jasperkent
Bluelighter
Back in the day, when someone died they were subsequently dead. Forever. Death was the end of the story, unless it was Jesus Christ-- but I'm not going there.
Occasionally someone would talk about being "clinically dead" (no breathing, no heartbeat) for a few minutes after a traumatic injury / heart attack or during critical surgery...or an overdose. In the case of the latter, doctors probably told patients "you died, but got lucky this time" as a sort of scare 'em straight tactic. At any rate, someone "dying" and living to tell about it was a rare thing.
These days, better medical technology and the widespread use of naloxone (Narcan) has helped a lot of people survive a temporary "clinical death." This is wonderful, but it has also resulted in the phrase "I died" becoming so common that it is devoid of gravitas and almost meaningless.
I've lost count of the number of addicts I've talked to who have "died" once, twice, three, four or more times. Either we need to come up with a different word for this, or I just have to get used to the fact that there are a lot of corpses walking around.
(mods, feel free to move this thread wherever is most appropriate)
Occasionally someone would talk about being "clinically dead" (no breathing, no heartbeat) for a few minutes after a traumatic injury / heart attack or during critical surgery...or an overdose. In the case of the latter, doctors probably told patients "you died, but got lucky this time" as a sort of scare 'em straight tactic. At any rate, someone "dying" and living to tell about it was a rare thing.
These days, better medical technology and the widespread use of naloxone (Narcan) has helped a lot of people survive a temporary "clinical death." This is wonderful, but it has also resulted in the phrase "I died" becoming so common that it is devoid of gravitas and almost meaningless.
I've lost count of the number of addicts I've talked to who have "died" once, twice, three, four or more times. Either we need to come up with a different word for this, or I just have to get used to the fact that there are a lot of corpses walking around.
(mods, feel free to move this thread wherever is most appropriate)
