re: A cat has 9 lives. How many times you cheated death?

Probably 2 incidents so far in my life that I should be dead from.

Tigerfan33, I hope you have your shite straight with God

I can think of three times when it could have gone either way.

Two tours Vietnam.
“Mild” Heart attack (stent collapse after 15 years).
Kidney Failure from reaction of medications.
Three time cancer survivor.
Started chemo again last Monday.

Six - that I can remember
18) Killed in Car Wreck
19) Found dead from aspiration pneumonia
23) Struck and killed by flying debris on I-65
46) Died from massive heart attack
48) Struck and killed by City Transit Bus
50) Died from extended ventilation for viral pneumonia

I just “cheated” severe injury. I was careless topping a tree with a chainsaw and the felled tree kicked the saw back into my arm. Luckily just a deep cut, no major injuries at all.

Three times. One time nearly got shot by two escapes from prison. Walked in on them as they were hiding in an empty house. One time I walked in on vandals preparing to steal the cooper in my electrical wiring. Caught'um just as they were about to rip the electrical wiring out of my walls. And one time I fell asleep at the wheel, drifted into the oncoming lane and dang nearly got run over by an eighteen wheeler.

My mother was (and still is) a very compassionate and holy woman. She now occupies a soft fluffy cloud in heaven. I saw a picture of mom when she was a young woman. My mother looks like that now......young and beautiful again. The prayers of a holy woman, for her children, is very powerful.

We should always honor our mothers (and fathers as well). Compassion, patience, and gentleness to elderly parents washes out a lot of punishment due to sin.

Your mom still alive? Dad as well? Call them and tell'um you love them. Do it often. I miss my Mom and Dad a lot.

Too many that I know about, probably 1000s we all might have no clue about

I cannot say that I have cheated death because I believe that I will not die until The Good Lord determines. But there are two instances when I thought there was a good chance I could die:

In October 1995, just before I stopped drinking, I was leaving a saloon in Georgetown. I looked both ways before I stepped into M Street and It looked clear. I stepped off the curb to hail a cab and was struck by a car. (I later found out that the car had been parked in the curb lane to my left and was defogging its windshield, when I took off and hit me). I cracked the windshield with my head and was thrown into the far eastbound lane of M Street. Had there been any traffic going east bound I would have been run over. Before I knew it I was on a backboard on my way to Georgetown University Hospital. They say that God protects babies and drunks – I was both. I had little residual effects of the accident.

In July of 1997 I had an angioplasty with a stent emplacement. I coded that night. I remember the room going black; hearing the machines beeping; hearing doctors and nurses speaking around me; and feeling the bed going backwards so that my feet were higher than my head. I was very objective about it. I said to myself, “you may be dying, you should say an Act of Contrition” (16 years of Catholic education). Next thing I knew I woke up and was naked in bed with my feet elevated. The nurse said, “welcome back”.

That was be beginning of a long summer. I got very sick a couple of weeks later and spent three more times in the Washington Hospital Center and was finally sent to Georgetown University Medical Center. What happened was that I was given a medication that was supposed to reduce the size of the platelets going though the stent. I turned out to be the one in the bazillion who had an allergic reaction to the drug. My reaction was that it shut down my immune system – I could not generate white blood cells. When I was finally transferred to Georgetown in August 1997 the hematologist/oncologist that met me asked me how old I was. I told him that I would be 46 on September 10. He said, “I don’t think so”. I responded, “Nice bedside manner” (I resisted the urge to end the sentence with “a-hole”).

Anyway, I am one of two people in the world in their 40s who survived this without a bone marrow transplant – the other one is a man in France. I never believed that I was going to die, but I accepted that it could happen. I just kept telling myself that “only the good die young”. By the Grace of God, I’m still here 24 years later.

quote:

---

may win this one. I’ve been held hostage at gunpoint at a supermarket that was being robbed. During robbery was used as a shield by the robber. At end of event the robbers shot up two cop cars that were in pursuit.
Later in life was ran off a bridge and when my vehicle crashed to the bottom of the bridge the side of the truck was punctured by multiple pieces of rebar. Three of the rebar pieces went right behind and in front yard of me,pinning me in truck till I was cut out.
Few years later I was bitten by a large cottonmouth and went to the hospital for anti venom shots. Went home and had a bad reaction to the shots and woke up 4 days later.
Then a heart attack at age 44 that doctors can’t explain how I lived through.

---