There's nowhere to go but up––or so we're told.
No, some people go down. All the way down. It can happen fast, and it's scary on top of it.
Redditor Aodhan88 asked: "What's the fastest way you've seen someone ruin their own life?" and we quickly discovered that these stories don't satisfy the desire for schadenfreude at all.
"Couple of guys..."
Couple of guys in my hometown were looking for something to steal so they could sell it to buy drugs.
They come to a house where no one was supposed to be home and one guy gets out of the car and goes to the house to steal a grill. A friend of the homeowner happened to be there and came out when he stepped onto the porch. He tells the friend that he is looking for his dog so the guy walks out into the yard to help look for it. The would be robber panics and pulls out a gun and shoots the man in the back of the head. At 21 he started a life sentence for a really stupid murder.
"My college buddy..."
Huffing Paint. My college buddy was an affable stoner type who liked psychedelics, weed, and drinking.
He was broke so he got into huffing paint over the summer, he passed out with a plastic bag full of spray paint over his face and ended up depriving his brain of oxygen and is now mentally disabled due to brain damage. Like, drooling slurring can't tie his own shoes or perform basic life tasks level disabled.
"Saw a guy..."
Saw a guy slide down a stair-rail and fall backwards 12 feet onto a concrete floor. Died at the hospital less than 24 hours later. From college student to dust in less than a day, pretty quick.
"Guy from my school..."
Guy from my school went to rob a corner shop at knife point.
He pulled up with his push bike, went into the store and threatened the shop keeper with a knife to give him all the money in the register.
The shop keeper refused and the robber was too p*ssy to do anything so he grabbed a pack of gum and ran out.
Twenty minutes later the robber realised he left his bike behind in his panic, so he went back to get it.
This was at the same time be police were questioning the shop keeper on the incident. They swiftly arrested him there and then.
Think he got 2 years...for stealing gum at knife point.
"My half brother..."
My half brother decided it was a good idea to try and rob the restaurant he worked at. Didn't wear a mask or try to hide his voice in any way. At the time, he was hopelessly addicted to crack so he obviously wasn't thinking straight when he convinced his dealer's gf to help him out. She secured a "gun" for him and he was dumb enough (or desperate enough) not to check it and didn't realize it was a bb gun.
They did manage to get out of the restaurant with $7,000, but the dealer and his very large friends were waiting for them when they came out. They beat the crap out of him, took the money and left him unconscious for the police. He got 7 years in prison for armed robbery and grand larceny.
He did manage to kick his drug habit in prison though.
"In less than 5 years..."
GiphyIn less than 5 years, one of my cousins was married twice, to two equally horrible people, and blew through two inheritances. He and his first wife trashed a house my grandmother let them live in for free and got mad when she asked him to pay for repairs. He is now completely alienated from family, including his parents, and disowned.
"Kid I went to high school with..."
Kid I went to high school with used to break into homes in his neighborhood to steal phones with his younger brother. They always did seem to have a couple of screws loose, but never thought they were capable of hurting anyone. Then one night they robbed the wrong house.
As they were sneaking into the kitchen, the owner of the house came in for a late night glass of water and caught them in the act. Unlucky for them, he also was a former Marine. They got into it but one of the kids had a knife, and started repeatedly stabbing the dude in the head. They ran off after that, but the next day they were arrested. One is still in Juvie 5 years later, the other was sentenced to 30 years in state prison.
"This happened to my brother."
GiphyThis happened to my brother. He's walking home and his buddy pulls up in a new car and asks if he wants to go for a ride. He gets in and they pull into the gas station and the guy said he had to go in and pay. My brother is sitting there when multiple police cars pull in and surround the car, guns drawn. The friend had stolen the car and robbed the gas station and went out the back. Took 15 minutes. Took months to convince the police he was innocent.
"I saw a guy..."
I saw a guy in the highway blow past me in a lifted truck doing about 120-130 mph hit a concrete divider. He was being chased by a state trooper.
If say that was the fastest way I've seen someone ruin their life.
"A few years back..."
A few years back, one of the students attending the university I work at got caught trying to sneak a sh!tload of drugs into a local nightclub. The first we found out about it was when some police officers turned up with a warrant to go through his room, and I was the lucky person chosen to go let them in.
So I opened the door, and oh dear lord there's drugs everywhere. If you've ever seen one of those old-timey pick-n-mix shops with all the sweets in big glass jars, imagine that but with pills and wraps of powder instead.
Everything else was all super neat and tidy and it was one of the cleanest student rooms I'd ever been in, just that every flat surface had a container full of drugs or some other sort of paraphernalia on it.
This student was in his 4th year of a masters degree, and due to finish in three months. He ended up being charged with Possession With Intent to Supply, and since a lot of the stuff he had in there was Class A, is now going to be in prison for a decade or two.
He was also expelled of course, and will still be on the hook for £60k of student debt afterwards.
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.