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People Break Down Their Craziest 'It's Just A Scratch' Experiences

People Break Down Their Craziest 'It's Just A Scratch' Experiences
Image by jaymethunt from Pixabay

Those who remember Monty Python and the Holy Grail can recall a famous scene in which the Black Knight tenaciously denied King Arthur passage across a bridge and lost all his limbs in the process.


"Now stand aside, worthy adversary," the King told the Knight.

With blood spurting out from his severed arm, the Knight dismissed the injury as "just a scratch," and continued on with their combat.

terry gilliam film GIFGiphy

In many cases of injury, adrenaline kicks in and the shock of what happened sometimes overtakes feeling the pain.

Being numb from what can be unbearably excruciating convinces many injured people – like our valiant Knight – to keep on keeping on, even though all his limbs have been lopped off.

Wondering about the kinds of physical trauma people have played down, Redditor Madameknitsalot asked:

What's your, "Tis but a scratch!" moment?


Collapsed Lung

"I am a bartender in a nightclub. One night while working I was pouring a drink while I reached back with my other hand to open a fridge, and that's when I heard a 'pop' and got a huge pain in my back/shoulder area. the pain was pretty bad, but I was sure it was a pulled muscle and there wouldnt be much point in seeing a doctor other than getting meds. So I waited. fought through the pain which was so bad at times it was making it hard to breath."

"that was a Friday, i called off Saturday and had Sunday monday Tuesday off before I went back to work wednesday, once I biked into work. in all I waited 9 days total before finally deciding to go to the ER."

"I had a collapsed lung. called a spontaneous pneumothorax. 20 min after getting to the er I was put into emergency surgery. I was essentially breathing with only one lung. and any major impact To my chest would have collapsed the other and probably killed me."

Jon-Longson

Not The 'Rona

"Happened to me when I was in school just 3 months ago. I suddenly started not being able to breathe but I was like 'I am sure its nothing' when I got home I actually slept for 3 hours but woke up from the pain. Me and my family thought it was corona so we went to a hospital. I was quite shocked to learn I had a collapsed lung. But the worst part wasnt the lung, it was the operation and the aftermath. Having a tube inside you for a week hurts like hell. Havent slept for 5 days during my stay there."

Janhan_

Hit By A Car

"I got hit by a car my freshman year of high school. I went flying lost consciousness for a split second when I hit the ground (thank god for helmet). When I came to people were all around me asking if I was ok, and what happened etc. I was like 'oh yea, I'm good. I'm gonna just get back on my bike and go now.' But didn't really move. Then people started asking me to call an ambulance and my mom etc. I was like 'why? I'm good.' I even told my mom on the phone I was still gonna bike home.but as I was saying that, the people around me had started to move one of my legs and I watched as my foot proceeded to NOT move. I had broken both bones in my leg completely in half and part of ankle.

"Just pure adrenaline and shock. I also vividly remember thinking 'huh this is what it feels like to get hit by a car'. Also the leg wasn't setting right (probably from movement) and the doctor decided to put me on laughing gas as he tried to crack my bones back into place. Was in a stupor laughing as I felt my bones grind."

Twosteppindepression

Ant Bites

"A couple weeks ago, I stepped on an ant hill and got a bunch of ant bites on my ankles. 3-4 days later, the itching was unbearable. I wasn't sleeping, my legs were swollen, and no amount of benadryl or antihistamine cream was helping the itching. I finally went to a clinic to get a shot or whatever, because I clearly having some sort of allergic reaction. It was a staph infection that had spread from my ankles up to my knees. I would have died if this 1920 instead of 2020. I was on antibiotics for 10 days, and now several weeks later, the dead skin from the infection is still flaking off."

– level 1onzie9

Effects Of Shock

"I got hit by a car while riding my bicycle,flew through the air, bounced off his windshield breaking his windshield, my helmet and two vertebrae. Then thrown to the ground where my kneecap shattered and bone was sticking out of the skin. And as I lay there in shock (unaware of how badly I was injured) I thought 'I might be able to get back on my bike and ride home.'"

Not_you_HB1sjFSPE7

The Thing About Extreme ADHD

"So, it's fascinating."

"People with ADHD make *excellent* positions in triage / handling emergencies. I explain to others that it's like our brains are always underclocked, starving for stimulant, and nothing can maintain our interest for long because we burn through the unique information too quickly. Our brains are constantly seeking that 'high' of the thrill of unique experience, just to maintain operations and survive."

"It's why there's the oxymoron of 'hyperfocus...' I can sit and study something for hours, figuring out some new game's mechanics and min/maxing my build... because it's giving me what I need. I wish to heck I could control what I hyperfocused on. ADHD meds takes away my hyperfocus, but it at least allows me to (usually) work on what pays the bills... even if I'm at a quarter of the ability as when I'm hyperfocused."

"During an emergency, I am suddenly operating at 'normal' operations. Information is flowing in fast and hard, the brain's on a spike of natural stimulant, and I am more rational and clear-headed than anyone around me."

"Having jobs that constantly vary what I'm working on, dealing with high-priority customers that have an emergency, working on problems that require a unique solution and have strong time pressures... these are where I thrive."

Darkphibre

Not Finished Playing

"I broke my neck on a huge shorebreak wave and didn't want to leave the beach so I continued swimming and playing volleyball until my friends noticed my neck was swelling up bigger than my head."

throwawayMambo5

Getting To First Base

"Back in my baseball days, when I was pitching. I completely lost a pitch, and it beaned a guy in the jaw. He throws his bat down, glares at me with the glariest of glares ever glared, SPITS OUT BLOOD, then calmly runs to first base as though nothing happened."

"It was terrifyingly bada**."

el_pobbster

person holding photo of three girls near chainlink fence
Anita Jankovic on Unsplash

Life is all about learning new things, including learning new things about the people in your life. Sometimes, the things you learn are shocking, disgusting, or even scary.

I was the new kid in town when I was in fifth grade and my first friend was this quiet (and cute) boy in my class. He and I remained friends through middle school, and even though we drifted apart in high school, our interactions when we ran into each other in the halls or the cafeteria were really nice.

All throughout school and even beyond, he remained quiet, polite, and reserved. Just a few years ago, I read a news article written about him. He had apparently fatally wounded his father after an argument.

I had to reread the article several times to make sure it was really about my old friend. I think about it a lot, and still can't believe it!

I'm not the only one that has a shocking story like that. A lot of Redditors learned shocking or scary things about people from their childhood, and are ready to share.

It all started when Redditor ValuableHovercraft90 asked:

"What's the scariest thing you have found out about someone from your childhood (old friends, teachers, etc)?"

So Creepy

"That the boy who lived across the street and moved when I was 6 is still obsessed with me and my sister 30+ years later and posts ramblings on Facebook with our names and that he's going to be with us. Pretty terrifying honestly."

– mrscrawfish

The Worst List

"A neighbour died when he was 30. Police searched a trailer he owned and found weapons, bombs and a list of people he wanted to kill. My uncle was on that list."

– Flashy_Somewhere_648

"I'm glad this ended the way it did."

– CreepyCandidate4449

Terrifying

"One of my best friends (and locker partner) from high school was kidnapped by terrorists in Iraq. After a nightmare of 6+ months, all went silent. We buried an empty casket in his memory 10 years later."

– francois_du_nord

"This is horrifying. How incredibly sad for family to never get any closure. Very sad to read this. :("

– fizzycherryseltzer

"About 15 years ago my dad received a very good offer for work in Iraq, as a construction specialist. He was considering going, since at the same time the financial crisis started in Europe, but then one of his friends, a civil engineer, was kidnapped. Never returned back either."

– 19lgkrn70

"Same thing for my dad old coworker told him how great the money was. Dude got sniped working on a radio tower or something. My dad luckily was like, "I got a wife and family that would kill me for doing something so dangerous.""

– tristanjones

End Of The Friendship

"One of my dad's good friends, and my "uncle", just stopped coming around one day. I was told he was always busy with work, away, etc."

"Turns out, he killed 3 people in a drug deal gone bad and got life in prison."

"What's scary, is that we were over at his house for a weekend BBQ with a bunch of people earlier in the day of the night he did it, and it happened at his house."

– pnwking509

School Friends

"Don't know if it was scary, but I grew up with a kid whose birthday was the day before mine so we almost always shared birthdays in elementary school. We were friends, even spent the night at his house growing up. Later on in our teens, he started getting into some really dark stuff. I recognize that now as his being a sociopath, but like most everybody else at the time, figured it was just him going through some kind of emo phase. Over the years, we lost touch but I would occasionally run into him around town and our meetings were cordial, if not friendly."

"Last year, he was sentenced to 35 years in prison for killing a man back in 1993, roughly 3 years after we got out of High School. Apparently he, his sister and another man lured this guy out to the boonies and killed him to steal money he had gotten in an insurance settlement."

"The only reason they were caught is the other guy got religion, felt remorse and went on the local TV station and aired a confession before turning himself in (He got 25 to life)."

– 530_Oldschoolgeek

"A girl I went to school with did the same thing. She was the nicest girl, got good grades & was kind of a dork. Mixed with the wrong people after graduation. She and two others lured an old man into an abandoned building, stabbed him and robbed him. He later died from his wounds."

– HereF0rTheSnacks

The Worst Afternoon

"I had a friend in grade school who was being raised by her single dad. She had a unique name and pretty face. She never talked about her mom, and she was super outgoing, so all us kids just made friends with her quickly. It was weird her dad never brought her to our birthday parties, even though she was always invited, but we didn’t think much of it. A couple times, she was allowed to ride the bus home with me after school, and we played and had fun until her dad came to pick her up. Later in the school year, she invited me to ride the bus to her house, and my mom agreed. I was 10. It was the scariest afternoon of my young life. I cannot articulate the extreme tension in her home. We weren’t allowed to make any noise, and we mostly stayed outside, me desperate for my mom to arrive."

"Her dad screamed at us for opening the door, and I was too nervous to go into the house to use the restroom. I knew she was embarrassed that there were no snacks or comforting interactions, like at my house. I didn’t really tell anyone how uncomfortable the experience was. After that day, I didn’t hang out with her a lot. We were in different classes, drifted apart, and decades later, when my own daughter asked to go to a friend’s house, I thought about that girl."

"As an adult, I figured out her dad probably worked a night shift and tried to sleep during the day…or he was an alcoholic who was really angry. Maybe both? I looked her up on social media, and thanks to her unique name and face, I recognized her immediately. She’s a perfectly well-adjusted woman with a beautiful family. She even had pictures of her kids with her dad and tributes to him as the greatest father and grandpa. Her whole page made me wonder what the hell I experienced that afternoon in the 4th grade?"

– OlderAndTired

School Is Supposed To Be Safe!

"In our school, we had something called "de halte." In English, it means "the halt" literally translated. Basically time out. BIf you had a meltdown in class or you were just a little sh*thead, you were sent there for 15 minutes or so to cool off.

The de hatle teacher got fired and jailed for breaking 4 different wrists of 4 different students by bending them the wrong way..."

– Ok_Win7358

*Skin Crawling*

​"There was this classmate a grade below me but all grades shared the same drama class. She was weird and kind of "off." I tried to befriend her at one point and was rebuffed. It later came out that she was actually an almost 30-year-old woman who would show up in a new area claiming to be a 15-year-old runaway. Kind of freaked me out."

jackfaire

It turns out it was a good thing that the friendship didn't work out!

Group of people dining out at a restaurant
Dan Gold on Unsplash

When we think of the term "red flags," we're quick to think of red flags that might appear in a problematic or abusive relationship.

But red flags can appear in any place in our life, especially the workplace or places that consumers frequent, like big box stores and restaurants.

When it comes to restaurant red flags, these are important to note, as they could have a negative impact on a consumer's health.

Redditor FlintTheDad asked:

"What's an immediate red flag at a restaurant?"

Fair Enough

"When you see the owner breaking apart frozen chicken on the curb outback."

- Mourning-Poo

High Humidity

"High humidity inside."

- Presitigious_Gold_585

"Yes! The small that causes is unmistakable."

- TemperatureTop246

Sticky Furniture

"All of the furniture and menus are weirdly sticky..."

- Silver_Sunshine360

"I know what *some* of that is. Some furniture and cleaning solutions aren't compatible. The cleaning spray reacts with the finish on the table tops, and softens, it, which makes it feel a bit sticky, and dulls it super fast... but it's the sanitizer cleaner they use for *everything*, and they don't want to have to deal with a separate cleaner for certain surfaces."

"I used to sell commercial office furniture, and we'd run into this issue sometimes. The worst was when a company asked us to source some tables they found from a local craftsman (since we were already an approved vendor in their system, they often had us buy and deliver stuff for them). Beautiful, hand-made stuff."

"So we bought them and arranged for the delivery and placement. When we got to the site and saw where they wanted them, I cringed... I knew the tables were finished in shellac, and they were having us put them in their lounge area, where I knew they often had events with drinks."

"Shellac dissolves in alcohol. Spilling a drink on it can ruin the finish. Before we left, I left a note on the tables about being careful and emailed the client some care tips. The NEXT DAY they sent us pictures of the ruined finish, asking, 'What is wrong with our tables?!'"

- NecroJoe

Sounds Fishy

"A seafood restaurant should NOT smell fishy."

- turtyurt

"And conversely, a seafood MARKET that does not smell fishy is indeed fishy."

- FourMeterRabbit

A Specific Smell

"That *smell.*"

"You know the one. floors feel a little slippery/slimy underfoot and it smells like they've been mopping the place with the same dirty mop and bucket water for weeks."

"This isn't something you're likely to see in a nice place but I've encountered it in more fast-casual dining places than I care to remember."

- y2knole

"THAT smell. It always reminds me of yeast rolls. I guess it's bacteria in the mop water that has been setting in that bucket for three days."

- SpeelingChamp

Restroom Cleanliness

"Dirty restrooms."

- carboncanyondesign

"This is a dead giveaway. If they can't keep part of the restaurant that the public DOES see clean, you can imagine how the non-public facing parts look."

- OkaySureBye

"Health inspector here. The key is to look for build-up that looks like it's been there more than a day. Most places don't have bathroom attendants and it's unrealistic to expect public bathrooms to be spotless every minute of the day."

- Vives_solo_una_vez

The Right Audience

"Whenever I have friends come to visit me in Osaka and they're dying to try some authentic ramen. My goto line is:"

"'Look for the most run-down looking, back ally shack you can, the more run-down looking; the better. Guaranteed It'll be the best ramen you'll ever have!'"

"And to anyone who happens to read this, no, Ichiran is NOT the best reman joint. It's nice don't get me wrong but please ask around, research ramen in the area you're visiting, I guarantee you there's SO much better out there!"

- kevo998

"I look for people of that ethnicity eating there. Mexican restaurant with only white people? It might be good. Mexican restaurant with Mexicans wearing high-vis shirts? S**t's going be fire. Bonus points if there’s a grocery store attached."

"The same thing goes for Asian restaurants sans the high-vis shirts."

- PsychoticMessiah

Too Many Variables

"A huge menu."

- dnb_4eva

"A huge VARIED menu."

"Places like Chinese, Mexican, and Indian restaurants generally have large menus, but most items use the same base ingredients."

"It's the places that try to incorporate lots of wildly different dishes that you want to avoid."

- MagnusPI

Unexpected Restaurant Guests

"A raccoon falling through the ceiling tiles. 1:00 AM, drunk as h**l, looking for something to eat, and I found a dive that was still open. I ordered my food, and while waiting for my order, a raccoon fell from the ceiling."

"The waitress ran to the back screaming. The cook came out armed with a cleaver and chased it into the kitchen. The look on his face was like it had happened before. Other people eating there were in shock and got up and left."

"Mystery meat: the new special. Get me the f**k out of there."

- alwaystired707

That Wait Time

"I immediately look to see if there is anyone actually eating. If there are a half dozen tables with no food on them, and people looking anxiously to the kitchen, I'm out."

- scotttr3b

Cleaning Response Time

"Multiple dirty tables that haven’t been cleared. If the restaurant isn’t crowded, staff should have time to clean them. If it is crowded, staff should be trying to turn tables over quickly."

"Dirty tables mean they are either severely understaffed or the staff just doesn’t care. Either way, you will be waiting a long time."

- 787la57la47al

Inappropriate Smells

"Once went into a restaurant that boasted the biggest Cinnamon Rolls in the city/state... Only for there to be a pervasive smell of absolutely raw stagnate sewage throughout the dining room. Needless to say, did not return."

- nekroves

Construction Said It Best

"A green flag for a restaurant is when you see a lot of construction workers going there for lunch. You'll know it's cheap and good, hearty food."

"In my old city, there was this tiny little family-owned Chinese restaurant with delicious and cheap lunch specials. Every construction worker downtown sat at the counter at the front for lunch."

"Meanwhile, the waiters would be in this little back room watching TV and the chef must have been at least 70 years old. The food was genuinely so delicious and filling. Probably not good for your cholesterol but so tasty!"

- okaymoose

Atmosphere Matters

"Not a red flag about the food but if a place has their music up so loud I can’t hear the person I’m with, then I won’t eat there."

- Adro87

"Conversely, if it's TOO quiet; as in, not only is the sound system way too low, but if the customers are also weirdly quiet (barely having conversations, just sort of sitting there) and the atmosphere seems almost stifling."

"A couple of years ago we walked into a gastropub in Scotland just like this - very low music, the room was half full (and this was at peak lunch time), and everyone who was there were just sitting, looking sullen, barely speaking, waiting for their food. Just really... odd... vibes."

"After five minutes of sitting at the bar trying to get the attention of staff (who were all standing around looking at their phones), we left and went to a definitely *not fancy* cafe down the block that was the absolutely opposite: people just seemed happy to be there, staff were attentive, and the vibe was really welcoming."

- Good_Difference_2837

The Ultimate Red Flag

"Gordon Ramsey walking in with a camera crew."

- Tint-kicker

"One of the local restaurants we like was recently closed for a bit due to filming for 'Kitchen Nightmares.'"

"My husband still likes to get their food, but I'm waiting until the episode airs!"

- Lington

No restaurant is going to be perfect 100 percent of the time. They're going to have a slow night or poor response time or get some orders wrong from time to time.

But there are far more problematic behaviors and characteristics to find in a restaurant that are perfectly good reasons to never go back there again, no matter how good they may have been in the past.