• Mac@mander.xyz
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    1 year ago

    Pull over and stop. It’s not worth it.

    However, if you decide not to: simply jerk off while driving. It works. 🤷‍♂️

  • AFK BRB Chocolate@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’m not a great sleeper, even when I’m in my bed, it’s dark and quiet, and I’m tired, so I’ve never worried about falling asleep at the wheel, but it happened one time. I was around 30 and between marriages. I had gone to a couple back-to-back parties and had been awake 30+ hours. Driving home on the freeway going 70, I got woken up by my tires going over the lane marker dots. I couldn’t have been asleep for more than a moment but it scared the complete crap out of me. I drove home with the window down (it was cold out), the stereo up, and smelling like adrenaline. I’ve never pushed it like that again.

  • jet@hackertalks.com
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    1 year ago

    Cold AC on blast, Spanish band music super loud, downing energy drinks, chewing gum/jerkey/anything, slapping myself across the face, and pinching my legs… all to stay awake while driving and not die.

    God! I was stupid.

    Who else has pulled over and done jumping jacks on the side of the road to wake up?

    • Jay@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      I used to do a lot of driving for my job. A lot of times I’d pull over and walk around a bit just to get things flowing again. Worst came to worst, there was more than a few times I’d just take a nap… I’d sooner be late somewhere than dead or worse, taking someone else out.

  • ArgentCorvid [Iowa]@midwest.social
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    1 year ago

    You might want to get checked out for sleep apnea.

    sleep deprivation and ADHD present a lot of the same symptoms.

    With my CPAP I don’t fall asleep in the car on the way to work after being “asleep” for 8 hours. Still can’t focus so if I end up in the ditch, it won’t be because I nodded off.

  • froh42@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    (Update: changed wording & inserted the missing “always”, I just wanted to warn people of other situations, not rule out it can happen like this - there just might be no warning at all when falling asleep while driving )

    Falling asleep while driving doesn’t always work like that. Your brain can also just shut off.

    Many years ago I was going the Autobahn from Munich to Nuremberg - going with 150 km/h, 95 mph or so.

    I was driving in the middle lane of 3, it was Friday early evening (around 6) and still daylight.

    As said I was on the middle lane, low traffic (fortunately!) and suddenly I was on the left lane.

    I was just out for a few seconds, enough time for the car to wander over to the left lane.

    That probably was my closest situation to dying in traffic.

    (I switched my schedule to not drive 2 hours after work THAT DAY)

    • NightAuthor@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      Idk, I’ve definitely been falling asleep and thought “aren’t I driving, why are my eyes closed?” And then quickly open them.

      • froh42@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Thanks for mentioning that - I updated my wording, as I didn’t want to say “it can’t happen like this”, I just did want to say “There might be no warning at all”.

  • the post of tom joad@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    This happened to me once, when i thought it was a good idea to get up at 6am, do chores around the house then work a full 8 hours from 10p-6a doing construction then drive 2 hours home. (Thing is, i could pull it off in my youth). Well, no more. I’m very very lucky neither i nor anyone else had to pay for my stupidity.

  • moist_towelettes@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I was recently diagnosed epileptic and I’m starting to experience this phenomenon where I’m unable to tell the difference between dreams and reality.

    I’m not even supposed to be driving yet, but I was under the impression that I had been for a while (in my dreams) only to find out my odometer hadn’t changed when I tried to drive IRL. Really jarring.

    • Good Girl [she/they]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      1 year ago

      Geez, how do you manage that? When I disassociate hard I get heavy anxiety about not being able to differentiate dreams and reality and it feels like i’m gonna lose my sense of self. I can’t imagine it being common occurrence.

  • 30p87@feddit.de
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    1 year ago

    For me it’s not falling asleep, but classically getting lost in thoughts. When I’m on medication I think about random things too, but automatically check the street every half a second consciously. If not, it often happens that I suddenly realize the car in front of me has been getting a lot closer since the last time I paid attention to it, which is before I got completely lost with my full mind in a subject. It’s also a lot harder to turn and shift smoothly without meds, as I then do it automatically without even being able to concentrate on it.

  • pec@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    I moved to the city so I don’t have to drive every day. The only way for me to not daydream while driving was to drive fast enough for it to be dangerous.

    One of my friend, often a my passenger, admitted he felt safer when I was driving fast and when I was a low speed he would “copilot” for me.