I called them for the first time ever back in February of this year due to my first manic episode. I was stoned 24/7 for a month straight after being illegally fired from my job. I was also smoking one of those mystery “mushroom” vapes during this time.
Eventually, I believed that my union had started a massive international social media campaign surrounding my case without telling me. This was exciting and fun at first, until I made a statement insulting Trump and Musk to some of my union siblings. At that point, I started to believe that I was the subject of a gamergate style hate mob and that my life was in danger.
At 3am after at least 2 weeks of very little sleep, I thought I heard noises from my phone that indicated a streamer that hacked me. At this point, I called 911 to report a stalker. Nothing came of the call, but my family knew something was wrong and gave me the help I needed. I’d be happy to share more about what I was believing at the time for those interested; mental health is important folks!
Something stupid, I was very tired after work and I don’t know why but I found a packet of silica gel in the kitchen shelves, and somehow I thought it was a snack, so I opened it and I have no idea why, I started to crunch on it. After a couple of minutes of chewing the silica gel spheres I woke up and realized my mistake and panicked, maybe those have copper sulphate because are blue, so I called the emergency number. They didn’t laugh of my stupidity and they reassured me that probably I wouldn’t need to be hospitalized. They were so nice that they called me after 30 and 60 minutes for a follow up on my health.
i got a job working tech support for 911 and had to make test calls regularly from different sources
that’s pretty cool! Did you have to replicate certain scenarios, like background noise or bad reception?
sometimes… the 911 operators had machines that connected to a shitload of audio sources simultaneously… think all emergency service radio bands (police/fire/sheriff) as well as the land-lines and cellular networks… this was back before texting to 911 was a thing.
i was always testing external radios and phone sources. the cell providers were the worst (at the time)… sometimes 911 would work for Primeco but not Verizon or whatever so each cell provider had to be tested independently.
it was just weird first doing it as i grew up terrified i would accidentally dial 911.
Primeco
It was all that extraterrestrial PCS technology.
Lucky. I got a job working tech support for a hospital and had to wave full sample jars of piss at a barcode scanner.
I worked for a newspaper overseeing delivery drivers, one of which was regularly hotboxing his car while waiting for his route to be printed. He wasn’t subtle and he was always a little out of it. My bosses said it wasn’t our problem because technically he was a contractor, not an hourly employee. His route took place around 2 AM so with empty roads it hadn’t really been a problem, but I didn’t want indirect blood on my hands when it invariably DID become a problem.
So I called in a suspicious driving report after he left the warehouse one night. The next night his route was being done by someone else. I worry that I caused him long term trouble by involving the police, but I try to balance that against the potential trouble of a crash.
Idk, I don’t regret my choice, but I do still feel conflicted when I think on it.
A lady standing on my neighbor’s back porch smoking a cigarette cussed me out when I let the dog out. Except my neighbor had moved out last week (I had helped) and I knew it hadn’t sold yet. A girlfriend of one of the guys up the block was having a episode of some kind and had decided to squat in my neighbor’s home. I locked the door, waiting for the next morning.
I decided to call the Emergency Line to see if they would send mental health first but they sent the cops anyway. Our local cops are really delicate with mental patients so they got her back to her boyfriend and left the homeowner to cleanup.
glad it turned out for the best, but belligerent squatters sound terrifying
I saw a dog sitting in the middle of a busy road. Clearly wasn’t a stray, but just lost and confused and all the cars were just driving around it. I got out and lead it to the sidewalk, but my car is still just sitting idle at the intersection. Cue people honking at me to move, because of course. Some drove around me. Finally one dude hops out, tells me to move my car while he holds the dog, then I do the same for him.
The dog has no collar or tags and at this point we’re like well idk what to do now because this is clearly someone’s dog. We poked around a little bit, then call the cops for them to deal with it. Cops show up, say they can take it to the pound to see if it has a chip. We’re literally all picking up this big 80 pound dog into the back of a cop car when a lady comes running down this big hill and is like “that’s my dog”
Forgot to lock the side door to the house. Someone literally tried to open the door and come in. I was close enough where I put my shoulder against the door. They left thankfully then I called 911 (emergency services) and the police showed up. But the problem is by that point the individual as well off my property down the street and we couldn’t “ Prove” That it was him so he just got a verbal warning of stay off the property. He never did come back.
Regardless of whether my door is locked, the idea of someone uninvited trying the knob is rather frightening to me.
Especially because, in this house, all of my external doors are surrounded by windows. They don’t really provide any security, so if someone malicious were to come by, they’d get in if they wanted to.
Alternatively, if I’m nearby, we might end up having a staredown. That doesn’t sound scary, necessarily, but definitely upsetting.
As an older teen I witnessed from across the street a neighbor-man following a teenage girl around their front yard as she was yelling “Stay away from me! You’re scaring me.” The cops showed after the two had already left. I never figured out what it was all about. I just know it was a big enough distraction for me to forget I was already on the phone calling my buddy. Since then i’ve called more times than I care to admit both in a professional capacity and private.
When I was a wee lad my little brothers were playing with matches in Mom and Dad’s room. All of a sudden Mom bolts upstairs with a pitcher of water and yells, “CALL 911, SAY FIRE!!! RUNNNNNNN!!!” Then like the flash I was on the phone in 2.98813ms. 20 minutes later I’m playing in a fire truck and a bed is getting thrown out of my house. That was a fun day.
Car crash in front of my house. Someone pulled out without seeing a car coming and got T-boned.
I wonder if Patty made it.
Be me, 16 yo., in basement bedroom chilling. Hear/feel a thud feels like the whole house just got picked up and dropped a few inches. Meet dad’s fiance who had been chilling in the den at the top of the stairs, confused. Eventually look outside through the darkness to see something strange in the front yard. Jump in the car, swing the headlights around to reveal a smoking wreck wrapped around a pine tree in the front yard. Rush out to find what remains of the driver gurgling his last attempts at breaths. Call 911, volunteer firefighters show up within minutes. Nothing to be done. Dude was paste from the inside out. Drunk driving, speeding, and didn’t make the curve.
As an aside, DOT shows up a few days later to trim all of our pine trees with branches at ground level to have no branches below about six feet. Presumably to make it easier the next time? Looked ridiculous.
But yeah, that gurgle was something else. Never heard anything like it before or since.
My boss one time told me about a similar deal when he was a farm kid in the middle of nowhere, when a driver had failed to navigate a corner at speed (velocitized, like hypnotized); and my poor boss watched a broken human die at 6.
That stuff changes ya, man.
Was working as a baker in a supermarket on graveyard shift. Only 3 people in the whole store, me and two cleaners. I heard a giant smashing sound from the front of the store, 3 or 4 guys broke the window nearest to where the cigarettes were stored. They threw down a tarp and filled it with smokes then threw the tarp into a stolen van and drove off.
I called 9911 but the cops didn’t get there until they were already gone.
Anyone wondering why it was 9911, I needed to get an outside line first.
I used to work at a facility where, to make an outside call, you had to start the number with 91 like: 91-###-###-####
However, dialing 911 bypassed the external call arrangement and just called emergency services directly. I have no idea who made that boneheaded design decision, but the local dispatchers were definitely not a fan of it.
Neighbour was yelling for help after a screaming match with her husband (which they had regularly).
He got a restraining order (ianal and not a native speaker, that’s the closest English term I can think of) and wasn’t allowed in the building. Of course he was back with her and her kid a few days after…
Similar for me. Neighbors husband figured out we were helping move his now ex-wife out secretly. He came back while we were at her new place and destroyed a bunch of her stuff. He was yelling so loud I could hear it inside my house with headphones on. Called as I was walking over to see wtf was going on.
She fortunately did divorce him and is fighting for full custody of her kids. He’s still an abusive liar, which most people can’t see. He’s a GP in a small town and his nice guy facade is thick.
One morning shortly after coming home from a hospital I found a hole in my skin with something of absolutely hideous colour steadily trickling out of it. Spent another week in there and got some stronger stitches.
I think overall it’s good to have the experience of calling an ambulance, because now doing that isn’t just in the “other” category in my brain, but an actionable option for sudden situations.
similar for me but w legal drugs. my doctor switched my anti-anxiety/depression meds and the interaction made me think that i was talking to god and that i was going to die.
i called 911 and the cops showed up about 3 hours or so later. my mind was clearer when they did and i tried walking up to them to tell them that they weren’t needed, but they put their hands on their guns and yelled at me to stay away because i was “being aggressive”. i just stood there on the sidewalk and watched them look for me for about a half hour until i got hungry and walked away.
Delusions of grandeur are pretty scary, as it turns out. The situation with the cops would have been too much for me
It was the most terrifying experience I ever had. It made me quit those prescriptions permanently and I switched to talk therapy instead.
There was a misunderstanding with a neighbor earlier that night because he heard my dog yipping and whining and thought she was in pain. He called the cops, they confirmed everything was fine, and told him that my dog just sounds like that.
A little after midnight, the neighbor pounded on my door so hard it shook in its frame and screamed cuss words at me at the top of his lungs. The neighbor moved to the parking lot and was pacing back and forth, running around in small circles, and jumping up and down, all while his eyes were locked on my apartment’s windows. I called the cops. I later learned that the neighbor called the cops a second time at this point saying he definitely heard me beating my dog, despite my apartment being silent since the first incident.
The officer that arrived acted like the neighbor’s behavior wasn’t an issue at all, and he kept cutting me off whenever I tried to give an explanation or evidence that my dog wasn’t hurt. He basically treated me like I was guilty the whole time without listening or checking. Ultimately, he said there was nothing to be done and left.
I found out the neighbor called a third time to say I was hurting my dog at 3 in the morning while my dog and I were asleep, but nobody was dispatched. My apartment management didn’t bother even talking to the neighbor after I told them everything.
My then boyfriend had trouble to breathe and was feeling restless/nervous. Originally we wanted to drive to the doctor but a few steps out of the house and he said that he had to sit down. He could not stand up again, so I called. Turns out it was tachyarythmia absoluta, his heart was all out of its rythm. Not deadly but feels eery and not healthy in the long run. We had luck and after quite some time it started beating normal again, if that had not been the case the doctors wanted to “restart” it manually, meaning by shock.
