What's the biggest bullet you've ever dodged?

[reecejackox]

I would say

Quitting a job then finding out three months later they had gone out of business.

 

[TippyThomas]

I went into the gas station to grab a cup of coffee for the road. I got the coffee and got into my car and as I was sitting there getting things in order a person ran into the station and robbed and shot the attendant and another customer. A couple of minutes could have been all the difference.

 

[Carol_]

 

[hereyago]

My most recent: because I seem to have 9 lives with stuff.

last June, my apartment building caught on fire . No one was hurt or killed thankfully.

I was about to go relax in the tub. Heard what I thought were fireworks because it would be July 4 in a couple days.
I started walking again to the bathroom and heard a sound like something was building up. Then BOOM the sound and it shook the building.
I looked out the patio door I was about to open it and yell at the neighbor above if he was ok thinking it was a tree.
I saw the air conditioners on fire.
At that point my Niebuhr banged on the door . I ran out and thinking he saw what I saw. He said no the whole building above was on fire. I ran back in got the dog and got the cat out.
At the same time my daughter is running up and she had tried to call me to tell me to get out but I couldn’t hear her.

 

[MrJT]

We were staying at my Aunt's house in San Clemente. We went to Tijuana for the day. On our way back, some of us wanted to stop at McDonalds in San Ysidro. My mom didn't want it, we drove on and ate somewhere else. Got back to my Aunt's house, and they were thankful that we were okay. Turns out that not too long after we passed the McDonalds, a guy came, shot up the place, and killed a number of people.

 

[DLgal]

Not me but my husband. Having his military retirement denied early last year meant not having to look for a new job mid pandemic. We would have been so screwed.

 

[RogueX]

Through work, won a trip but ended up not going. Good thing, the flight I was booked ended up being hijacked.

 

[okeydokey]

Ask Reddit

 

[VandVsmama]

May 2019 - diagnosed with early stage breast cancer
June 2019 - double mastectomy due to cancer + a genetic mutation which gives me 40% chance of it showing up on the other breast.

1 week after the surgery - test results from the mastectomies come back. Precancerous cells found in the non-cancerous breast. No lymph nodes affected. So other breast would have ended up cancerous, too.

Felt like I dodged a bullet. no chemo needed. No radiation. It's a darn good thing I'd listened to that little voice earlier that said, "You really should go get a mammogram."

Recovery from the surgery was a bear. But totally worth it.

 

[Luv Bunnies]

I would say

Quitting a job then finding out three months later they had gone out of business.

A very similar thing happened to me! I was fed up with corporate PR and looked for something different. I ended up taking a job with a small PR agency. It took me about three months to realize that the owner was an awful person and life it too short to deal with someone like that everyday. I quit and found a new job about six weeks later at a bank. My desk was upstairs on a balcony that overlooked the branch area. They couldn't see me, but I could look down on the branch if I went up to the railing. A few months after I started, I heard a familiar voice being rude to one of the tellers. I peeked over the railing and it was the PR agency guy! He was there to close his business account. The teller asked him the reason for closing the account and he mumbled something. She politely asked him to repeat the reason and he yelled, "Out of business! Did you hear me that time?" After he left, I went downstairs and talked to the teller. She said he's always rude when he comes in and they were all happy to see him close his account! I happily worked for the bank for 10 years. Dodged a huge bullet by getting away from that guy!

 

[mi*vida*loca]

A guy was trying to date me after my divorce. He seemed legit. Single father to 3 girls all under 12. Mom left the kids behind. I knew of mom and she was a wild person. It never worked out for us to go out since I was a single mom to two kids. Time constraints, work, etc.

A few months later he was arrested for molesting and raping one or two of his daughters. I know for sure it was one and hearsay said two but I never followed the case. This wasn’t a one time deal either. He did this for years apparently. He’s serving 20+ years.

 

[DisneyOma]

Had a mole removed - very early stage 1 melanoma. Got another removed - in situ. Two close calls!

 

[John VN]

What's the biggest bullet you've ever dodged?

I was in a row boat with my sister on Lake Hopatcong, NJ. We were just letting the boat glide after an oar pull when a sound like a huge fly only vibrating passed by my right ear. Shortly after was a loud firecracker noise. I've been told by shooters and vets that the BULLET most likely was larger than a .22 and within a couple of feet away.

 

[Allison Joy]

So once I was driving to work, and (thank goodness!) noticed that this car ahead of me was going WAY to fast to stop on the exit ramp that was backed up. He hit the back bumper of the last car on the exit ramp at an angle, which sent both cars back onto the highway, right in front of me and another car. One of the cars ended up sideways across a lane, the other along the left shoulder, facing the wrong way. Even though those two cars both went across four lanes of traffic, no one else was hit. The driver in the lane next to me and I looked at each other with this "Did that really just happen??" look, as we drove on past the accident.

Edited to add

I suppose the other one I could say is that when I was a baby, I had multiple problems, where one doctor wasn't sure I would live, and others said since I was so far behind physically, I would also likely have cognitive delays. I had an IEP for physical reasons in elementary school, but I was also in the gifted education class. I call that one more of "blessed" than "dodging a bullet" but I saw some other people list health related things, so I thought I'd mention that too.

 

[Ladyandthepuppies]

I got engaged to a guy I thought was the love of my life. He broke things off a few weeks later and I was heartbroken. It took me a long time to get over it but I eventually did and met the actual love of my life. I’ve been with my DH for 12 years and I still have heart eyes for him lol

My ex got engaged to another girl just a few months after we broke up...a few years later I heard he had cheated on her and walked out on his wife and kid to be with the new girl. And a few years after that he apparently cheated on wife #2 and left her for someone else. Seems like he has some deep issues and any time I hear an update on him I am always so grateful that he broke up with me BEFORE we got married or had kids. At the time I was devastated but now I think I was so lucky compared to all the other hearts he’s broken since then.

 

[smokeyblue]

When I was in my early 20's I was getting sick all the time. Ended up finding that there was a mass on my pancreas. Tests were inconclusive as to what it was and I end up having surgery at Mayo to remove half my pancreas. They also decided to yank my gallbladder at the same time. Well good thing they did because there was also a tumor on my gallbladder and it was starting to turn gangrenous. Tumors were benign, but would have continued to cause problems had I not had surgery.

I ended up working on the inpatient surgical unit in my hometown a few years later. Getting to know the surgeons and their skill level, I would have been in big trouble had I got sick from my gall bladder dying and I had to have emergency surgery at home.

 

[low-key]

seems like all the bullets get me rigt between the eye, lol

 

[bcla]

Once we were on the way to watch a movie and my dad was driving on the freeway in the #1 lane. He slowed down a bit to fiddle with the radio, but then a car from the other direction flipped over the median divider in front of us and my dad was able to swerve out of the way. Just a little bit faster and there was a good chance we go head-on at the speed limit against a car with momentum towards us.

 

[happily single]

18 years ago a band I grew up with Great White was playing at a little bar not to far from me. I debated going, but in the end ended up inviting a “guy friend” over for w while. He left and I turned the television on. The band set off fireworks that caused a huge fire, killing over 100 people in an overpacked bar (the station fire, west warwick). I am still shaken at how close I came to going that night.

 

[China Expat]

Catching cancer at a very early stage!