The "you aint as hard as you think you are" thread

General General Discussion
1

I’m always inspired by stories of hard as woodpecker lips people to keep humility, and marvel at how tough some people can be. There’s also no doubt that prior generations make most today look soft. Obviously, we can all quote an amazing story from some great books, but I want a “I thought I was hard 'till X did…” story from your own experiences.

I’ll give you one that still blows my mind 'till this day, and it’s not about some tough as nails marine, SWAT, gunny sgt, etc, but about my grandma! My grandmother was first generation Norwegian. These are some tough people. How tough?

I’m 13-14 years old and I hear a crash, bang, type noise up stairs. She yells for my help. I go up stairs and she has slipped on a rug and broken her tibia (shin). And by broke, I mean her foot is facing backward totally. Not a compound fracture, but you could see the bone pushing at the skin. Is she screaming, crying? Nope, in obvious pain, tells me to go get my step grandfather.

So we are now carrying her down the stairs to take her to the hospital. She says “wait, I’m hungry!” Step grandfather and I look at each other and know, there’s no arguing she she’s set her mind to this.

She then demands a hot dog and a glass of brandy. So, we put her on the kitchen table so her foot is hanging over the edge as to not (hopefully) make it worse and her the hot dog and the brandy. We sit there and watch her eat her dog and drink the brandy (and was not in a rush about it I might add…) and then announced she was ready to go to the hospital.

That was my grandma. My mother “the meanest man you ever met” as I liked to call her, was not much better. These were some hard ass Yankees the likes we don’t see today.

On threat of death that’s a 100% true story, an experience that showed me early on just how tough people could be, and that women could be hard as nails.

Lets hear another good one.

2

My two yo nephew went out with his grandmother to her work so she could show him off. He was chasing a lizard and slipped on some water. He fell smack flat on his face busting out his two front teeth. (mind you he’s two, those weren’t going to fall out for several years to come). Well he cried for a few minutes and by the time the bleeding subsided he was back to normal. He manned up for the emergency dental visit, and was good as can be. Infact he went home and resumed his usual roughhouse self and fell down hitting his face on the edge of the sofa thus giving himself one helluva wicked shiner only hours after the tooth incident. Again cried for about a minute and then simply told everyone clear as day “I want to go to bed now”. Kid is a tough little turd.

3

My great grandmother came over from Norway around 1910. Stories of her childhood and breaking holes in the ice to go swimming are great fun!

My dad’s great grandfather or great great grandfather Francis Webster crossed the plains in a handcart in 1856 with the Mormon Pioneers. The trials and travails they had are unmentionable. (you can read about it here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_handcart_pioneers)

We have people like these in our midst today (think Marcus Luttrell and probably a few unsung M4C members) but percentage wise they are a lot less likely to be found today than in our past. I know I am not one.

4

my grandpa is a rancher and almost everything he does sets me off this way. just like shooting competitions with grandpa vs steel sights to scopes :stuck_out_tongue: and watching an 80 year old with a shoulder replacement chop firewood at 3 in the morning every morning

5

The story that got me recently was the 5 yo kid that was out playing when a rabid fox tried to attack his little brother and five other kids. The kid pinned the fox to the ground with his bare hands for over a minute till his dad was able to dispatch it. And the fox had rabies. The boy asked for a bandaid.

6

My grandpa and great aunts/uncles lived in Holland until 1948. They were about 5-18 years old during WW2, and went through years of occupation. One of my great aunts told me about getting strafed by German planes on a few occasions, and my grandpa was part of the Dutch underground. At one point he was hiding in a house, and a German patrol came by. They had some secret compartment he had to hide in laying on his back with the floor boards inches from his face. He could see through the cracks German soldiers standing over him.

I couldn’t imagine a childhood like that. How’d you like to be 10 or so years old and get strafed by a fighter? My mom was conceived in Holland just before her mom came over here with the rest of her family. A church in Long Beach, CA sponsored them to come over, and my grandpa stayed in Holland. I didn’t meet him until 1997, and he passed a few years ago.

Im 26, and most people my age and up into their 40’s (at least) have lived easy lived compared to our grandparents.

7

My Grandfather, World War II in the Battle of Leyte Gulf.

Being the BAR man of his squad and over 6 feet tall, he was a popular target for the Jap infantry.

They came under fire in a valley and began running for cover. While running “the ground hit [him] in the face”. He landed on his watch, which was worn in the inside of his wrist. 0900 hrs.

He had been hit by a Japanese Sniper in high in a tree. The 6.5mm Jap round struck him in the right side of his neck and exited out his left hip, taking one of his lungs with it. When the round exited, it struck BAR mags in a pouch, causing the bullet to “explode” causing carnage to his hip area.

He could not move. He sat and slurped blood and sand, watching his wrist watch, while the battle ensued around him. His own troops declared him as dead and removed his ammo, boots and personal items during the battle. They also took his jeweled Samurai sword and other treasures he had gathered in 3 years of fighting. This pissed him off. Nothing he could not about it. He was paralyzed and could not talk. The wet sand packed his wounds and prevented him from bleeding out.

12 hours went by. The action ceased. “This ones alive! He don’t look too good”, he could hear. Phillipino stretcher bearers carried him well into the night. It was very painful and bumpy. At the Aid Station, he hears a female nurse say “This one’s not going to make it”. He response inside his head was “You God damned right I’m gonna make it!”

He was transfered to a hospital ship offshore, then transported back to the States. He stayed at Walter Reed for over a year, then was discharged. For 2 years after, his right upper body was half paralized. He learned to shoot left handed. The Government listed him as 75% disabled.

He regained the use of his right hand/arm and went on to be a legendary County Sheriff for 32 years.

He is still alive today. He still cusses “those damned Japs” because of minor complications he still has (DA trigger pull on some guns is too much right handed).

Grandpa is a true bad ass, and his war stories are the best. The shit those guys (kids) used to do…Dude is hard!

8

My great-uncle (1920-1998) was a B17 pilot stationed in England during WWII based in England. He flew his 25 missions and was offered the chance to rotate home to train bomber crews. Needless to say, he refused and flew yet another 25 missions before returning home.

My grandfather (a Marine in WWII) is a little foggy on the details, but he did tell me this story:

My great-uncle flew the 3rd aircraft in a formation of over 35 B17s on a bombing run over France. They ran into heavy weather and got lost, running into over 100 Luftwaffe fighters in addition to flak that you could walk on. Long story short, his B17 took over 400 machine gun rounds and was directly hit 5 times by flak, which blew a 4 foot hole in the side of the aircraft and destroyed an engine. With 3 of his 10-man crew killed or wounded, only 3 engines online, ammo depleted, and fuel leaking, the ENTIRE remaining crew decided unanimously to continue the mission. They flew on to their bombing run and were pounded again by flak and fighters. My grandfather took a direct hit from an ME109 in his right shoulder - through the windshield and through his shoulder. His copilot and one of the waist gunners bandaged the wound, but he remained at the controls holding the bomber steady for the bombardier and flying straight through more direct AA hits with his left hand only. My grandfather said he later described the AA experience as “like being inside a tin can inside a washing machine”. All his bombs hit their target.

On the way home, they were jumped by fighters yet again, and the previously destroyed engine was hit again, blowing the prop off and again injuring my great-uncle. Upon return to his base, he was rushed to surgery along with the surviving members of his crew…but not before ensuring his entire crew had medical attention before he did. The surgeons managed to remove over 10 pieces of shrapnel, part of the metal jacket from the ME109 shell, and a 2" section of a BOLT, which was later identified as one which held a piece of the propeller together. This, apparently, came from the destroyed engine which was hit a second time. He kept the bolt piece until he died.

Upon recovering from surgery, he was listed in fair condition and was slated to be shipped home. He AGAIN refused, and spent 8 months in rehab, only to fly the rest of his second 25 missions before returning home.

From what I remember, he walked with a limp on his right side and his right arm became next to useless, as he was often seen wearing it in a sling. Unfortunately, he was overcome by lung cancer in 1998. The two most distinct things about him that I remember are a) the fact that he still wore his bomber crew jacket every winter…with the hole in it! and b) He kept his US Army issue 1911 (he traded his revolver for it) loaded in his side drawer and would clean it every month on the kitchen table. He taught me how to clean a gun when I was 6.

9

That dude is a hard SOB. He’d still kick my ass.

10

I know its a movie…but its a good portrayal. Doesn’t get any harder than this:

11

LOL, I was thinkin the same thing Will!!!

12

There was a guy I used to work with that was from Nigeria. When he was about 11 years old they had a civil war and his family had to leave their village and live in the jungle. He was in the “army” at 11 years old and running around shooting people with a machine gun in the jungle. When they could catch enough rats they would have a feast. This man has a work ethic like no one I’ve ever met before. He’s not afraid to do things for himself - he built a 1000 square foot addition on his house all by himself. He thinks most people in this country are lazy and spoiled and contends that there are no poor people in America. He frequently tells folks that if they want to see poverty they should come home with him when he goes. He’s one of my favorite people in the world.

13

My wife could tell you stories about my pain threshold that would blow your mind as she’s known me half my life now and seen my survive many things that would kill most people with a smile on my face but I’m modest so I’ll save those. Instead I’ll tell a quick story of my great grandma that proves one’s pain threshold is most certainly genetic:

My great grandma was all of 4’ 10" and had EIGHT children. It gets better. I just turned 32 the other day so it’s safe to say that when she was bearing this children that would be my grandpa and his siblings there wasn’t a whole lot of options for making the pain go away. To top it all off as if that weren’t enough the crazy part is that the smallest baby was 10lbs 2oz!!! :eek:

…I dare someone to top that.

14

I think Jacklyn Lucas still holds the record.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacklyn_Lucas

Private First Class Jacklyn Harold Lucas (14 February 1928 – 5 June 2008) was a United States Marine who was awarded the Medal of Honor for his heroic actions during the Iwo Jima campaign — for unhesitatingly hurling himself over his comrades upon one grenade and for pulling another one under himself. One of the grenades exploded, and Lucas absorbed the entire blasting force of it with his own body. Private First Class Lucas, the youngest Marine ever to receive the United States’ highest military decoration, was presented the award by President Harry S. Truman at the White House on Friday, 5 October 1945.

Although only 14 years of age, having a muscular build, 5 ft 8 in (1.73 m) tall and weighing 180 pounds (82 kg),[2] he enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve without his mother’s consent[2] on 6 August 1942. He gave his age as 17, and went to Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, South Carolina for recruit training.

During his rifle training, Pvt. Lucas qualified as a sharpshooter. He was next assigned to the Marine Barracks and Naval Air Station Jacksonville, Florida. In June 1943, he was transferred to the 21st Replacement Battalion at New River, North Carolina, and one month later he went to the 25th Replacement Battalion, where he successfully completed schooling which qualified him as a heavy machine gun crewman.

He left the continental United States on 4 November 1943, and the following month he joined the 6th Base Depot of the V Amphibious Corps at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. He was advanced to private first class on 29 January 1944.

With statements to his buddies that he was going to join a combat organization, PFC Lucas walked out of camp on 10 January 1945, wearing a khaki uniform and carrying his dungarees and field shoes in a roll under his arm.

He was declared UA (Unauthorized Absence) when he failed to return that night and a month later, when there was still no sign of him, he was declared a “deserter”, and a reward was offered for his apprehension. He was also reduced to the rank of private at that time.

He stowed away on board USS Deuel which was transporting units of the 5th Marine Division into combat. He surrendered to the senior troop officer present on 8 February 1945 dressed in neat, clean dungarees. He was allowed to remain, and shortly after he was transferred to Headquarters Company, 5th Marine Division. He reached his 17th birthday while at sea, six days before the heroic actions at Iwo Jima, for which he was awarded the Medal of Honor.

On the day following the landing at Iwo Jima, he was creeping through a twisting ravine with three other men of his rifle team when the Japanese opened an attack on them. The men were in a trench when two enemy grenades landed nearby. Lucas pushed a thrown hand grenade into the volcanic ash and covered it with his rifle and his body. He reached out and pulled a second grenade beneath him. He was left for dead by his companions, although he was miraculously still alive. Severely wounded in the right arm and wrist, right leg and thigh, and chest, Pvt. Lucas had undoubtedly saved his companions from serious injury and possible death.[1]

He was evacuated to the hospital ship Samaritan, and then treated at various field hospitals prior to his arrival in San Francisco, California on 28 March 1945. He eventually underwent 21 surgeries. For the rest of his life, there remained about 200 pieces of metal, some the size of 22 caliber bullets, in Lucas’ body — which set off airport metal detectors.[3]

The mark of desertion was removed from his record in August of that year while he was a patient at the U.S. Naval Hospital at Charleston, South Carolina. He was discharged from the Marine Corps Reserve because of disability resulting from his wounds on 18 September 1945, following his reappointment to the rank of Private First Class.

On 5 October 1945, Lucas and 14 other sailors and Marines (including Pappy Boyington) were presented the Medal of Honor by President Harry S. Truman. In attendance at the ceremony were Lucas’ mother, Admiral Chester Nimitz, and Secretary of Defense James Forrestal.[3]

15

No movies allowed! :smiley:

Has to be true and personal stories.

16

He doesn’t like to talk about it much, but I know a little bit of my great uncle’s story.

He was a pilot in WWII, flying B-17’s over Okinawa. After several successful missions, his B-17 was shot down over Okinawa. He was the only one to survive the crash, and survived alone for several days before being taken captive. All I know from this point is he was a POW, he was rescued, and received the Purple Heart. I gather he was tortured, and will not talk about it. He was stricken with malaria, and that caused his hair to fall out prematurely.

Today, he is 87years old, builds custom furniture, and cabinetry. He has had both knees, and both hips replaced. He rides his bike 10 miles a day, and takes his boat to fish on Lake Erie at least once a week. The man has more energy than a squirrel on crack, and shows no signs of slowing down.

My grandfather had a birth defect, and only had one arm. He died when my dad was 3 from menangitis, but from stories and photos, used to gather snapping turtles with only one arm. :eek:

Now my Great grandfather was 100% Cherokee Indian, he was one of the first linemen in Akron OH, and wired much of the city. He single handedly wired Stan Hewitt from gas lighting to electric. Stan Hewitt was the home of the Seiberling family, famous for the creation of the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co. At 85 yo, he put a new roof on his 2 story house, by himself. At 92, he tore out, and rebuilt the entire basement foundation of his house, again, by himself. He died at the age of 102 in 1989.

All 3 were on my dad’s side. There is 3 tough SOB’s. I see a little bit of myself in those 3 men.

17

My grandpa’s stories from his SEAL days (there aren’t many, so I appreciate it greatly when he shares them) always awe me.

I learned I was a bit tougher than I thought I was when I took a 9mm Ranger SXT to the elbow from two feet away (friend had an ND). I didn’t cry, pass out, anything, just had him put pressure on it and call 911. The bullet shattered my humerus, split my elbow joint into five pieces and completely destroyed my funny bone. It was 45 minutes before I got a shot of anything on the helicopter, which took about 30 minutes to get me there. Then I laid in the trauma bay at the hospital for about six hours before they finally gave me something else. Took two steel plates, 17 screws and a synthetic bone graft to piece my elbow back together.

I still have full bottles of prescription pain killers sitting around they gave me at the doctor’s office that I don’t need. I take one or two occasionally when I go to therapy to stretch my arm back out and get it working, but other than that I try to stay away from them. That was two months ago, I can do push-ups off a wall or counter already (not horizontal but at like a 50-60 degree angle).

18

Mu uncle spent WW2 in a sub off the coast of Japan getting chased around and depth charged. Ever been in one of those WW2 era subs? I have been on one on display, and going into it, how they survived in such a thing, I have no idea. The reason I don’t add him to the “you aint as as hard as you think you are” list is he never told any stories. My father told me some second hand so that’s how I know. I think I would rather be just about anywhere other then in one of those subs considering what it was like to crawl down into one for the short time I was in one, and I am not by nature claustrophobic. I don’t mind tight spaces, but tight spaces under water, full of diesel oil, BO, sea water and condensation dripping on me, etc with people above trying kill me, would not make me a happy guy.

19

My mother is German, lived on a farm on the outskirts of Munich during WWII as a child. She had 4 brothers and sisters, all older than her. My grandfather had fought for Germany during WW1, but not the second war. They were not Nazi’s and didn’t believe in the propaganda like most common Germans, unlike how much of history tries telling us otherwise. With my grandfather being a farmer, they grew/made almost all their own food. A big problem was that the German army would visit the farms and take what they wanted. It was a struggle for them to hide enough food to feed themselves. Late in the war, Nazi leaders in Munich were going around heavily recruiting older boys for the Nazi Youth. These older boys would later be formed into an SS Panzer division. When I mean recruiting, you didn’t have much of a choice from what my relatives told me. The regular German citizens were as much afraid of their own leaders as the masses of people that were targeted for genocide. Anyhow, one day while they were eating dinner, a motorcycle pulled up to their farm. It was a ranking Nazi party member from the city. I am told my grandfather ordered everyone upstairs, but my mom and a few of her sisters kids hung out at the top of the stairs spying so they could peak down the stairways as you know how kids are. Anyhow, the Nazi man was invited in (like you had a choice) and him and my grandfather were having a conversation about the two oldest boys and why they werent in the youth program. The conversation got quite heated right there in the foyer area I guess you could call it. By this time, my mom was scared and her sisters took her quietly into a bedroom. They soon heard struggling downstairs for a few moments, and then it got quiet. The boys went downstairs to find grandpa dragging the now dead nazi into the basement. My mom later said she saw grandpa driving off in the Nazi’s motorcycle, only to return home by foot late into the night. My grandfather never told anyone in the family what exactly happened and no one in the family ever found the dead guy but my mom has suspicions that he was buried in the basement. I am proud of the tough ole bastard protecting his family when many families caved in from fear to the Nazi demands. I can’t imagine living like they did through those times.

20

All right, I’ve got one.

My grandpa is 93. He’s a Pearl Harbor survivor, went up one side of Europe and down the other, and ended up as a master sergeant whose final billet was as the NCOIC of the US Army MP command in Antwerp, Belgium.

I’ve been hunting all over the West with him and have seen him get really fucking injured a couple of times, one time involving a large outboard motor, and another when he slipped on wet grass while mowing and lost three toes under the lawnmower (took the toe of his boot right off, and toes with it). I’ve never heard him yell in pain from any of that shit.

He was about 70 when the lawnmower incident happened: I was in the house when his foot went under the lawnmower, and all I heard was the lawnmower stop, then silence for a minute, then a rap on the back door. I opened the door and he was standing there with his left foot in a pool of blood on the porch and the toe of his boot in his hand, with the toes inside it that he’d picked up off the ground. He said, calmly, “I think I messed up. Get a rag, and get the car keys so we can go to the hospital.”

He stuffed the rag into the end of his boot and we went to the hospital, where they reattached his toes. He came home, had a shot of whiskey, and went to bed. I never heard another word about it.

Cut to last summer. Grandpa is finally not doing very well, and had to be put in a nursing home because he could no longer get up and get himself to the shitter. He had been acting VERY strangely for a month or two prior, and once we got him to the MD, they found that he had a horrific bladder/kidney infection that had just about killed him. Which brings me to the pièce de résistance of this post.

When a truly bad bladder infection hits you, especially if you’re old, it can fuck up your ability to empty your bladder. For instance, if your “Full” mark is 400ml, you might only be able to piss 150ml at a time. Also, when they’re that bad, the infection typically goes into the prostate too. Soooo… you have two options: a hard bolus of antibiotics and hope that you can get the swelling down before your urethra closes completely off, or 2) a catheter. (insert shudder here). Unfortunately for Grandpa, option 2) became the only option.

I was with him in the ER when they decided he needed to be cathed. This probably agitated me more than it did him :D. Another nurse came in and I faced uprange and started talking to him to try to distract him from the horror that was about to ensue on his nether regions.

I had no idea. He was talking about something, and midsentence he stopped, cocked an eyebrow at me and a single bead of sweat popped out on his forehead. A couple of seconds later he started talking again, and I heard the nurse mutter something to the other nurse. About 30 seconds later, Grandpa winced a little bit, then started talking about wanting to get the hell out of the hospital and go home. About a minute after that, the nurse said “All done.” and left.

About 30 minutes later, I happened to look down and see the urine bag had HUGE CLOTS OF BLOOD floating in it, and I went and found the doctor.

Long story short, it turned out that the nurse had BADLY TORN his urethra when trying to ram the fucking catheter past the poor old bastard’s prostate, and he had to go in to surgery a couple of hours later to fix it.

All he did was raise an eyebrow when his fucking pisstube was being ripped.

I think of myself as having a reasonable pain tolerance. I don’t think I would have reacted as well.