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Anonymous 911 Dispatchers Reveal The Stupidest Calls They've Gotten On The Job

Anonymous 911 Dispatchers Reveal The Stupidest Calls They've Gotten On The Job
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Anonymous 911 Dispatchers Reveal The Stupidest Calls They've Gotten On The Job

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People do dumb things. Sometimes, 911 dispatchers have to bear the brunt of ill-conceived choices when they receive emergency phone calls from people who have no idea how 911 works. Here are some personal favorites from dispatchers, who shared the dumbest calls they've ever received. Bless.

Only in Florida.

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Guy gets his truck stuck in the mud while out doing donuts at 3 AM and calls for help. Tell him he needs to pay a tow truck to winch him out. Guy gets angry and claims we are leaving him stranded in the dark (spooooky), tell him we can send an officer out to check on him if the area is unsafe. "Y'all got me f---ed up, I'm on probation and you tryin to send me back to jail!"

Tow truck arrives and while trying to winch him out, guy keeps taking off his clothes and trying to hook up with his girlfriend in the back seat...of the truck the driver is working on. Tow driver leaves. Guy calls back and is now VERY angry that tow driver didn't give his girlfriend a ride home, since he's gonna fight the cops when they show up. Additional officers were sent.

Calling the cops to ask permission to commit a crime... that's dumb. Also, meth is bad, don't do meth.

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I had a woman call 911 to ask if it was legal to sell a baby.

I had a guy call to report information on a drug dealer because the dealer had sold him the wrong drugs. The guy said this was an ongoing issue and he had finally had enough.

Doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result probably means you're doing it wrong.

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Repo companies in the area report their repos to us, just in case the owner decides to try and report the car stolen. I started my shift that day logging several when one of the owners calls in. We take his info, confirm it matches, and let him know it was reported as repossessed and to contact his finance company.

A little while later, he calls 911 again to let us know that he paid it up to date and the address they gave him to pick up the car didn't exist, so he wanted to report it stolen. We again refer him to his finance company.

A few hours later, he called 911 again. He checked his onboard GPS signal and saw it listed his car in another city, the next state over. So he had driven there and searched the city, but didn't find it. So it had to be stolen. We again explain it was repoed and to continue speaking with his financial institution.

The day carries on, and we eventually get to the end of the shift. As we are wrapping everything up for our shift up before night shift gets in, he calls 911 again. He found the tow yard his car was stored at, but it was closed for the night. He needed us to open it for him so he could claim his car. We explain that it was a private business and the car wasn't stolen, so we can't just bust in and take his car, he will have to claim the car once they are open in the morning. He was so moved by our logic that he decided..... to try reporting it as stolen again.

I thought demons lived in fire...

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Some lady wanted the fire department to come burn her house down because she thought a demon lived in it. I sent paramedics and police to check on her but I told her we'd be happy to burn her house down in a controlled training capacity if she wanted to donate it, but there was a lot of paperwork to get that started.

That frontier spirit hard at work.

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"I'm super drunk and I got run over by a sled." Now in northern Alberta typically this would mean a snowmobile and potentially life-threatening injuries. No, no. His kid hit his ankle bone with a wooden toboggan. Didn't even have a bruise.

Ha, "piping" hot. Get it?

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My husband used to dispatch before he was old enough to go to the police academy. We lived in a small town, ranked 3rd most dangerous in our state. Lots and lots of drug use. There was a woman who was honestly crazy. I don't know if she had mental problems before the drugs or if the drugs fried her brain but she was a regular caller. Some of her calls- she called to report a break-in because she fell asleep with her blanket wrapped around her but when she woke up it was bundled at her feet. She called one summer night (routinely got over 115 degrees in the summer) and said that she had walked 3 Miles from her apartment and needed a ride back because she was barefoot and her feet hurt. He asked her where her shoes were and she said she was carrying them. She walked 3 miles and didn't think to put them on.

Another call wasn't stupid but still stuck with me. It was a domestic violence call and when he asked what was going on the woman yelled: "he threw a piping hot chicken pot pie at me!" Something about her attention to detail I just thought was funny in an unfunny situation

Stop? More like slow.

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3 am. Got a call about a suspicious vehicle outside of her house. I start getting the description and get my officers en route when she says "They're leaving!" I get the direction they are headed and relay it; I've got 4 officers converging like a net on this guy.

Now that I've got a moment I ask the woman: "What exactly did they do?"

She replies: "They just stopped at the stop sign for a moment and then they moved on...."

PSA: don't deep fry a frozen turkey, you will have a bad time.

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1) Every Thanksgiving you'll always get the person who calls because they don't know how long to cook a turkey. Never fails.

2) Every Thanksgiving someone always puts a frozen turkey in a deep fryer - usually in a trailer home - and a fire "surprisingly" occurs.

3) People who have warrants on themselves love calling to complain and ask to see the police in person for a dispute. They don't seem to remember we look up everyone in the dispute, not just the accused.

Ok, I have questions.

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A lady ran over herself with her own car. She called to let us know she was okay.

This was fall of 2012. Hope she's uh, still doing okay.

Edit: Damn, that blew up. For those wondering, this was in CA. The lady was calm, laughed nervously/embarrassed a couple times, absolutely refused any type of response (even Quiet from the FD), and didn't say how it happened.

We took down her info, gave the typical Safety Admonishment, told her to call back if she needed to.

This level of petty is inspirational, not sorry.

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Once my dad got a call from the 911 dispatch. At first, he was really confused because he didn't call them in the first place. They asked

"Sir do you have a daughter?"

"Yes. Why?"

"Well, she just called and claimed you broke her heart!"

Apparently, my sister got in trouble when she was about 5 or 6 and called 911 claiming "My daddy broke my heart." She hung up in embarrassment after the dispatcher began laughing.

1 2 3 4 5. How are these people alive?

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I've been a dispatcher for about 7 years now in a medium size county in Florida.

  • Every year on July 4th and New Years we get calls about gunshots. Every single time the caller is perfectly convinced they're gunshots and couldn't possibly be fireworks. They'll say they hear automatic weapons or my personal favorite "rapid-fire shotguns". And every single time a deputy goes out to investigate, it turns out to be the unlikely culprit of fireworks.
  • I had one woman call 911 to tell me she found a cell phone on the ground. That's it.
  • Irate elderly male calls 911 while standing in the Sheriff's Office lobby to report the clerk not being helpful. When I told him that's not something you use a 911 line for, he went apesh_t, going as far as threatening to break into the office and shoot me. He was subsequently arrested.
  • Male was arrested for domestic battery, called 911 from the backseat of the patrol car and stated he was being unlawfully imprisoned. When I told him the only thing I could do for him was to send him more deputies, he said "...no thanks" and hung up. He then proceeded to call three more times looking for a different answer. We told the deputies on scene, they took his phone away and added a charge of misuse of 911.
  • Had a woman call in stating she accidentally took too much melatonin. She started getting hysterical when she felt the effects of her overdose. She was getting sleepy.

Blast this pesky contraption!

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I'm not a 911 dispatcher but I'm a central station operator (I'm the lady that asks what your password is when your alarm goes off)

Been at my job 5 years. My favorite call ever was the second call I made to the house of an old couple, their alarm had gone off about 30 min prior, they weren't sure why the alarm was sounding so they asked me for the police to be dispatched. On the second call, the wife answered the phone, gave me all the correct information and then passed the phone to the officer. The alarm was still sounding but there was another weird beep in the background. We walked the owners through shutting their system off but this beep was still going off. The officer was getting frustrated and the homeowners weren't sure why the alarm as still sounding so they wanted me to shut the alarm down. I told him that our system was shut off and the beeping wasn't from us. The officer then went looking for the sound. He found out it was their alarm clock sounding. I swear I heard him roll his eyes through the phone and I tried my best not to laugh. He handed the phone back to the older couple who still had no idea what was going on but said the officer told them everything was okay.

Tldr: old couple has us dispatch PD because of strange beeping noise. Officer arrives to find out it was their alarm clock.

Come on, really...

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Too many to count. If I had to pick a favorite I'd have to choose the time a concerned citizen called in an animal stuck in a tree. That animal...was a bird.

Ohhh you have warrants? Yes, we will definitely give you a ride.

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Got a call from a woman in the wee hours of the morning, clearly drunk and slurring.

.

She says : "I wan shu to send an ocifer to mah housh and takh me to the bar, wait while ah git drunk, an then takh me home."

.

Me: "Ma'am I think you are looking for a taxi service."

.

Her: Well you guys shushpended mah license!"

.

Time passes...

.

Her: "Okay! Ah'm ready! Come n' git me!"

.

Me: Ma'am, I already told you, we are not a taxi..."

.

Her: "AH GOTS WARRANTS!"

.

Me: "Oh, well in that case..."

.

They said she fought like a prizefighter.

"Her hands are all blue...our caller never even noticed" that her neighbor had blown her brains out.

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We have a call that every new trainee at my county listens to during training because it highlights how completely oblivious our callers can truly be. A neighbor enters her friend's house because she's not answering the door. She finds the patient on the couch sleeping. She calls 911 because she's not waking up. She says "She's not moving, not answering me or waking up. It looks like she has been cooking with blueberries, her hands are all blue." Operator already knows that means she's dead. We send everyone out, EMS arrives on scene first and immediately backs out. According to the deputy that arrived right after, she had a gun in hand, shot herself in the head and it splattered ALL over the wall behind her. Our caller never even noticed.

All crustaceans matter!

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Working right now. My favorite call of all time was up in arms about lobsters being reserved at the local grocery store. He had a fit and called back a few times. Screaming and crying from the Seafood counter in a store I used to work for. I eventually sent an officer. Threw an even bigger fit in the store. Dinner was canceled and lobster man spent a night in jail. I called my old co-worker to get the play by play from inside the store.

"Most 911 calls are pretty dumb." Yeah, kinda picked up on that.

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Going to let you in on a secret. Most 911 calls are pretty dumb, and not emergencies. I work overnight so most of the time the calls we get are pretty legit. But occasionally...

I've had the guy call in because he was looking at the weather radar and said that law enforcement, NOAA, and the CIA were covering up the fact that the storm he was looking at was going to destroy the city. There was no storm. There was no rain or wind. It was clear outside, had been for weeks and remained that way for weeks afterward.

Another woman called in because she said someone broke into her home and was now currently sitting on her couch looking at his phone. She said some noise woke her up and she saw the light from his phone when she opened the bedroom door. I asked the usual questions including if she had a dog and whether it was alerted to the noise. She said the dog was asleep on the bed and that he usually barks at strange noises (huge clue that nothing is happening, most dogs will alert to strange noises at night). Officer goes on scene doesn't see anything. Turns out the light she saw was from one of those electronic picture frames, that she owned, and knew about.

Another break-in call. Woman calls at around 2:30 in the morning. Says she heard someone knocking on her door and heard some noises outside. I've got 2 or 3 officers headed her way. Through our conversation, I find out she is hiding in the closet. Then, I ask when the last time she heard or saw something strange. She gets very quiet and says that she last heard something at around 11 pm. Turns out she had been working up the nerve to call 911, sitting in the closet for 3 and a half hours.

These are some of the more memorable ones I've had recently.

Well that's one way to Escape the Room...

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I'm not a 911 dispatcher, however, I have a funny story involving my work and a 911 call. I work as a Game Master for an Escape Room company. We have a particular room that involves a phone, in which you need to input the correct phone number into it to progress in the room. It's not a real phone. But, one of the players had said, "Dial 911." Their Apple watch then dialed 911. They apologized and said that they were "hostages" in an escape room. Luckily the dispatcher understood they were playing a game and not real hostages.

For those wondering, if you input 911 into the phone in that room, it will say something along the lines of "You are unable to make the call as dialed."

Oh man I definitely don't want my phone passed around after I die.

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A friend of mine wasn't 911 dispatch but he is an officer who had to work a desk for a period of time.

He got these two calls in successive days:

Day 1: "I can't find my lotto ticket and I'm sure I won!"

Day 2: "I live in Canada, but I got a text from your area code that I don't recognize and it says 'she's dead. How do we hide it?..."

The first call was dismissed. The second actually led to two arrests for murder

When you know you're screwed...

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Answered a 911 call from a gentleman stating someone was chasing him. He had no idea where he was other than it was near the beach. I used the phase 2 location from his cell phone to start officers while I tried to get more information because English was not his first language and he seemed extremely panicked. He's in a vehicle and another vehicle was chasing him. I heard sirens in the background and asked him if he knew who was chasing him. He said yes that it was border patrol and he was scared and refused to pull over for them. I convinced him to pull over for one of my officers and that was the end of it.

Tldr: illegal immigrant called 911 because border patrol was chasing him.

Worst. Three-way. Ever.

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At around 7am we got a transfer call from California call to our 911 center stating that a woman and her husband were being assaulted in their home by a stranger. No other information was provided except for the address. No prior history on the address either.

About half a dozen officers set up a small perimeter around the house to prevent the suspect from running. A highly intoxicated male tries to run out into the backyard and ends up being tased and detained. Sounds pretty standard for the most part.

Turns out that the original female victim had tried to video chat her friend in California while hooking up with a stranger that she and her husband brought home from a club the night before. The stranger didn't like this, so he starts screaming and freaking out to end the call. To the person in California, it seemed like her friend was being assaulted, which she definitely was not. The husband was in the corner and when the officers tried to speak to him to clarify the situation, he was too embarrassed and refuses to cooperate. The guy who was tased was evaluated by EMS and everyone was free to go about their business once there was some clarity on the situation.

This kid is going places. Nowhere is a place.

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I used to be an emergency call taker for an ambulance service in the UK (so, 999 rather than 911!). One call started like this:

"Ambulance Emergency, what is the nature of the emergency?" (distant echoey voice) "I'm stuck in a washing machine!"

I thought it was a prank call (we used to get a lot) but apparently not. The ambulance crew knew the address well - there was a guy in his late teens who lived there and his thing seemed to be to squeeze into small spaces when his parents were out. He always kept his mobile phone with him in case he got stuck, which was quite often.

The "Deep State" strikes again.

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A very well spoken lady called me to say that someone had stolen her laptop while she was working in a leper colony in Chelsea, London. This lady called almost every day, usually to tell me that MI5 had put a chip in her brain to track her activities or that her assigned officer from the Royal Protection Group had not shown up for work. Funny that. Edited to add that I was a 999 call handler/dispatcher in London.

This is DEFINITELY how horror movies start.

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Man called me twice, at 3:00 and 3:30-ish in the morning, to tell me about the "Swamp Things." He was so drunk, I almost sent someone out on a wellness check, just to make sure he didn't pickle himself to death (though to be fair, I suspect he had long experience).

He "Wanted it on record that if anyone hurt one of 'em, he was gone' have they a**." I assured him that I had entered that into the report in large letters (this was, in fact, true).

He ended the second call with, "I seen 'em when I was a kid, and they're back!" Helluva thing to hear at 3:30 am on a solo shift. That sh_t's how horror movies start.

People Reveal The Weirdest Thing About Themselves

Reddit user Isitjustmedownhere asked: 'Give an example; how weird are you really?'

Let's get one thing straight: no one is normal. We're all weird in our own ways, and that is actually normal.

Of course, that doesn't mean we don't all have that one strange trait or quirk that outweighs all the other weirdness we possess.

For me, it's the fact that I'm almost 30 years old, and I still have an imaginary friend. Her name is Sarah, she has red hair and green eyes, and I strongly believe that, since I lived in India when I created her and there were no actual people with red hair around, she was based on Daphne Blake from Scooby-Doo.

I also didn't know the name Sarah when I created her, so that came later. I know she's not really there, hence the term 'imaginary friend,' but she's kind of always been around. We all have conversations in our heads; mine are with Sarah. She keeps me on task and efficient.

My mom thinks I'm crazy that I still have an imaginary friend, and writing about her like this makes me think I may actually be crazy, but I don't mind. As I said, we're all weird, and we all have that one trait that outweighs all the other weirdness.

Redditors know this all too well and are eager to share their weird traits.

It all started when Redditor Isitjustmedownhere asked:

"Give an example; how weird are you really?"

Monsters Under My Bed

"My bed doesn't touch any wall."

"Edit: I guess i should clarify im not rich."

– Practical_Eye_3600

"Gosh the monsters can get you from any angle then."

– bikergirlr7

"At first I thought this was a flex on how big your bedroom is, but then I realized you're just a psycho 😁"

– zenOFiniquity8

Can You See Why?

"I bought one of those super-powerful fans to dry a basement carpet. Afterwards, I realized that it can point straight up and that it would be amazing to use on myself post-shower. Now I squeegee my body with my hands, step out of the shower and get blasted by a wide jet of room-temp air. I barely use my towel at all. Wife thinks I'm weird."

– KingBooRadley

Remember

"In 1990 when I was 8 years old and bored on a field trip, I saw a black Oldsmobile Cutlass driving down the street on a hot day to where you could see that mirage like distortion from the heat on the road. I took a “snapshot” by blinking my eyes and told myself “I wonder how long I can remember this image” ….well."

– AquamarineCheetah

"Even before smartphones, I always take "snapshots" by blinking my eyes hoping I'll remember every detail so I can draw it when I get home. Unfortunately, I may have taken so much snapshots that I can no longer remember every detail I want to draw."

"Makes me think my "memory is full.""

– Reasonable-Pirate902

Same, Same

"I have eaten the same lunch every day for the past 4 years and I'm not bored yet."

– OhhGoood

"How f**king big was this lunch when you started?"

– notmyrealnam3

Not Sure Who Was Weirder

"Had a line cook that worked for us for 6 months never said much. My sous chef once told him with no context, "Baw wit da baw daw bang daw bang diggy diggy." The guy smiled, left, and never came back."

– Frostygrunt

Imagination

"I pace around my house for hours listening to music imagining that I have done all the things I simply lack the brain capacity to do, or in some really bizarre scenarios, I can really get immersed in these imaginations sometimes I don't know if this is some form of schizophrenia or what."

– RandomSharinganUser

"I do the same exact thing, sometimes for hours. When I was young it would be a ridiculous amount of time and many years later it’s sort of trickled off into almost nothing (almost). It’s weird but I just thought it’s how my brain processes sh*t."

– Kolkeia

If Only

"Even as an adult I still think that if you are in a car that goes over a cliff; and right as you are about to hit the ground if you jump up you can avoid the damage and will land safely. I know I'm wrong. You shut up. I'm not crying."

– ShotCompetition2593

Pet Food

"As a kid I would snack on my dog's Milkbones."

– drummerskillit

"Haha, I have a clear memory of myself doing this as well. I was around 3 y/o. Needless to say no one was supervising me."

– Isitjustmedownhere

"When I was younger, one of my responsibilities was to feed the pet fish every day. Instead, I would hide under the futon in the spare bedroom and eat the fish food."

– -GateKeep-

My Favorite Subject

"I'm autistic and have always had a thing for insects. My neurotypical best friend and I used to hang out at this local bar to talk to girls, back in the late 90s. One time he claimed that my tendency to circle conversations back to insects was hurting my game. The next time we went to that bar (with a few other friends), he turned and said sternly "No talking about bugs. Or space, or statistics or other bullsh*t but mainly no bugs." I felt like he was losing his mind over nothing."

"It was summer, the bar had its windows open. Our group hit it off with a group of young ladies, We were all chatting and having a good time. I was talking to one of these girls, my buddy was behind her facing away from me talking to a few other people."

"A cloudless sulphur flies in and lands on little thing that holds coasters."

"Cue Jordan Peele sweating gif."

"The girl notices my tension, and asks if I am looking at the leaf. "Actually, that's a lepidoptera called..." I looked at the back of my friend's head, he wasn't looking, "I mean a butterfly..." I poked it and it spread its wings the girl says "oh that's a BUG?!" and I still remember my friend turning around slowly to look at me with chastisement. The ONE thing he told me not to do."

"I was 21, and was completely not aware that I already had a rep for being an oddball. It got worse from there."

– Phormicidae

*Teeth Chatter*

"I bite ice cream sometimes."

RedditbOiiiiiiiiii

"That's how I am with popsicles. My wife shudders every single time."

monobarreller

Never Speak Of This

"I put ice in my milk."

– GTFOakaFOD

"You should keep that kind of thing to yourself. Even when asked."

– We-R-Doomed

"There's some disturbing sh*t in this thread, but this one takes the cake."

– RatonaMuffin

More Than Super Hearing

"I can hear the television while it's on mute."

– Tira13e

"What does it say to you, child?"

– Mama_Skip

Yikes!

"I put mustard on my omelettes."

– Deleted User

"Oh."

– NotCrustOr-filling

Evened Up

"Whenever I say a word and feel like I used a half of my mouth more than the other half, I have to even it out by saying the word again using the other half of my mouth more. If I don't do it correctly, that can go on forever until I feel it's ok."

"I do it silently so I don't creep people out."

– LesPaltaX

"That sounds like a symptom of OCD (I have it myself). Some people with OCD feel like certain actions have to be balanced (like counting or making sure physical movements are even). You should find a therapist who specializes in OCD, because they can help you."

– MoonlightKayla

I totally have the same need for things to be balanced! Guess I'm weird and a little OCD!

Close up face of a woman in bed, staring into the camera
Photo by Jen Theodore

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.

Man's waist line
Santhosh Vaithiyanathan/Unsplash

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.