“Travelling around Europe on a topdeck tour, start to get very unwell (headaches, nausea, memory loss, muscle weakness) could not figure out what was wrong, all I knew was that i needed to get back to the UK to the family I had there so I could get help. Was in Poland and judged too sick to continue with the tour so I organise a flight to the UK. Taxi driver and hotel recpetion actually needs to physically carry me into the taxi to get there. Kind taxi driver gets out at the airport and finds a wheel chair and stays with me for a while. The flight admin say that due to the wheelchair I need to get on the plane via the wheel chair lift, I protest and say I can walk but they are adment. Get wheeled into the wheelchair lift but a mechanical failure means that the flight leaves and I am stuck in the lift/grounded as it was the last flight. Get put up in hotel by the airline that night, the receptionist at the hotel inquires about my illness and as they had some medical background they determined that a doctor should be called, it was Christmas eve so no one was around, so they took me to the emergency department. Was put into ICU for 2 and a half weeks after suffering two cerebral venous thrombosis (strokes). Would not be alive if i had gotten on that flight.

Did not change perspective on life, but it did give me an ability to understand that anything can happen. The experience also gave me massive psychological trauma, so… you win some you lose some.

TLDR; had strokes at 18 and am only alive today because of a mechanical failure delaying me getting on a flight.” – smartcookie321