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?

Obviously different people will have different experiences.

I appreciated the 'pause' of normal life. A member of our household was very ill during lockdown, but it meant that we didn't need to fend off mostly well-meaning visitors. Also they were not watching, on social media, all of their friends out having an amazing time either, as everyone was stuck at home.

They made an amazing recovery btw.

What rubbish. You can still be empathetic to the painful experiences of others reading this thread, even if lockdown was a wail of a time for you.

Breast Cancer, particularly the nearly 5yrs of Aromatase inhibitors that could be used as a torture instrument.

Watching my DSis die of pancreatic cancer. She had survived 20+ years post breast cancer ( diagnosed at 34) was in the early stages of Parkinson’s. Life is so unfair.

My DS21 bursting into tears on the phone then saying he “didn’t want to be here” he wasn’t referring to his location. Fortunately he was able to share, unlike so many young men who can’t and end it all. He’s fine now, he’s worked out how to deal with his mental health and that his lovely friends are not frightened about talking. His spiral down was due to a relentless series of family events/tragedies that occurred in a short period of time. Singularly he would have coped but not all at once.

My mum dying suddenly at 69.

Very sorry that you had to go through that, must have been horrendous.

Being told my grandad had died

My mother is a narcissist,my father and enabler,one brother is the golden child,my other brothers are the ignored children and im the scapegoat

My mother decided when I was very young,that any problems she had where my fault so shipped me out to my darling grandad

He wasnt perfect but he was my rock-he shaped me into the woman I am now and I was his carer from a very young age

We adored each other

Anyway,when I was about 12/13 he fell asleep in his chair and woke up and asked who I was

He also asked for his own name and where was he?

He seemed to understand and I was too young to understand

I went back to my mother and told her what had happened and was told not to be so stupid and to stop telling lies

A doctor was called in for a home visit (i dont know who rang them) and walked in and he asked grandad the day and month and who was the prime minister?

Of course grandad said 'I dont know'

The doctor looked at me and said 'its dementia' and walked out-id never heard that word before and certainly didnt understand it

I noticed he'd started putting rubbish in cupboards,wasnt bathing (he was always a smart man),wasnt shaving (unheard of) and getting angry with me over nothing

About 2 weeks later,he was found walking up and down the street,in his pyjamas,no slippers and it was snowing looking for my granny (who had died long before I was born) as he wanted to say goodbye before he went off to war but he was very upset that he couldn't find her

Family who id never met and certainly hadn't bothered with him for years,suddenly showed up and whipped him into a home

I found out by coming home as normal after school,everything I owned was in a skip and I was told I had 2 minutes to get what hadn't been chucked and to leave

I remember going back to my parents and seeing how my mothers face dropped when I told her-she really didnt want me back under her roof

I'd go see him in the home 4/5 times a week but he didnt have a clue who I was (the family didnt bother going to see him-it was only me) and seeing him go from the most intelligent man I've ever known reduced to a shell almost killed me

My mother got a phone call to say that he wasnt going to make the next 24 hours and if she wanted to say goodbye,now would be a good time (she'd not seen him in the flesh for years and had never visited him in the home)

She never passed that message onto me

This would have been the Monday and I rocked up on the Wednesday-im told he'd hung on,whispering my name and 'pushing' something unseen away while muttering 'not now,my name'

I said the most painful 'i love you' and he opened his eyes and saw me,but I didnt know that was going to be the last time I ever saw him,he knew but I didnt

The next day he was gone

I've never felt pain like it-i was 14 and my rock,the only person that loved me,had shaped me and done everything for me had gone

My mother prodded me awake with 'grandads gone,he'd dead,now get up and get ready for school'

Of course my mother made his funeral all about her,how she was the best dil in the world and how much she'd done for him while I was shoved at the back and ignored like I was nothing by his adult dc and other grandchildren

My family took the line 'hes dead,move on and forget him' and I had zero support-i wasnt allowed to cry or mention his name

I really struggled turning 28 as id lived half my life without him and think of him every single day

I hope I do him proud

Many but visiting my son in prison is near the top of my list.
Thank you all for sharing, sending you strength

Pregnancy.

Its hard to watch

I agree with the bedbugs from the OP. Also some people have no reaction to them, others do, I'm in the latter camp, I took photos. Diatomaceous earth was the winner in the end.

Near death experience during what was meant to be a minor procedure. Watching the staff realise something had gone very wrong and then chaos while my body started to shut down including my ability to communicate.

BPD mother.

Homelessness.

My mother.

@Vintageblueribbon/ I’m so sorry, that’s one of the saddest posts I’ve read on here. 😢

Me too.

A toxic workplace

my SIL was a nurse and the unit she worked on had a scabies outbreak once then her young adult son who traveled for work brought bedbugs home from a hotel. She went slightly mad and frankly hasn't fully recovered.

Her H would make fun of her but it really did seem to shatter her. The scabies went on for a long time then the bedbugs and she just couldn't cope.

You have my sympathies and deserve a medal for surviving all that! I can't imagine having a young child and rats in the house I'd lose my grip on reality honestly.

Hysteroscopy

me too.

I'm so sorry for the losses in this thread, rather puts my own problems into perspective.

Three things
First, the custody battle I went through with my ex over our DD (we had started off cooperating quite well but his mental health deteriorated and he started refusing to bring her back on time, and eventually at all) . He and his parents used every dirty tactic they could think of, knowing I had very little help as a foreigner in their country, including accusing me of abuse and getting a doctor friend from their church to make an accusation too as that would carry a lot more weight. Had to spend several days in hospital with DD while she was put through all kinds of tests (and later on at another hospital for sexual abuse screening - luckily she was too young to remember that) and then just as she was being discharged into my custody after doctors and social workers were satisfied she was fine, a fax came through from the court, a judge had ordered her into his custody based on my ex's application saying she was in hospital because of abuse and he didn't bother to call the hospital or the social workers to verify this (two weeks later when we were in court he was very angry about being misled but I was even angrier about him not bothering to check). Several years of extreme stress, which got worse as his mental health got worse, and it all affected DD who developed attachment issues and behavioural problems, and he then used his parental rights to deny her medical treatment but thankfully that was the last straw for the courts who stripped him of his rights because of that.

Second, hydronephrosis and appendicitis at the same time, with the former diagnosis confusing the latter (they had a reason for my pain so weren't looking for another reason until all the treatments attempted failed). I've never been in so much pain before or since, I was begging the doctors to kill me at one point. I was pregnant at the time so they were limited in what pain relief they could use too, plus it didn't help when the baby was kicking in that area (which seemed to happen a lot after surgery)

Third, my dad got covid fairly early on in the pandemic and it was a bad dose, he was in a coma on a ventilator for 5 weeks and I thought he was going to die. I remember calling him when he got diagnosed, before they put him on the ventilator and trying not to cry because I thought it might be the last time I'd ever speak to him. But he didn't die so I am very grateful for that, and know that this isn't anywhere near as horrible as some of the other experiences in this thread.

Getting married, being someone's wife, living in a same place with a man.

I've a few. My Dad having a 2nd heart attack not knowing how he'd be after sedation. Was fine. Made a good recovery.

My 6 year old son having a brain tumour. Made a full recovery.

Currently watching my dad dieing slowly from bowel cancer and trying to support my mum.

Fractured shoulder is by far the worst. And I say that as someone who's also been through breast cancer.

An abortion. I know it was my choice, to a degree (failed contraception), but it was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced. It’s been 3 years and it still haunts me, physically and emotionally.

My 6 year old son having open heart surgery

Having a termination for medical reasons and then instantly regretting it. Trying and trying to justify it to myself but I never can. Still feel the regret and heartache to this day and it was 12 years ago. I chose to do this to myself - I ruined my own life. What a stupid, stupid person I am.

Drug/alcohol addiction (I used lockdown to detox from methadone)

Losing a husband to suicide