Have you ever been in a situation where you "knew" you are about to die?

[OffWithTheirHeads]

I've been there a few times in my life. Once in my late teens while rock climbing, I fell off a cliff and was certain that this was it. I'm sure the event lasted less than two seconds but what I remember is an incredible sense of peace. I simply accepted that this was it and was good with that. I ended up falling on an outcropping about 15 feet below and was fine but while I was falling, I didn't know that.

The second time, we were driving late at night in the avenues of S.F. and a car ran a light and hit us broadside at about 50 mph. It was amazing! The adrenilin kicked in and my brain was racing at about 2,000 MPH. I watched the window glass explode in slow motion and the whole event that I'm sure, in real life lasted for less than a second, seemed to take about 20 minutes. In the end, we all walked out O.K.

The third time, I was driving along Highway 1 near Bolinas and a van tried to pass a car on a blind curve. It's a two lane road with a mountain on one side and the Ocean on the other. There is no place to go. We hit at about 60 MPH. I saw it coming and there was nothing I could do. Again, a second or two to deal with your upcoming death. Again, a sense of peace. This is it. Oh Well.

Anyone have similar, or different experiences.

Yea, I know, not your usual lounge question but let's face it, the reason your here is because GD is like SNL.

[MorningGlow]

1. Yes, three times

The first time I was a passenger in a car that came damned close to tumbling into a ravine. It was hellish not being able to control anything.

The second time I was driving (thank goodness I was alone in my car) and a minivan came barreling down a hill and blew through a stop sign at an intersection where I had the right of way. I remember being "slow" to react (although everything happened in only a few seconds), because I just could NOT believe that this dark green minivan was suddenly in my space! I wrenched the steering wheel to the left and only glanced off the minivan's driver's side door. I was almost in the clear--headed for the sidestreet, where the van was headed, essentially in front of it, but I was off by a couple of feet. Hit the street sign head on--totalled my car, blew out my knee, whacked my head on the windshield, and split my lip on the steering wheel. But I took all that woman's insurance--and her daycare license, as she had her daycare kids in the car in violation of Mass. state law--and I wasn't sorry!

The third time I didn't realize I had come close to dying--of a sinus infection, of all things. It was my first, and I didn't know what the problem was--I thought it was just a bad cold. I kept taking medicine but nothing was helping. I was visiting my brother and his family in California at the time, and when my SIL saw me lying on the guest room bed, crying from the pain, she took me to their family doctor. He said, "Good thing you came to see me now. A couple more days and this infection would have reached your brain and you would have been dead." (I was 23.)
:scared:

[KamaAina]

2. Actually, yes

not physically but spiritually. Even worse. :cry:

[nolabear]

3. This isn't quite the same, but I was once held at gunpoint.

In the mid '70s I was fool enough to hitch hike across the country with my now ex. We were, oh, 19 or 20, and went from North Carolina to northern California. We were on the way back when we were picked up by a trucker in LA who said he'd take us across Arizona and New Mexico. I swear he looked like Hoss Cartwright and called himself Big Daddy and the White Lightning Express on the CB. In retrospect I also think he was tweaked out of his mind on speed.

When it got late he offered to let us sleep in the bunk behind the seats. We woke up in the wee hours way out in the desert, stopped, with a very, very big gun pointed in our faces. Let's just say he made demands, which for some reason we had the audicity to refuse. I told him that if he shot me at that range he would blow me all over the inside of his truck. After a while he told us to get out, which we also refused to do since he could have shot us then. We actually made him take us to a very busy highway (by this time it was light) and drop us off in full view of other cars.

I was mad at him, but even more so at the highway patrol, who, when we told them, completely blew us off. I hope to god he never did it to anyone else.

I don't know if I believed anything at that moment, except that we needed to be really, really good at keeping him from being able to kill us.

[Initech]

4. Actually yeah in Germany last year.

We were crossing the street, and my slow ass wasn't fast enough to get across the street. There's a Mercedes going at LEAST 75 MPH down the street. I get stuck in the middle lane and I just freeze, thankfully my friend comes and rescues me from certain doom. Between that, seeing a friend of mine who actually *WAS* seriously injured in a similar accident, and getting a ticket for jaywalking - and all of this was in the last year - I wonder if God is trying to tell me something?

[MiddleFingerMom]

5. This was a while back (within the last year or so)...

.
...I was feeling worse and worse and weaker and weaker. I have a heart
condition that I've been getting good help with. I knew I had a follow-up
appointment and tried for the previous week to just "make it" to that.
.
The day before the appointment, I couldn't stand it any more and went to
the ER. The time before, it took me NINE HOURS to be seen by a doctor
(with PROBLEMS BREATHING as my major symptom!!!). THIS time, there was
no crowd and I was taken back immediately. I got into a gown and the
doctor came right in and had been speaking to me for no more than two
minutes when I just started fading. I could tell I was dying -- that
my heart was shutting down(?). I could hear the doctor's voice, calm
and confident, telling me, "We're here. We have you. We will not let
go of you." Instead of going into the light, I could see the rectangle
of light that was the exam room receding away from me.
.
Later, I found that I had "died" for a very short time.
.
I had ALWAYS been curious -- how I would react if I had some foresight
as to my impending death. I was more than a little afraid that I would
be ultimately hypocritical and start begging some mythical "higher
power" for mercy and that I hadn't really MEANT all that "misguided
cynicism",
.
I'm very happy to say that didn't happen. My overwhelmingly prevailing
thought was, "It's OK... it's OK... it's really OK." No panic, just calm
acceptance.
.
So, with my "It's OK" reaction, when the chips were down and the final
curtain was closing (if I may be allowed to mix metaphors), I realize that
I did not channel Jesus or his ilk... I'm pretty sure that I channeled
Kurt Vonnegut.
.
:rofl:
.
Serious.
.

[OffWithTheirHeads]

6. Interseting. As an Athest, I felt peaceful while contemplating death.

I'm good with that.