Sometimes psychological pain causes more suffering than physical pain. | Image: Martin Redlin.
Death is one of the main topics that haunt the mind of every human being. Since we became aware that life is not infinite and people come and go from this world with the passage of time, certain existential doubts assail us.
One type of doubt has to do with the circumstances of our future death. How will we die, when, of what, are some of these doubts. Specifically, the way in which we will die is one of the essential questions we ask ourselves for fear of suffering in our last moments . Throughout life we fight to eliminate or reduce suffering, but with respect to those last moments, that fight becomes stronger.
The 10 most stormy deaths
Next we are going to see, in this ranking, from lowest to highest, the worst deaths that you should not wish even on your worst enemies. Among them we will find some classics and others that are not so .
One of the problems that we find when making this list is that it will depend a lot on the tolerance of each person to each type of suffering. There are people who fear physical pain more and others psychological . The duration and intensity of the type of death are normally combined in a negative way, that is, the more one increases, the more the other decreases. In any case, we can find some exception in torture.
In the list we have gathered causes of death and we have excluded complex tortures that are often based on the combination of different methods (burning, cutting, asphyxiating, inserting, etc.).
10. Decompression
The decompression process appears when the external pressure that surrounds a body drops sharply. This causes the body itself to expand. Applied to human beings, it can happen in any context in which a person is in a place with a certain pressure and outside, there is much less.
It can therefore happen to you if you travel to space, practice diving or go by plane (although it requires a lot of altitude to be lethal). In the case, for example, of going inside a submarine and getting out while underwater, the process is reversed, since the external pressure is greater than the internal one.
Death happens because the lungs (especially if they were swollen and the person tried to take a breath to hold on longer) before the change in pressure expand enormously . The more pressure difference, the more expansion.
The tissues are torn by the expansion and the oxygen that circulated through the bloodstream and the lungs escapes due to the increase in volume. The whole body begins to swell and the person ends up dying of cardiac arrest.
9. Suffocation
Whether because a person is crushed by a crowd (which prevents them from expanding their chest) or because their airways are obstructed, dying from suffocation is a relatively common cause of death .
It lasts longer than decompression death and is considerably more distressing . On a psychological level it is also very “painful”, especially in cases where it is known that oxygen will not be able to be resumed.
Time is quite important in this death and a great unknown. First of all, it takes between 1 and 2 minutes to lose consciousness. Seconds later the body stops breathing. At that moment the body entersa state of “pause”, where if no measures are taken, the heart will stop beating between 1 and 3 minutes later, being able to diagnose “clinical death”. Finally, neurological death will come soon after.
8. Choking
This type of choking refers to choking due to obstruction of the airway by a foreign body (OVACE). Being the most frequent drowning in water or food, this type of death is equally terrible as the previous one.
There are two differences to note. In the case of being submerged in a large body of water, the psychological anguish is usually greater as well as the feeling of no escape . When the time comes, the person involuntarily tries to breathe underwater by swallowing it and flooding his lungs while he is conscious.
In the case of choking to death on an object, there is a possibility that the object does not occupy the entire pathway and allows a little air to pass through, this will prolong the agony .
For these two specific reasons, we consider drowning ahead of general suffocation.
7. Radiation
Death by (ionizing) radiation is quite varied depending on the source of radiation, the time of exposure, the dose and the person.
For starters, it increases the risk of leukemia and virtually any cancer. Other symptoms are diarrhea, fatigue, fainting, burns to the skin and internal organs, vomiting, hair loss, delusions, internal bleeding, decreased immune system, sterility, etc.
In fatal doses, the symptoms generate an almost unbearable discomfort throughout the body and the organs begin to malfunction . The worst thing is that between the administration of the dose and death, there is a period of supposed recovery, which disappears a few days later, when the cells of the intestinal system fail.
An extreme dose causes death in a short time due to the destruction of the cells that make up the nervous system.
6. Frozen
Death by freezing was one of the great traps of World War II for the Nazi army during the attack on Russia.
This death, which is usually long, since the body loses temperature relatively slowly, first goes through several phasesin which the symptoms are varied and often reversible with relatively few sequelae (such as amputation of a limb).
The third phase of hypothermia, before death, is characterized by the disappearance of the extreme chills of the previous phase. The inability to move the extremities and the mouth appears , the cellular metabolism is annulled, the skin turns blue, delusions and stupor appear, the organs begin to fail, until consciousness is lost and subsequently brain activity.
The disturbing thing about this death is the previous process, where the pain in the extremities, as if they were stuck needles, it is unbearable until you finish losing sensitivity. A temporary relief until it is discovered that the nerve cells of the limb have died, and therefore, it would have to be amputated if it survived.
5. Hunger
The human being can endure weeks without eating . Some experts argue that even more than a month. If hunger already appears when we spend 8 hours without eating (not counting the time we sleep), how will a person feel who has spent one or two weeks without eating anything?
The time he survives will depend on the amount of body mass (fat, muscle , etc) available to the body to obtain energy. Over time, the organs will begin to fail, leaving the brain and heart as the last survivors .
4. Thirst
Dying of thirst is much worse than starvation. Thirst is a much more unsettling sensation than hunger . In fact, when you go for a while without eating or drinking water, thirst completely overshadows hunger.
The human body is wise. Faced with the imposition of a dry season, the organism reveals itself by making thirst appear. As the human being can go weeks without eating, but not without drinking, obtaining water is the main objective, and therefore, the suffering it causes is much greater than that of hunger.
In addition, when you have not eaten for a long time, there comes a time when the body’s own fatigue prevents you from feeling hungry; but this does not happen with thirst. The thirst never stops increasing until the last moment. Such is his commanding call thaturine will appear as a lifesaver quickly without even questioning it .
3. Perforation (impalement)
The classic impalement torture consisted of placing the victim on a large stake (usually wooden) on which she was slowly allowed to fall . The stake used to be inserted through the rectum or through the vagina , in the case of women. Other times by mouth, in reverse. There is even a variant where the stake was first heated red-hot before the person was dropped.
This heinous method of torture and murder could last from a few seconds to 1 or 2 days .. Everything depended on the course followed by the stake (since it could or could not damage vital organs) and the speed with which the person fell due to his own weight.
2. Burnt
Probably one of the most extreme pains in the world, but it does not occupy our first place for two reasons. The first: when the skin burns along with the tissues, so do the nerve endings responsible for sending pain signals, which makes the pain in certain areas disappear .
The second reason and the most important: The person, because of the strong pain, usually faints, since the human brain “disconnects” so as not to have to endure such activation. If this does not happen, a person on fire dies in a very short time, although it depends on the intensity of the fire and whether there is smoke or not (being able to lose consciousness due to suffocation).
1. Infections and Insects (Scaphism)
This method of torture consisted of introducing a person into a trough (small wooden box) with several holes through which to place arms, head and feet. The executioner smeared the box with milk and honey to attract all kinds of insects and over time fed the victim with spoiled food. The latter produces strong diarrhea in the person that will attract even more insects .
The box remains closed at all times, so the insects, the smell and the waste in the process of putrefaction begin to create a completely unbearable climate. The biggest problem appears when the insects begin to enter the victim’s orifices to lay eggs inside hers. As the days go by, the insects inside begin to feed on the person. In the end, he dies from multiple infections and organ failure.
There is a version in which, instead of a box, a large dead animal (normally a horse) is used, and the same technique of placing the person inside with the limbs out is used.
