Sometimes what might appear as too much to others is just right for you.
And more often than not those of us who overplan, overthink, and can be perceived as "over the top and too much" end up being vindicated in the end. Even to our own shock.
Planning and plotting and being overprepared is a the scout's motto. It should be a life motto, because another important life truth is... you just never know.
Redditor u/lawofdox18wanted to hear about the times life has turned out for the best by surprise by asking:
Overthinkers of Reddit, what unlikely scenario actually came true that you were completely prepared for because you are an overthinker?
I always over-shop. Because what if the store suddenly gets set on fire on the day I need toilet paper. When I gotta go, I gotta go. I can't run an extra block when I gotta go, and all because buying in bulk seems strange to others. Take a guess who was already toilet paper stocked pre-pandemic.
Needle & Thread
Excited Jump GIF by Megan BatoonGiphy"I always carry a small sewing kit whenever I go to a wedding. I have sewed two brides into their dresses so far!"
Middle School Days
"All the teachers at the Middle School I taught at knew I was a pack rat and one day a kid split his pants and the school counselor came to me and said 'Mr. Thehogdog, would you happen to have a pair of sweats or gym pants in your truck'. YEP. So the the kid spent the rest of the day in a pair of nylon pants I had behind my seat."
"He is lucky because if he didn't fit he would have spent the rest of the day in a white disposable 'coverall' I had in case I had car trouble in nice clothes. Icing on the cake: It was a student I really liked who was super helpful to other kids and teachers, so it was nice to do something nice for him. I also carried a 'Swiss Army' brand soft side brief case (yard sale find) STUFFED and it had a few of each size of battery."
"One day Phil Niekro and 2 Braves players were there for an assembly and Phil's mic battery was dying so I SPRINTED upstairs to my classroom, grabbed a 9 volt from my bag, then basically rolled across the panel and switched out his battery and got back to the PA avoiding getting on TV News cameras."
Through the Hourglass...
"Not me, but my mother."
"Apparently at a party where my parents and their friends were playing board games, there was a realization that an hourglass was missing from one of the games they planned on playing. My mother proceeded to reach into her purse and pull out an hourglass she just so happened to bring, on the off chance they didn't have one."
"HOWEVER, later in the night when some drinks had been had, someone accidentally slammed a drink down, breaking my mother's hourglass. Without missing a beat, she reached into her purse and pulled out ANOTHER hourglass. She knew the first one, being glass, might get broken so she had a backup ready."
Former Flat Earthers Explain What Finally Made Them Come Around | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Creepers
"I didn't actually plan for this, it just worked out. But one day for some reason I put a suction cup in my pocket. I can't exactly remember why - it was from a shower hook that I think broke (?) and I put it in my pocket hoping to find a replacement or something."
"Later that day I was standing around with a few friends and one friend was lamenting that his bumper was dented. He showed us and said, "I bet I could pop it right out if I had like a suction cup or something." I wordlessly pulled the suction cup out of my pocket and handed it to him. Everyone definitely thought I was creepy as hell."
25 Plus
tom jerry GIFGiphy"When my son was still a baby, we had to take an 11 hour flight. As an overthinker, I brought at least 25 diapers for him to go through. He didn't need that many, but the mom sitting close to us was very grateful when she ran out of diapers not even halfway through the flight and I gave her a few."
See, these people get it. It's better to be safe than sorry. If I had a kid I'd be packing a hundred diapers. And to be a sewing aficionado and carrying around supplies, should be mandatory skill for everyone.
The Cut
scissors GIFGiphy"I carry scissors in my glove compartment. They came in handy when a kid tightened a skinny zip tie around my 9 year olds finger at a park. Completely cut off the circulation. Also the other kids mom was a nurse so that was helpful too. Carry scissors and a nurse at all times."
Clogged!
"One time, I waaaay over thought a concern I had around dryer vent fire. When the time came that we had a clog, didn't know, and there was a wee burst of flames I was freaking READY."
"Edit to add: I cleaned the lint trap religiously. I just had a gut feeling. I bough One of those things from Amazon to clean it and nothing came out so DON'T LET THAT FOOL YOU."
"If your drying times are up and there's sometimes a smell, call someone or check every POSSIBLE location. We found basically Brillo pads of burnt hair inside the heating element. Stay safe pals!"
"Last edit: thanks for the award - my first of this kind!!! You rock fuzzybum."
just in case...
"Was at one of those trampoline parks with my kid when I look over and see several of the workers attending to an elderly lady sitting on the floor. Turns out she'd taken a shot to the forehead somehow and was bleeding profusely. They were trying to help with paper towels. Well I'd taken a free local Stop the Bleed class "just in case" and since have kept supplies in my truck."
"Asked if they needed some gauze and a bandage, went and got it, and brought it back. I told the guy, "Now if one piece of gauze fills up -" He interrupted, "Take it off and put on a new one." I said, "No! You put another one overtop that one, but leave the bottom one there." He said, "Well, you know more than I do. Come over and help." We were able to get her patched up."
- nchiker
Slim Jim
"I bought and learned to use a slim Jim ( open locked cars) I carry one in my car and have been able to help no less than 10 people who have locked their keys in their car. My brother was visiting me from out of town and he need something from Target, he called me and said an elderly man had locked his keys in his car and I was able to drive over and help. Also have jumper cables that have helped start a few stranded drivers."
I See Things
All That Magic GIF by NickelodeonGiphy"Went through a stage as a teenager where I thought I was psychic."
"I know, I know, stupid. A friend asked me jokingly to make a prediction. I told him to get a flashlight, because tomorrow would be dark. I grabbed one myself when I got home and put it in my purse. No idea why, just did it. The next day the Eastern seaboard blackouts happened. He still asks for predictions to this day."
Got It!
"I worked weddings for a while, during an age (26-28) where lots of my friends were getting married. I've helped to bustle pretty much every bride whose wedding I attended, including brides who I didn't know well (who were either friends of my husband, or I was close friends with the groom)."
"At work, I had one of those craft supply organizers full to the brim of emergency supplies: pins (safety, bobby, AND straight pins), hair ties, earring backs, a sewing kit, pain relievers, tums, granola bars (sometimes you just need to get the bride to eat SOMETHING), chalk (works great for covering up minor stains on white dresses), hairspray, makeup remover wipes, superglue, bandaids, blister bandages, you name it. People were always pleasantly surprised when they needed something random and I was just like "yep I've got that, here you go!"
Tiny Ideas
"I remember one day in school a teacher was complaining someone had tied her blinds so tightly she couldn't get them to open or close. Me being the weird kid, I ask her if she wanted a screwdriver to get it undone. She looked at me like I was crazy and a little scared as I reached into my wallet and pulled out this tiny screwdriver from those tiny finger bmx/skateboards and handed it over."
"Everyone thought I was crazy and my teacher laughed in relief when she saw it. Everyone thought i was weird until I told them I used it to tighten the screws on my glasses. They were constantly unscrewing themselves and I was sick of having to go to the opticians every time it happened. Obviously the solution was to carry a tiny screwdriver with me!"
- Zanki
Parent MD
"I found a nickel-sized lump on my fifteen month old daughter's temple, freaked out, obsessed over it, researched it exhaustively, and concluded it was a dermoid cyst that had worn through the skull. I was told by a pediatrician that it was a bone bruise that would fix itself over the course of three to six months, no imaging was needed, and I shouldn't make an appointment at the children's hospital because it would resolve on its own."
"I got an X-ray done anyway and the radiologist confirmed every one of my suspicions, but the pediatrician still said to wait and see because that's what you do with dermoid cysts and it was definitely not through the skull despite what the radiologist said. Made an appointment at the hospital anyway, and the surgeon swore up and down that although it was a dermoid cyst as I'd suspected, it would not be through the skull since in all his years of practice it never had been."
"Well guess what? It WAS through the skull, and it was pressing on the membrane between the skull and the brain, a hair's breadth from breaking the membrane or pressing on the brain. A couple more weeks of waiting and my daughter could have had seizures, a brain infection, lasting damage. I overthought it and now she's a happy, healthy three year old."
Firesaver...
scary movie burn GIF by UsGiphy"I carry a fire extinguisher in my auto. I witnessed a car accident where the engine caught fire. I quickly put it out before it burned the inside of the car. Everyone survived."
- mwthread
The Classmen
"In college on occasion upper classmen would randomly steal the under classmen towels from the shower stalls and then lock their room doors so they had to go to the RA bar messed. I had the idea to stash a towel in the drop ceiling tiles for just that event. Maybe a week later I became the victim of a towel snatching. However, the upper classmen were very unhappy to see me strut out with a nice clean towel from my ceiling stash."
- duck1914
Holding the Deck
"I always keep an unopened deck of cards in my backpack. You never can tell when some Hold 'Em may be needed to pass the time. But when I was at a business conference the bigwig who was presenting to us was having to wing it with a few things because his luggage had been lost, and he didn't have all of his materials. He had the PowerPoint deck, but he didn't have his props."
"He started going into explaining how he'd be able to demonstrate this statistical principle he was describing, only he didn't have the unopened deck of cards he needed. Voila! I was able to produce a shrink-wrapped deck of cards. My boss was also in the same presentation, and he was also impressed that I just happened to have a deck of cards on me, so that's nice, too."
- ronearc
My Left Hand
"Injuring my dominant hand... as a kid I had an irrational fear of having it chopped off. I spent all of grade 6 teaching myself to write and do things with my left hand. I made a conscious effort to remain as ambidextrous as possible. As an adult I broke a few fingers on my dominant hand... but it wasn't a big issue because I could do most things equally with my left hand. Anti climactic, but it was useful lol."
I am Here
ichabod crane map GIF by HULUGiphy"Getting lost in a foreign country. Relying on phone GPS to navigate, data stops working... had over prepared and memorized the map of the downtown area ahead of time."
The Back-up
"I am basically blind without my glasses, and I've always taken a backup pair of glasses when I travel. It went untouched for years, taking up valuable space in my luggage. Lo and behold, one trip to Montreal a few years ago I just woke up one morning to find my glasses broken - no idea how it happened. And I finally got a chance to break out my backup pair 😎."
- caruul
Got it All...
"I used to live out of my backpack, and I always thought I'd need to leave town, so I kept just about everything in there you could ever need. Often times I'd end up having to stay somewhere without much notice, and I'd have: a change of clothes, face wash, tooth brush, toothpaste, scissors, floss, phone charger, money, snacks, etc. Enough to cover me for at least two days without actually needing to go home."
I hope everyone is paying attention. Be more like the overthinkers. We're the ones you want on the island. You want to stay useful or be fed to sharks. Eventually, our day always comes.
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Experiencing death is a fascinating and frightening idea.
Who doesn't want to know what is waiting for us on the other side?
But so many of us want to know and then come back and live a little longer.
It would be so great to be sure there is something else.
But the whole dying part is not that great, so we'll have to rely on other people's accounts.
Redditor AlaskaStiletto wanted to hear from everyone who has returned to life, so they asked:
"Redditors who have 'died' and come back to life, what did you see?"
Sensations
Happy Good Vibes GIF by Major League SoccerGiphy"My dad's heart stopped when he had a heart attack and he had to be brought back to life. He kept the paper copy of the heart monitor which shows he flatlined. He said he felt an overwhelming sensation of peace, like nothing he had felt before."
PeachesnPain
Recovery
"I had surgical complications in 2010 that caused a great deal of blood loss. As a result, I had extremely low blood pressure and could barely stay awake. I remember feeling like I was surrounded by loved ones who had passed. They were in a circle around me and I knew they were there to guide me onwards. I told them I was not ready to go because my kids needed me and I came back."
"My nurse later said she was afraid she’d find me dead every time she came into the room."
"It took months, and blood transfusions, but I recovered."
good_golly99
Take Me Back
"Overwhelming peace and happiness. A bright airy and floating feeling. I live a very stressful life. Imagine finding out the person you have had a crush on reveals they have the same feelings for you and then you win the lotto later that day - that was the feeling I had."
"I never feared death afterward and am relieved when I hear of people dying after suffering from an illness."
rayrayrayray
Free
The Light Minnie GIF by (G)I-DLEGiphy"I had a heart surgery with near-death experience, for me at least (well the possibility that those effects are caused by morphine is also there) I just saw black and nothing else but it was warm and I had such inner peace, its weird as I sometimes still think about it and wish this feeling of being so light and free again."
TooReDTooHigh
This is why I hate surgery.
You just never know.
Shocked
Giphy"More of a near-death experience. I was electrocuted. I felt like I was in a deep hole looking straight up in the sky. My life flashed before me. Felt sad for my family, but I had a deep sense of peace."
Admirable_Buyer6528
The SOB
"Nursing in the ICU, we’ve had people try to die on us many times during the years, some successfully. One guy stood out to me. His heart stopped. We called a code, are working on him, and suddenly he comes to. We hadn’t vented him yet, so he was able to talk, and he started screaming, 'Don’t let them take me, don’t let them take me, they are coming,' he was scared and yelling."
"Then he yelled a little more, as we tried to calm him down, he screamed, 'No, No,' and gestured towards the end of the bed, and died again. We didn’t get him back. It was seriously creepy. We called his son to tell him the news, and the son said basically, 'Good, he was an SOB.'”
1-cupcake-at-a-time
Colors
"My sister died and said it was extremely peaceful. She said it was very loud like a train station and lots of talking and she was stuck in this area that was like a curtain with lots of beautiful colors (colors that you don’t see in real life according to her) a man told her 'He was sorry, but she had to go back as it wasn’t her time.'"
Hannah_LL7
"I had a really similar experience except I was in an endless garden with flowers that were colors I had never seen before. It was quiet and peaceful and a woman in a dress looked at me, shook her head, and just said 'Not yet.' As I was coming back, it was extremely loud, like everyone in the world was trying to talk all at once. It was all very disorienting but it changed my perspective on life!"
huntokarrr
The Fog
"I was in a gray fog with a girl who looked a lot like a young version of my grandmother (who was still alive) but dressed like a pioneer in the 1800s she didn't say anything but kept pulling me towards an opening in the wall. I kept refusing to go because I was so tired."
"I finally got tired of her nagging and went and that's when I came to. I had bled out during a c-section and my heart could not beat without blood. They had to deliver the baby and sew up the bleeders. refill me with blood before they could restart my heart so, like, at least 12 minutes gone."
Fluffy-Hotel-5184
Through the Walls
"My spouse was dead for a couple of minutes one miserable night. She maintains that she saw nothing, but only heard people talking about her like through a wall. The only thing she remembers for absolute certain was begging an ER nurse that she didn't want to die."
"She's quite alive and well today."
Hot-Refrigerator6583
Well let's all be happy to be alive.
It seems to be all we have.
Trying to lose weight is a struggle understood by many people regardless of size.
The goal of reaching a healthy weight may seem unattainable, but with diet and exercise, it can pay off through persistence and discipline.
Seeing the pounds gradually drop off can also be a great motivator and incentivize people to stay the course.
Those who've achieved their respective weight goals shared their experiences when Redditor apprenti8455 asked:
"People who lost a lot of weight, what surprises you the most now?"
Redditors didn't see these coming.
Shiver Me Timbers
"I’m always cold now!"
– Telrom_1
"I had a coworker lose over 130 pounds five or six years ago. I’ve never seen him without a jacket on since."
– r7ndom
"140 lbs lost here starting just before COVID, I feel like that little old lady that's always cold, damn this top comment was on point lmao."
– mr_remy
Drawing Concern
"I lost 100 pounds over a year and a half but since I’m old(70’s) it seems few people comment on it because (I think) they think I’m wasting away from some terminal illness."
– dee-fondy
"Congrats on the weight loss! It’s honestly a real accomplishment 🙂"
"Working in oncology, I can never comment on someone’s weight loss unless I specifically know it was on purpose, regardless of their age. I think it kind of ruffles feathers at times, but like I don’t want to congratulate someone for having cancer or something. It’s a weird place to be in."
– LizardofDeath
Unleashing Insults
"I remember when I lost the first big chunk of weight (around 50 lbs) it was like it gave some people license to talk sh*t about the 'old' me. Old coworkers, friends, made a lot of not just negative, but harsh comments about what I used to look like. One person I met after the big loss saw a picture of me prior and said, 'Wow, we wouldn’t even be friends!'”
"It wasn’t extremely common, but I was a little alarmed by some of the attention. My weight has been up and down since then, but every time I gain a little it gets me a little down thinking about those things people said."
– alanamablamaspama
Not Everything Goes After Losing Weight
"The loose skin is a bit unexpected."
– KeltarCentauri
"I haven’t experienced it myself, but surgery to remove skin takes a long time to recover. Longer than bariatric surgery and usually isn’t covered by insurance unless you have both."
– KatMagic1977
"It definitely does take a long time to recover. My Dad dropped a little over 200 pounds a few years back and decided to go through with skin removal surgery to deal with the excess. His procedure was extensive, as in he had skin taken from just about every part of his body excluding his head, and he went through hell for weeks in recovery, and he was bedridden for a lot of it."
– Jaew96
These Redditors shared their pleasantly surprising experiences.
Shopping
"I can buy clothes in any store I want."
– WaySavvyD
"When I lost weight I was dying to go find cute, smaller clothes and I really struggled. As someone who had always been restricted to one or two stores that catered to plus-sized clothing, a full mall of shops with items in my size was daunting. Too many options and not enough knowledge of brands that were good vs cheap. I usually went home pretty frustrated."
– ganache98012
No More Symptoms
"Lost about 80 pounds in the past year and a half, biggest thing that I’ve noticed that I haven’t seen mentioned on here yet is my acid reflux and heartburn are basically gone. I used to be popping tums every couple hours and now they just sit in the medicine cabinet collecting dust."
– colleennicole93
Expanding Capabilities
"I'm all for not judging people by their appearance and I recognise that there are unhealthy, unachievable beauty standards, but one thing that is undeniable is that I can just do stuff now. Just stamina and flexibility alone are worth it, appearance is tertiary at best."
– Ramblonius
People Change Their Tune
"How much nicer people are to you."
"My feet weren't 'wide' they were 'fat.'"
– LiZZygsu
"Have to agree. Lost 220 lbs, people make eye contact and hold open doors and stuff"
"And on the foot thing, I also lost a full shoe size numerically and also wear regular width now 😅"
– awholedamngarden
It's gonna take some getting used to.
Bones Everywhere
"Having bones. Collarbones, wrist bones, knee bones, hip bones, ribs. I have so many bones sticking out everywhere and it’s weird as hell."
– Princess-Pancake-97
"I noticed the shadow of my ribs the other day and it threw me, there’s a whole skeleton in here."
– bekastrange
Knee Pillow
"Right?! And they’re so … pointy! Now I get why people sleep with pillows between their legs - the knee bones laying on top of each other (side sleeper here) is weird and jarring."
– snic2030
"I lost only 40 pounds within the last year or so. I’m struggling to relate to most of these comments as I feel like I just 'slimmed down' rather than dropped a ton. But wow, the pillow between the knees at night. YES! I can relate to this. I think a lot of my weight was in my thighs. I never needed to do this up until recently."
– Strongbad23
More Mobility
"I’ve lost 100 lbs since 2020. It’s a collection of little things that surprise me. For at least 10 years I couldn’t put on socks, or tie my shoes. I couldn’t bend over and pick something up. I couldn’t climb a ladder to fix something. Simple things like that I can do now that fascinate me."
"Edit: Some additional little things are sitting in a chair with arms, sitting in a booth in a restaurant, being able to shop in a normal store AND not needing to buy the biggest size there, being able to easily wipe my butt, and looking down and being able to see my penis."
– dma1965
People making significant changes, whether for mental or physical health, can surely find a newfound perspective on life.
But they can also discover different issues they never saw coming.
That being said, overcoming any challenge in life is laudable, especially if it leads to gaining confidence and ditching insecurities.
