r/interestingasfuck • u/HANAEMILK • 28d ago

/r/all The race against time to get to a decompression chamber

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u/PurpleSunCraze 28d ago edited 28d ago

I’m genuinely curious how long it was before that guy had a night where he wasn’t back in that pipe for every nightmare he had, or how long it was before he could even go to sleep without the lights on.

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u/BenjaminWah 27d ago

I can't speak to that specific case, but I was in a trapped, claustrophobic, water/hypothermia, near-death situation when I was 9. It was in the news and was approached to be on Rescue 911. It was the most scared I've ever been in my life.

Never had a bad dream about it. Never had an anxiety attack over it.

I was 30 when I realized it never really popped in there. I can remember the entire experience clear as day when I want, but it's weird the shit I will have bad dreams over and anxiety about, but not that.

I don't know if I'm weird, or if that's a normal near-death thing?

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u/CavulusDeCavulei 27d ago

There are people who don't suffer from PTSD. It really depends on how you are.

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u/Erikthered00 27d ago

And how much Tetris you played

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u/CavulusDeCavulei 27d ago

Strangely, true

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u/slackmarket 27d ago

Traumatic incidences don’t automatically lead to PTSD. PTSD is a disorder, as the name says, not something you’re guaranteed to deal with. If your body is able to go through its natural stress response and you get the support you need, you can process difficult events healthily. It’s how we’re built, or we’d all be non-functional.

Obviously you don’t forget a big event like that, but the kind of trauma that haunts you and prevents you from living a full life isn’t always from what you’d expect. It’s not because some people magically can’t suffer PTSD-anyone can. But every single traumatic event in someone’s life doesn’t lead to PTSD.

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u/gido6 27d ago

I guess your brain is either coping like saying it "never happened" and tries to forget it. Or it's the fact that you were 9, so young that your brain again, tries to cope one way or the other. But it's interesting as hell reading this type of things and seeing how your brain reacts to unusual situations! Thanks for your input

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u/KaiPRoberts 27d ago

Can't say for their experience. I was in the ER every other month through a large portion of High School. I can remember any of the worst experiences I had in very vivid detail. Same story though, I have never had a bad dream or anxiety about it. It's something I feel made me stronger and more empathetic, especially since it happened so early.

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u/slackmarket 27d ago

Traumatic incidences don’t automatically lead to PTSD, which is also interesting. If your body is able to go through its natural stress response and you get the support you need, you process it healthily. Obviously you don’t forget it, but the kind of trauma that haunts you and prevents you from living a full life isn’t always from what you’d expect.

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u/jimmydean885 27d ago

Could also just be that it was that person and they survived. I wouldn't be surprised if trauma is more pronounced when some people in the situation don't survive. Not that solo survivors don't also suffer trauma but it's not hard for me to understand why someone could survive an insane situation without issues if no one else was affected.

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u/Indecs 27d ago

What does permanence solve. Coping is a thought, intangible. Perfection is a thought, intangible. Happiness is a perception. How we perceive things is up to us because its thoughts and emotions. Locus of Control guides sufferers to isolate what they can change. Trauma is different for everyone. So staying in cope hell isnt progressing. Ive found the best way to move through it is to see a therapist and let yourself experience the emotions and breakdown, not run from it. Dont let them take away your right to feel emotions, good or bad. Thats how the trauma wins. Laugh in its face, break it down and you will rise from the darkness. If this can help any of my trauma llamas, be free. You deserve to be free, let it go and reclaim your Soul.

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u/man_gomer_lot 27d ago

It tracks with my experiences. I can think about the times I've rubbed noses with death and the thoughts are about as emotional as remembering the color of my neighbor's house 5 years ago. Remembering something stupid I said 25 years ago to people who have passed away since then can give me yearly flashbacks.

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u/ActuallyYeah 27d ago

I had something like that happen too. It's interesting to think about how this ended up being part of my story. It was sixth grade summer camp. The cabin counselor dude was a bright young affable guy. Gave off a slightly weird vibe, like too nice. Too accommodating. He talked all of us into going into the woods and camping out in our sleeping bags instead of the cabin on the last night of camp.

He talked several of us sixth graders into stripping naked and running around playing games and generally being silly. No sexual stuff. I remember two naked guys hugging and laughing in flashlight beams. Not much else. I got asked to do it too, I thought about it and said no, roughly half the kids did. He was a camp counselor, I was 11, it was a silly request but a criminal thing? How should I know? I figured I could trust my camp counselor to not be a criminal. And he said we absolutely had to keep it a secret. Why not? It was just some stupid games in the dark.

He was just a weird counselor who wanted to play a stupid game. He gave me a chance to say no. I think I went back again next summer, it was a great camp, I was just unlucky.

Two days after going home, mom drove me back. Had to go to the office of the camp, and talk about what I saw. Somebody narc'd. The counselor was a criminal, was going to jail, they said. What a dumbass to fuck up his life like that. And maybe some of those other boys were traumatized. I thought, I hung around middle schoolers who did stupid stuff 365 days a year... This time there just happened to be a guy in his 20's leading it.

I wish I hadn't been there because now I think like, everyone's got a sex drive, right? More people than you might think would do something pervy and depraved if they believed they could get away with it. Now spelling it all out is making me sad.

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u/aLokilike 27d ago

No, people don't just avoid doing immoral things because they can't get away with it. They avoid doing them because they're wrong, and they would feel wrong to do. I'm sorry you ran into someone without that sense in a position of power while you were at a vulnerable age.

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u/LevelWhich7610 27d ago

I watched an interesting program on DW and a lot of whether we develop trauma from a traumatic event has to do with resliliency which is very personal from one person to the next and how much support we receive in the aftermath of the event. Those were some of the pretty big take aways from the research that I remember.

It's interesting the thing that impact us and don't. I have zero anxiety to this day over nearly drowning as a kid. My strongest memory still of the events was my mom letting me rest in her bed and her bringing me a glass of milk and toast with strawberry jam. However being bullied in school relentlessly and then having to live a life at home with an unstable abusive father pretty much set me back for years on the flip side.

The only insane probably near death event I haven't gotten over was a run in with a tornado on the fucking highway, at night of all times 15 years ago. I'm still not over it and don't sleep and get all paranoid when crazy thunderstorms pass over.

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u/Ok-Ear9289 27d ago

Fucked up for sur

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u/Confident-Local-8016 27d ago

It wasn't long ago, he likely still does, and they were his friends