About a month ago a big burly dude fell on me. I hit my head and saw stars, then when I came home I googled it and learned that it was a symptom of a concussion and could be a sign of damage to the optic nerve. That was a moment of sheer terror.
I work on very large (30+ tons) custom mining equipment that rotates side to side. One of the machines had its center of gravity above the axis of rotation. On it passing a certain point, the machine started rotating down on its own and almost smashed into the ground next to us. The spring applied brakes engaged and stopped it about 10in of the ground! If it had hit the ground, a multimillion dollar, one of a kind piece of equipment would have been ruined!
I didn’t give myself enough rope to stand up properly and had to precariously balance while securing myself about 6 meters (20 ft) up in a tree. I was secured once but would have hurt myself a lot if i fell, so yeh i was scared for a second two days ago.
Two months ago the lymph node under my left collar bone got very inflamed. I went to the doctor who ordered an ultrasound and chest x-ray. The ultrasound was, “worrying” so they ordered a CT. The CT suggested that my lymph nodes had gone bad. I spent the last two months afraid that I was going to leave my kids unsupported as one was finishing her first year of university and the other his first year of high school. A couple of days ago I got the best possible news under the circumstances that I have Hodgkins Lymphoma which is curable and I am expected to go on and live a long life.
Last year suffered a severe shoulder dislocation that lasted ~2.5hrs, while in the middle of nowhere. It was unimaginably painful and I struggled to believe it would ever be over. The ambulance took so long to arrive.
But the real fear came in the following days, weeks, months. Knowing that it could happen again at any moment without warning, even from the simplest movement with no strain at all. When the severe one happened I wasn’t doing anything unusual, I just reached out to pick something up and pop. My damaged muscles were in such a state that it could pop out with no real cause.
Nowadays I’m doing much better. I’ve had a surgery to fix it, with 90% success rate. But that 10% risk still keeps me up at nightbsometimes.
Last week my kid’s mare got spooked by a plastic bag while said kid was riding her. They never flinched and everything was under control in a few seconds but you bet I was unable to breath while watching from afar.
Had a zombie apocalypse nightmare last night for i think the second time this year, wake up scared even though i recognize it’s a dream inside the dream. I know i shouldn’t play Project Zomboid if dream like this keep coming back, but ehh what the heck, game’s good.
About 6 years ago I somehow (Safety, Maintenance, and Engineering departments never figured out how) managed to get stuck in a robot cage with 4 water jet cutting robots. I have never been more terrified in my life.
One of my coworkers said he had never seen anyone move as fast as when I yanked the safety rip line to kill the machine. Didn’t get hurt, thank god, but found out that adrenaline makes me giddy. Every thing was flipping hilarious for a few hours after they got me out of the cage.
I often have nightmares (yay PTSD!), the last bad one I had was about a week ago. It was about my sister being scared and me not being able to get in contact with her or help her. My husband woke me up 3 different times from that one because I’d keep yelling in my sleep, which happens at least a couple of times a month and sometimes a few times a week.
I’ve been in therapy and am on meds, there’s just not a magic bullet unfortunately.