“Something’s Not Right”: Unforgettable Stories of People Avoiding Close Shaves By Their Gut Feeling
In this gripping compilation of stories, you'll encounter moments when fate hangs in the balance, when the choices made in the blink of an eye determine life's trajectory. These thrilling tales recount the experiences of those who faced life's shadows head-on, finding strength and fortitude in the face of imminent danger. Prepare to be captivated by a collection of gripping stories where danger lurks just beneath the surface, unseen until the very last moment.
1. Holiday Nightmare Averted
My sister since she was about 5 was always obsessed with tsunamis and would always ask my dad every night before she went to sleep if there would be a tsunami that night (we lived on a beach).
About 5 years later when our family was holidaying in Samoa an earthquake struck at about 6am. It was only a dull low rumble but went on for over a minute. Everyone at the resort woke up and went outside for a few minutes then went back to bed.
My sister, having been obsessed with tsunamis, ran down to look at the water and noticed the sea going out and saved a lot of lives including my own.
There was about a minute from her noticing till the tsunami hit. Luckily for us there was a cliff right behind the resort if not a lot more people would have been killed.
So something like a gut feeling 5 years in the making.
2. Trust Your Guts
I went to hospital with shortness of breath and my heart racing. They did a chest x-ray, blood test for blood clots, ECG, and a few other tests but all came back normal.
After observing me overnight everything still looked good, oxygen saturation was perfect, my heart rate was still a bit elevated but nothing too crazy, and it seemed that it was likely leftover symptoms from a bad virus that I'd had a week or so earlier.
The ER doctor asks me how I would feel if they sent me home and I just had a bad feeling about it all. I told him as such and that I had no real basis for it except that I just felt off about it.
He said fair enough, let's try one more test and if that comes back negative then we'll send you up to General Medicine and see if they can track something down.
That test was a VQ scan that found that despite all other tests showing no results for blood clots, I actually had a whole bunch of them in both lungs. I ended up with a diagnosis of unprovoked bilateral pulmonary embolisms and am on blood thinners for life.
Super grateful both for the bad feeling and the ER doctor who was willing to listen to it!
3. Driving Hero
Back in 2011, My dad and I were driving down the country for New Year’s Eve. Suddenly he goes quiet, kind of starts breathing slowly and steady, and tells me to look up the road.
He was so calm and focused. I look up and see a car spinning in the middle of the freeway ramping up speed and knocking cars off the road.
This is Scandinavia, winter, pretty much on ice. I imagine the driver of that car hoping, just hoping.
So my dad proceeds to accelerate towards the guy spinning, which didn’t even occur to me was weird.
He was just so calm, which made me calm.
The car hit us on my dad’s side, half a second earlier my dad turned slightly right, which was just enough for the car to push us out of the road and completely safe into a snow hill.
I realized a bit later that a lamppost on that same side we flew off had crushed the back Right side of our car, just missing the angle that would’ve hit me.
Years later I realized the reason my dad sped up the vehicle. Getting hit by that car was a question of when, not if, and if he had not accelerated, that lamp post would’ve been my death.
After that my pulse always drops in pressure situations.
4. Always Trust Your Gut
Last year, December 1st. I had slept for almost a week trying to fight what I thought was the flu. I woke up and that exact gut feeling kept on telling me something’s not right with me. Called the parents to tell them and then cabbed myself to the emergency room.
Took blood, the whole 9 yards; was there for 8 hours. Discharged and sent home. Called the next morning asking me to come back because they found something in my blood. Bacteremia and Endocarditis. I was put on penicillin immediately, for 2 months.
More tests, more things wrong. I went for a specialized test on December 21st, and woke up to them telling me I need surgery as soon as possible.
They’re trying to find a surgical team, the earliest is the 24th. I go in and while they’re operating I have an ascending aortic aneurysm and it caused an aortic dissection. They’re able to fix it. I’ve got a synthetic valve in there now.
Here’s the kicker. I work in a restaurant kitchen, just before the start of the holiday season. Normally most cooks would tough it out and just work. Most think it happens and it’ll get better soon. Just keep going.
There was just something about the way I was feeling this time that made me go to the hospital. I’m told that if I had done that, I more than likely would have died before my birthday and they would have found out about the aneurysm during the autopsy.
That still sends freaking chills down my spine. My best friend works as an emergency room nurse at the same hospital that I was operated on and she was freaking out internally but kept it together on the outside for me. She explained just how serious this all was after I was in recovery.
I’ve promised to tell her whenever I get that same feeling again.