When did your world go quiet?

[PalominoOrGreyOrChestnutOrBay]

inspired by a tiktok trend recently, just thought it might be an interesting thread. I’m a regular poster not a journalist or anything like that (MNHQ can verify!).

When did your world go quiet? Basically, what was a time you got a fright and time seemed to stop or go quiet?

mine was I was on my horse and he decided to rear up, over concrete ground, and I felt him wobble back. As soon as I felt that first tilt backwards everything sort of went quiet and it was like an out of body experience (not a good one!). I couldn’t hear anyone around. I just remember the last thing I thought was along the lines of this is it im about to die and it was like everything was in slow motion. Luckily it was all ok but that split second was easily the scariest moment of my life and my world completely stopped.

So, when did your world go quiet?

When the cars in front of me on an A-road came to a stop but the HGV behind me wasn't looking or slowing down. I could see him approaching through my mirror and thought we were all going to die. He slammed his brakes on at the very last second and missed our car by inches.

Later that same day my DH had popped into the shop whilst me and the DC were sat in the car when a parked HGV started reversing into us 🙄 I was glad to get home that day!!

I don't know actually - I didn't try to speak except for the phone call, I can't remember if it was hard to speak at that time.

I'm so so sorry, truly heartbreaking xx ❤️‍🩹

Post C-section, my baby and husband had been rushed out of the room and there was a sense of panic but I couldn't hear anything properly or feel (obviously) much. All I knew was I was so cold but desperately needed just a drip of water in my mouth. I felt like I was slipping away and in slow motion. I felt like it was taking hours, when in reality, it wasn't that long. It was strange.

Apparently there was a bleed , I don't remember much apart from feeling eerily calm, until suddenly they were putting my baby on me. Oh, and getting that drip of water. It was the best tasting water I'd ever had.

When I answered the phone to my brother and he just said my family nickname and I just knew my dad had died ( he was very very Ill) the noise that came out of my throat was almost a howl and the world just stopped. I know understand what people say that they howl with grief.

When I took a phone call after college that 5 of my friends had been in an accident. I remember feeling like all the life had been sucked out of me through my feet. My friend was frantically asking what was wrong but I couldn't hear her, I just stared. They had all passed away age 17 we found out after hours of desperately trying to find out information.

Also, when my second son was born he went into distress and they pressed that god awful button. The room filled up and I had people holding my legs, pushing my stomach, cutting me, the nurse telling me to push harder when I knew I was pushing as hard as I could. I felt really calm and almost resigned to the fate and I felt like I was just watching from above, all the while wondering how we were going to tell our family that the baby was died and it was all my fault. Thankfully, after a brief resuscitation, our little boy is now absolutely fine and as soon as he cried, the calmness left me and I absolutely broke down and everything became loud again.

Years ago when a disgruntlement person set my place of work on fire by pouring a can of petrol through the open reception window, a couple of feet away from me and a colleague, all the time looking me dead in the eye. I remember thinking that I would need to remember everything about him, so I could tell the police. Everything really did go very quiet and time stood still. It must have been seconds but get like an eternity

Another one for me was when I thought my own father was going to kill me. He was in the throes of dementia and all his fear and anger was focussed on me. He got me trapped in a tiny bedroom, picked up a heavy office chair and pushed me on the bed and pushed the chair with all his weight down on to me, crushing me. I thought he was going to kill me and time seemed to stop all I could think of was this can't be happening. Luckily at that second the house phone rang and it distracted my Dad enough for me to grab the phone and scream for them to all the police. I had no idea who was on the phone. I managed to stand up but my Dad started throwing punches at me. Luckily the police arrived quickly (they had only just left for a different dementia caused incident) and my Dad went into a care home. The look in his eyes was horrible, I knew he could and wanted to kill me in that moment (I'm not sure he knew I was his daughter then).

When my mum rang me to tell me my little sister had died. I was living in a different country at the time. Every second - from being told the news, to seeing her in the morgue the next day after a night flight - was silent. I can't remember what happened between those moments even now and it's been almost eight years.

Trigger warning ⚠️

Moment I realised the man I was chatting to 10 minutes previous was now trying to rape me.

My world went very quiet when I was forced to accept that I couldn't stop him and the only way to survive and get home to my children, was to go limp and get it over with so I could escape.

I couldn't go limp by the way, it was impossible. I could only seize up every muscle in my body which made it 100 times more painful, because I wanted to keep fighting him and so had to fight myself instead.

Fuck I'm so sorry for the trauma pp's have had to face, the scary and the heartbreaking. 💔
I hope life treats you all kindly from here on. 🌺

When my then undiagnosed adhd and autistic girl climbed on top of her bank beds and fell 10ft out if bedroom window. She'd been to see Peter pan and thought she could fly. I literally was on automatic pilot until hrs later. I got back home and just broke down crying
She only had a tiny bruise to her hip and I think I also aged 20 years

When the police knocked on my door at 2am to tell me my son had been involved in an RTA.

He hadn't been taken to the local hospital, he'd been taken to the specialist head trauma hospital further out.

Coming down the stairs DS2 said to the officers, is everything ok? They said wait until your parents are down son.

I asked is my son dead, they said we know he's breathing.

I drove to the hospital despite them offering (fuck knows why I did!), I was completely calm.

Totally silence in the car, I looked at DH and for the first time I saw an old man, he had aged 10 years in 10 minutes.

I got to the hospital and the moment the lovely nurse held my hard, I broke down!

All was good, he survived and broke a collar bone and chipped his tooth.

The massive swollen head, amounted to nothing!

Nowhere near some of these. When my now 10 yr old ds was born, in a very precipitous labour in the back of a speeding ambulance. He was 9'11oz and did a lot of damage on the way out which I didn't realise immediately. I lost a couple of litres of blood and couldn't stop shaking. On arrival at hospital they gave him to dh and took me off for repairs. I remember lying silently and hearing the beeping of one of the machines getting faster and starting to panic, making it go faster still...until the doctor noticed, moved it away and started talking to me to distract me.

As a teenager a best friend committed suicide. She had tried previously and I had been there. This time involved a very high building so was pretty fool proof. A mutual friend found me at school and told.me, I remember saying "you're kidding" before going to find my tutor who was sat in his office looking devastated and confirmed it. I got in the car (6th form) and drove down there, saw the police tape etc and realised it was true. Like somehow everyone might have been lying.

When my first son was born not breathing.
When I had a serious car accident happen to lorry and car directly in front of me.
When I witnessed my dearest Mum die

Driving on the motorway once in the fast lane, woman several cars in front of me lost control. I couldn't see this due to large number of trucks in the slow lane. Apparently she swerved across three lanes of traffic, went off the side, came back around and landed at a dead stop facing onward traffic in my lane. All I saw was the cars in front of me suddenly swerve right, and then there the car was, right in front of me, at a stop. I remember thinking, 'oh wow I'm going to die now'. Guess my body took over, I swerved into the middle median. Still hit her, but on the side. I was actually following a friend, and she managed to get out of the way because she could see the woman lose control. She stopped further down and literally ran down the freeway as she heard me crash and she said, 'Oh I thought you were dead, I really did.'

Almost exactly a year ago a consultant told me that my mum - who had been in hospital for weeks with liver issues and associated neuro issues - that she had developed a twisted bowel that he thought “she was unlikely to survive”. It knocked me sideways. Although her future looked complex, we were planning for her discharge pathway. And I’d bounced into hospital with my cheery face on, only to be quickly diverted into another room and be delivered this news. The minute after stretched like elastic until the point of snapping, and then i audibly swore as the future concertinad. She died a week later. I miss her so much. My lovely mum.

When I saw a mum screaming on a deserted beach and realised she couldn't swim and her 2 children were caught in a rip and being pulled out to sea. I remember so clearly every minute of getting them out, even though it was well over 20 years ago. It felt like ages but was probably only 5 minutes.

First time tandem skydiving and thinking clearly and calmly as I jumped that I was going to die (for no good reason, it went perfectly well).

My father knocking the stuffing out of me, twice. The first time, he was kicking me on the ground and I thought he was going to kill me. I still remember how loud my breathing sounded and how calm I was. I think he stopped because I just lay there.

Dd was v young, under 6 months I think. She was very unsettled one night so we decided to just bring her downstairs for a bit. I walked down the stairs, DP carrying DD a little way behind. I got to living room then heard a massive THUD from the stairs. I went stone cold. Complete horror welled up at what I might see if I went to bottom of stairs. I couldn’t breathe. As it was, my DP had just slipped on the second to bottom step and the thud had been his bum / side hitting the step, and there was my baby girl cradled safely in the crook of his arm smiling at me and completely fine.

I felt physically sick and my breathing went all ragged for a bit after - completely uncontrollable. I realised the extent of my love for her that night.

Reading every single one of these in the middle of the night whilst the family sleeps is haunting and

Oops posted too early.

Mine was when I went for my scan during my first pregnancy. May 2020. My DH had to wait in the carpark for me due to covid restrictions. I had a student sonographer who went quiet and asked if I'd had any bleeding. I said no. I went into that room with a feeling and never once looked at the screen. He left to get his supervisor who confirmed the worst. They left me in the room for 10 minutes to call my husband before taking me upstairs to discuss what had happened. I never phoned him because I didn't want him to hear it over the phone and then wait outside for me. When I eventually left I just collapsed on him in the carpark.

The time in that room alone was the most harrowing experience of my life and I'm still so angry he wasn't allowed there with me.

The other time was when I was 7 and found out my mum had taken her life. I stood up, wrapped myself in her blanket and just sat in my wardrobe for hours.

When I nearly passed out driving in the dark on the dual carriageway with my two children in the back. My hearing went and my vision started to go. I have no idea how I pulled over. I know I was a semi conscious garbling mess for a while then petrified until rescued and safely home as I couldn't get me and the kids out of the car and we were just on the side of the road. The youngest slept through the whole thing, the eldest was traumatized for some time after.

When I was told I had cancer. I was 23 and totally blindsided by it. I went and sat in the corridor of the hospital and I just remember it felt like the world had stopped. I was alone (I honestly didn't think the appointment would be very important) and I remember just thinking "this is going to change my whole life and no one knows". It was the roughest year of my life, but it's been 12 years now and I'm fit and healthy.

I'm so sorry 🥺 I have tears reading this. No 7 year old girl should go through that and I'm so sorry for the loss of your baby. The worlds such a cruel place 🥺

When I was contacted by police to say that my son was missing and that they'd found a suicide note.

Five long days later when they contacted me again to say that they had found his body.