Not quite a brush with death...but earlier this year I went on a diving trip. I made my ascent and at around 7 metres I started to suffer from reverse ear block. Which is where the air in your ear starts to expand as you rise but has no has where to go, as a result your ear drum goes pop!

My head started to bang, I could either go down to cure the pain and stay down there until I ran out of oxygen, or surface and risk losing my hearing for the rest of my life. I clung onto the side of a cliff to control my ascent; it took me over 30 minutes to climb 7 metres. As I was just a few feet from the surface the pain was getting intense and I thought my ears were about to go pop, thankfully they held out; but if I had to climb another foot or two it could have been a lot worse.

Some people just aren't made to dive, I'm one of them - so I'm keeping my white arse out of the sea and in the pool