I was five years old, and my dad put me and my cousin on a float in Galveston Bay. He was pulling the float until it became so deep he had to swim. I fell off the float and my mother noticed from way behind us and started screaming. I remember floating down, down, and peace came over me at some point, and I could hear my parents talking, trying to find me. When my dad pulled me up by my hair, I remember, as I was choking and trying to breathe, wishing I hadn't been rescued because I felt so free.

I've had this happen to me back in 2013. Had an artery rupture in the back of my neck. A vertebral artery tore open and I was bleeding internally, which clotted them came loose then went up into my brain causing a stroke.
The scariest part of it was that although I went numb and couldn't control my body, couldn't speak properly, and didn't know what was going on, the fact that it didn't hurt and there was no pain scared the crap outta me.
It's weird to think that I experienced a partial brain death when it was all said & done. In a weird way its let me come to grips with the reality that death will happen one day, but if it's like that again for me, I'm not as fearful of it.

I was stood up two weeks before my wedding to someone I dated for six years. I didn't have anesthesia or an unexpected heart attack that made me close to death. But a part of who I was died that day. I too, never returned as the same person I was before that happened

I've had many near-death experiences from involving a criminal and my stolen pistol, falling asleep at the wheel at 1 am and ended up in an Everglades canal, coming within 6 inches of being decapitated from the shoulders up by an out-of-control crane, an obviously failed suicide attempt, and others including an accidental out of control plane I was flying being able to regain control moments before crashing
The last most vivid occurred on an operating table at the Miami VA Hospital in December 2010. I was there for a routine placement of 2 cardiac stints. Having a stint procedure back in 2003, I thought is was going to be a piece of cake even though the procedure prohibits full anesthesia and I must remain awake. I felt honored to have two visiting cardiology surgeons professors from the University of Miami Medical School while the Chief VA Cardiologist monitored. I was placed where I could also see the large screen radiology monitor that the surgeons were seeing too as they worked. About 10 minutes into the operation, I started to experience the most extreme pain that I have ever experienced in my life. I seriously thought I was dying. I was screaming, crying calling out to my deceased son to help me to cross over. I turned my head to the surgeons sill crying and the look I saw on their face was that of an "Oh Shit" look. After awhile the pain let up and I was able to breathe normally again Then 5 minutes later it happened again and I heard their voices getting loud and fervent as I was experiencing the extreme pain in my chest along with my screaming and hysterical crying. All I knew was that the procedure was taking 3 times as long as was expected. When it was finally over, I was totally exhausted and fell asleep on the gurney. I don't know how long I was in recovery but once I was awake again, I was taken to my room in CCU. The UM Cardiology surgeon came to check on me 3 times a day till I was released to go home. My dear friend Marie came to take me home in her Lamborghini. What a ride! But I really felt that I was near to death twice that morning.
As it turns out, I was able to access my medical record for the operation a few days later and I discovered that in fact, I DID come within seconds of dying. The surgeons experienced 2 major equipment failures. That "Oh Shit" look on their faces was valid.

It happened so fast I did not have time to think. One second I was tooling along and the next I was upside down over the car and seeing my bike mounted vertically on the front of the car, and then I was standing in the road behind the car. I stuck the landing! If I had not been standing up on the pegs when I hit, or if it had been a taller car, I would not be here to tell the tale. As it was I walked away with nothing more than matching divits in my shins where they had smacked the handlebars as I was being launched, and the tingly feeling that I had been extremely lucky. There was also a near-drowning-while-trying-to-surf-some-big-waves incident, but that is another story. As for the jealous ex-husband who wanted to kill me, I'm not even going to go there. Likewise the dipshit with the rifle pointed at my head (unrelated case). Shall I go on? Suffice it to say that life is a very iffy proposition.

I have been in many near death experiences usually related to accidents but I forget the experiences after a time that they seemed normal occurances in life. Then one day I just woke up in a hospital and found out I cannot remember anything about the several days prior to my admission at the hospital. I was sleeping for several days technically although I was interacting with people at the hospital. In effect whenever we sleep we are dying because we may never awake from the sleep. Not to scare you, but this made me realize that I can die in my sleep anytime. But this made me see how precious life is. Everybody should be happy that they are still able to wake up in the morning. A nuclear bomb, crime, accident can happen anytime. I don't want to scare you but when we close our eyes to sleep we experience the comfort of death from this sometimes troubling world.

I was very.sick with colitis my pulse was through the roof. I had lost a ton of blood, due to colitis. They told me I might not make it through the night.

Several years ago, I woke up in the morning with excruciating pain in my right leg. I managed to drag myself to the phone and called my brother's house. He wasn't home, but my sister in-law come over to drive me to the hospital. On the way, I started having massive pain in my chest as well. Turned out I had a bad DVT blood clot in my leg and an extreme pulmonary metabolism from blootclot in my lung. I didn't have any thoughts really because the pain was excruciating. Last thing I remember about it was the ER doctors freaking out, then I blacked out. When I came to, they told me I had died.

I was robbed at gunpoint on the street in front of my apartment many years ago. The guy hit me on the side of my head with the gun, and I guess that kind of spun me around. My back was to him and I remember waiting for the bullet to enter and wondering how it would feel. Fortunately he just grabbed my purse out of the car and took off.

On a side note, the whole "life flashing before your eyes" seems to make sense to me as, I don't know about you but, I experience this often on a regular basis when I wake from sleep, I liken it to a computer booting up, loading memory images.

My Apt got broken into 20 some years ago & I was forced into my bedroom at gunpoint, all I felt was fear, desperation & wonder if I could escape out the window quick enough.
At points when I've been really ill (luckily not often) I've thought "this is how its going to end" knowing in the back of my mind it would in this case but ultimately not. It's depressing thought that your mind tends to turn off for self survival purposes but in my case sometimes that gate has hung open inducing panic attacks, on the plus side one of those attacks induced me to adapt a more healthy lifestyle which substantially minimised the attacks.

One time I was with my friend, we took some bong rips, went and got taco bell, and by the time I was finished, and working on my slushie, I began to feel really bad. I was telling my buddy, (as I began to sweat hardcore and double over in my seat) 'dude get my mom, I don't feel good.' and before he could act, I passed out.

I remember waking up, and literally everything was reset, new OS install. I asked my buddy.... 'what happened?' and he said jokingly 'you died.' we both laughed pretty good.

But I got sick. Really sick. He went home. I puked my guts out that day. I wretched and writhed, it was so bad my parents asked me a few different times, 'Should we call 911?? You look freaking horrible.' and I declined the 911 calls, and after much agony I slept hard for a good half a day.

I think it was E Coli in my crunch wrap supreme.... But I've been back to taco bell several times since then Lol!

I was in an old van doing 70mph on the motorway, There was a flash shower of rain and the car in front hit the brakes way too hard, when I hit mine the left wheel locked up and threw me across all three lanes and into the embankment. The van dug in, flipped onto its roof, rolled across a few hedges and back down onto its wheels facing the wrong way up the hard shoulder. I sat there with my hands still on the wheel without a scratch on me, I think pushing hard against the steering wheel and wearing my seatbelt kept me in my seat and all the real damage was to the passenger side. As to my thoughts during the event it was a kind of slow motion 'shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit' and then a whole lot of adrenaline, but I was surprisingly calm in a sea of panicking 'good samaritans'. I guess it looked worse than it turned out to be.

Yes, a few times.
Nothing was really going through my mind except "this is it".
But it wasnt. I lived through it.