rSlash - r/Offmychest What Random Coincidence Saved Your Life?

Episode Date: May 12, 2026

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Wayfair, every style, every home. Every now and then, someone would die. Risk. True stories, no holding back. They catch my mom poisoning my sister. People say risk makes them feel less alone and more alive. During my time in prison, I discovered a podcast called Risk. That podcast saved my life so many times. Risk.

The show where people tell true stories they never thought they dare to share wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to R slash Off My Chest, where a bunch of people share how one random, minor thing possibly saved their lives. Our next Reddit post is from Old Collar. I'm an 18-year-old guy, and I was visiting a local local. university with some of my friends. We'd been at a party, but I was designated driver, so I stayed sober. We left from the function around 12, and our hometown is a few hours away, so I stopped at a convenience store to get an energy drink. I got a bloom and a water for the drive home. My drunk friends really wanted dessert, so I told them I'd grab them something on the way back. While I was

checking out, they picked out a place on the college town's main road. Last night was one of the biggest parties of the year, so people from all across the region come in. I was there earlier, and it was packed, but I didn't see any harm stopping by really quick. We were just about to leave when a homeless lady was checking out, but she was 10 cents short for one Laffy Taffy. She asked me if I could spot her, so I started looking for a dime. I had none in my wallet, so I told her I would go look in my car. I couldn't find any dimes in my car. It took me a solid 10 minutes to find one. I gave the dime to her, and she ended up paying for the candy and thanked me. After we started driving to the dessert shop, we got stuck in gridlock traffic. Police cars kept driving past us with lights and sirens on.

After about 30 minutes, I made a U-turn and drove home without getting dessert. In the street in front of the dessert shop that we were trying to get to, there was a fight. The fight quickly escalated, and people started shooting at each other. It was so packed that multiple people were hit by flying shrapnel and stray bullets who weren't even involved in the original fights. If I didn't spend the extra 10 minutes trying to find the dime, we would have been inside of that dessert shop, or waiting in line outside of the store. My friends were so drunk, I don't know if they could have run. I know people who were around the shooting, and they said that it was chaos. We may have gotten trampled or worse. I guess the moral of the story is that good karma will help you in the long run, or maybe over a

period of just a few minutes. Then down in the comments, we have a similar story. One night, I was planning on going to my buddy's house to jam and have some beers and party. My daughter, who was about four at the time, said that she wanted me to stay there with her and mommy, and basically begged me to stay. She'd never done that before, so I figured, what the hell, I'll stay. I called my friend and told him that I wouldn't be able to make it that night. The next day I called, and I was told about what happened. They had a huge party. There was a guy there who was like a friend of a friend and they didn't really know him. They said that he was acting kind of weird the whole night, but was basically minding his own business so they left him alone.

Turns out, that guy was on PCP and quietly took a butcher's knife from their kitchen and started stabbing people. He snuck up behind my friend and slit his throat. He died almost instantly. His wife threw their kids out the back window and then jumped out herself and they all hid while she called the police. The police found the guy walking down the road covered in blood. He didn't even remember killing anyone because he was so high on PCP. I absolutely believe that my daughter begging me to stay home saved my life because I would have certainly been close to my boy and I would have tried to stop the guy, possibly getting hurt or killed myself. I'm so glad I listened to her. There was something different in her voice when she said, Daddy, please don't go. I just didn't think that would

happen. Then this story from two of me. My parents used to work one block away from the World Trade Center. On September 10th, my dad was sick, so he went to the doctor. And the pharmacy was out of stock of the medication his doctor prescribed, and they told him it would be there in the morning. On the morning of 9-11, they told him they wouldn't be able to fill it until later that afternoon, so my parents stayed home that day. The one sick day my parents took in probably a decade, literally saved their Then we have this eerie story from the same poster. I grew up in a commuter town where most people worked in New York City. The tragedy of seeing the parking lot full of cars belonging to people that never came home was shocking.

There is a memorial at the train station with the names of everyone who went into the city for work that morning and never came home. Around 10 people in my school alone lost a parent that day. I don't remember how many, but it was a lot. And another one from Don't Kill Me Jay. I had a heart condition that I was unaware of at the time, and it first presented itself by me having a heart attack in my sleep. Now, usually I sleep alone, but my girlfriend convinced me to stay at hers that night. She had to perform CPR on me until the paramedics arrived. That was quite some time ago now, but if I would have been in my own bed, which happened 99% of the time,

I would likely not be here. Another one from Wise Lake. I knew someone who had an appointment at the Murrah building at 9 a.m. the day of the bombing. The bomb went off at 9.03 a.m. Their toddler was being difficult and made them run about 10 minutes late. The office where they had an appointment was on the ground floor and it was obliterated. No one in that office survived. Chilling.

Another from repulsive pipe. My cousin said that she woke up and had a bad feeling about going to class. She just decided not to go. She called her family and let them know that she was skipping out on class that day. They were like, go for it. If she had gone, she would have been shot and killed by the Virginia Tech shooter. I just celebrated her third child's birthday with the family earlier this month. I'm so, so thankful that she stayed behind.

And then this story from Grand Theft Bay. Once, I dropped a chocolate-covered almond right when the light turned green. I didn't go immediately because I didn't want it to melt on. my seat, so I looked down to grab it. Another car ran a red light. If I didn't take a few extra seconds for that almond, I would have been T-boned on the driver's side. And then a similar story from ad potential. Same here, basically. I was at a red light and it goes green. I hesitated for a second to skip a song. Nume! A taxi runs a red light at Mach's stupid. I don't remember the song, but I'm glad I skipped it. Another from Verkerprud. When I was around six, my mom was

was driving me to school. We get to the bottom of our driveway and our dog Hank came out of nowhere and planted his butt right in front of our car. Mom tried calling out the window to try to get him to move, but he didn't move a muscle. Mom got out and started yelling at him, trying to get him to move. A semi-truck came absolutely flying past the end of our driveway and likely would have taken us out had we been crossing the road to turn in the direction of my school. Mom immediately started petting Hank, telling him what a good boy he was. He probably would. He probably would have taken us. He probably heard the truck coming, obviously. But still, that was one very loyal and very smart doggo that I really think saved our lives. Another story from Lone Wolf. Back in high school, a buddy and I were

leaving a football game. My buddy wanted to say goodbye to his girlfriend at the time, and he spent an extra 30 seconds kissing her at the street corner. I finally said for us to get a move on and started skating down the road. So we did, and not 10 seconds later, a yellow challenger is screaming down the road and rides up onto the sidewalk out of control. We're pumping as fast as we can and sort of jump into the ditch near the high school parking lot and nearly get hit by the car.

If I hadn't said, Dude, let's go, we surely would have gotten hit. His girlfriend and my friend were literally halfway down the crosswalk when that car drove by them. Everyone crossing saw the whole event. We brushed off the sweat

and just kept riding our boards away. A tow truck was there before we even got back onto our boards. Another from PM Act. My Uncle John was a crazy bad alcoholic in the early aughts, like Blackout by noon kind of drunk. He had an interview in Tower 1 on 9-11, moments before the first plane hit. He got too drunk the night before and ended up sleeping through his interview.

Wild. Unfortunately, this wasn't any sort of wake-up call. It did the opposite, lull. Drinking saved my life, so why should I stop? Type of attitude. Another from ERIS. When I was 15, my dad and stepmother went to a Christmas party. I had my best friend spending the night.

We called some boys who brought some booze over. We had way too much to drink. I was getting sick in my parents' bathroom while my friend was in my bathroom. Our friends left because of curfew, and my friend and I passed out in the bathrooms. My dad had a weird feeling and came home early. My dad never leaves an open bar early, except this one time. He came home to find him. me unresponsive. He did CPR until the ambulance came. If he had been one minute later, I wouldn't be

here. I actually died and my dad brought me back. Another from Bu Jamas. One night I was taking the bus home after working late. I got to my stop at about 10.30 p.m. It had snowed a lot and the snow was deep at the curb where the plow had pushed it. So the bus driver stopped in the regular lane and let me out. I started to go when I thought I heard the bus driver say something, so I looked back to ask, even though she hadn't said something. And I said, good night. I turned around and was just about to step out the door, and a car blew past going way too fast. I saw the driver for a split second looking up at me, mouth open and surprise. Then they were gone. I absolutely would have been killed if I had just gone out the bus door. I still think about that sometimes.

Another story from Durhagen. I had a doctor's appointment in a part of Tokyo on the day of the sarin gas attacks. I wanted to leave a little early, but my husband was running late. If we had left at the time that I wanted to leave, there was every chance we would have been on one of the affected train lines that were gassed. My husband being late, which annoyed me at the time, likely saved our lives or at least spared us from disability and PTSD. I'd never heard of the sarin gas attacks in Tokyo, so I just looked it up. Some crazy doomsday cult

went on a train with plastic bags full of poisonous gas and then pierced the bags. Another soy from airport sloth. I had just gotten off work one night and normally I would rush straight home. However, my mom asked if we could go grab a bite and I said, why not? I finished eating half an hour later. I drive her home and I start driving back to my apartment. On the way back, I was stopped by some lost drivers for directions. I wasn't too familiar with the area they needed directions in, but I lent them my power bank for 20 minutes so they could charge their phones and use Google Maps. And like you said, good karma will help you in the long run, or maybe over a period of just a few minutes. Because when I got to my apartment, police cars were everywhere. Someone was murdered on my apartment floor an

hour prior. Had I rushed home from work like I usually did, I would have encountered the suspect and tried to stop them, and likely would have been harmed, or worse. Another story from even regular. When my kids were three and five, I had the day off from work. We had ramen noodles for lunch, and I'd accidentally had some small pieces of ramen get under the burner. So they of course got burned and smelled. It had been cold and rainy all morning, and it felt nice when the sun came out and heated things up, so I considered going somewhere later so they could play outside. After lunch, my kids said they were still hungry and specifically insisted on sandwiches. The thing was, I hadn't gone shopping yet, and we had no bread. I tried to convince them to have

something else, but it didn't work, so we got dressed and went to the store to get groceries. When we got home, there were firefighters punching holes in the roof of our apartment because it was on fire. If my kids hadn't insisted on sandwiches, we'd have been. been home and our main exit would have been cut off. The only way out would have been to jump from the balcony. Apparently, the teenager in the downstairs apartment was lighting baseball cards on fire and throwing them on his bed. He didn't even let his mom, who was asleep on the couch, know there was a fire before leaving. Another from InQuestica. I was a teenager working in a snack bar in a grocery store in Redendo Beach, California. My family was very poor, but my mom made

sure to buy me a used car. A weird older man came by three days in a row. He got right in my face and was asking me what time I got off work. Of course I didn't tell him. He shortchanged me. I thought to myself, you came here so many times for that. No, turns out he was Lawrence Biddecker, the more aggressive one of the toolbox killers. He was known for forcing young blonde teens into his torture van. If you have the streaming service peacock, you can watch the document about him and his partner, Roy Norris. Another from Redneck Angel. My best friend and godmother to my son took the same way every day to go to work. She was meticulous in what time she left. She'd mentioned multiple times that she was always stuck beside the same white sedan every morning.

Apparently, they left the house at the same time every morning too. One day, she couldn't get her act together. Left her coffee mug, had to go back to get it, left her purse, had to go back to get it, etc. This happened a few times that morning. Before she left, she sent me a text saying she was off her game because she was forgetting literally everything that morning. Come to find out, if she had left at her normal time, she would have had a full 18-wheeler turn over on her in a very tight curve on the interstate. The white sedan was crushed and traffic was backed up for miles.

When she went through the accident area, she could see all the blood covering the white sedan. Since then, she said she's never been more thankful for being ditsy. This video was an unexpected detour. I went down to the comments after the main post and just saw comment after comment after comment to people who have had near-death experiences. So if any listeners have a similar story, let's hear it in the comments. I personally do not have one.

However, I did give someone CPR when they were choking on lamb one time and may have saved their life. That doesn't exactly count, but it's my closest contribution here. here. Our next Reddit post is from Iweed. I don't call my parents enough. I always tell myself I'll call tomorrow and then I just don't. Weeks go by sometimes. A while back, I downloaded this app where you send your family an emoji every day to say that you're alive. Sounds dumb, but it worked. It's kind of like that are you did yet app, but the opposite. Less, are you did and more, hey, I'm still here. My mom got super into it. Every morning before 9 a.m. I got a little sun emoji. A.m. A. 100, and 20 days straight. Then a couple of weeks ago, I got a notification saying that she hadn't checked in.

She never misses, ever. Called her, no answer. Called again, nothing. Something felt off. I drove over and found her on the floor in the hallway. She had fallen and hit her head and was out cold. No idea how long she'd been there. She's okay now. She's home and doing fine. But if it wasn't for a stupid emoji, I wouldn't have known. I would have just gone about my day and maybe called her that evening. Maybe not. It took my mom lying on her floor unconscious

for me to realize how bad I've been at this. Stay in touch with your parents. You'll regret it if you don't. That was R slash off my chest. And if you like this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new Reddit podcast episodes every single day.