What is your real life "20 seconds of courage" story, that changed everything?

1. I pulled into my driveway (winter so it was dark, dead end street) and when I opened my door I heard this bizarre, faint wailing. It sounded like someone crying/talking but not quite it that makes sense. Immediately I’m on edge and scared because it’s so dark and I can’t see anything. I send my child inside to get my husband and instead of waiting for him, I just start running to the sound. I found my elderly neighbor laying on the icy ground where she’d slipped on the ice and broken her shoulder. She was in shock, nearly frozen and could only muster that weird wailing sound. My husband was there moments later and we got her off to the hospital. She said later she’d been laying there for hours and figured she was going to die :(
   — twomangocats


2. I was perhaps 14. I was swimming at our local club, in the shallow end near the stairs. A little girl, must have been four or five came off of the stairs. I thought she was swimming for a moment and then I noticed she was bobbing up and down -- starting to drown. I didn't think and I grabbed her, and pulled her to the stairs where she started to sob because she was so scared. Her mother ran over and grabbed her and thanked me. The lifeguard never looked twice. It was right time, right place. I lived for a long time with the fear of what would have happened had I not been there.
   — rmsfr


3. Didn't really pnsyically change anything but changed a lot mentally. I work as a lifeguard, and for 9 months in this job I have had no incidents. The oldest lifeguard there had been working at that pool for 3 years and has only had to pull a kid from the water who was in minor difficulty, so overall nothing happens in this pool. The pool has regulars and since it's a "premium" club we are encouraged to get to know these people. This one guy always chats to me and is super pleasant, and he comes over from the fast lane and I see him slip and grip onto the rail. Thought he had fallen so I went over and just. His face. Half of it was sagged, his eyes were almost completely red from bloodshot, and he stared right through me. He had a stroke. I guess I managed to keep my cool though. Hit the alarm, in the water and had him out before everyone else had come. I don't know if he's ok. I guess my mental health has taken a turn for the better after that. I'm not scared any more, not riddled with anxiety. I don't know why it's like that, or of it'll wear off but I'll keep with it at the moment
   — MarzyBand






4. My first job in college was as a barista at this little cafe near campus. It was a super trendy spot and the pay wasn't great but I liked it because working there made me feel really cool. The general manager was kinda shady, though. He was friends with the owner and had been working there a long time, so no one wanted to question his shadiness for fear that it would result in being fired. I started to notice that the women who worked with me seemed really uncomfortable when he was around, and when I talked to them about it I found out that he had been sending them creepy facebook messages asking about their boyfriends, giving out a lot of unwanted and lingering hugs at work, and some occasional downright weird shit like making jokes about putting roofies in the drinks of attractive customers. No one wanted to bring this up with the owner because they knew that at such a trendy cafe, it wouldn't be hard to fire all the baristas and replace them with a new crop of eager college students. So they put up with him but were really uneasy all the time. I started watching him to see when he was being a creep so that I could try to distract him/make things easier for my female coworkers, but I was also scared of losing my job so I didn't want to be too confrontational or talk to the owner. One day, though, he said something really weird about a female customer (I think it was something along the lines of "imagine tying *her* to your bed") and I just lost my shit and was like "Dude, you're fucking done." In that moment of clarity/rage/courage/whatever it was, I immediately called up the owner and told him about what this dick had just said and that it wasn't the first time he had said something like this. I made sure that I wasn't implicating any of my female coworkers in this because I didn't want to endanger their jobs. I knew my job was on the line now but I didn't care anymore. I told the owner that either this guy went or I did. The guy was fired. The owner said that he was very impressed with how direct and articulate I was, and he actually promoted me to shift manager. I worked there for another year and learned a shit ton and gained a lot of confidence from the experience of being a manager, which helped me transition into real adult jobs later.
   — Faux_pod


5. I was 13, and I was at my best friend's birthday party, and we were having fun late into the night and talking and one of my friends opened up about how her mom's boyfriend ( Who was like in his 30s.) would tell her he had dreams about her whenever they were alone, she started crying and said she was scared and her best friend at the time said not to tell her mom because "He made her mom really happy." I got really pissed, and I grabbed her phone dialed her mom and told her to tell. She's safe now, and the guy ran outta state but I heard he went to jail months later. I had never dealt with anything like that, but it was just a gut feeling.
   — Spookyboomerang


6. One night when me and my sister were still young enough to share a room, i couldn't sleep for some reason. After awhile i noticed my sister making weird sounds in her crib and i turned on the light and she had somehow gotten her head stuck in her crib. I don't know what would have happened if i was able to sleep that night.
   — amakurt






7. It was the hottest day of the summer, and my dad didn't drink enough water when he decided to do yard work. I was helping him when he went into a seizure due to dehydration. He isn't epileptic but I am, so seizures are something we have dealt with before and are well-informed about. Neither of us had our phones on us and I was the only one out here with him, but I couldn't just leave him because he was seizing and he bit his tongue, which caused it to swell and fill his whole mouth, so now his airways were cut off and he was losing oxygen. So I did the next best thing: I screamed for my mom, who was inside. I screamed for about two minutes, the seizure was going on five, when she finally heard me and ran to see what was happening. She had her phone, but she couldn't pull herself together to call 911 (understandable, my dad's face was blue). I, more or less, yelled at her to give me her phone and had her watch my dad, instructed her that it's just like when I have my seizures, keep him on his side and everything, reported everything to the ambulances, and they got to my house two minutes later (we live very close to a hospital). My dad was okay, started coming out of it by the time paramedics arrived. Just dehydration, which we all gave him flak for, not drinking enough water in the middle of freakin' June. The paramedics pulled my mom aside and told her that he was very impressed with how I composed myself over the phone, how I even reported information that was useful for them without them asking for it, like his history of seizures and that he didn't drink water. That was the first time I ever heard from my dad, "sum_cynical_bastard, I should have listened to you." That made me feel good. EDIT: I didn't save my dad from a seizure. But at least taking him to the hospital made it known to him that he needed his rest for a few days after working so hard in the heat.
   — sum_cynical_bastard


8. I got married at 18 to a guy who was 5 1/2 years older than me. Two weeks into the marriage he became mentally and physically abusive, cut me off from my friends, and cheated on me repeatedly for months to come. I wasn’t allowed to leave my house alone unless I was with him or a parent (who he luckily didn’t cut me off from). I also wasn’t allowed a car or a job. The signs were there before the wedding but I was young and stupid and just wanted what I thought was love. When the only thing you can do is house work and cook for your husband, you end up having a lot of free time and I started playing his video games. I ended up making some true friendships on Xbox live. Then one day one of my friends on there invited someone I never played with before who we will call Jake. The three of us played all the time together. I was secretly texting Jake and playing with him alone whenever we got a chance until one day he told me he loved me. I knew at that point I loved him too but I couldn’t just leave my husband. Well after the next time he hit me I ended up getting a greyhound bus ticket to a different state to be with Jake. It took me not even one minute after he hit me to start planning my getaway. I didn’t know if Jake would let me live with him. I didn’t have any money but 100 dollars I saved over the months. He easily accepted me with open arms and we have been together ever since. We are now engaged and we have worked our asses off for everything we now have. He is a phenomenal person. Funny, smart and absolutely more handsome than I deserve. My leaving my home state changed my life irrevocably. But I would do it again. TL;DR Was in an abusive marriage and left in the middle of the night to a different state after less than a minute of thought. Edit: I should probably mention this was about 7 years ago.
   — JessaCuh


9. So this was a "fake" courage moment. I guess saying that the courage was real but the danger wasn't. A decade ago my mom used to always sleep on the couch (L-shaped, no man in her life) and sometimes I'd fall asleep out there on the other end of the couch with her watching a movie or something. One night I woke up and I don't know if I was still just half dreaming or what the deal was but I saw a figure, looked like a man, "I asked who the hell are you?" got no response so I just jumped up and charged them. Took me a second to realize I charged nothing but air but was proud of myself that I was ready to thrown down.
   — tocamix90






10. Just did 8 hours of courage. I'm extremely anti social and got a hot cook job and I pretty much make steaks all day. Poorly. It was terrifying but fuck it i got through it, terrified the whole way.
    — SupahSRWZ


11. I dunno if this counts yet, but it was like senior year in HS and I’d been dating this guy like a month. It was that kind of relationship where you “date” but really you just kinda text and wave shyly when you see each other(yes we were older than most kids who do that- I’m just cringily shy and he went along with it). It easily (easily) could have ended in us breaking up and never speaking up again, and I knew that but I liked him more than I’d like anyone so far so I figured it was worth it to actually try. One day I knew the end would come up soon if I didn’t make a move so I went up to him and kinda grabbed his hand. And then we started talking for real. Well now it’s been like four years and he’s my favorite person. We’re talking about getting engaged and he makes every day better so yeah. Go me
    — sugarsodasofa


12. I'd been visiting a very close friend for the weekend and came home to my mother. She was abusive, and started screaming at me basically immediately, as well as some physical violence. I texted him to come get me because I couldn't take it anymore. He drove an hour and I spent the next few days in the car (he lived far away but was in the area for a while). I still live with him. Since I've cut off my family, I can function as a person, and am so much healthier. It's changed my entire life.
    — rammydeath