You're in a coma but aware. What would be your "special kind of hell"?

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

This article got me thinking about it:

Man trapped in coma for 12 years was aware of everything, hated 'Barney' reruns

At age 12, Martin Pistorius became mysteriously ill and fell into a coma. For the next decade, he was trapped inside his own mind, gradually pulling himself out of a vegetative state.

For most of his time in the coma, he was aware of his surroundings. Today, after a miraculous recovery, the 39-year-old South African man recalls being forced to watch Barney reruns for hours at the special care center where he spent most days.

"I cannot even express to you how much I hated Barney," Pistorius told NPR. The show's theme song, "I Love You, You Love Me," was revealed last year as part of a list of songs used in "enhanced interrogation techniques" by the CIA, according to The Houston Chronicle.

That hatred was part of what triggered him to start regaining control of his mind and body. more

To me, it would be being aware that my family was giving up hope for my "return" while I wasn't really gone. In the above article, the mother already had told her son, "I hope you die." It was his father's strength — and the constant repetition of the Barney theme song — that gave him the impetus to regain control of his mind.

My second special kind of hell (thanks, Firefly) would be having to listen to Yanni music forever.

[Xipe Totec]

1. Republican Presidential Debates nt

[2theleft]

2. People eating loudly would enrage me enough to hopefully get me out!

I am VERY sensitive to eating noises. That, or water dripping constantly, someone clicking a pen repetitively, etc. But, the Barney song would do it to now that I think about that particular brand of hell a bit.

[hibbing]

3. "Classic Rock" radio playing

[LiberalElite]

4. Gum snapping nt

[Art_from_Ark]

5. So we're talking about a "Commander Pike" type of coma?

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

7. No. People knew Pike was aware of his surroundings

plus he could communicate via lights. He was more like Stephen Hawking than a veggie.

In the end he was reunited with Vina -- a horribly deformed human -- on a planet where the inhabitants were able to produce the illusion of health and beauty.


Captain Pike and Vina

Thanks for the memory.

[Skittles]

11. an impossibly gorgeus couple

both gone too soon

from Susan Oliver's Wiki page

n 1967, piloting her own Aero Commander 200, she became the fourth woman to fly a single-engine aircraft solo across the Atlantic Ocean and the second to do it from New York City. She was attempting to fly to Moscow, her odyssey ended in Denmark after the government of the Soviet Union denied her permission to enter its air space. She wrote about her aviation exploits and philosophy of life in an autobiography published in 1983.

[hay rick]

6. I've been there.

My special hell experience:

I worked at a coffee packing plant in the late 60s. Myself and another guy worked on a production line and alternated between two functions. We each did one task and then switched to the other task every two hours. The company produced instant coffee packets for guests of motel chains. One of their main products was a combo-pack which was a foil package with four compartments: one for instant coffee, one for sugar, one for non-dairy creamer, and one for a stir stick.

Job one was the "good job"- you worked the floor keeping the hoppers full of sugar, coffee, and creamer and the machine supplied with the correct foil for the packets. The other job involved substituting for the stir stick dispenser. The mechanical system that was supposed to accomplish this task was broken, so every two hours you would have to climb on top of the machine with a box of 10,000 stir sticks and feed them one at a time into a slot for placement into the combo-packs.

What bothered me more than the tedium was the radio station which we did not control. It was a "top 40 station" which I swear only played 10 different songs on any given day. The one that made me want to scream was Glen Campbell's "Dreams of the Everyday Housewife." Having survived that ordeal hundreds of times, I suspect I may actually be immortal.

[kairos12]

8. Somehow ending dumped at the Palin's house.

[frogmarch]

9. Feeling my dogs licking my face,

trying to wake me and being unable to kiss them back.

[Skittles]

10. whistling, humming, bag-rustling

I am sure after a certain amount of time it would force me out of my coma

[KamaAina]

12. President tRump's inauguration

[Kali]

13. polyfuckingphonicspree

[chknltl]

14. A ticking clock or a beeping monitor or a rusty swing outside.

I can't say why but these would make my life hell.