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Abnormal Physical Strength In A Crisis (Hysterical Strength)

Mighty_Emperor

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I'm sure we've all heard tales of mothers lifting cars off their children, etc. so I wonder - does this really happen? Has anyone studied this?

I did have a search of the boards but couldn't come up with anything (if there is a thread let me know and I'll merge away) and I peeked in a number of general paranormal books but couldn't spot anything.

I've always found these stories fascinating but for soem reason haven't really thought to lok them up until now.
 
One example I witnessed meself (though it wasn't in adversity - more a case of exhibitionism).

I used to know a guy who had practised Budo Tai-Jutsu as a soldier, before suffering an injury that left him hobbling on a pair of crutchs.

One night, the topic of channeling chi energy came up (as it does) and he decided to give a demonstration. Basicly, he asked a guy to stand in the middle of the room and make an aggressive move; no sooner had he raised his hand than this guy was out of his chair, across the floor and had the poor sod on his back in exquisite pain so fast I didn't see it.

He had to be helped back to the chair.

As I recall, this was witnessed by about a dozen folk, who all agreed they had never seen the likes.

The guy seemed to move out of his chair and into the attack in one fluid movement, without any discernable transitions, and so fast it was a blur; certainly less than a second from start to finish.
 
The story that comes to mind is the one that is referenced in the 70's tv show Incredible Hulk. The story has to do with a mother who has to save her children from a car, and either lifts it and moves it off them, or tears the door off, or something like that.

The story used to get talked about quite a bit, but I can't find a mention of it online... and now I wonder if it was a UL or a real event.
 
this the kind of thing you mean? -
my dad was in an earthquake once (well, more than once, but i'm talking about a specific event) and thought it best in the circumstances to get out of the building (not usually advised). the fire exit was locked with a big padlock, which my dad broke off with his hands in order to open the door.
 
Mr. R.I.N.G. said:
The story that comes to mind is the one that is referenced in the 70's tv show Incredible Hulk. The story has to do with a mother who has to save her children from a car, and either lifts it and moves it off them, or tears the door off, or something like that.

The story used to get talked about quite a bit, but I can't find a mention of it online... and now I wonder if it was a UL or a real event.

Yeah I assumed it was too and it does seem to come up on UL sites although info is often scanty:

http://tafkac.org/faq2k/wild_608.html

although it gets stated as fact on other sites:

http://www.tryskelion.com/engwork2.htm

It also gets mentioned vaguely mixed in with real life cases here:

http://www.adventurecorps.com/way/superhuman.html

And it gets mentioned on the Discovery Channel site (so its possible that show might touch on it):

http://www.discoverychannel.com.au/herofactor/feature3.shtml

I've found some details here with names and everything:

Super-Mom Lifts Car Off Her Daughter And Drops It On Son

In Chicago, USA, a mother's triumph turned to agony after she summoned the amazing strength to lift her car two feet off the ground, freeing her pinned 7-year-old daughter — then accidentally dropped it on her 5-year-old son, killing him! Experts say Doris Brouvin, who weighs just 129 pounds, experienced what psychiatrists call a "crisis-powered physiological enhancement event" — a phenomenon in which a person in a state of high emotion finds his or her physical capacities dramatically increased. Researchers believe adrenaline is released into the system, allowing the affected person to act with superhuman power. Mrs. Brouvin's experience began as she was changing the left rear tire of her 1982 Buick. But she didn't realize the car jack was sinking precariously in the sun-softened asphalt. She took the bad tire off and turned to pick up the new one. But while her back was turned, her daughter Melanie crawled under the car — just as it fell off the jack, pinning the girl's left shoulder. "I don't know how I did it," Mrs. Brouvin said. "All I knew was my child might die if I didn't lift that car off her right away." Incredibly, the determined mom managed to lift the car and hold it up long enough for her daughter to roll out from under it. "As soon as I saw she was safe, my strength instantly gave out," Mrs. Brouvin said. "I dropped the car and knelt down beside Melanie." Only then did she realize her son Sean had crawled under the car from the other side to try to help extricate his sister. She had dropped it right on him. "I tried with everything in me to lift the car again," Mrs. Brouvin says. "But I'd used every ounce of power to free Melanie." Although it's small consolation to her, doctors say that lifting the car a second time wouldn't have helped. The weight of the Buick crushed the boy's skull, killing him instantly. No charges have been filed against the distraught mother. Doctors say young Melanie should regain full use of her damaged arm-shoulder socket.

but a search for her name (and crisis-powered physiological enhancement event) only brings up two sites with the same material and no obvious source.

http://www.paranormalmysteries.com/viewpost_50168.asp
http://www.theonlinenet.co.uk/comedy/true_stories/001.html

And it sounds like such a UL!!!

I did see one of those extreme accidents caught on tape from Hawaii where the helicopter goes completely out of control and ends up in a ditch. There are only a couple of people on hand (and the dimwit still filiming it) and the trapped pilot was in trouble so one guy lifted the helicopter while the other slid the pilot out from under it. Now the guy doing the lifitng was called "Tiny" and was built like a break outhouse but it was still an incredibly impresive feat.

I know during the strongest men competitions they throw cars around like big toys but they have engine removed which contributes a big slice of the weight and in this example (which turned up in my search) a crowd have to lift a car off a mother and chold trapped underneath:

http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/OttawaSun/News/2004/07/10/pf-533999.html

fluffle: Exactly that type of thing although examples of things like focusing Chi, etc. are clearly relevant as well (even if I hadn't thought of them at the time ;) ).
 
And this is from Berkely:

The Effects of Catastrophic Events on Human Health

By: Denis Devine

...................

While many are familiar with the positive effects of a jolt of hormones under stress – such as the mother who lifts a car off her child under the influence of adrenalin – few know about the negative effects hormones can have in such situations.

http://research.chance.berkeley.edu/page.cfm?id=11&aid=23

And Discovery again:

You will feel amazement and love beyond your imagination. At the risk of sounding sappy, I will say it: You are going to feel an overpowering sense of love for your child. Of course there are exceptions, but after experiencing it myself I can finally believe those stories about mothers who lift 2-ton cars off their trapped child. Sometimes when I look at my son, I feel certain that I could lift a vehicle off him if the need ever arose. Of course, with all the sleepless nights he's subjected me to it would have to be a Volkswagen Beetle rather than a Ford Explorer, but you get the idea.

http://health.discovery.com/centers/baby/parenthood/postpartum2.html

but its always so vague and mentioned in passing.
 
In times of extreme stress, we can do amazing things. Let me share one incident in my own life.

About 10 years ago, we moved from Illinois to Kentucky. One day after the move, my old dog was in such pain he had to be put down. I didn't know anyone, so I decided to do it myself. We were on a farm, so I picked a place out by the tobacco barn, dug a whole, gave my old boy a hug and a kiss and an appology, and did the deed. I buried him, my face awash with tears. Then I found a boulder perhaps 3 feet long and 2 feet wide and a foot thick. I was able to lift it, carry it, and place it on top of the grave. Carried it maybe 10 feet, just 2 or 3 steps. And that was it.

About a week later, I thoguht maybe I'd adjust the stone a little. I couldn't move it, nevermind pick it up. I believe that the stress I felt unleashed enough adrenalin and endorphins that I was able to move the stone without even hurting myself.

So yes, it's possible.
 
not quite the same thing, but when my brother was hit by a car a couple of years ago and seriously injured, witnesses told me that he had the presence of mind to get up and move out of the road after being thrown into the air and landing on it rather inelegantly. the injury to his head was sufficient that when i arrived some 10 minutes later he was unable to form sentences, didn't know where he was and couldn't remember my name, and it was two months before he was able to stand.
 
Superhuman endeavours

I think there may be a thread about this kind of stuff already, but here you go. This is from the Pride of Britain website. It's one of those truly inspiring yet bloody annoying things in a "Noel's Christmas Presents" kind of way i.e. it can bring tears to even the most cynical of people like myself!

http://www.prideofbritain.com/2001winners/

"Special Award

Leisa Hodgkinson

FOR the second time in her life Leisa Hodgkinson kept her head while all around were losing theirs.

Sales rep Leisa had nipped out for a sandwich one Friday lunchtime, when she watched in horror as seven-year-old Jean-Luc Archer suddenly ran out in front of a car.

She says: "I started screaming before he left the pavement because I could see what was going to happen."

The schoolboy was left crushed under the back wheels of the BMW car.

While other pedestrians looked on in shock and did nothing, Lisa, of
Warrington, Cheshire, ran to the car.

The traumatised driver had frozen with his foot still firmly on the brake, leaving Jean-Luc trapped.

Leisa, 29, knew she had to act fast. Although she is only 5 ft 7 inches tall, she somehow managed to summon up the strength to move the one tonne vehicle.

She says: "I was trying to push the car but it wouldn't move and then from somewhere I managed to find the strength to lift and push at the same time and it moved."

Once he was freed, Leisa realised Jean-Luc was not breathing and gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

She says: "When a young guy came over to help me, he was literally sick at what he saw and had to move away, and I suddenly realised how bad Jean-Luc's injuries were."

Lisa looked after him until the ambulance arrived and spent all night at the hospital with Jean-Luc's mum, Maggie.

She says: "It all hit me when I went to the hospital. I was covered in blood from head to toe and when I walked into A&E everyone stared at me."

Jean-Luc lost an ear in the accident, and was left with crushed pelvis and two shattered arms. The injuries left him unconscious for four days and he was given only a 30 per cent chance of survival.

But he has made a remarkable recovery and since nicknamed Leisa "Wonderwoman" for her superhuman strength.

Leisa says: "I don't know how I did it, I think it was just fright and
adrenaline. I've got a little boy and I just kept thinking it was him
because you imagine it's your own."

Even more amazingly Jean-Luc's life is the second Leisa has saved in the past 18 months. Last year she resuscitated a lorry driver on the M62, in Cheshire.

The judges' opinion

"It's just an amazing story. Not only did she save the little lad's life but she'd already saved a life somewhere else the year before. She's obviously got superhero genes.""

Now I know that "adrenalin is a powerful hormone you know" has a high bearing on such tales, but there must be a point at which you go beyong the influence of adrenalin. It just shows what the human body is capable of, and watch ethereal energies we may have the potential to draw on.
 
I stumbled acorss a short exchange in the FT letters:

FT168:52

SUPERHUMAN STRENGTH

For many years I have read references to allegedly true accounts of old ladies or children lifting two-ton cars off people trapped beneath them. In some versions the old lady suffers fractures and dislocations as a result. I have read these accounts in human interest articles, in books on human potential, hypnosis, self-improvement and martial arts. And although one training manual stated that adrenaline can produce a modest 25 per cent increase in muscular contraction force, all the others assert a many-fold increase. There is, however, a conspicuous lack of academic referencing on the subject. Do readers know of any first-hand accounts or medical information on adrenaline's strength-enhancing properties, if any?

--------------
DAVE FREEMAN
University of Wolverhampton

FT173:74

Superhuman strength

Dave Freeman refers to "allegedly true accounts of old ladies or children lifting two-ton cars off people trapped beneath them. In some versions the old lady suffers fractures and dislocations as a result." [FT168-.52].

I have collected many accounts of cars being lifted off trapped people. Some of the vehicles weighed as much as two tons, although none of these was lifted by old ladies or children. Also, none mention the lifter being injured. They are not academic references but from newspaper articles that have direct quotes and name people, places, and other details.

My father-in-law and I were building a fence at the front of my property a few years back. It was a calm, sunny afternoon. Somebody started screaming "Get it off! Get it of f me!" and, without thinking, I bolted around the corner and across the next street to where the cries were coming from. Another man had heard the screams and also came running. In the driveway was a teenager trapped under a car. His wife or girlfriend was standing nearby holding a baby and looking visibly shocked. An elderly man was standing, indecisive, on the steps of the house.

The front left tyre was off the car, and the disc was cutting into the teenager's leg. The other man and I grabbed either side of the wheel area and hefted with one motion. The left front of the car (the passenger side) lifted maybe two inches (5cm) and the trapped man instantly slid out from under it. We dropped the car as soon as he was clear. I fully expected blood to spray out from a massive gash, but amazingly he only had an indentation and bad bruising.

Some cases are remarkable. In early March 1993 in Hortonville, Wisconsin, a 1974 Camaro slipped off a jack and fell on the left side of 18-year-old Lance Meyer's face. "I just made up my mind I had to get out," he was quoted as saying. The 1431b (65kg) boy lifted the car and was able to squirm out. He needed 350 stitches and commented "I'm mighty sore." [AP, 11 Mar 1993]. On 4 October 1993 near Awanui in New Zealand, 47-year-old Terry Cohen lifted a handsaw and bench (weight about one tonne) off his neighbour William Macrae. The Concord Monitor of 28 Feb 2002 related how Donna Stilwell (110Ib/50kg) lifted up a Dodge Ram van full of tools - about 4,0001b (1,814kg) to 5,0001b (2,268kg) -about 4in (10cm) so her trapped husband could crawl out.

Fate magazine also yields many examples: 123Ib (56kg) woman lifts 3,6001b (1,633kg) car off man (May 1961); 1351b (61kg) man lifts front of car (Sept 1961); ISOlb (68kg) man pushes tilted 4,0001b (1,814kg) coal cart off a co-worker (April 1963); lOSlb (48kg) woman lifts l.Ston car off a four-year-old (Mar 1975); 1201b (54kg) woman lifts 2,0001b (907kg) car off an 11-year-old (May 1975), etc.

I don't know if an adrenaline rush can explain these feats or not, but either way I find them fascinating. If any readers are interested in exchanging information they can contact me by email: stunts AT paradise.net.nz

-------------------
Peter Hassall, stuntman
Wellington, New Zealand

I've dropped him an email and pointed him over here.
 
I dont understand how this works. because normally when people are shaken up or distressed, they tremble a bit from nerves and whatnot, losing strength, accuracy and power behind their movements (ie punches in a fight). All this talk on this thread goes against what I have witnessed in the past. Does this sudden gain in strength only come about in heroic moments, or for fights as well?
 
Human_84 said:
I dont understand how this works. because normally when people are shaken up or distressed, they tremble a bit from nerves and whatnot, losing strength, accuracy and power behind their movements (ie punches in a fight). All this talk on this thread goes against what I have witnessed in the past. Does this sudden gain in strength only come about in heroic moments, or for fights as well?

I suppose it would depend on the person and the circumstances. One would imagine that with the fight or flight repsonse the shaking and weakness would be part of the flight part. In the fight part you would tend to be more focused and feel less pain. If there was a massive burst of strength then people would probably be punching people's heads off ;)

Whats being discussed here would seem to be beyond adrenalin or you would imagine weight lifters, etc. would have tried to find a way to harness it ;)

I suppose the question here is what can people do naturally? We tend not to be put into situations whereby we have to grapple with something like a car so we don't really know what is possible.

In the strongest men events when they have to pick up cars or roll them the engines are removed to lighten the weight but they have to get the whole car moved whereas here you only really need to lift a corner or side. Its all about pivots, moments, etc. - someone with access to an engineering workshop should be able to work out the kind of force needed to do that and it would then be possible to see if this was beyond the envelope of normal human ability.
 
Vague memories tell me that it actually isn't adrenalin that causes the rush that people feel (I will check my neuroscience books later and find out what does). Most text books suggest that the extra strength thing is a myth. However, I believe this to be conflated with the ideas that hypnotism can somehow confer the recipient with additional abilities (it can't).

However, I once picked up a friend of mind by the elbows and lifted him to the ceiling. I was drunk and angry at the time - I remember looking at him in shock (and he at me) at this feat of strength. He was a good 15 stone...and though I am a fairly big and strong chap/duck, this was still pretty damn amazing. So, my science training tells me one thing (you don't get super strong)...but my personal experience leads me to believe that some enhancement can occur. Gah, the world of double think.
 
I suspect the "super strength" is more a do or die, death or glory thing, i.e. you don't care what damage you do to your self in order to rescue the trapped person,
 
I know of a couple of instances of unusual abilities in times of crisis.

My mother's uncle and his son were invoved in a car accident that left the son trapped under a van. The uncle grabbed a chain out of the back of the van, attached one end to the van,trew the other over the branch of a tree and lifted the van up. He held it there till help arived. When they got to the hospital the uncle was found to have a ruptured ear drum and a couple of broken ribs. It's not known if he got the injuries in the addident or from lifting the van.

When I was four I attended a municipla firework display that went a bit wrong. One of the rockets flew too low and set my hair on fire. My mother beat the flames out with her hand. Neither of us was burned.

I'm not sure that we become superhuman in a crisis. I think we just don't realise how strong we are untill it's really imortant.
 
Like Cujo, I've wondered if it could be related to mind over matter, the same way yogis can perform strange feats by entering various mental states. That, in those brief instances, a body not knowing normal limitations (or recognizing them) can do something that is actually ordinary to the human body, but that we are conditioned to think we can't do, so we DON'T do it...
 
I read this thread with interest a few days ago; was going to post, then decided not to because the examples of which I'm personally aware didn't qualify as massive. I'll mention them anyway.

There was a boy I was absolutely infatuated with when I was about 13. He spent most of his time away at boarding school and a few times a year came home to spend holidays with his mother. His parents were divorced, which was fairly exotic for those days and in that particular region (rural). His mother owned what had been a farm on a ridge, although she didn't farm it; just lived in the house with its lovely view. The area was quite high; described these days in tourist brochures as 'alpine'; reasonably rare in that part of Australia. In order to drive her son back to school in the city, the mother was required to traverse winding, mountain roads. She had a powerful, off-road type vehicle. One day my father told me that the mother had overturned her car on a bend. It had rolled a few times apparently and had come to rest at the edge of a steep drop. The son had suffered various injuries and when he managed to stagger free of the vehicle had discovered his mother pinned underneath. He was confronted by a dilemma; if he tried to move the car off his mother, there was a possibility it would plunge over the drop, taking his mother with it. Or, he may cause further injury to her if he tried to shift the vehicle. He knew cars along the road were few and far between and this was in the days before mobile phones.

While he was wondering what to do, his mother regained consciousness and was in extreme pain. Investigation showed the son that the vehicle's hot exhaust pipe was burning its way into her ankle. Finally he must have decided any action was better than none and somehow managed to lift and push the heavy vehicle off his mother. Then he ran a long distance to a farm and help was finally organised. He ran back to his mother. All this occurred in thick, virgin bush country. After a few weeks in hospital, he returned to school. His mother was hospitalised for several weeks for her major injuries. My father later reported that even after her other injuries had healed, she suffered ongoing problems in the area burned by the exhaust pipe. Even my father was impressed by the son's courage and clear-thinking under stress. The boy was only about 14 or 15. I overheard my father say to someone that even grown men, or possibly two grown men together, could not -- under ordinary circumstances -- have lifted the weight achieved by the boy on his own. The conversation drifted to amazing feats accomplished in adversity and my father told of several instances he'd witnessed during the war; of men of ordinary size and strength singlehandedly manhandling potentially lethal jammed shells, depth charges etc. in emergency situations. He said in real life, these feats would be considered near impossible.
 
Interesting story! Sometimes though, one can push or lift something and there is a natural fulcrum we are not aware of - however, I like the idea of your friend getting the massive burst strength (I think we would all like to be able to do the same in a similar situation)
 
These stories are amazing. I wonder whether these feats of strength could explain how our ancestors were able to construct great buildings from huge blocks of stone. It seems like some modern people are able to instinctively move heavy objects given the right circumstances. Perhaps these abilities came more naturally to ancient peoples.
 
Good labour management and familiarity with the technology of the era - I really don't believe that they (the ancients) had hi-tech, super-duper lost tech, alien help or mystical sonic runes that flew the stones up. I love reading about these kind of things, and though reality is so much more mundane, it is probably ( :lol: ) the truth.
 
I just wanted to compliment everyone on a great thread, fascinating stuff.
 
Emperor said:
I stumbled acorss a short exchange in the FT letters:



FT173:74

Superhuman strength

Dave Freeman refers to "allegedly true accounts of old ladies or children lifting two-ton cars off people trapped beneath them. In some versions the old lady suffers fractures and dislocations as a result." [FT168-.52].

I have collected many accounts of cars being lifted off trapped people. Some of the vehicles weighed as much as two tons, although none of these was lifted by old ladies or children. Also, none mention the lifter being injured. They are not academic references but from newspaper articles that have direct quotes and name people, places, and other details.

.............

I don't know if an adrenaline rush can explain these feats or not, but either way I find them fascinating. If any readers are interested in exchanging information they can contact me by email: stunts AT paradise.net.nz

-------------------
Peter Hassall, stuntman
Wellington, New Zealand

I've dropped him an email and pointed him over here.

I've heard back from him and he has collected a few more accounts but hasn't got any answers. I suggsted dropping in here and/or throwing in a roundup of cases into the mag as it would at least move the debate on which tends to get stalled around the "does this even take place?" stage (which is why I started the thread in the first palce ;) ).
 
Okay, moving on past the does it take place stage. 1)It seems as though scientists (this is an assertion) do not go with the idea of greater strength than the body (in question) appears to produce. 2) Many people here have either seen,heard or accomplished said feat..or at the least believe in it. The question I would ask is this ' in this modern day of camcorders etc has anyone recorded something that looks like a feat of superhuman strength?' This may take the thread in a new direction :D
 
As someone who can pull a sicky at the drop of a hat (a grounded titfer can have me bedridden for weeks) I was really impressed with this website. Not quite superhuman strength, but certainly superhuman resilience, maybe people were just tougher in them days, shame there weren't camcorders.....

Link

[Emp edit: Fixing big link.]
 
Hi Human_84-That weak shivery feeling is your body producing too much scrapping hormones.If this was something you or others felt as a child,it is normal.As an adult,you may find that it is not as intense.'Avin' a scrap, regularly,takes a lot off the effect and makes it easier to "control"

But....

If six Para's have just said"OY"


It's Shanks' Pony time
 
Hi M+E...does your point lead on to 'pain is merely weakness leaving the body' :D
 
More on the lines of:AVOIDING pain means me leaving the area ;)
 
I read a story like this in a book i read title "the power of concentration", which tells of some guy finding a kid trapped beneath some meatle pillards, and he lifted him free.It basically says that when you put your mind to it, you can do anything, and thats what these people did, they achieved that "wanting power".
 
I was travelling through London, one day. Not an easy task, as it is always "mad drivers Heaven" there.
I saw on the opposite site of the road, a man jump from a bus, as it had stopped, and a car was coming alongside, at some speed.
It "hit him" as he casually walked right infront of the bus, threw him in the air, and many feet along the road. :shock: Now anyone would think he would have been finito, but nope ,to my uttmost suprise and I think of many others, he got up, stood up and continued walking :shock: :shock:
I felt extremely "sick",and came over all "dizzy" as there was no blood, to be seen at all, and somehow you expect that, with an accident.
Now why , and how did he not harm himself?
:D :D
 
It's possible that he did hurt himself quite badly but didn't realise at the time.

With severe injuries there can be a grace period of up to 30 minutes during which the victim feels no pain. I read of one case where a man had his leg nearly blown off by a 50 caliber round from a Chinese rifle and didn't realise till he tried to walk on what was left of the leg.

Cujo
 
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