Let's be honest, life is hectic.

Between work and family and friends and chores, it can be hard to find time for yourself.

We all find ourselves longing for peace and quiet from time to time,

a moment alone with a book or a creative project or even just time

to sit and think.

And in November of 2021, one woman finally received just that for 500 days in a cave 230 feet below ground.

50 year old Beatrice Flamini is an extreme athlete from Spain.

She was participating in a research expedition called Time Cave in collaboration with the University

of Granada.

The goal was to study how extended isolation and lack of sunlight might affect a person's experience of time,

and to Flamini, the challenge sounded like just her cup of tea.

After being lowered into the cave, Flamini spent the next year and a half alone,

reading, weaving, exercising, drawing, and preparing meals. And what did she say when the

scientists finally came to retrieve her on

April 14th of 2023? I didn't want to come out yet she said. Already no way.

I hadn't finished my book. Now if you're feeling your chest tighten at the very idea of this story you aren't alone.

What was a dream come true to Beatrice Flamini would be for many of us a nightmare.

Clostrophobia is of course one of our oldest and most common human fears, and horror writers

have made use of this for centuries.

Like Edgar Ellen Poz, the Cask of Monteeado.

If you've ever read it, then no doubt the final horrifying image is burned permanently

into your mind.

...