What is the scariest thing that has ever happened to you?

[begin_within]

The scorpion thread yesterday inspired me to post this thread.

One scary event was, while hiking in Sequoia National Park, in 1993, we came to a cliff edge that had a direct drop of about 2000 feet. There were no signs, nothing manmade at all. Just part of the trail went out to a point that was a cliff overlooking the valley 2000 feet below. My friends walked right up to it and looked over, and just seeing them do that scared me. I crawled on my stomach to the edge and took one glance over the edge and immediately felt dizzy and sick. I crawled back, and got back on the trail, but the whole rest of the hike I was very shaky. Every single step was scary and I lagged behind my friends, so I was alone for a while, thinking I was going to slip off the mountain at any minute. It was a tremendous relief when the trail turned and went into a forest, away from the cliffs. The next day I was still so shaken up, I couldn't even climb up Moro Rock with them, which has a stairway carved into the rock and handrails.

In the summer of 2005 I was in the desert in California, alone at night, and I was sitting on the ground. I saw a small scorpion walking right towards me. Knowing that the small ones are the ones with the strongest venom, I exploded off the ground and flew into the car. Probably scared the poor thing to death.

But the scariest thing of all happened one year ago when my Mom choked on a piece of garlic bread, and turned blue. We got it out of her, and she survived and she is fine today, but she came within a couple minutes of dying. That was genuinely terrifying and that feeling lasted for days afterwards. It was five months before I let her have garlic bread again, and even now I cut off the crusts.

And you?

[ThomCat]

1. I was homeless

I had just been injured and become permanently disabled. I had no job and no income. I was in buffalo, and it was winter.

I didn't qualify for any public assistance because I was a college student and they counted my student loans (which has already been paid to the university) as personal income.

I found out how few friends I really had.

[Sequoia]

69. That's sad.

I wake up at night in fear of that. Hope things improved for you. Winter in Buffalo though...that had to be tough. The friends part...yes indeed. We used to be doing okay but when my husband's inheritance ran out all the "friends" fled the scene. Now we don't get invited to their parties or homes anymore 'cause we are in the poverty level now.

[ThomCat]

72. I'm doing better

but thanks to my disability I'm always one health problem away from losing everything. It's not a nice place to live.

I have many fewer friends now, but I love them much more. I cultivate people who are not shallow and who show an understanding of other people's perspectives. Shallow, self-centered people really, strongly bother me now.

I hope you have found and cultivated better friends too. :hug:

[mainegreen]

2. In a plane that dropped 2000 feet very quickly.

There is a reason you buckle those damn belts when they tell you.

[ironflange]

19. Same with me

In 1972, over Greenland, at night, at least 10 seconds of weightlessness. It made me afraid to fly for many years, but I'm slowly getting better. It's progressed to a mere dislike.

[conscious evolution]

23. I thought it was fun

when I too a similar little flight while I was on a flight!!

[closeupready]

79. That happened to me, too.

Or the time I almost drowned as a kid on vacation with my family - my oldest brother pulled me out, thank God for him.

[Arugula Latte]

94. I was flying into Vegas on a layover, and the plane was just a few feet

from the ground when it suddenly soared back up again. The pilot didn't say anything, but I'm sure we came close to colliding w/ another plane. :scared:

[Parche]

131. my fellow oregonian

A group of us were flying AA DC-10 1989 if I remember right, on approach into
Miami airport runway 27L. I am an avid airline/airplane buff and was listening
to the 'ATC' radio channel 9 and heard the controller call our plane to descend
immediately, we dove (in the clouds) fast, there was an EA jet right in front
of us. People were screaming as our descent was the quickest I have ever had.
No one knew but me what was going on, I didnt tell anyone until we landed.

[Arugula Latte]

132. Yikes!

I think the quick descent would be much scarier than our quick ascent! :scared:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

100. I've been there.

Thing was, I was flying into Texas at the time and as soon as it was over those magnificent bastards were hooting and hollering like it was some kind of rodeo.

[LeftyMom]

3. I was 19

And unexpectedly pregnant, in a country that had just suffered a coup, fearful of the future, with a shitty job and no way to afford child care once the kid was born, unsure how I'd afford to feed the kid or if I'd be a good mom or if my body would even cooperate in getting the kid out safely, with no real support network to speak of.

[mainegreen]

4. You win.

Kids to early wins hands down. It's scary enough at 30!

[Taverner]

90. Fuuuuuuck

Harsh....harsh indeed

What happened next?

[LadyoftheRabbits]

5. Whoa...

:(

This summer I almost drowned in a rip tide at the beach. If my dad hadn't been able to pull us both toward shore, I probably would have.

[begin_within]

9. Once I went out on a boogie board into the Pacific, and I never had learned to swim properly

I was happily riding the small waves close to the shore, staying on top of the boogie board. It was great. Suddenly I slipped off of it and started sinking immediately. I went down about 3 feet underwater and there was still plenty of water below me, and I was looking up at my board. Fortunately the leash was tied to my ankle. It was tied to save the board, but it ended up saving me. I pulled on the leash and the board came down a little but I could grab the board and I grabbed it and it pulled me up above the water. It all happened within about 10 seconds. I didn't inhale any water at all. Suddenly I was on top of the board sort of sideways, but at least I was in the air. I quickly went back to the sand and never got on a boogie board again since then. That boogie board saved my life, because I am a very poor swimmer and I would have certainly drowned in that quickly moving water.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

6. My grandson stopped breathing in my arms and I was certain

he was dead.

So I can relate to how frightened you were. Thank God for both of us, the worst case scenario didn't happen.

[driver8]

7. The 1994 Northridge Earthquake.

I lived about a mile and a half from the epicenter of the quake. I woke up to the sound of a train going right through the middle of my living room, and the room shaking so violently that I could not stand up.

I was on the first floor of a three story building and just kept waiting for the building to fall on top of me. Thank God, it didn't.

[begin_within]

12. I have been in several fairly large earthquakes, but not near the epicenter.

I remember the 1971 one which was centered in Sylmar. We were living in Orange. I was in my single bed and the bed started bouncing up and down. I thought someone was trying to wake me up, but nobody was in the room. I got up and went into the hallway where the rest of my family had gathered. It was in the middle of the night. I don't remember feeling scared at all. There was one that happened on a Sunday morning in June 1993 I think, and it was centered in Landers, and I was standing on our concrete driveway in San Diego. The entire ground started moving back and forth, like you were in a fun house. It wasn't all that scary, but it was weird. All the rest of the day when I was standing up I sort of felt like the ground was still moving. It just upset my equilibrium for one day. But I don't remember really being scared in any earthquake I have been in. They usually end so quickly that there isn't time to get scared. My grandmother lived in Vallejo during the 1906 earthquake in San Francisco, and she was terrified of earthquakes for the rest of her life.

[driver8]

21. I remember the Landers' quake. The house I lived in at the time

had a swimming pool and the water was splashing out of the pool as the ground swayed. That was a strange feeling -- very different than the Northridge quake.

The thing about the Northridge quake was that it lasted so long. I remember thinking, "this has to stop soon!" Not only that, but it was loud!!

[Art_from_Ark]

35. My house was practically right above the epicenter of a quake

earlier this year. Nearly a M6.0. The house felt like it was a small boat out on the ocean. I half expected the walls to start collapsing, Then for about a hour after the quake ended, there was a really weird atmosphere in the house, almost like it had been transported to the middle of some creepy cemetery.

[S n o w b a l l]

22. me too...

I was in Palos Verdes though...about 10 miles south. Scary it was!

[radwriter0555]

43. Yes, I was in it too, in Toluca Lake... I was laughing though, while my bf at the

time was screaming like a little girl.

I had a serial killer stalk me for a few weeks. I knew he was coming back one night in particular, so I waited up for him...

I was in an elevator that fell a couple of floors before the brakes kicked in. I laughed through that one too.

Dunno what it is about me and laughing in scary things.

[Patiod]

53. A serial killer? For real?

What happened?

[Sequoia]

68. I remember that one!

I lived in Santa Monica and it was pretty bad there. But you are lucky the building didn't pancake like that 3 storey apartment building which flattened people on the 1st floor. I'll never forget that day...Jan 17, 1994. Just Saturday I was wearing a Reagae Cat-in-the-Hat "I Survied" T-Shirt a guy was selling in Venice shortly thereafter.

[closeupready]

80. I was staying with a friend with a place

near Century City. Being there on vacation, I thought this sort of thing happened all the time. My friend (who'd lived in LA for many years) laughed, and said, "um, no, that was the worst I've ever experienced."

[Whoa_Nelly]

8. Was caught in the Kaweah River outside Sequoia Park gates

Pulled upstream toward a huge whirlpool, kept getting sucked under water. My boyfriend at the time was there...ran and grabbed my hand as the last possible handhold on a boulder slipped from my fingers with the whirlpool right behind me. He literally pulled me straight up out of the water and onto the top of that large boulder. I started laughing. He asked if I was hysterical and needed slapping. I told him no, was just about the happiest I had ever been in my life and glad he saved me. Then, I asked him to get me the Bota Bag...a slug of wine seemed like it was really called for at the moment.

Same guy saved another woman from drowming several years later. He received a Carnegie medal for bravery for it.
http://www.plumsystems.com/db/chf/plum_press.asp?id=58851

[WCGreen]

30. I'm glad he pulled you out....

Who else would kiss my syrup....

[Whoa_Nelly]

31. Awwww...WC!

You and your syrup are the sweetest ever! :* :hug:

[av8rdave]

10. Near midair when I was in pilot training....

a botched rejoin on a formation training sortie. We crossed at 90 degrees to each other, each doing somewhere around 350 knots indicated. Missed by 20 feet or so.

It was over before we realized exactly what happened, so it was really scary after the fact. At least we never would have known what happened.

[cobalt1999]

11. Hard to pick...

1) I somehow got my foot entangled in my own parachute when it deployed for about 20 seconds, I got it free but that was a LONG 20 seconds. that had the heart pounding for the next hour though.

2) As a teen, driving a boat late at night, no lights, unfamiliar area...just "felt" something was wrong, turned the boat left and just missed crashing into a unlit dock at 45mph that would have decapitated me and my date. I'm still anal about driving boats at night.

3) When taking flight lessons, I out practicing stall recoveries solo when the engine just died. Student pilot, maybe my 3rd solo flight, and I'm in an emergency situation. Luckily the engine started right back up, but that was two weeks before I could get back into the plane.

4) Lost in an underground cave while in college. No one knew we where there, so nobody was going to report us missing. Very small passages, mostly on our hands/knees in partially water filled tunnels. Found a old line and followed it to a larger passage, from there out, but we'd been wandering for hours.

But my choice would be...

5) When we took our first child home from the hospital. The next day she was crying LOUD, I innocently & chauvinistically asked my wife "what's wrong?". She replied "I don't know". I realized for the first time that she didn't know anything more than I did about babies (which was nothing). Until that moment just assumed my wife (as a woman) would know all about being a mom and how to care for children and I at that moment had a short panic attack. I really said "we are going to kill this baby"..."can we take it back to the hospital?"..."what are we going to do?!?".

[redqueen]

129. re: just "feeling" something was wrong...

i love those kinds of incidents... so mysterious.

[Downtown Hound]

13. Was briefly romantically involved with a woman

who one night told me that she was a victim of repeated cult abuse. She claimed that they would come and drug her, take her off to these secret locations, and make her and other girls do really unspeakable things. I didn't know if she was lying, crazy, or telling the truth. But I liked her and decided to stay with her for at least a bit longer.

The thing was, after she told me this, I noticed strange things begin to happen to me. People seemed to appear out of nowhere. One time after I took her home and I was parked along her street a black car pulled up right next to mine and the driver just stared at me for several minutes. Other times I would see people waiting in cars outside her house reading the newspaper and looking at me when I went inside. Another time we went to a movie together and I could swear there was somebody following us.

But the final straw for me was when there was one night that I couldn't find my wallet while I was house sitting for my parents, who were out of town. All day long, I had had the feeling like I was being watched. It simply wouldn't go away. I mean, we all have those feeling now and again, but this day it was incredibly strong. Then at night I couldn't find my wallet, which I always put in the same place. I looked everywhere for it. Finally I went out to my car, which was parked on the street, and checked it very throughly. Nothing. I went back inside and looked some more. I had just about given up when I looked outside and saw that the light of my car was on. I was certain I hadn't left the light on. I went out to turn it off. And there sitting on the passenger seat of my car, is my wallet. But it's not alone. Surrounding it were two pieces of origami that this romantic interest of mine had made for me. I kept the origami in my bedroom at home, not in my car. Here I was on the other side of town and it was now in my car that I had just searched along with my wallet.

The message to me was quite clear. We can do anything to you, and you won't see it coming. We work in the shadows. This is a warning. It's the last one you will ever get. I did some research and talked to some people that dealt with victims of this kind of thing. I gave the woman their names and strongly encouraged her to talk to them. And then I told her goodbye. I sometimes feel like a coward for that, but this woman wasn't the love of my life and I knew she never would be. I really didn't want to die for her. I have never seen any signs of those people again. And I seriously hope I never do.

[begin_within]

14. Sounds like a good Twilight Zone episode.

[Downtown Hound]

16. That's how it felt

But it really happened. Every word of it.

[Shakespeare]

20. That IS scary. What was the cult?

:scared:

[Downtown Hound]

24. Beats me.

If they had a name, she either didn't know it or never said.

[last_texas_dem]

40. Wow, that is a scary experience

It definitely does sound like it could be a plot for a horror movie or TV show, as a poster above noted. I can't even imagine having to deal with a situation like that.

[Sequoia]

70. Your story gave me the chills big time. Shakey scary stuff.

What sort of cult was it?

[Downtown Hound]

107. Some kind of black magic cult

I don't really know. All I know is what this woman told me. According to her they made a lot of illegal pornography, snuff films and the like. Really nasty stuff. And they held rituals at these secret locations where they did a lot more nasty stuff. Those things I really don't want to go into here. All I do know is that according to her, there were some pretty powerful local people involved, and I saw evidence of this in other incidents that I didn't list above. But other things did happen, and it was enough to convince me that a lot of what she was saying was true.

The bottom line was that they had a lot of money and a lot of power, and they were some really sick individuals. That alone made me not want to mess with them.

[BlueIris]

111. You're not a coward. You were right to run from her, and run far.

After I read the first paragraph of this post, I thought the next part of it was going to be like, "Things got really bizarre in the relationship because it was clear that she had some sort of personality disorder and was leading a chaotic lifestyle and had 'borrowed' the story of having been ritually abused from someplace on the Internet in order to draw attention to her own childhood abuse issues..."

Yikers. When I hit paragraph two...shudder. That's wiggy. I haven't been in contact with that many people who were that close to an actual RA survivor, especially one whose handlers were still around. Scary.

[Left Is Write]

15. The scariest thing that ever happened to me...

is something I really can't talk about.

I'm being sincere. I just can't.

[graywarrior]

17. Getting through the first 5 years of sobriety.

No wait, getting through the first 20 years of sobriety.

[redqueen]

130. congrats

:toast:

[S n o w b a l l]

18. An ectopic pregnancy...

....that burst and having to go through the experience alone.

[Patiod]

54. Yikes! Going through any medical emergency alone is scary

But have heard and ectopic pregnancy is both painful and frightening in the best of situations.

[momophile]

25. a near car crash

going about 75 in the middle lane of the highway with cars on both sides of me when I realized that there was a stalled car (with the people inside) ahead in my lane. I hit the breaks as hard as I could without locking them, waiting for the semi next to me to get ahead, and then got over just in the nick of time. If I'd locked up the car, I'm sure I would have either hit the stalled car or one of the cars/semis next to me. I had to pull over shortly after to breathe and cry. Then only a few minutes later ambulances were rushing past us toward the stalled car. I never found out what happened (as I was in a different country), but I know it couldn't have been good.

I don't speed much anymore.

[Redstone]

26. Hard to say, because I have what a psychiatrist once called "a pathological

lack of fear." And believe me, that's not a good thing.

When I should be afraid, I get, for lack of a better description, detached and focused at the same time. I can't really explain it.

Lots of things that should have been scary: Falling off the skid, getting shot, getting shot at, being 500 meters from an Arc Light strike, having an aneurism blow out in my gut while I was driving (near a hospital, fortunately), driving through Franconia Notch at night in a blizzard after the road had been closed, having to back the rental car five miles down an old mining road that was hanging on a canyon wall in the Panamints with a BIG drop on one side after getting stopped on the way up by a washout, being told I have MS, being told I had a deadly blood disease at 14 years old (Ha! fooled 'em on that one!)...

It's been fun, though.

Redstone

[Porcupine]

36. What the hell is an Arc Light strike? nt.

.

[jmowreader]

78. Saturation bombing by B-52s over Vietnam

Read https://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/PopTopics/arclight.htm and you will understand.

In Orrin DeForrest's 'Slow Burn,' he talks of having Vietcong who'd survived Arc Light strikes surrender to the Chieu Hoi (open arms amnesty program) Centers. He'd move them to his center and start talking to them, and they'd describe how the bombs would just walk in on you.

[Redstone]

99. Thanks for stepping in and explaining that for me. An Arc Light strike was a TOT

(Time On Target) drop by a cell of three Buffs.

Fucking impressive.

Again, I appreciate you coming in and providing an explanation. I owe you one.

Redstone

[idgiehkt]

27. not for public consumption

a :hug: for all of us.

[XemaSab]

28. I'd like to give a big shout-out to the 1989 quake

'Cause that was some freaky shit. I thought the building was going to come down around me.

I've had some moments in the woods when I've been pretty scared. Both camping and at work. Creepy people, creepy noises.

[Arugula Latte]

97. I was in that quake, too. Driving in Berkeley.

My car tipped to the side and I thought I had two flat tires. I then saw all the lightpoles swaying and pulled over. A woman in a minivan full of kids was behind me and didn't realize we'd had a quake. She honked at me to move ...

I saw cars crushed by fallen bricks and I'll never forget driving over the Berkeley Hills to the East Bay and seeing these huge fires burning in San Francisco off in the distance ... :scared:

[XemaSab]

115. I could see big fires burning in Berkeley and San Francisco

They said on the radio the Berkeley fire we could see was one of the libraries at UC Berkeley. :(

Which turned out to be a lie. :P

[Redneck Socialist]

29. Almost drowned

Hiking solo, tried to ford a river after several days of rain. Bad plan. Adrenaline is an amazing thing.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

32. My husband and I were newlyweds, living in Palo Alto.

The Saturday before Easter, we decided to go driving up in the hilly wooded area behind Palo Alto.

We got up to a dirt road that looked rather pretty, even though it had been raining the day before... The dirt looked dry, so we decided to go for it....

And I might mention that I was about 4 months pregnant with our first child.

So we proceeded down the dirt road, only to discover that the dry stuff was just a layer over the mud. My husband was trying to steer the car and it was handling like a boat. We rolled from one side of the road to the other, and the only thing that kept us from going over the side was a little ridge on my side of the car.

I looked down into the gully, and there I saw many cars that hadn't made it...rusted hulks.

I could scarcely breathe.........This went on for what seemed like forever.

We finally got out, onto the paved part once again. It was hours before we got home. The folks who lived up there were not pleased to be asked to call a tow truck...seems there were lots of fools like us!

We never went back.......

Our daughter is now 40 years old, BTW...

[Taverner]

71. Must've been Montebello Road

Been there many times.

I was in college at the time so it was kind of a nice "inspiration point" if you will.

You know, 18 years old, on a date, with a car....that sort of thing.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

83. I don't remember the name of the road..........

We had come up on Page Mill Road, if that helps.........

[Taverner]

88. Yep - Montebello

It's a sheer cliff, but once you get to the top the view is awesome.

Too bad you were too freaked to enjoy it! :scared:

[Alexander]

33. Maybe not the scariest I can remember right now, but definitely up there.

Just this past August, on my way back to Phoenix from northern Idaho visiting extended family, I was driving ridiculously fast (probably 80-90 mph) in the middle of the night with the windows down and the music blaring, in southern Idaho kind of close to Boise. I was making the return trip alone - I had gone up with a friend - and I saw a deer standing in the middle of the road. My horn, for some reason, didn't work, and I put on the brakes and swerved slightly to avoid it. I didn't swerve enough, and my brakes screeched like a banshee. Thankfully at the last second the deer stopped staring at my headlights and started to run away, otherwise we both would've been killed. My car nicked the deer's hindquarters, and it ran off. I stopped my car and checked for damage - nothing but my heart, which likely skipped several beats. I consider myself lucky that I didn't die right there.

[leftofthedial]

34. in the middle of nowhere Mississippi, twenty cops or so surrounded my car

with their guns drawn and aimed at me, ordered me out of my car

I thought I was dead

(this was the era when lots of badass cops hassled long-haired kids)

it was a case of mistaken identity, me a hippie on summer break from college and them looking for a major drug distributor

if they'd found the ten cases of Coors beer I was smuggling to Washington DC to sell, they really would have given me some shit

[TK421]

37. Back in 1996, my brother took me down to a very bad area of

Philly ( Cambria, North Philadelphia ) to try cocaine for the first time. He parked his car on a street full of drug dealers...when he got what he came for, he put the car into drive. There was a dealer standing RIGHT IN FRONT of his car, so I remember seeing the guy flying about ten feet forward when my brothers car bumped him. My brother was so wasted and I was so scared because dealers were pushing all kinds of drugs through the partially opened window that neither of us noticed someone was right in front of the vehicle. The guy stood up with an angry look.....one of the dealers asked my brother to shut his car down. I remember my brother telling him "Fuck you, I'm not shutting my car down ". He sped away, but the dealer reached inside the car and tried to grab him by the neck. He had scratch marks on his neck from it. There were gun shots following this escape. I vowed never again to do anything like this ever. My brother doesn't even remember it!

[Patiod]

56. I've seen "bad" areas of other towns

but "bad" in Philly is about as bad as it gets.

What sucks is I have friends who have to raise their kids there (their church and family support system are all in North Philly, so they're reluctant to move). Raising kids is hard enough without armed drug dealers all over the place.

[TK421]

105. There was quite literally a "sea" of drug dealers on either side of the

car....I thought that they were going to break in and carjack us. My brother seemed to be calm through this, but I wanted nothing more than to get the fuck out of there.......really SCARY shit going on.

[last_texas_dem]

38. A driving experience

I was driving home from college a few years ago. I was in the left lane with a big eighteen wheeler in the right lane a little ahead of me. I'm speeding up to pass him when suddenly I realize he is moving over to the left lane and doesn't see me at all as I'm in his blind spot. I realized I had to either move off the road or get crushed because moving to the right or braking and staying in my lane was not an option at this point. I ended up hitting the brakes and bailing out into the grassy meridian dividing the right and left lanes of the four-lane highway. I went diagonally forward across the grass and was a matter of feet from slamming into a car going the opposite direction on the other side. I remember seeing the face of the driver I was heading toward as I was on my way! But I braked hard enough that I missed the other lanes by a matter of feet. I ended up making a 180-or-so degree turn before becoming stuck in the mud and my car finally coming to a stop, facing the opposite direction of how I was originally headed. Eventually, a state trooper stopped and had me towed home for free.

Alright, I know this one doesn't compare to the experiences of many of y'all but that's about the scariest one I can think of. Runners-up are when I was questioned by the FBI about something (I'm still a little too paranoid to give any details, and it's probably better that way) and getting some threat letters and stuff thrown in my yard by my ex-girlfriend's ex-boyfriend. So my scary driving experience takes the cake for now.

[Omphaloskepsis]

39. Long story short....

My mother did something that required her and my sister and myself to leave the country permanently. My mom left us in a car in a major city in southern Mexico while she went to exchange currency. She got lost. She had told us not to leave the car. We didn't. We damn near died(cooked).. No food or water the entire day. It was very hot. Eventually, risking incarceration, she went to the embassy. And a gentleman helped her find us. We were parked near a flea market. I was ten years old and I wish that story was made-up.

[Heidi]

45. I have many similar stories.

On balance, my adoption at age six makes up for most of that stuff, but those times never really completely go away, do they? :hug:

[Omphaloskepsis]

119. No they don't..

The best thing I have ever done was to get away from my mother. At the tender age of thirteen I put some clothes in a garbage bag and left in the middle of the night. I eventually ended up at my sisters house.

[gr8dane_daddy]

41. Started dating this one chick...

and I found out she was a Neo-Con! :scared:

No really...I was following a car on I35 North out of Texas at night when the car hit a horse on the road and split it. I drove right between the carcass. Pulled over and offered help.

[phrenzy]

42. Wow - Lots Of These...

I think I have just been stupid, reckless or unlucky.

1 - Near Drowning. A story remarkably similar appeared earlier in this thread. In Costa Rica, Atlantic Ocean. I am a terrible swimmer. Calm water, having fun. On a boogie board got crushed by a massive wave out of nowhere. When I finally came up from under the water I was like 100 yards away from the shore I had just left and was being pulled farther and farther out. Waves kept crashing on top of me and I would go under for a while and come up again. The only thing that saved me was that my costa rican cousin had fastened the velcro wrist strap around me. I didn't even think that would be necessary since the water was calm and I wasn't planning on going out very far. I would have been dead if he hadn't done that. I eventually learned (a lesson I'll never forget) that if you swim SIDEWAYS ALONG the current you will make your way back to shore. If you try to go straight for the shore you're screwed. The I got to witness the nightmare of my cousin and aunt who had gone out to save me WITHOUT any boogie board being stuck out in the middle of the water. I was certain that I was about to watch my relatives die trying to save me after I was safe. Thank god they were able to get a surfer from further down the beach and get to my aunt just as she was about to give up.

2 - 1989 SF Earthquake. Not much to say. Living in an old apartment building in the mission. It felt like it was definitely coming down. I ran down the wooden staircase as fast as I could and into the street. By the time I made it outside it was over.

3 - Almost killing someone. I was in my moms car (which I 'borrowed' without her knowledge) when I was about 15. I was waiting for a friend and got pissed off and was just gonna hit the gas to speed away. Well, I hit the gas, without realizing I was in REVERSE instead of DRIVE. I came inches away from crushing a girl that was standing behind my car. She was wearing a puffy skirt and I had apparently pushed it in flat without actually hitting her.

4 - Looking over the 'Cliffs Of Moher' in Ireland. Similar to the OP, it shook me up for a while. I crawled on my stomach to look straight down this insane sheer cliff that went down hundreds of feet to jagged wet rocks below.

5 - Most likely almost ODing on cocaine. Heart went nuts. It calmed down thank god. Could have just been a panic attack, but it sure didn't feel like it.

6 - Having an intense fear of flying and being on a Japanese airline which was showing a news program in mid air about how an airliner can break apart in mid-air.

[crim son]

104. I OD'd on cocaine too.

I blacked out and when I revived I thought, "Gee,I think I OD'd." Then I did a few more lines. IOW, it didn't scare me. For the record, it's been about twenty years since I've done anything of that sort.

[ForrestGump]

44. Too many candidates for 'scariest'

because for most of my life I've been very active in the outdoors (grew up that way and, later, made a career of it). Those kinds of activities and even just traveling, especially when by the seat of your pants, can really up the adrenaline factor and provide some rather terrifying moments.

One of the closest potential brushes I've had with death (while diving...as fate would have it, on the 20th anniversary of Elvis' death) would possibly take the cake were it not that, in a very real way, the scariest moments of my life have been emotional ones that involved other people. Given the choice between physical danger and the kind of emotional turmoil and utter fear that can accompany certain aspects of romantic relationships, I think I'd choose the spitting cobras and volcanic eruptions any day. Scary situations in nature (including 'artificial' environments, like freeways) can at least be something I may well have a great deal of control over, in terms of outcome, if I'm prepared enough for the situation. Matters of the heart are far more dangerous, ultimately.

I'm quite possibly much better prepared to be Indiana Jones than the male lead in any romantic movie (at least when the latter's plot is lost by one or both protagonists). Kinda sucks, because I bet I could show Richard Gere et al. a thing or two if I only had the right writers... :-(

[sakabatou]

46. Beign temporarily paralyzed for 4 hours

[Lowell]

47. Landing in Ton Son Nhut

during Tet 68 and having to run from the burning plane to nearby bunker. I arrived in country during a rocket attack and was nearly killed within the first five minutes I was there.

[BlueIris]

112. Holy shit.

That is INSANE.

[Lowell]

121. You got that right

war is nothing more than organized insanity. The entire 13 month tour was surreal. My heart goes out to those young people serving today and living the same lunacy we did a mere 40 years ago.

[livetohike]

48. A few "full bore linear panic" attacks in the woods/swamps

Anyone familiar with Pat McManus' books can relate to that. We have been lost several times either on a trail, or out in a canoe in the swamp....I remember a day after Thanksgiving trip when we took a friend out in the canoe in the swamps of S. Carolina. He never went canoeing with us again :-(.

Fortunately, nothing really horrible has happened to us, but that adrenaline rush is something I hope to avoid in the future.

[MissMillie]

49. being in a car wreck w/ my son when he was just 2

We were both uninjured, but let me tell you.... scary stuff.

[NewWaveChick1981]

50. A couple of things...

First, in the summer of 1973 (I was ten), my family and I had gone to see my grandmother in SC for Father's Day Weekend. We lived in Atlanta at the time. On the drive back on Sunday, I started feeling really strange, like I was really fatigued and wanted to throw up. My sister and I were in the back seat lying down for the four-hour drive home. My father was driving, and my mother and brother were in the front passenger seat. About an hour into the trip, I started saying, "Mom, something's not right. I feel awful." She asked me what was wrong, and I kept telling her, "I feel like I'm gonna faint but can't. And my stomach feels really weird." We stopped at a rest area and sat outside for a bit, and she gave me some Sprite to drink. I took a sip and couldn't drink any more. I wasn't going to throw up, but I could not swallow any more. My sister said she was feeling strange too, and we got back in the car so we could get home as quickly as we could. About two hours later (an hour or so from home), my sister felt as bad as I did, and all we wanted to do was sleep. Neither of us could fall asleep, though. Then Mom and my brother started feeling weird, and by the time we got home, Dad felt strange. It was all I could do to get out of the car. I opened the door and stepped out, and I immediately sat down in the yard. I was too weak to walk. All of us sat outside to get some fresh air. Our neighbor was keeping our dog for us, and she saw us drive up. She ran over when we were sitting in the yard. She was a nurse, and we all looked really bad. She was alarmed when we told her what the symptoms were, and she said, "Oh my God! You need to get to the emergency room RIGHT NOW! I think you all have carbon monoxide poisoning!" We drove to the hospital, and Mom, Dad, and my brother were just told to get plenty of fresh air. A nurse walked my sister around to make sure she didn't fall asleep. However, I almost lost consciousness, and the nurse attending me got me on oxygen and walked me up and down the hallway to keep me from drifting off. In a couple of hours, I was better, and the next day, I just felt a little sick to my stomach but nothing else. The doctor at the emergency room told my parents that we all had carbon monoxide poisoning, and that I had it the worst. If I had actually fallen asleep, I would have died. :scared: Thank goodness for our neighbor, because nobody realized what it was. The day after that, my dad took the car in for inspection, and there was a hole in the muffler. The fumes came up through the back seat right where I was sitting. No wonder I had it the worst. :(

Second, when I was in college, I had a stalker. I worked part-time at a grocery store, and a regular customer found out my last name (a stupid bagger gave it to him when he asked :grr:) and called me. When I answered the phone, he said, "Hi!" I said, "Hi! Who is this?" He said, "John. I saw you on campus today." I said, "Oh, really? Where?" This guy described every single action I took on campus that day, including the bathroom breaks I had made. He told me the buildings where my classes were, what times my classes met, where I ate lunch, and so on. :scared: At the time, I had two male roommates, and one of them was home. He was alarmed when he saw my face while I was on the phone---I was terrified and pale. :( I wrote him a note that said, "Call the police. I'm being stalked." He looked upset and ran to the neigboring apartment. (This was 1984, so no cell phones.) I tried keeping him on the phone until the police could come, but when my roommate got back, he grabbed the phone and said, "This is her boyfriend. The police are on the way. Leave her alone or I'll kick your ass!" The guy said, "No you won't!" and hung up. The police got there a few minutes later and took my statement. They sent a patrol car out for a few nights and kept in touch with me over the next few days. About a week later, I saw an article in the newspaper that said police had caught a guy who had been stalking another college student. They set up a sting at her apartment and nabbed him as he tried to come in. This guy's name was John Risk. He owned a restaurant on the main drag in Chapel Hill and was a regular customer at the grocery store where I worked. The police officer who was working with me called me and said they thought they had the guy who had been stalking me, but without more evidence, they couldn't prosecute him for my case, but they had more than enough to put him away for the other one. He was later convicted. I still looked over my shoulder for about a year afterward, though. :(

Third, one of the girls I knew in college was raped and murdered in her off-campus apartment. :cry: We were in the same freshman class and lived on the same hallway in the dorm. She was of Middle Eastern heritage and was a very striking, beautiful girl. I knew her reasonably well. I saw her on the bus all the time for a while. By the time we got to our senior year, we didn't see that much of each other but were still friendly. She had moved off campus to an apartment with another girl. The other girl's boyfriend raped her and ended up stabbing her to death. She was 21 years old. :cry: I was so shocked and upset about the whole thing, as was the whole town, and her family was beyond devastated. After graduation, I briefly worked in a bank there in Chapel Hill, and the trial started just about that time. Her family banked with that particular bank back in their hometown, so they used our branch while they were there. I had the opportunity to speak with them and tell them how sweet their daughter was to me and how sorry I was. He was convicted and sentenced to life without parole. And the guy was 21 when he committed that horrible murder. :cry:

[Patiod]

58. The stalking thing is terrible

A friend of mine was stalked, and has a lot of really awful stories about all her creepy experiences - things like finding notes on the little balcony outside her 3rd story bedroom. It went on for a year or two, and no one ever did anything. The guy finally moved to Miami, and it was only then that the stalking stopped.

Glad they caught your guy so quickly.

[NewWaveChick1981]

86. Yes, it is.

:scared: It was terrifying. :cry: I'm glad they caught him too. And I hate that your friend had to endure that for such a long time. :hug: I'm glad it eventually stopped, though, without any bodily harm to her.

[mnmoderatedem]

51. presidential elections in '00 and '04

but then that happened to all of us...

[Zavulon]

52. Hearing the news that Gore threw in the towel in 2000.

Seriously, that's as scary as anything that's happened to me in my life - and I've been shot and stabbed.

[Patiod]

55. A breakin when I was half-asleep

Woke to find someone squatting in my window, removing the fan.

Screamed bloody murder, grabbed the sheet (it was broiling hot and the apt. didn't have air conditioning, so I was sleeping nude) and ran for my front door (into a hallway).

It was a dicey neighborhood, so we had 3 locks on the door, and I couldn't get them all unlocked at the same time. I could hear the guy get through the window as I was fumbling with the locks.

Finally got them un-locked, and ran into the hallway where there was only 1 other door. Banged on it, and the mid-wife who lived there let me in immediately. She told me later it was first night she had been home in weeks.

I had really, really bad PTSD for months after that. Until I could move out, I refused to sleep in the apartment, so I lived like a vagabond, sleeping on sofas or chairs at my friends' houses or apartments. One or two nights when I HAD to be in the apartment, a neighbor lent me her Corgi, who laid on the floor facing the window, and barked a lot - surprisingly, he was a real comfort.

Jumped at every noise or movement, drank like a fiend. Took months for the adrenaline to settle back down.

I got caught in fishing line on a 125' dive in murky water off the New Jersey coast, and that wasn't nearly as scary as a break-in where nothing was stolen and I wasn't even hurt.

[two gun sid]

57. The first time I was shot at...

when I was in the service. Scared the hell out of me. I tried to make myself as small as I could.

About 25-30 feet up a utility pole when my left gaff cutout as I was stepping down with my right foot. I squoze a flat spot on the pole hugging it. I had fallen many years earlier from about 10 feet but, that didn't scare me. It hurt like hell but, I wasn't scared while I was falling.

[Tracer]

59. A Cautionary Tale for Parents.

We were on the ferry, coming back from a vacation on Nantucket.

I was standing by the ferry's rail with my 4-year old daughter and 6-year old son. We were looking up at the seagulls that were circling just overhead eating chips and bread out of other passenger's hands.

I glanced to my right and saw a woman in a deck chair frantically waving her hands and making horrid grimacing faces at me.

Looking down, my heart stopped as I saw that my little girl had CRAWLED THROUGH THE RAILING!!

I grabbed her and dragged her back onto the deck and nearly collapsed with fear and relief.

This happed many years ago, but even as I type this, I can feel the chill of panic.

[Arugula Latte]

98. Oh gawd.

Nothing can compare to that fear a parent feels for a child. :scared: That is the worst feeling ever.

[seemunkee]

60. gowing through whitewater without the boat

I went with some friends and coworkers to do some easy rapids in West Virginia. Unfortunately the river we were going to run was too low so they decided to go run the Loop on the Youghigheny. I was the least experienced and kept asking if this was easy an easy river and they assured me it was no problem. We had 2 open canoes and two kayaks. I was in the bow of one canoe with my best friend. At one point the river heads towards a boulder and then rolls to the right. I was trying like mad to turn the bow when we hit the rock head on. I was later told I did a somersault in the air before hitting the water. Everything was pretty confused and I was tossed around under the water for awhile before coming to a moderatly shallow area where I could run while being pushed along by the water. My friend had also lost the boat and it came up behind my sideways filled with water. Everyone was yelling at me to get away from it so I wouldnt get crushed. It was too shallow to go under, plus I was more than moderately freaked about going back under water, and movng too fast to get around. I finally got away from it, went through another drop before grabbing hold of a rock and crawling out of the water. Our boat got wrapped around a rock and had to be pulled out and beaten back into shape. It had an accordian fold in the center from our initial impact. That was the last time I ever went on whitewater.

That was a new rental boat from the store we worked at. New rules were quickly issued about employees borrowing company equipment.

[gfindu]

61. my wife

having an affair

[MorningGlow]

62. Too many for comfort

1) Choking on a piece of steak when I was alone in my apartment.

2) Car crash--a minivan went through a stop sign and I swerved to avoid T-boning it. I almost made it but ended up hitting a signpost head on. Totaled my car and got me a lot of stitches.

3) Driving in Boston. :scared:

4) Being told by a doctor that my sinus infection was so bad that if I had waited one more day to get medical attention I would have been dead.

5) The worst: MorningGlow Jr. stopped breathing when he was a newborn. I had read that infants do that from time to time and to just give them a little shake, which I did, but my gods, that was terrifying. That, and his falling down the stairs when he was 2. He was fine; I was the wreck.

On edit: Forgot one because I usually block it--got a threatening anonymous letter for writing a newspaper editorial. Turned out to be a (literally) crazy relative, but still. ...Or is that a badge of honor, getting threatened for an essay published in the paper? :evilgrin:

[Ms_Dem_Meanor]

63. When I was 9...

I was staying with at my aunt's house the same week that my grandfather had passed. I woke up in the middle of the night and saw his ghost sitting in the chair in the corner of the room and he spoke to me. He said hello and that he was fine.

[LSK]

64. when I was a kid, my dad almost drove right into a tornado

It was in summer in Iowa and we were driving out to Colorado. You could tell it was storming ahead and I wanted my dad to stop in a rest area till it passed, but he refused and kept heading right into it. Then I noticed that there was some green in the clouds ahead and finally we drove into it and a huge winds forced us to stop and after being blasted by side winds of about 75 mph it passed with no damage to us. I guess it wasnt quite a tornado, but a microburst.

We were also camping in Springfield, IL and a tornado ripped apart the other half of the campground we were in, missing us by a few hundred feet. I was maybe 6 at the time and all I remember is walking around the campground afterwards and seeing wrecked campers.

[Patiod]

66. So someone else noticed the green sky before a tornado

Was in Detroit once during tornado season. Returning the rental car to the airport, when the sky turned green. I'd never seen that before, and it freaked me out. Asked some folks about it, but they didn't know what I was talking about.

And yes, there were tornadoes reported all over the area, and our flight was grounded.

[Bridget Burke]

77. I've seen a hurricane turn the sky green.

Hurricane Alicia blew through Houston during the night, back in 1983. Every thunderbolt turned the sky dark emerald.

Since I was in a fairly sturdy building & far from the water, I wasn't really frightened. Just in the grip of something far more powerful than mere humanity.

[Blue_In_AK]

65. My entire family was in a serious car accident,

except for me, when I was 8. My mother died after 3 days, my dad and brother were in the hospital for months. I had to stay with my strict authoritarian grandmother who really didn't know how to offer me comfort. I felt very lost and alone and didn't know what was going to happen to me. I've had quite a bit of trauma in my life, but I think that was the most frightened I've been.

[livetohike]

73. Here's a big hug Blue

:hug: I'm so sorry this happened to you. I too was in a horrible car accident with my Grandma and Uncle when I was 8. I was hospitalized for 10 days. My Grandma and Uncle were in the hospital for a long time, but they both made it.

[bikebloke]

67. Norwegian Mountain Hike

I was doing farm work on a Norwegian farm in the Hardanger region. One weekend, a Dutch bloke and I decided to hike up the mountain. We passed the snow line, and I started sliding down slope on my back. Luckily, I knew to spread my arms and legs stopping a meter from an edge. Later when we were going back down, I saw the edge I nearly slid off. I would have fallen for half an hour before decorating the landscape. Whew, that was a close one.

[livetohike]

74. The thought of this just makes me cringe

Glad it turned out okay :hi:.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

75. I was lost in an unfamiliar suburb at night, one with a spaghetti tangle

of freeways, and I somehow ended up on a ramp that was closed, although I didn't realize it. I just about freaked when I realized that the ramp led to going onto another freeway the wrong way. I was screaming all the way as I stuck to the left-most lane and did a sharp left turn to take the next real exit. I'm surprised that I'm still alive after that.

Another scary incident was a close call. I was walking down a street in Portland, when all of a sudden, I heard a resounding, metallic crash behind me. I turned to see that a truck had "run away" coming out of the West Hills and hit a lamp post on the corner of Burnside and 23rd, knocking it over. If I had been walking just a little slower, the tall, metallic lamp post would have landed on top of me. :scared:

[jpak]

76. Caught in 60 knot gale

in a Zodiac

in heavy ice pack

in Antarctica

not fun

[Aristus]

81. Once when I was about fifteen, I was walking home alone, at night,

past a graveyard (no really, this is the truth.) I thought the place was deserted, but apparantly someone heard me and began to chase me. Probably a high school kid playing a prank or a druggie afraid of getting caught. Either way, they chased me for about a quarter of a mile until I got to a well-lit residential area. Scared the pee-waddley out of me.

[nosillies]

82. Two things...brazenly attacked by a crazy man, and had a drink drugged

1) I was living in a foreign country and was getting onto a public bus. A religious fundamentalist from a different country started berating me because I was a woman and therefore inferior and therefore should not be in line in front of him, and just spouting various related scripture or something. As we were getting on the bus, my big mouth self starts telling him exactly what I thought of him. Next thing I know, I'm getting a major beat down with his holy book. Ouch. All I could think of was the horror stories you hear about "city folks" who watch violent crimes occur and don't try to stop them. Glad to say that almost everyone on the bus and street helped pull him off of me. But he did manage to escape and was never caught, that I know of.

2) Was drinking at one of my regular bars in NOLA, and the last thing I remember was going to the bathroom. About twelve hours later, I woke up with a start. The good people I was with never let me out of their sight, probably saving me from some horrible fate. I remember nothing, so the experience itself wasn't so scary -- just the thought of having absolutely no control over my circumstances and what happens to me is the most unsettling, frightening feeling I can imagine having.

[LibertyLover]

84. A plane I was in

blew an engine on takeoff. One minute we were racing down the runway at Mexico City's international airport, next one we are skittering all over the tarmac as the pilot hit the brakes, flaps and reverse thrust. We finally came to a halt and just sat there for a few minutes. So my friend and I got up to talk to another friend further back in the plane. He had actually seen the engine blow and was telling us about it when a stewardess walked by, heard the conversation, made him repeat what he had seen and than ran to the nearest cabin intercom. A few more minutes and we were towed back to the gate and disembarked. The plane was towed away. The friend who had seen the engine blow said that it was really cool - this long jet of blue flame came out of it and lots of small pieces of stuff too.

[jmowreader]

85. Accidentally crossed into a communist country while drunk

There were at least two 'Concerts for Berlin.' They were held on the lawn in front of the Reichstag. One was in 1987 during the 750th Year of Berlin, the second was in 1988 as Berlin was the European Cultural City that year. This incident happened on the last night of the 1988 concert.

Tell ya true, I don't even remember who played that night. But I do remember that I went to the show with a couple people off my team and we met three daywhores at the concert site. Next thing you know we've embarked on a long night of hard drinking.

After the show was over, we all staggered over to the Lehrter Stadtbahnhof. (This has since been replaced by the Hauptbahnhof--the Main Train Station.) We get up on the platform. S-bahns have two lines on which trains run in opposite directions, and for some reason lots more trains were coming up from the west, to go into East Berlin, than were coming from the east to go to the Zoo station. (We had this route all planned out: Lehrter Stadtbahnhof to Zoologischer Station on S9, stagger over to the Irish Pub and drink beer, then take the S9 to Rathaus Steglitz where we'd stop and drink beer, then take the S1 to Lichterfelde-West where we'd drink beer at the bahnhof, then drink beer at all six of the bars on Kadettenweg between the bahnhof and Finckensteinallee (where Andrews Barracks, the base we lived on, was), then finally have a beer at the Speakeasy and a doner kebab at the Imbiss before going to the barracks to drink another beer before going to bed. How in hell we intended to drink all these beers was a complete mystery; none of us had more than DM100 on us at the time and none of the bars between Lichterfelde-West and Finckensteinallee stayed open past midnight. But that's what we were going to do.

Around about 10pm, a train came to the 'going east' track and went back the way it came. Immediately one of the daywhores announced that he had been to the previous night's concert (so had the trick trash, but we had used the S1 into Anhalter Bahnhof to go home on the theory that no matter how drunk we were, we wouldn't fuck up and go to East Berlin--a Very Bad Thing--because the S1 terminated at Anhalter Bahnhof) and at some point trains were going west off both tracks. Obviously this had started, right? So next train that came to the station, we would all get on it and go to the Zoo Station.

The next train went right straight into East Fucking Berlin with six Americans who weren't supposed to go into East Berlin that night, and weren't supposed to use THAT method of getting into East Berlin at times when we WERE authorized, right in the fucking middle of it. We got to Friedrichstrasse and we're all 'don't say a word in English, we're all fucking dead, don't say a word in English, maybe the Volkspolizei (East German cops) won't have a friendly little chat with us...' Fortunately for us there was another train sitting there getting ready to go west. We got off the one we were on and just hauled ass straight across the platform. Right outside on the platform were two Vopos and two Soviet captains. They're standing on the platform and they had this LOOK on their faces...you could tell exactly what they were thinking: 'Dumbasses.' (Neither the Vopos nor the Soviets were allowed to get on the trains going west because there was a history of them getting on the train at Friedrichstrasse supposedly to 'check for people riding black'--without tickets--then defecting.)

When the train was moving again and we KNEW we weren't going to wind up political prisoners, we're all 'Tom, your ass is so kicked...' No further beers were consumed that night.

The next morning, the six of us went to the security office to explain what happened. 'Did you have any contact with communist authorities?' (No.) 'Did you enter onto the territory of the German Democratic Republic?' (Does running across the platform as fast as your little legs can carry you count? 'No.' Then no, we didn't.) 'Did you divulge any classified or unclassified material to any communist agent?' (No.) After about twenty 'no's, they just told us to not use that S-bahnhof if we were trashed because people fucking up and going into East Germany happened all the time, then let us go.

[dysfunctional press]

87. we were trapped on the king's island sky-ride for over an hour...

when the ride shut down for some reason due to an oncoming storm.
being trapped in a small open cable-car at the highest point of the ride, at night, witha storm blowing up is NO FUCKING FUN! especially when we missed out on almost 2 hours of riding other rides...and we weren't coming back because it was a special trip for our church youth group from chicago.

[QMPMom]

89. In 1978 I was in Israel when some members of the PLO

murdered Senator Abraham Ribicoff's niece on a beach. We were stranded by a sandstorm on the highway along the Mediterranean where the murder had happened earlier in the day. We finally got to the next city and witnessed a bus bombing and several children killed. This is all the information we had. No one was telling us anything else.

There was a news blackout and we didn't know that Lebanon and Israel were trading fire. The Israeli borders were closed and we had no way of leaving. We called home and my hysterical parents told us all the details of what was happening. They were watching the news in the US and seeing coffins being carried through the streets of the city we were in.

[1gobluedem]

91. Finding out I had a brain tumor

When I thought I just had wax in my ear.

[leftofthedial]

92. the last six years

[Guava Jelly]

93. I looked in the mirror

eeeeeeeeek! fright night!

[crim son]

95. A ferry ride between the southern tip of N.Z.'s North Island

to the northern tip of the South. Rough water doesn't describe it. We fled to the lower deck which was a dining area and watched while plates of food slid across tables, over the specially-designed barrier at their edge, and onto the floor. There were rows of windows through which one would normally look out and gaze at the sea. In this case the windows were alternately free of water and facing the sky, or completely submerged and practically at your feet. It was horrifying. Nobody was calm.

[youthere]

96. Once...

I went to GD..:scared:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

101. Very sick child.

And a very fast drive to the hospital.

[China_cat]

102. I had a gun put to my head and the trigger pulled.

Neither my abusive ex or I knew that he was out of bullets. I then got pistol-whipped and almost lost my eye.

[amitten]

114. I'm sorry. n/t

[Auggie]

103. Someone broke into the house when I was in it

It was a ground floor railroad flat -- long and skinny -- and I was in the rear of the building. They broke a window and came in the side. I couldn't hear them.

[baldguy]

106. A couple

- Riding my bicycle & being hit by a car. It ran me off the road into a line of bushes.

- I got a concussion playing football in high school. (Landed on my head during a play.) Finished playing the game (we won) but after that, I don't remember anything. I woke up in the hospital the next day, not knowing who or where I was, or what had happened to me. It took another two days to regain my memory.

[Skittles]

108. easy

I came home from school one day to find out that my dad had been taken on a stretcher to a mental hospital - I would not see him again for almost a year - and my mum, who had never driven a car or written a check, had to take a bunch of kids, alone, back to America.

[Ptah]

109. ATF at my door, with Police back-up.

Yes, these guys: ATF Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives

http://www.atf.treas.gov/



Wake-up call!

Second scariest:

Near death motorcycle ride, north through Oak Creek Canyon.




Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwwwwwwwwwww!

[mainegreen]

120. If you don't mind my asking, *why* were they at your door?

Hopefully wrong address!

[Ptah]

127. They were searching for my son and/or any alleged booty. n/t

[Patiod]

126. And why was it a near-death motorcycle ride?

through Oak Creek Canyon (Sedona?)

[KingFlorez]

110. I slipped and almost fell down some stairs

I slipped on a stairs when I was walking down, I started to tumble but I grabbed on to the rail before I fell all the way down. I was terrified.

[BlueIris]

113. Living in this nation between April and June of 2005.

I woke up everyday thinking it was the last day I would be alive.

[Mythsaje]

116. A guy walked into the bar where my pregnant ex

was working with a big gun shoved down the front of his pants, holding it in place through a hole in the pocket of the jacket he was wearing. It was a Sunday evening and she'd cut him off before he thought appropriate--he was on meth or something too--and there were only a couple of other people in the bar.

My ex stared him down from the other end of the bar while I, acting in a way I tend to think most people wouldn't, actually moved close to him. Within reach. And I orbited him for about five minutes, not letting him get out of reach until I sensed he was actually getting scared of ME. Then I backed away, gave him some room.

He made some threatening comment and left.

I don't remember being frightened at the time, but I did break down that night when we were in bed a few hours later. My ex passed the word to some of the more hardcore patrons and the guy never came back.

That was probably the most frightening thing that's ever happened to me. I've probably never been closer to dying, or to killing someone, in my life.

[CanuckAmok]

117. Getting shot at, or nearly drowning (twice)

Probably the near-drowning, because the shooter(s?) were far away and couldn't hit anything to save their lives.

1) when I was a kid, my friends and I used to swim under my friend's pool's solar blanket. It was this opaque blue plastic bubble-wrap cover for the pool. I got disoriented under it once, and couldn't find the edge. Pushing up didn't do any good, because the water got sucked up with it.

2) Once in the Bahamas I was walking in the surf, walked out too far, and got swept away from shore in a rip-tide. There was nobody else around, and the more I tried to swim to shore, the further out to sea I went. In a matter of seconds, I went from being 20 feet from dry beach to being 100+ feet from it. Plus, the waves were really high, and kept washing over my head. I still don't know why the water pushed me back to shore, but that's the only reason I'm here today. Neptune kept my wallet and sunglasses, though.

I should probably stay on dry land.

[enigmatic]

118. Thrown out of a moving train outside of North Platte, NB

I was on the road pretty much full-time when this happened; I was in the back of the boxcar I just jumped on, when 2 guys hopped on about a 1/2 mile down. The Cardinal Rule is never to be either outnumbered on a moving boxcar by people you don't know; I didn't, and got robbed of my gear and money, and tossed out of the boxcar for good measure.

I thought it was all over; we were going about 30mph and I couldn't physically brace myself. I hit the dirt and gravel on my side and rolled for a bit before wiping out, shredding my coat and jeans and leaving me pretty scraped up and with a badly sprained wrist. I was pretty lucky, though; it could have been much worse.

[Crim_n al]

122. I was Thaaat close to getting eaten alive ...

I was swimming alone at a secluded beach.

It was a heavenly day; clear blue sky, clear blue water,
golden sand clearly visible underneath it
rising occasionally in sandbanks almost level with the surface.
My family was sitting on picnic rugs on the sand,
still eating lunch.

Impatient as usual, I'd refused to wait after eating,
and was swimming straight out to sea,
enjoying the waves gently foaming over my skin.
I was far enough out so that I could hardly see my family any more
when I noticed flat black diamond shapes with long pointed tails,
and realized I was swimming over a group of stingrays.
Frightened, and realising how far out I'd swum, I turned and started swimming back.

I was halfway back to the beach, having been swimming as fast as I could,
when I looked down to make sure the stingrays were not following me.
Horrified, I saw a creature unlike anything I'd seen before.
I was not a fish, not any type of sea creature I'd heard of.
It was as black as the stingrays, but this one had an appendage waving from each corner.
It was swimming directly underneath me, so I tried to swim faster.
But however quickly I swam I could not get away from it.
I pumped my arms and legs faster and faster, petrified now, but there was no escaping it.
As I got in closer to the shore it rose up higher and higher,
until it could easily grab me with its waving legs.

It was huge now, as big as I was, almost touching me.
But I was almost at the shore at last, I could run from there.
So I put my feet down in the knee deep water, but saw it still there,
grabbing my feet as I tried to stand.
I shrieked, slipping over in fright, and saw, to my horror, it was grabbing my hands too.

Screaming and panic-stricken, I struggled to pull free from its clutches.

And realised it was only sand around my hands and feet.
This fearsome sea-monster was my shadow.

There was also that other time, early morning in Burleigh Heads, when I had a deadly box jellyfish wrap its 6 foot long tentacles around me. I was 16 and on a Christian youth camp and my new friend there got life-saved because seeing it frightened her so badly. I walked out of the sea, because I figured, given the choice between me and salt water, this clinging, stinging thing would prefer the water.

The camp doctor wouldn't help after I identified it. Instead his eyes were popping out in terror and he was yelling at me to get out of his clinic because I was going to die. My room-mates, once I dragged myself back to my cabin, finding it hard now to breath, ran and told camp officials ... who sent the message back that if I was too sick to come to the hall for lunch then I was too sick to eat, so not to expect any dinner.

I lay on my back all afternoon, working at pushing my chest up and down to make air go in and out, worrying about my parents. I knew this camp had been a big expense for them, and if I died on the first day like this, their money for the next two weeks would be utterly wasted.

It was pretty scary, but not nearly as bad as being attacked by my shadow.

[Ex Lion Tamer]

123. Becoming a father.

When I found out my wife was pregnant with our first child, I freaked. And I mean freaked. Panic attacks, hospitals, tranquilizers, etc.

Pretty embarrassing stuff! And I'm not at all proud of it.

Thank God my wife was level headed.

[kwassa]

124. Most scared, or most danger?

Most of my most scareds have involved driving and suddenly not being able to see, due to rainy asphalt going black, or being on unlit canyon roads with no guardrails. One was driving on the coast highway way up high above Half Moon Bay in a Winebago with too much play in the steering, while oblivious co-workers partying all around me. I could see a thousand feet down into the ocean, no guardrails.

I have many of the same as others here; pulled out to sea in a riptide, nearly killed when trying to bodysurf in big waves, nearly drowning as a child, nearly drowning rescuing someone else who was drowning. The Northridge quake threw me out of bed, but I was scared for only half a minute. The house behind ours caught on fire, and I couldn't find the keys to get us out of deadbolted locks and window bars. Finally, I did.

Plenty of car stories; on one trip across I-80, a truck pulled out suddenly on the uphill grade, didn't see me until he was about to shove me off a cliff. I later found marks from his tires on the side of my car. Another truck dropped a huge metal cleat on the freeway, I couldn't swerve to avoid it because of vehicles in the other lane, I hit the cleat hard and ripped out my exhaust system.

Spin-outs, and rolled cars, as a teenager. I think I can go on and on...

[Burma Jones]

125. My Son had the Flu and an asthma attack and was admitted to the ICU

My wife went in with him and I stayed home with our daughter. After 24 hours of treatment, things were OK, but that was the worst night of my life.

I also nearly drowned while rafting on the New River in West Virginia, that was very scary too.....

[redqueen]

128. I was told my daugher had Kawasaki syndrome.

I know weird right? A motorcycle is what I think. But no, it's serious, and can leave the heart impaired for life.

So far so good... but we're supposed to have her heart checked every so often. Her doc says she's fine, but keep an eye on it. So yeah now it's not so bad... but hearing that, when she was just a tiny little two year old... yikes.



edit: it's weird... i didn't even think about the stuff that had actually happened to *me* until i went back and read through the thread. parent thing, i guess.

[TrogL]

133. My girlfriend is really sick

A fight broke out last week at an event I was in charge of and I ended up confronting a guy twice my size (he backed down).

This is a hundred times scarier.