that won't happen again
Being bullied at work
Commuting 2 hours plus every day each way to a job that wasn't worth the cost and effort which is hoped would lead to better things but it didn't. A bit like the marriage I guess. But at least I eventually had the sense to quit and find something else that wasn't as stressful.

A severe asthma attack and finding that my reliever had run out. I truly thought I was going to die. It was like trying to breathe through the eye of a needle. Had to go to A&E and was waiting ages for a Dr to give me a neb. Sittng in a brightly lit side room trying to stay calm whilst bloody Magic FM blared from the nurses station nearby. Pure panic. Eventually had to have steroids.

On lighter note, a huge seagull swooping down and snatching my Greggs cheese bake in the city centre (Liverpool) a few weeks ago. In front of everyone. I'm from the North East Coast so used to gulls, but this fucker was huge!9

Labour. And pregnancy sickness.

Too painful experience I can’t even write down in an anonymous forum.

My partner being wrongfully arrested for suspected child sexual abuse about 10 years ago. He was and is absolutely innocent - although I have to accept that people will think I'm deluded - but I'm not.

I worked nights and he worked days at the time. I came in from the garden one day with the dog, and there were two uniformed and 2 plain clothes police in my living room. They took all my devices, including my router, and one of them was awful to me. I was kind of hysterical, and I had never had any dealings with the police before.
They couldn't tell me why he'd been arrested. The female plain clothes said "well it's not rocket science, is it love" (that always sticks in my mind).

They questioned me about our sex life, asked me what he was into, it was fucking awful.

He was released on bail, but couldn't live with me or have any unsupervised contact with any of the children for 6 months. I had to tell a lie about him working away for a while, and I had to have a visit from social services to speak to the children.

My mum came straight up the next day to be with me. I couldn't tell anyone anything about anything for obvious reasons.
Obviously I knew he was innocent, and so did my mum. I even called his ex wife to ask if there was the slightest possibility that this could be true (she's lawyer) and even though they didnt really get on well at the time, she knew too.
I had to carry on working as normal, I had no childcare, and all the while not knowing what was going to happen. Six months later, he got a phone call telling him that the case was dropped, that our devices would be returned asap, and that was it.

I absolutely know that they were doing their job - but I'm pretty sure I have ptsd from it, and neither him or me have ever been quite the same again. I've had some horrors over the years, but that has been by far the most traumatic.

My dad had a fall and broke his back in January 2019. He made something of a physical recovery but was never really the same again.

He was put on the end of life pathway 10 days into the first Covid lockdown and passed away in May 2021 - I cared for him at home until the last six weeks whilst also (initially) trying to work full time, raise a teenager on my own and weather my mums feelings around my dad's demise.

I had the closest relationship with my dad - absolutely adored him - but it nearly killed me. I ended up not working for two years afterwards and diagnosed with cPTSD, anxiety disorder and panic disorder.

I plod along ok these days but my mum is still going at 86 and I cannot even begin to describe the fear that she will have a similarly long drawn out decline. I know I could not survive it.

Too many to mention. But two medical nightmares stand out. The first being a colonoscopy and the second a MRI scan, which involved my head being squeezed into a tightly fitting cage and then being propelled into an extremely narrow, loud and dark tunnel for what seemed like an eternity. It was only then that I realised I am claustrophobic. Never again.

A spinal block. It was pure agony.

Norovirus: throwing up violently while shitting (sorry TMI) at the same time. Horrenduous. My middle child nearly died from organ failure from it as a result of catching it. Terrifying.

My ex dragging me out of bed naked by my hair, beating threshold out of me. I escaped through a tiny window and left him soon after. I thought I was going to die.

I'm so sorry for your loss, I hope you have people around you to support you.

Not so good for the thousands that died though

I am so sorry for all your experiences, but also in awe at the bravery of the posters on this thread. Love to all of you.

Your post from where you say you have been estranged since 2020. This is so similar to my experience, I'm sorry you went through all of this. My mother died yesterday. I don't know how to process it. I'm completely lost.

So sorry to hear so many sad stories... and sorry for your loss. May I ask what his symptoms were? I'm always terrified of strep throat infections and doctors routinely say most things are viral. Big hug to you all