to feel a bit naffed off at the people who did nothing

[Loveneverfails]

Basically,

there is only one shop in the place I live.

A property is being renovated just along from it.

On the way home today, we spotted an old man lying on the pavement (about 2pm), in between the shop and property.

His zimmer was beside him. It was clear he was in pain and the zimmer was broken.

We stopped the car and got out.

Clearly the old boy had had a tipple but equally clearly his zimmer was broken (one wheel sheered off and no where to be seen). He was in a dreadful state, smelly, dirty, on the pavement. Calm but still, on the pavement! Could say his name and where he lived and that he was just out of hospital with a broken hip.

Builders came out and said - we offered to get him up an hour ago he said no. They told me the local shop keep selling him booze when he toddles along for it.

People were walking past him and us and not saying a word ?!

AIBU to think he is a human being, was clearly in pain, was filthy and smelly (builders commented on it) and people should not be just walking on by . REALLY? they left him there because he didn't want help - could they not have called an ambulance?

We got an ambulance.

He was taken away. I think his hip may be broken again :(

We also arranged local district nurse to bring him a zimmer if he doesnt get one given to him in the hosp, and spoke with his GP.

Took about two hours of our time but I will sleep tonight!

I was also sad cos the builders were laughing taking pics of him on the pavement

Same thing happened round here. Old boy fell off his bike and laid on the floor, no one helped him. I called am ambulance and stayed with him :(

drunk people can still be injured, in pain or dying ffs

well done OP

FWIW I've at least 2 problem drinkers/alcoholics in my close family, and while I hate what they are doing to themselves, they still deserve dignity and help when something like this happens

I can tell the difference between drunk and not drunk

No you can't, not without at the very least a blood test, you just think you can.

I was 17 when I had a young woman screaming. Her partner was at the bottom of a stairwell in some flats, unconscious.

Yes, I could smell alcohol, and the woman said that he'd taken class A drugs but there's no way I could have left him lying there. I did what I could, called an ambulance and followed the instructions I was given. I even made sure the woman got to the hospital safely.

No matter who they are, they deserve help when injured. I can't turn my back on someone. It's cowardice.

It could be our parents, our child or ourselves, why would anyone be happy if they were lwft there to potentially die.

So sad.

Thanks OP for stopping.

Thank goodness for people like the OP

I once helped an old man who had fallen and had a head injury. I cleared blood from his mouth, sat with his head on my lap. Called an ambulance.

Later on the police called where I worked (I was walking to work when it happened) and we really aggressive "did you accidentally push him, did you take anything from him, how could you possibly hear if you'd already walked past him, what did you hope to achieve"

So sadly because of that experience I'd think twice

It could have been my grandad, he ended up suffering from dementia, wandering, falling, lying in a ditch for hours. I am very glad that the people who found him stopped to help. It makes me feel sick to think that anyone would have walked by, left him suffering, or stopped the point and laugh.

"I just think everyone is someones child,"

Or brother/sister/parent/cousin/friend etc.

Honestly, how can someone live with themselves if they ignored someone who needed help? Where is their conscience?

I helped make sure a dog didn't get knocked over on a main road on Monday, just by cycling back to a farm to ask them if they had the requisite number of dogs. Just a small thing, but if that dog had been knocked down I would have felt it had been my fault.

I always stop to help if I can. A while ago DD and I stopped the car as there was a man lying at the side of the road (I went to check on him, she stayed in the car, mobile in hand to ring 999 if it was any kind of scam)

I work in healthcare and remember being told years ago of a case where a dr walking home saw a man on the floor near where the drunks hung out in town, checked he was breathing, etc but he was slurred, agitated and smelt of alcohol so thought he was a drunk put him in the recovery position and walked on. He turned out to be a normal guy who had been at a work 'do' and had a stroke on the way home. He died later.
Whether that story was true or not I don't know but I don't ever want anything like that on my conscience

House that is horrible.

I would definitely phoned for an ambulance, even if he said he was ok. He was old and couldn't get up.

If he'd been aggressive I would have moved away from him, but stayed around until the ambulance arrived. I couldn't leave someone lying there.

House, it's likely someone had robbed him - and they were ruling you out as a suspect. I'm sorry to hear they were so rude about it. Please don't let it put you off.

There's an epilepsy awareness film where a young man has a fit at a busy station. He is robbed before he's helped.

This is just so sad

My mum has a condition (ataxia) that makes her seem drunk. In fact, it used to be called the drunken sailor disease. She can't walk very well, stumbles/falls alot and slurs her words so that most people can't understand her. We are well used to the looks people give her and the muttering people do about drinking so early in the day etc

I hate to think that one day someone will cross over the street to avoid her if she's fallen

I really hope if that ever happens she has someone like you OP - or the many other caring people here who would also help.

My niece tried to take an overdose of paracetamol washed down with alcohol after getting bad news. People saw her and just ignored her and the police only found her in the nick of time. Any longer and she would have died. She was not a sad drunk but a girl who needed help and no one even tried to call for an ambulance for her.

I would never walk past anyone who was obviously hurt. It takes not time to call an ambulance to make sure the person gets help.

For all you who would cross the road - One day that might be you lying there for whatever reason. Would you like people to ignore you if you were hurt - even if you were smelly or drunk? Thought not.

I despair of people sometimes.

I wouldn't have walked on by but then I am a Nurse and also every core of my being anyway wouldn't have allowed me to not intervene.

It backfires sometimes though. Having a woman spit in my face and call me a cunt when I was trying to stop her boyfriend smacking her outside a club wasn't nice. Someone else called the Police and they told me I shouldn't have got involved as it put me at risk and I should have waited for them (had no idea if anyone had even called them!).

The way I think about it, the day I walk past something like that is the day that I might in fact be a 'cunt' so I still wouldn't ignore anyone in obvious distress.

I hope this thread has educated at least one person to not ignore someone needing help. I admit to not having heard of ataxia before, but know that diabetic hypos mimic the symptoms of being drunk.

If anything this will teach us not to assume.

I've been the one left fallen in the road. A van full of phone engineers sat and stared at me as I lay face down, half on the pavement half in the road. I was mortified and upset by that. I definitely wasn't drunk... It was 9.30am and I was delivering library books to a local nursery.

Stepaway... That accident happened near me. Truly awful. That poor boy and his poor family.

I can understand people not wanting to approach a strange situation, especially if they have small children with them, but you can ring police from a distance and let them investigate.

You are so right OP. We recently helped a young girl whose car had caught fire. It happened right outside a huge cathedral in our city. Once she was safe and away from the car and other people had been alerted people came out of the cathedral including 2 priests. They shouted to me "is that her car?" we were talking to the police at the time. I said that it was. They then turned their backs and started taking photos on their mobile phones and ignored her. I was really sickened by that.

I did come home and think the same as you Step....people are fucking selfish. Actually no one else, not just the vicars and other cathedral folk asked if they could assist..... no doubt there were plenty of exciting snaps on fbook later though.

My dad died in the street on his way to work because nobody helped him. I didn't like him as a person (he had alcohol issues) but nobody deserves to be left like that.

Well done OP.

I don't know how people could have used their phones to take photos but not to make a call to the emergency services. I've called them when I went past a bus stop on the bus and noticed someone lying face down on the pavement in the bus shelter (bus hadn't stopped). Probably they were drunk but what if they weren't?

DS1 loves the Emergency Bikers programme and there was one where a rough looking bloke with a bottle in a bag had passed out in a bus shelter and was very out of it when they roused him. Obviously drunk? Except he hadn't drunk much and had actually had an epileptic fit - hence the disorientation.

Well done for helping. Im horrified at people ignoring him, but sadly have some experience
I have told this before on MN. I went into our local shopping center and noticed a woman, maybe in her early 60's falling asleep, upright, on one of the sofas in the mall.

On my way out I looked again (about 45 minutes had passed) and she had slumped down the seat, and was sprawled across it. I put my trolley and the young DDs against a shop window and started to go over to her. There were 2 people sitting on the sofa also.
A woman talking to a security guard tried to stop me going over , saying she was a nurse in A&E and the woman was drunk. She was wasnt happy that I insisted on going to check in the woman.

It turns out the poor lady had died.

There was obviously something wrong with the way she was lying/sitting, how many people just walked past her for over half an hour?

And then for someone to physically try to stop me because she thought she knew best? It wouldn't surprise me if others, had thought about helping but were put off by the nurse, especially as she was with a security guard.