What is your scariest moment ever?

My scariest moment was being in danger and not being able to think clearly enough (due to previous trauma) to get myself or my children out of danger. To me, that is ongoing, real horror. I don’t do horror movies. I lived too much of it for too long.

I could tell you, but it’s medical and not pleasant. Suffice to say that the patient ended up doing okay.

@snowberry I can name that tune in one note. (Anybody old enough to know what I refer to with that comment?)
My heart is with you. If I could, I would grant you release from that pain. We shouldn’t have to feel that our life is never going to stop being frightening.
@Rarebear was this patient in your care, a relative, friend?

Patient. Trust me on this, you do NOT want to know the details. But you did ask.

I understand. I was in an emergency room just about a year ago. I know at least one person was scared. My condition was declining rapidly, and they didn’t have any real answers. What’s more, my 11 year old daughter was there watching every move and listening to every word. They could not have pried her away if they tried with a straight jacket, pepper spray and half a dozen guards. She was scared, but mostly fascinated, watching needles, tubes, monitors. They were really great about including her.
The medical profession is a very human thing, and frightening when things go somewhere out of our control. My biggest wish for caregivers is honesty. If they don’t know, and have to guess, I want them to say so.

The experience that still scares me 40 years later is almost falling, or at least realizing how easily I could have fallen, out of Fountain Place, a 60-story all-glass skyscraper in downtown Dallas with over 26,000 sealed windows. This was during my early ad-writing days. I was inspecting one of the top, still unfinished floors looking for ideas for a leasing ad campaign I had been assigned to develop. As I walked around its perimeter enjoying the amazing panoramic view, I suddenly came right up to a side that was completely open – no glass, no struts, no ledge, no nuthin’ but empty space. It was for the grace of God that I didn’t step out, stumble out or be sucked out by the wind into the void. Scared? I was absolutely terrified. I dropped to my knees and backed slowly away from the opening. I think this was the start of my fear for heights.

When I was 8 years old. My alcoholic father was babysitting me. He had drank so much he passed out on the floor. But, I had thought he had died. My mom was working the night shift. She worked at a newspaper. I looked up the name in the phone book and called it. Of course it was the main number so I couldn’t reach her.
I sat on the sofa with my dog and cried until she got home.

When I was 12 I was thrown out of a ‘51 Ford pick-up in a minor accident where the truck ended up on it’s side in the barrow pit with me pinned under it. Got soaked in gasoline, too.

In 2003 I was in a Caracas market district, and evidently in the wrong place at the wrong time. I found myself suddenly surrounded by helmeted men in black fatigues and assault rifles; a military police sweep. I spent 90 days in a prison before I was released, apologized to, and asked to leave the country. My passport is no longer good in Venezuela or any of its islands.

The facility I was kept in was made up of about 20 large, gymnasium-sized rooms with high ceilings lit 24 hours a day by bright fluorescent lamps. Each “dormitory” housed about 200 men in metal bunk beds placed about three feet apart in groups of six bunks, “cubicles” separated by eight foot cinder block walls.

Each cubicle had a shtick, a scam, for survival. The men in my cubicle were manufacturing cigarettes from tobacco and toilet paper they bought from the guards. The guys in the cell north of ours made a good living marketing and collecting money for the tattoo artist. Every dorm had a tattoo artist. The guys to the south sold pornographic drawings, often made to order from photos of client girlfriends. The place was nothing but live surfaces. The air was filled with the shouting and cries of insane men 24 hours a day. And you never got used to the smell of two hundred sweating men with bad hygiene, pissing in bottles next to their bunks, shitting in Tupperware-like containers until they could dump them when they unlock the toilets in the morning.

The guy who had the upper bunk across from me, a convicted sneak thief, stole a guy’s art supplies from the other side of the wall. Things like art supplies—a pencil, a piece of charcoal, an eraser, some brushes, some home-made watercolor paints, and a shoebox to keep them in—are nearly impossible to come by and represented more than a set of tools and a livelihood to the artist. It was his only escape from this hell hole, his only coping mechanism and it took him a year to put it all together. The artist, a convicted forger, asked that the thief return his kit. The thief, a bully, laughed at him. The forger swore vengeance. He was a little guy and the thief was huge, so nobody took the forger seriously.

One night I woke up to a man screaming in my ear. I opened my eyes to see him dancing and flailing his arms around in panic and pain. He looked like he was jogging in place, a high- stepped jog like a running back going through the line with the ball. He was fully engulfed in flames, a funnel of white smoke was coming from his head. His hair was burnt away and his ears and lips were shriveling. He spun down the line of bunks, slapping his chest and groin and crumpled to the floor against the wall whimpering and moaning. Soon he was quiet and the fire reduced to a steaming, glowing cinders where his clothes had been. The smell was horrible. There was a crowd in our cell watching him die without comment. It was curious entertainment to them. Not one person tried to put him out, including me.

I heard later that the artist had spent a month collecting honey and gasoline in a quart jar and then poured it on the thief from over the wall. Then he lit his ass up.

The investigation was short and violent. Men were gratuitously beaten for a few nights by the guards. But nobody was ever actually arrested and punished for this.

I’ve been shot at and threatened, brought into the ER twice for heart attacks, been lost at sea a couple of times, and there’s probably a lot more times I’ve been a bit unnerved by life’s little surprises, but never have I been so scared as when I watched helplessly as a man burned to death just a few feet away from me.

When I was 9 months pregnant with my daughter and realized I hadn’t felt her move for about 24 hours. Went to the ER where they hoked up a monitor and all was fine, she had just gotten too big to turn and move much in those final days of the pregnancy. Horrible feeling though, thinking your baby may be stillborn.
Other than that my scares mostly surrounded my animals and the wildlife scene where I’ve lived for years.

Coming face to face with a Mountain Lion behind my goose barn some years ago. A 15 second stare down and the cat just calmly turned and walked away. I RAN bad idea but instinct, all the way to my deck in sheer terror that I was about to be pounced on.
Another time I had a bear in my driveway and was terrified it would try to break into the house.

Hearing the Coyotes making their victory kill whoops and hoping dinner wasn’t one of my cats. haha
I have also been shot at a few times in the woods, very scary.

I was in an accident when my car flipped over. Fortunately, the vehicle was well constructed (5-star rollover safety rating) and I was strapped to my seat properly (too many people don’t use their seatbelts in the right way). Besides whiplash, my only injuries were cuts and bruises from being removed from the car. I did not lose any body fluids, but was covered in coffee, as I had not yet started to sip my morning brew.

3 a.m. for several months after my husband split.

I had multiple panic attacks when I was a kid. They occurred while I was flying and a few times when I went up in a tall building (one that I specifically remember happened at Coit Tower in San Francisco) and a few bad elevator episodes and once on a roller coaster ride with a really steep drop.

You may have figured out that I have a fear of heights and falling.

@Jonesn4burgers Actually I HAVE healed from those traumas and most others. But I still have no patience for fake horror. It’s stupid, and what could possibly be the point?

@Pachyderm_in_the_room reminded me of a similar, pretty much identical experience I had in Las Vegas. I was young, so while my family was gambling or what not, my brother and I would go off on our own in the hotel and look at its amenities. This would always include going to the top floor (if we could get past the occasional security). One day we were at the Palazzo, and we were on our own. The security was thick there—there were guards at every set of elevators that went to the hotel floors. But my brother got lucky and found a hotel card on the ground, so we used it to get past the elevator guards. When we got to the top floor, we realized that it was still under construction. We went to the end of the hall to see if there was a window we could look out of and found the skeleton of a really nice 2-story end suite. The walls and floors were done, but there was no furniture. As we were looking around at the massive space, I found a big french door frame from floor to ceiling at the end that led to a balcony with a breathtaking view of the Strip. I went outside and realized it was completely open. There were no railings at all! It wasn’t meant to be a balcony, they just hadn’t put the window panels on yet. I got freaked out and started pulling on my brother to get us to leave.
The Palazzo is the second-highest building in Las Vegas (second to the uncompleted frame of another building). I can’t find a good picture of where I was, but this picture sort of shows it. I was on that ledge on the very end of the building (but I think I was on the other side).
I’d say that was the second most frightening moment of my life.

@Pachy No wonder your name wouldn’t show up, you chopped it off.

I thought that I was going to die last July when I suddenly had pulmonary embolism (blood clots in the lungs). The pain varied a lot and sometimes reached a number 10 (which means rolling around on the screaming) The nurses acted strangely in that they constantly offered me pain medications (many different kinds at any time). Usually nurses try to give as little pain meds as possible. So it seemed like they thought that I might not to make it also. Perhaps that was the scariest aspect of the ordeal.

I passed out in the doctors office, while I was losing awareness I experienced a terror that I have never felt so helpless. I was put on the bed and the doctor wiped the sweat off of my head face and neck with a cold wet compress. I didn’t crap myself.

I’ve never been really scared by physical danger. In those cases I go totally calm and my brain races along with thoughts. The first time I knew what really being scared meant was the time my s/o had a breast biopsy and the time that elapsed till we got the results. That’s the first I had ever felt that icy cold feeling.

When I was 21 I lived with my boyfriend in a two family house. A man broke into the landlord’s place downstairs, then came into ours. We thought it was the landlord coming in to snoop because he thought we weren’t home.We had been lying in bed watching TV, so when our door opened, my boyfriend got out of bed and walked into the living room. The man who broke in shot at him twice, barely missing him. My boyfriend quickly jumped back into the bedroom and pushed the dresser against the door.We stayed in there for quite a long time to make sure he was gone . The police told us later that the man was on a robbery spree and had killed 3 people that he walked in on. I hope I never have to experience fear like that again.

OMG! OMG! OM DOUBLE G! I can’t believe what I’ve been reading. My comments will likely require two or three separate posts.
First of all, I should say I really expected this to be a bit like scarey story time at a sleepover, with a couple of actual numbing experiences popping up. As I have been in and out reading responses, I have had my gut twist, times I’ve nearly cried. Though I know any of you only from here and Askville, I have formed opinions and feelings about some, so these answers feel more real than just hearing something from another table in a diner or something.
@Coloma, this question was inspired by your mention of the cougar in TJBM. I started being curious about other jelly experiences. I too, had pregnancies which ended with no room at all, and frightened by the lack of movement. Some of the extra heavy movement stories may pop up at another time, but my first son nearly threw me on my bum.
@Pachy, I sure felt the terror as I read your story. I should add that I am so glad you did not get sucked away from safety.
@anniereborn, you made me cry. I can see that scared little girl still crying somewhere inside you. I want to give her a hug, and comfort her. I also want to give a good arse-kick to all the drunk parents who leave their kids short each time they drink. Yours was one of the stories I shared with my daughter. She felt you too.
@kritiper Gawd! That sounds awful! Were you badly injured too?
@Espiritus_Corvus, your story is so unbelievable, I have to prod myself to believe you would not make it up or borrow it from somewhere else. I am believing you, but, well, I guess I want to deny that people really walk around with stories like this in their lives. I just can’t imagine facing any experience so horrific. It would be so very hard to keep one’s humanity intact under such extreme conditions. It was extremely brave of you to share something so personal and so dark with us all. Reading your post tied my gut in a knot. I don’t have any god beliefs, but I have this urge to say, “God be with you”, because there should be some way to draw comfort from that expression.
@hearkat I am glad you came out of the ordeal without worse injuries, or mess other than your coffee.

It wasn’t my scariest moment, but possibly pretty scary for a few at the airport. I was 8½ months pregnant with my second, a baby who turned out to be almost 24 inches long. I am 5’2”, and am extremely short waisted. There is almost a half inch between the top of my hipbone and my bottom rib. Not a lot of room for a big baby.

Every time my son stretched out a little bit, he hit my sciatic nerve, and I’d be grasping anything to keep from falling down. I think I had several security people following me, hoping I didn’t have a baby right there on the concourse.

@janbb were you afraid for yourself, or someone else?
@Kardamom Heights didn’t bother me at all before the accident which left me impaired. Now I have awful problems with vertigo. Still, that falling thing is what really ends a day. My worst fall was as a child while tree climbing. It knocked the wind out of me, and there was no-one around to know I couldn’t breathe. I was convinced for several seconds I would die. Finally my body kind of gagged, and that was enough to open my lungs up again.
@dxs Well, did that learn ya to stay out of places you weren’t invited? Ha ha. My gosh, I can’t imagine what that sudden reality check must have been like. Whew! Did you tell your parents, or keep the experience a secret? I have lots of freaky moments in my life which my parents never ever learned of. There was an exposer once which nearly became an abduction. I didn’t realize that until years later. He asked for directions to the library, and asked if I could ride along to show him. Fortunately, I was busy delivering my paper route.
@gondwanalon I agree. It does add to the fright when you believe the medical staff has little or no hope that you will live. Still, I want to know the truth, whatever it may be. I am glad you are still with us.
@talljasperman Wow! Did you find out what caused it? I’m glad it didn’t get messy for you.
@Adirondackwannabe I can relate COMPLETELY. I will now share my scariest time ever. It was actually a chain of related events. When my now ‘tween daughter was conceived, was after I had been in the accident which left me impaired. The doctors gave me a 30% chance of surviving the pregnancy, because I was damaged, and going it alone, and getting on in years, etc. It was no question for me, I would not terminate the pregnancy. I would rather die giving life to my daughter than live disabled and without having the chance to watch her grow. I made it. It was rough. There were dizzy spells, and times I got too weak, and someone would have to help me get to a place I could sit. One time, a homeless man helped me get to a bench, then told me to wait for him to come back. He came back with a sandwich and beverage he bought me with his foodstamps. I felt much stronger after the snack. I tried to reimburse him, but he refused. My pregnancy not only went full term, but two weeks over. I was near nuts. I had cut my smoking and caffeine back to nearly nothing. I had gained a lot of weight. I was suffering a lot, and every day wondering if I would last yet another day. When I was two weeks overdue, I called the doctor, pointed out my condition and how far overdue I was. She agreed that I should not take the chance of waiting any longer. I was told to come in so they could induce labor. I packed with my things a two ltr of Mt Dew, knowing the hospital would not serve me any caffeine during my stay.
After I checked in, they hooked me up to monitors, including a heart monitor for the baby. After a time, they told me they could not induce labor yet, because my daughter’s heartrate was not stable. After all this time, worry, illness, would I lose her at this point? Gawd no! I was told to lay on my left side, because it would be safer for the baby. I did. For hours I watched as she seemed to do okay, then the rate would start to drop. After a bit, it would get better again. Back and forth. They would not agree to a c section. They said I was not strong enough. I knew my condition was not helping my daughter. I wanted her out, where she would be fighting with her own strength, not fighting against my weakness. There was a nurse staying watch in the room with me. I asked her if I would be allowed something to drink, since I was not yet in labor. She said okay. I had her get out the Dew for me. I chugged it as fast as I could, and hoped it would boost my daughter’s heartrate. After a while, it did. They finally agreed to induce the labor. The caffeine didn’t last long enough. Even though labor went lightening fast once they induced, her heart stopped during the birth. I begged them to save her. I told them they could break me like a wishbone if they had to, but get her out and make her live. They used a vaccum, and took her out. She would not breathe at first. There was a crowd of doctors and nurses around her. The OB who delivered her had my daughter on her lap, trying to start her going. At last, above MY crying, I heard HER crying. She sounded pissed. I was so relieved, I couldn’t stop shaking. I had to be held still so the doctor could take some stitches.
A few hours after my daughter was born, when we’d had a chance to bond, and get familiar, some bastards hijacked airplanes, and crashed into the World Trade Center. We were both alive and breathing, and now I had to wonder if my country was under attack. Was I going to have to raise by baby through an invasion on American soil? I am most grateful to our men and women in the military, making huge sacrifices so tired old mommies can raise their babies safe from invading forces.
@acamp What a personal thing, being afraid in your own home! I am glad you and bf were unharmed.
@snowberry, I’m glad things have improved with your fears. I have to laugh, about your airport story. Sorry. Been there so much myself, it empowers me to laugh at what can no longer get me. Ha! :).

There have been two very separate occasions: one that I should have been afraid and one that I actually was:

About 12 years ago, my wife and I were on our world trip. (We sold my house and decided the best way to enter a marriage is to both have nothing, hence we went on a seven month trip.) Somewhere in the middle of the trip we ended up on a little idyllic island of the coast of Belize, where life slows down and diving is great. We were there to dive the famous blue hole and we were truly disappointed when we learned that the boats had stopped boating, since there was a storm coming. We had heard about this storm, Keith, but it was supposed to move away to the North, so who cared. Besides… we’re Dutch so we were used to stormy weather… no problem.

Well… the storm didn’t move away to the north, it actually increased in strength and turned into a Hurricane and decided to come our way. This is when we learned we were trapped on the island. We were in a hotel called 17–88, referring to its location (17 north ; 88 West), which was exactly 1 story high, armed with a battery operated receiver, two mars bars and four candles. On the radio we heard the exact location of the storm 23/88 and so on, as if it were a sports match. They also advised that to the north of the eye, there would be up to five meters storm surge and that the hurricane had upgraded to level 5.

We spent two days like that, waiting for the eye of the storm… watching houses topple over, palm trees being torn out and rooftops of other buildings land on our patio. When the eye of the storm came, we went out and looked at a total war zone. We estimated we had about two hours at most before we would come at the north side of the storm. Then we would likely drown… there was nothing on the island higher than three meters…

The storm, however, chose our Island as a resting point… it stayed there for the good part of the day. We had put our diving gear out and ready for us to grab… guessing that we would wear that if the water would swallow the island. We set an alarm at night for every 15 minutes, sue we would check the water level. Yet… nothing happened. The eye come to our island and the storm stopped moving.

And then… the storm moved back the way it came. We never saw the storm surge. The storm came from the North and went back that way as well. once we left the eye again, of course we had another day or more of flying trees and debris. At least we lived, though…

The strange part was, though that we this likely was the most acute danger my wife and I have ever been in. We weren’t very afraid though. We did what we thought we could do and just waited.

The time that really scared me shitless, though, was when my wife was carrying our babies for about 24 weeks and the hospital told us we were going to have twins. (Ultrasounds were not common in those days, yet, in The Netherlands.) Our reaction was… “Well, maybe that is fun…” and the ultrasound technician said… “Well, I don’t think so… you better talk to the doctor”.

The doctor told us that our twin likely was suffering from twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome, but that there was nothing he could do. “Go home and come back in two weeks. If they then still live, we may be able to do something”. Thank god it turned out this doctor wasn’t merely a jerk, but also gave us the wrong diagnose. (I freaked out, talked to various other doctors and had the ultrasound redone at another hospital – The boys are healthy teenagers now!!!)

@Jonesn4burgers You would be correct in guessing there is still a crying little girl inside. I have PTSD from that and many other incidences involving my family.

@Jonesn4burgers Since my kids are adults, it was panic about how I would live out my life alone after being part of a couple for nearly 40 years. I wasn’t physically scared, I just couldn’t imagine being able to cope. Now I still grieve at times and get angry at times but I know I can do it.

I have moments when I have been physically scared in the past but nothing that was as bad as that time of emotional pain.

@Jonesn4burgers Naah didn’t say anything. I don’t even think they were on the trip with us.

@Jonesn4burgers I was getting my blood pressure checked and the machine read 80 over 40 and 279 heart rate/pulse. It scared me and I had a panic attack.

@Jonesn4burgers – No injuries. Lucky me! The truck could’ve caught fire, the door could’ve closed on my head or any place below that point, the truck could have turned over and skidded on the asphalt with me under it. Then there was that grain truck we almost hit just before the truck tipped over. GAD!

Being told after a PET scan that the nodule on my lung was most likely cancerous and it had possibly spread to a lymph node. A biopsy was needed.

After two biopsies and 3 weeks later I finally found out it was benign. Lung biopsies are not fun.

@jonsblond , I’m sorry for your fear and discomfort, glad you continue to be with us. :)
@kritiper how fortunate! I bet it stays with you. Do you ever smell gasoline when you feel lost or afraid? I just wonder, because our sense of smell is our strongest link to memory.

@Jonesn4burgers – Nope, never smell gasoline. Always liked the smell of leaded gas, too, though not so much afterwards…

In 1988 I was living in Okinawa and playing HS basketball. We were meeting for a practice game on Kadena Air base – but I lived off base. I was to meet my ride to go on base on the main drag (Hwy 58) so I had to walk down a long curvy road from my house at the top of the hill in Kakazu down to the highway.
It was early Saturday morning (like 5 or 6am) and still mostly dark out—and a drunk guy on a motorbike noticed me walking by myself and started following me.
I’d been aware of him following me and had been trying to find a place to run for help for a while..and so when he finally ditched his bike and grabbed me and threw me against a chain link fence, I screamed, kicked and ran for the one building I could see in the distance that had a light on it. (Turned out it was an empty construction company office—but I didn’t figure that out until later.)
Apparently my screaming “Kooban” (Police box) was enough to freak him out and he took off. I was shaken, but fine. Nothing scared me more than that attack until 1995.

In fact, nothing else (tornado that took off my roof, typhoons, car accidents, surgery to remove suspected cancer that left me in the ICU for a week) has scared me more before or after living through the Kobe earthquake in 1995.
I wasn’t in the city center – was further south from Kobe – but my dresser fell over. The (eventual) TV coverage and aftershocks scarred me for life. To this day the only thing that scares me are earthquakes. I’m absolutely terrified of earthquakes.

WOW! You are a survivor. Thanks for sharing your amazing experiences, @geeky_mama. I am really impressed with your quick thinking, and when you were so young. Did you report him? How does such a situation get treated in Japan?

@Jonesn4burgers – Ha! That situation is so common (along with men that attempt to grope you in crowded train cars) that absolutely nothing is done about it at all in Japan.
Sure, I reported it to my coach (I was still shaking when they picked me up) and my family—no one did anything about it.
At the time my Japanese was limited – now it’s not. If a sukebe ( <—Japanese word for dirty old men) man tried to touch my bum in a crowded train I’d not only grab it and show everyone around him, I’d now have the Japanese language skills to shame him verbally in addition.

I give you loud standing ovation. I got one once for my response to a marine who disrespected me that way. I was just entering the chow hall, in a hurry, and heading across to the end of the line. Some guy came up behind me and grabbed my right cheek. I spun around like a choreographed dance move and slammed my tray against the side of his head. My tray was unharmed, but there was a loud crack. Immediately all men seated jumped to their feet, cheering and applauding. I heard some comments here and there like, “THAT will teach him” and “Serves you right,jerk.” Our eyes met, and he sheepishly apologized. Ididn’t say anything. I just kept eye contact a second longer, and went to get my lunch. When I got to the line, I guess they kept track of wher I would have been, because this guy about three from the end said my place was in front of him.
After that I was great friends with the marines, and I always knew I had a table to sit at. They respected me for protecting my own boundries and for not letting myself be a victim.

One of my scariest was the 1994 Northridge earthquake, which destroyed my rebar-reinforced chimney 20 years ago today.

I live only about 6 miles from its epicenter.

Yikes! Do you live in fear of a reoccurance, or just hope lightening, or quake, won’t strike twice?

@Jonesn4burgers

I don’t have that much fear of one now, because since then I’ve had a 5.4-magnitude shutoff valve installed in my natural-gas line, restraint strapping applied to my water heater, and I’ve bought earthquake insurance.

I know that we’re going to have more quakes, but I hope none of them have a major negative impact on me.

Wow! I’ll hope with you. It sounds like you’ve been protecting your stuff. I hope YOU will be okay without straps.

Driving with my son to the site where his wife had just had a rollover accident with his four year old son in the car and neither of us knowing the status of either one. Fearing that the death of either one would kill my son.

Fear for others really does take on its own kind of power. Thankyou for sharing.

During a solo hike at Starved Rock, I had made the mistake of going off-trail, and came to the rim of a canyon. The trail there was closed, but having come cross-country, I did not see the signs stating so. At one point, the trail followed a narrow 4-foot ledge, sheer rock wall on one side, and a 30 or 40 foot drop on the other, and no guard rail..As I proceeded along, suddenly the soil beneath the ledge gave way. I found myself slowly sliding down into the ravine. I managed to grab a 3-inch sapling that happened to be growing from next to the break. So there I was, hanging by one hand, my other hand injured (only slightly, but enough to hurt like hell when I tried to use it), hoping the sapling would not uproot. I finally was able to maneuver myself back up to a solid part of the trail, and followed it around to the trailhead, where I then saw the sign saying the trail was closed due to unsafe conditions.

…...................And that’s why they call him Cliff Hanger! Okay, only people who watch PBS regularly stand a chance of catching the reference, but I couldn’t resist. If curiosity grips you, see an episode of Between The Lions.
I can see I’m not alone with gratitude for the staunch heroism of the sapling. Being entirely alone when danger happens is very frightening.

Oh. My. God. I got nothin’.

Well, I’ll try!

I’m pretty immune to bad weather in Kansas. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat on the back deck, or sat here Fluthering with tornado sirens going off all around. All I do is move pictures and other things to the cellar door to grab on my way down if I go that way. Never have though. Not in this house where I’ve lived since 1998.

However, about a year ago Rick was out of town, about 150 miles away. I was on the back deck that evening when I saw this cloud. Now, I’ve lived in Kansas since I was 8. I’ve seen plenty of SLCs (meteorologist’s official term for “Scary Looking Clouds”) but there was something…different about this one. It was huge, and slung very low to the ground. It was black and streaked with a sickly, dark green, and it was on the move, roiling and boiling. I can’t explain how menacing it was. It froze my blood…. and it was headed right for the house.

I grabbed my cell phone and ran to the cellar steps and sat on the first step. The door to the cellar is located in the center of a short hallway in the center of the house so I was pretty well protected even there. The cellar is dirt floored and really mooky and spider webby and no telling what could be down there. Really didn’t want to go down there…but I was ready to JUMP if I had to. Then the wind hit the house. Man. I almost jumped, but I didn’t. The house was shaking and creaking. I thought the windows were going to blast out.

I called Rick. My voice was shaking. I was terrified. It’s the most scared I’ve ever been because of Kansas weather. I told him I thought the house was being hit by a tornado.

Just then the electricity went out. It was as black as…night in that house. No light from the outside, either.

Rick said, “Val, I’m watching the weather channel. There’s nothing happening there.”
I screamed, “I’M TELLING YOU I’M IN A TORNADO!!”
He just kind of chuckled and said, “Naw. It’s nothin’. I’m watching the weather channel. It’s just a little wind, I’m sure. You’re fine.”

OMG. Now I was as PISSED as I’d ever been in my life as well as terrified. I’m not a silly girl who panics over little things and he damn well fuckingshitasshole knows that. I hung up on him and sat there, shaking and fuming, listening to “nothing” tearing at the house.

The phone rang. It was Rick. I ignored the call.

It went on for 10 minutes. Felt like a lifetime.

Finally it was all over. Five minutes later the electricity came back on.

The phone rang. It was Rick. I answered, saying “What!”
He said, “Val!!! The weather channel says multiple tornadoes are hitting Winfield!!”
I screamed “NO SHIT!!” and hung on him again. Refused to answer the phone for the rest of the night.

Then the sirens went off.

It was bad, bad. My husband could have died that night. I could have jumped in my car and driven an hour and a half to choke the livin’ shit out of him.

I wish we all spent more time here telling stories like this. This site would be so much more interesting.

Could spend all day just listening to you @Espiritus_Corvus!

Settin’ ‘round the campfire, spinnin’ yarns…

At sea, you must learn to tell a story. If you can’t, you might find yourself swimming home.

After 23 years of writing nothing but nursing notes, patient histories and progress notes for doctors—clean, clear, clinical observations necssarily devoid of sentiment or opinion—it is almost cathartic to write with some personal insight in a genuine voice.

And Benny was a great audience, I’ll bet.

@Espiritus_Corvus

“At sea, you must learn to tell a story. If you can’t, you might find yourself swimming home.”

And I thought the US Navy was harsh. ;-)

@janbb Buddy actually was a good listener. In ten years he’d picked up quite a vocabulary. I highly recommend talking to your animals. It’s good for you, and they like the attention.

@Brian1946 The Navy has to answer to your mother.

@Espiritus_Corvus Sorry for misremembering! And there are certainly stories Frodo could relate but he’s not one to kiss and tell. (Should we call you Dr. Doolittle?)

@Dutchess_III WOW! That sure takes me to some vivid places in my life. I know the feeling, being scared, someone important to you belittles it, and then the rage is hotter, fueled by the fear you already feel. I’m glad you didn’t end up in the Emerald city! I’m also glad Rick didn’t end up buried under the windmill. (smirk).

@Brian1946 It was at sea (even in the Navy) that I was able to listen to so many sea stories, and I noticed the good ones and the bad ones, and the good ones that were delivered poorly.

@Jonesn4burgers Well, he learned his lesson. He has never blown me off since. In fact, last Thanksgiving he was crawling around under the car, in a motel parking lot, 60 miles from home, because I was convinced the cat was in the trunk of the car…or somewhere trapped in the car! I HEARD NOISE IN THE CAR WHEN WE WERE AT THE GAS STATION! And our cat had disappeared about 5 days earlier. :(

@Dutchess_III Once, years ago, a store that I managed was broken into during the night, I got to work to open and the whole front window was broken out. I called my ex in a panic and he totally minimized the situation, for all I knew someone could have still been in the building somewhere. I was so PISSED!

Thanks for your concern honey. Pfffft!

I love you girls. I feel a lot less like the Lone Rangeress when I read your posts. The humor is great to have in my day too.

@Jonesn4burgers Ya don;t get to our age without having a good sense of humor. Hah!

old farts

@rojo yeah that too! Just wait, you’ll see!

@rojo , old farts are better than young farts. Know why? Huh, dooya? Because when farts get old, they don’t stink anymore .HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! How old are YOU? :-D

Wow!, some scary stuff written above for sure. My own biggest scare was back a while. I was a heavy smoker, going through about 30 cigarettes a day for most of my life but was physically quite active, and healthy, ( or so I thought ). I used to cough a lot, especially if I caught a cold. Late one evening, during a bad bout of coughing, I felt something sort of tug inside my chest. It scared me a little, but did not really feel serious, so I went to bed. I woke several times through the night with strong pains in the middle of my back, these pains seemed to come and go. I put it down to some sort of indigestion. I woke early and felt ok again, but during the course of the morning the back pain got steadily worse, and I got steadily uneasy. Around mid-day I started to perspire with the pain, as by now it was becoming unbearable. On hindsight of course, I should have called the hospital sooner, but in fact I was just waiting for the ( indigestion ) to go away. It was when my both arms started to throb that I realized that I had left it too late to call the hospital. I told my wife that I was scared and decided to drive to the hospital about ten minutes drive away. Strangely, the pain left me during the drive. I walked into the accident and emergency room and explained the situation to the girl at the window who told me to take a seat. The room was heaving with people waiting to be seen and I settled myself for a three hours or so wait. I had hardly sat down when I was whisked into a room, put onto a bed, and fitted all over with heart traces etc while another doctor was called. He came in, glanced once at the screen, looked at me and said, “I have to tell you that you are in the process of having a heart attack right now, but not to worry ( not to worry, Jeez ), “The good thing was” he said”, The blood clot was not on the main artery side of my heart”. I was fully concious at the time with just a little back pain.
He injected me with something, not sure what, then told me he was injecting again with what was called a “clotbuster” drug, He said “hold tight, this will make you feel like you’re getting the instant effect of ten lagers, for just a few seconds. Then WHAM !! Ten lagers,?. felt more like two bottles of Scotch !!. a wonderful feeling. He looked at the monitor, ” You’re going to be okay now” he said, “All back to normal, and all down to smoking, take my word for it ”. Ten days later I left the ward and have not looked at a cigarette since. That was twelve years ago, and am more active now than at any time in my life. Scared?, you bet I was, and if this story stops just one person from smoking then it was well worth a few minutes on the keypad.

Hot da_ _, I knew you would be a cool follow!
That is a heck of a story, and I thank you for sharing it. I am glad you have come to Fluther.
I hope you are crafting something for your profile page, because I am most curious to know more about you.