Content Warning: Grief, Cancer, War, Car Accidents, Random Accidents
Whether we're comfortable thinking about it or not, we all know that life is fleeting and that accidents can happen. But as humans, we try to convince ourselves that freak accidents and mistakes won't happen to us.
But it's important to remember that it can happen to anyone, and the memories can be horribly haunting.
Bracing themselves, Redditor D1ll3ng3r asked:
"To those who have accidentally killed someone, what went wrong?"
It Wasn't Worth It
"In Afghanistan, they told us never to drive back the way we came because anyone you passed that had planted an IED would be ready for you this time."
"One of our units was on patrol, and Command decided they needed to go back to the town they just left to interview someone else (or close to that, it's been 20 years)."
"Patrol tried to say no, but orders are orders."
"LT. Col. Blake Ortner, you were our commander and who made that call. I hope you haven't forgotten Cherry and Beasley."
- trnaovn53n
Rest in Peace
"On Christmas Eve, I made the decision to remove my father from life support. He had oropharyngeal cancer and was brain-dead from a carotid blowout. I know it was the right decision, but I'm pretty f**ked up by it."
"I also rescheduled his first immunotherapy treatment until after the holidays, and I wonder if he had it as originally scheduled if he would have lived a little longer."
"I sure miss him."
- PoonannyJones
"The cancer killed him. All you did was let him rest. We should all be so lucky as to have someone like you on hand, willing to make that call for us when we’re at the end."
"I won’t tell you that you ever stop missing them. I lost my dad to cancer two years back. He’s responsible for so much of who I am, from hobbies to music to truly horrible jokes. So every time I turn on the radio, or go fishing, or even go outside to look at the night sky, I remember him. I still miss him like h**l, but the remembering gets easier."
"Wishing you all the best. The hardest part about having a good parent is what to do when they leave us. Fortunately, we don’t have to figure it out all at once."
- attack_rat
Nothing You Can Do
"My best friend and I were unable to do anything for another friend of ours who fell on a climbing trip."
"We were desperate to help her, but there really wasn’t much anyone could have done so far into the backcountry. We couldn’t wake her up or move her safely, so we just kinda sat there… Eventually a helicopter came, but she was already brain dead by the time they got her to a hospital."
"It’s been a few years since, and I ended up going to med school as a result, so now I KNOW nothing could have been done. I still feel uncomfortable about it, though."
- tovarishchi
Medical Fallacy
"I’m in the medical field. I know it doesn’t technically count as killing someone, but failing to save someone due to lack of experience, inadequate reaction time or even your choice of medication can sure feel like you killed someone."
"I clearly remember the first patient under my care who died unexpectedly. I ordered the standard care medication for him and even joked around with him on the way out of the door. Two hours later, I was in his room as part of the cardiac arrest team. He didn’t make it."
"There were signs, signs somebody more experienced than me at the time might have picked up, that for this particular patient standard care wouldn’t be enough."
"As an older colleague said, it gets easier to deal with death over time, but the day it stops affecting you, you should stop practicing medicine."
- Rare-Sundae-9758
So Hard to Process
"My wife has a friend who was driving and hit someone on a Lime Scooter, the person was drunk and in the wrong lane so my wife's friend wasn't at fault and didn't get charged with anything, but the experience was incredibly traumatizing."
"Last I heard, she was going through therapy."
- WootangWood
A Permanent Reminder
"Not me but my Mother-in-Law (MIL). She was driving at night down a country lane with my Father-in-Law (FIL) in the passenger seat and my husband (nine years old at the time) in the back seat."
"She was coming to a bend when another car heading the opposite way rounded the corner in the wrong lane and hit her head on. The driver had been trying to overtake on a blind bend at around 70 miles per hour. He was killed almost instantly."
"My FIL and husband escaped with cuts and bruises, but my MIL was left permanently disabled. She still feels really guilty about it, even though it wasn’t her fault."
- Heart2001
Not a Deer
"A former classmate of mine was driving late at night, intoxicated, and hit someone with her car. She thought she had just hit a deer and kept going."
"When she found out about the guy’s death she put two and two together and turned herself in, plead guilty, and I think did a year or 18 months in jail. She seems to be doing okay now but d**n."
- Wikeni
"At the very, very, very least, she had the stones to turn herself in. But still. D**n."
- nrdrge
Her Quality of Life
"I was maybe 16 and had planted a huge vegetable garden in our backyard, my Grandma came over and I was super excited to show her since she absolutely LOVED plants and gardening."
"She came over and started pulling weeds in my garden, one was especially hard to pull out and she fell backward and hit her head on a paver stone."
"She had a brain bleed and was in a care home not knowing who anyone was and unable to walk or move her hands for the rest of her life."
"I technically didn’t kill her but I think the outcome was worse than death."
- KateEatsWorld
Influencer Culture
"Happened to a friend. They were a group of adventure influencers who do a lot of stuff like cliff jumping and cave diving and filming themselves. All strong athletes and very fit."
"They were trying to get some kind of a waterfall jump. One of them either slipped or misjudged the undertow of a cliff dive area, a VERY BIG no-no. She went in and didn’t come back, getting sucked under the water and down to a larger pool."
"Her boyfriend freaked out and jumped in after her, trying to save her. He also didn’t come up. Another friend also dived in and also didn’t make it."
"The couple who went down eventually had their bodies recovered miles down the river. All three died."
- GeneralZaroff1
"You see videos of RedBull cliff divers doing insane things off natural cliffs and stuff online but they never show the amount of preparation that happens before. They gauge water flow, depth, obstacles, rocks, etc. A lot happens before they jump."
"Don’t jump into the water without knowing what’s down there first."
- hummelm10
Keeping His Memory Alive
"This was a hockey accident when I was 19. I’m 36 now."
"I shot a low slap shot, and there was a net battle, and my friend on the other team got shoved, fell over, and the puck hit him in his temple and shattered much of the structure. He died later because of the bone fragments in his brain."
"I stopped playing for a long time after that. Now I play men’s league and wear his number."
- Airbee
Don't Take the Shortcut
"It turned out a new co-worker lived in the same apartment complex as me across town; she had just moved to the area a few weeks back. We actually ended up going to the 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part One' midnight screening together, and she was a really passionate fan of Potter. It was great."
"Her car was in the shop suddenly one day, so I told her at work about a shortcut she could take home on her bike. She went that way and was killed by a drunk driver crossing that other road."
"She was 26. The guy was going 75 in a 35 zone trying to show off his souped-up sports car."
"Sorry for the shortcut, Angie."
- scalebirds
Bless Both of Them
"While rock climbing in Nevada, I was securing the line and paused to sneeze. My friend prematurely switched lines without me giving him the thumbs up. He fell over 100 feet."
"I haven't climbed since. I was 18. I'm 51 now."
- -Economist-
One Good Last Day
"It wasn't me, but my sister was out for dinner with her partner on a Friday celebrating her new job as a newly qualified occupational therapist."
"He actually proposed to her that night, so they were celebrating that."
"It was the first day of snow on a December day, and for some reason, he was doing 70 in a 40, hit a puddle, and spun off the road. The car flipped and my sister was knocked unconscious."
"The police were there after 5 minutes but obviously, they aren't trained to do what ambulances and firefighters do. The ambulance took 15 minutes to get to them and she had died before they arrived..."
"It's been three years and three months since it happened and I think of her every day. I'm also furious about how he put my sister in danger like that, but I know he lives with the regret of what he did."
- s_miranda79
"Those are some complicated emotions to work through. But at least you can take comfort in that her last day was one filled with joy and celebration. I don't want to take away from the irresponsible behaviors of her fiance."
- boudreauxstorhead
"Thank you. I try tell myself that. She was happy, she got the job she had worked hard for."
"It sounds cheesy, but I truly live every day for her."
- s_miranda79
Something to Remember
"The amount of deaths here related to accidents on roads is staggering."
- Stock-Respond5597
"It makes sense though. Driving is easily the most dangerous thing that most people do on a very regular basis. It doesn't even matter if you're the safest driver in the world, sometimes stuff happens that's just totally out of your hands."
"When I was first learning to drive, my dad told me to drive like you and everyone around you is driving an armed bomb. I always thought it was a good analogy."
- Wagsii
Some Reassurance
"For everyone answering, just know you did the best you could in these situations."
"Even if there was nothing you could do, that was your best and that's enough."
- NiteKore080
Accounts like this are painful to read, and it's jarring to think about how fragile life is and how sudden death can be.
Take this as a reminder to hold your loved ones close, to be careful out there, and to remember, arriving a few minutes late and alive will always be more important than driving recklessly to arrive on time.
