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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 12:52 pm:

I flat-lined three times in the hospital. I got in a car accident in New Orleans while on vacation. The airbag gave me a blunt trauma to my liver. I went to the hospital in an ambulance from the scene of the accident and they did not catch my injury. Thinking that I was fine they let me go and I returned home. A week went by and I started feeling sharp pains around my abdomen. It got severely worse until I could not walk. I went to a family doctor in my parent’s small town and she misdiagnosed me with the flu and bronchitis. After a week on medication that was supposed to clear up my "flu," I returned to the doctor again. She prescribed some pain medication. I went home and the pain medication didn't work. Returning to the office one more time, she told me not to come back and that she has prescribed me enough medication. At that point, I wasn't even able to walk and my abdomen was swollen dramatically. I went to another doctor and he told me to go home and put a heating pad on my tummy.

The next day in near-death health, I was taken to the Emergency Room. As soon as I got there, I was diagnosed with sepsis (an infection in my blood) which has a 40% mortality rate. Then after a cat scan, they found my liver abscess that took up half of my liver (liver abscess has a 30% mortality rate), so they prepared for emergency surgery. I flat-lined once during surgery because of my liver condition and my blood infection. I also died once in the ER after catching Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) from my body going into shock, and then once again on the helicopter when they were sending me to a bigger trauma center . I don't remember seven days out of a month of hospitalization. During those days my sister came down because the doctors told my parents to call the immediate family because they thought I wouldn't make it. She spent three days with me at the hospital. I talked with her and many other people, but I don't remember any of it.

When I woke up it felt a feeling like I knew where I was and what happened, but I really had no idea what happened to me that week. I don't remember anything like a light or a spirit, but I was very calm and in good spirits during and even after realizing what happened. All I know is that I am a totally different person. People tell me that I look better than before my NDE, but I think I pay more attention to my appearance now since I feel sort of dirty with experiences: like I am a veteran with a thousand stories and no one to tell, or no one to understand my issues, or a innocent looking girl, but underneath she has some baggage that has more scars than an unlucky stuntman. No man will ever feel stronger than me since I have been through war with life and death. But now I am not scared of death anymore, because I felt a peace in the hospital that was warming and calm. I know now that it is a very peaceful place and god puts a fake terror of dying in everyone so we won't want to die right away so we can live our life.

I am having many problems keeping my friends right now. A lot of so-called friends before my NDE have abandoned me (maybe because of the fear of getting close to someone that is on the edge of death or there fake death phobia is kicking in). But on the plus side, I have gotten really close to my family now and less so with friends. I do have some weird sort of psychic ability now, like finishing other people's sentences. or asking questions they were just about to ask. .Plus I have been motivated more in learning now. I still go to school even though it’s only been a few months since I died in the hospital. .I can't have a normal conversation with anyone now (unless they don't know me). They have that look in their eyes like an overprotecting mom, or a sort of pity for me. No one asks questions about this; or if I bring it up they get too frightened and change the subject, or they just flat out tell me they cannot talk about it.

My life has always been a little bit stranger than other's lives, but what I experienced a few months ago has to top it all. Now I just wish someone could really understand and not just act like they understand. But in the end I will be okay.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 09:12 pm:

I was experiencing a difficult time in my life and I was filled with a lot of internal anger. I was doing methamphetamine regularly; it would help my emotional pain. (Or so I thought at the time.) I was realizing a lot of realities about the world that were evil and not what I wanted them to be. I had been hurt and taken advantage of by several of my friends. I was so full of anger I thought I would explode. One night, it was late, I sat down, very, very tired. I asked God from the bottom of my heart, to take away my anger, cause I knew that was not the way I was meant to feel.

All of a sudden, I was in a different place. I didn't see anyone, but I saw a wide, open green field about me. It was beautiful. I felt a sense of peace and happiness that was so wonderful, I can't even begin to explain it. Suddenly, questions I had pondered about started "just coming into my mind". I knew the answers to them. I "just knew". I understood why people sometimes "harden their hearts" and hurt others, whether purposely or not. I understood that my body was my shell for my time on this earth and that I was here to learn and to grow (should that be what I chose to take from my experiences. Here, Love had no boundaries. There was love everywhere, it was soo strong, you could feel it. I had no needs, wants or worries; I felt like all was ok.

I came out of it and was totally in awe. It changed a lot with me. At first, the bad came. It was like I lost all my boundaries. I had a hard time in this world as I was so focused on my experience. People would get upset with me, I did "inappropriate things" as perceived by this world. Everyone thought it was just the drugs, but I knew it was not. I attempted off and on to quit the drugs, but not before some trouble with the police, a divorce, identity theft, and the loss of my job. I hit rock bottom and truly got to know the Lord. I had some hard times, but slowly pulled myself up to where I am now. I still see society totally different from others; many times my view makes others dislike me. But I am ok with that.

I absolutely do not fear death; I had felt like I had a choice to die, like I was being asked, no voices, it was just in my head. When I was really down, I so wanted to die, I even asked God to take me, but he didn't and I know it was because the other part of me was battling the thought of leaving my kids. My mom died when I was 18 and I wanted my kids to have their mother for a long time. I eventually quit the drugs all together, I am back with my husband and my view remains. It has helped me to understand a lot, which has helped me to better deal with those around me. It has also helped me learn to love myself. (I work on this daily.) I know that no one will ever love me the way God does; they don't have the ability to. I now understand that. I wouldn't trade my experience for anything, I think it SAVED my life. I wasn't sure what happened to me at first, but I started reading and found others who have had NDE's , but had not been in any health danger. I now know, this is what I had.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 09:10 pm:

My daughter had died in 1994, age 33, of breast cancer. I was devastated about her death and was grieving. One day I was coming home, driving my car, when all of a sudden I felt my body drifting to the passenger side of the car. I felt as light as a feather and such a wonderful peace. I then said “I think I am having a out-of-body experience,” and after I had said that, I flew back into my body. To be honest I did not want to come back, the peace I felt while out of my body was the most wonderful feeling I have ever had. The learning experience I got out of this was that I believe God was telling me that my daughter felt that wonderful all the time now as she was with him. I have a deeper belief in religion now. I have shared this with a few people, whether they believe me or not, I do not know, but I know it happened as I was fully awake and driving my vehicle.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 09:09 pm:

I don't remember how I fell down while horse jumping . I was in a dark narrow round tunnel, and moving towards a bright white light that was no hurt for the eyes, rather mild . As I stood still, someone behind my shoulder said “don't be scared, no harm, no sweat, take it easy, you can go forward, it's really great!” I felt most peaceful and happy that in my entire life . But I knew I was not in the earth dimension any more. Approaching the ridge of the tunnel widening, I was inside the white light, being a small light in the infinite light. I hesitated and went back on earth suffering and crippled. I wish I had never come back was my last reborned thought.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 09:08 pm:

I only thought I was just tired, I didn't know what I was about to encounter. I'll try to make this to the point as much as I can possibly. When I was 17 years old, I had migraine headaches (like many people!), but I went to a clinic doctor at the hospital when I got an especially painful migraine and subsequently received a new medication. Little did I know that I was supposed to tell them about the other medicine I was taking (I was just a teenager and was not paying attention). As they discovered later, those were the worst medicines to mix because it can severely affect circulation and affect the heart, which it did.

I went home and lay down and closed my eyes. I could not sleep because the headache was too painful and after a short time (after taking both the different medicines), my body felt tense and tight, and then the necklace charm I was wearing was bouncing a tiny bit off my chest. My friend and my Mom were both there and saw the necklace charm bouncing (they saw it happen). The main thing I remember is that I went from feeling tense physically to suddenly feeling like I was lighter than air so to speak. Then I suddenly was surrounded by a churning black darkness and it was like swirling around me, like I wasn't standing in it but kind of floating in it. I heard a very frightening moan that even though it wasn't quite a sound, it was a feeling that made me think of a scary creature, and I felt its presence and I started to see a light at the same time. At first the light looked small then grew larger really fast. I am a Christian but I don't remember thinking of Jesus immediately. I felt more like a sitting duck just in awe. Then it was like a giant vacuum force grabbed me away from the darkness and pulled me into the light, but gently. It did not hurt me; it was like I already knew who was grabbing me away as if I was not surprised at all. That part I don't understand, but I just remember feeling safer than when I was in the swirling black stuff. I remember after that I was pulled into a realm I did not recognize, But the very clear memory I have held onto was that a peaceful presence came next to me and I felt confused. Then it manifested into what I feel was a being that reminded me of the feeling I had when I prayed to Jesus during life. It said (rather I felt the 'words') that "You are not ready yet, you have to return." I recall refusing to, but respectfully and almost like begging. I remember after that I felt the being surround me with the most incredible feeling of being loved, like a parent or a mother holding her child in her arms, that's the comfort and intensity of love I felt. The only other part I remember is being shot back into my body.

People around me were really freaked out because they said I stopped breathing, and could not hear them, and the ambulance was on its way. I was frustrated to be back on earth in my body; but I was elated to know that I experienced the love of that being, and that it would be there for me again one day, so maybe I just hold onto that sometimes. I really feel strongly that because of this experience, that there really are evil forces and good forces, and I wonder if this life shapes our souls, but that is just my feeling.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 09:06 pm:

In 1961, when I was thirteen-years-old, I lived near a test pit. the pit/pool had been surplused out of service, and with the addition of water and pool ladders had been turned into a fairly nice swimming pool.

The only drawback was that the pool water was not heated, and as anyone who has lived [there], would tell you, with only slight exaggeration, that a summer there could be compared to a winter in Seattle. Even though the water temperature was less then 55 Fahrenheit (13 Centigrade), it could not have been much more of a shock to my thirteen-year-old skinny, 100 lbs., system than had I jumped into a vat of ice cubes.

My Near Death Experience

So this is what happened. It was on a Saturday afternoon, late in summer just after school commenced.
We got there just before 2:15 that afternoon, where we met many of our Canadian friends.

After the usual chitchat and junior high horseplay we all went around to the deep end of the pool. I was the first to enter the water by attempting a stylish racing dive. Wham, I mean it was like standing in a puddle and sticking your finger in a light socket, and I was off to the other end, swimming like hell as I realized how freaking cold it was. All of a sudden, after a few numbing strokes, something happened. The cold was gone and I was swimming in a cloud and it was easy, as easy as I have ever known anything in my life, but a lot easier than that. I mean it was like my body was perfect, and I was flying, and it was unbelievably easy and very, very comfortable. The cloud was iridescent white, like mother of pearl, and as I moved forward it got brighter and brighter. It was so bright and so white, yet my eyes were not bothered by it in the least, it was perfect. I kept moving forward as I felt I was being drawn to something and all I knew is that I wanted to go there. Further along, I began to make out shapes that I began to distinguish as two beings. The light was getting brighter and I was warm all over. One being was very much larger than the other one. They were cloaked in white even more radiant and pure than the light. The diminutive one was to the left, from my perspective, and a little behind. Their faces were without any features, but I knew that I was basking in a love and warmth that to this day I could never describe except to say that within it dwells perfection and all that there is, everything, is known and understood. Finally, I began moving away, although I remember resisting with all of my being as I didn’t want to leave, not then, not ever. It was getting darker and finally dark when all of a sudden I became conscious. Two lifeguards were standing over me and I didn’t feel too well as I had apparently taken in lots of water. They said that I hadn’t been breathing for several minutes, approximately ten minutes. I couldn’t speak. I was back and I would never be the same.

The Kicker

Remember the time line. I went in the pool at approximately 2:30 PM. I was pulled out about five minutes later, not breathing. The lifeguard worked on me for approximately ten to twelve minutes, as he recalled, without a response. Shortly before 3:00 PM his replacement came on. His replacement had just arrived back that same afternoon from the International Red Cross, where he had just been taught the new technique of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. He saved my life.

From that day forward I’ve never been afraid of crossing over to the other side. Remember though, you can’t defeat your purpose.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 09:00 pm:

In 1997 I became a near death survivor, and I want to share my story because I hope that somewhere someone else might understand.

I saw myself lying in my hospital bed from both above and next to it. I saw that there was only one nurse in the room, sitting in a rocking chair watching over me, I knew it was okay for me to leave the room. I walked down the hall and began to feel a warm sensation, I followed it into a tunnel that grew brighter, and as I walked along I began to smell wonderful flowers, I knew they were carnations. As I reached the end of the tunnel I realized that I was dressed as woman dressed in 1940. As I reached the end there were clouds that seemed to be parting, and there I saw a pair of hands. At the sight of them I was overcome with emotion, a deep in-my-soul feeling of grief, happiness, and love. I knew without looking at the face of the person who he was, my grandfather, who had died in WWII, 20 years before I was born.

As I stepped out I was aware that we were in a town, and walking down the sidewalk of main street. Everyone who we passed or talked to knew my grandfather and was real excited to see that I had come to see him. All of the woman in town were dressed in there Sunday best. We passed a hat store, a butchers market, a pharmacy, and the streets were lined with dogwood trees in full bloom. As we walked, we did some talking. He told me he had been waiting a long time to talk to me, that he knew I would be the only one who could correct things. He told me he had watched my dad (his only child) grow, and had grieved with my grandmother (his wife) for all that they missed, but that he was proud of her for raising my dad alone. We talked about when I was born, how my mother kept stating that a man in a uniform had walked into the room, smiled and left, the doctors told her it was from the medication. She had never told me this but when I asked her, she turned real pale.

Anyway, we decided to have fried chicken for supper and after we went to his house, which I knew very well, my grandmother had kept it until the 1980's, I slept in a huge bed with blankets fresh from hanging on the line. It was such a real feeling of being home, safe and loved. I felt such a peace that night. Over the next few days we really talked, and he asked me to tell him what I had been told growing up about him. I felt such sorrow, I had really never been told much, other than he was killed while training in flight school in WWII; that was it. It was a subject that was not brought up, and I honestly had no interest in. My grandfather took my hands and asked me to do something for him. He asked me to look into his crash because the Army had not given the families the correct findings, and that they all (his crew) needed there families to know. I asked him how to do this, and he just looked real deep into my soul and said I would know how. He also asked that I take our family history and continue it, that it would be a wonderful journey.

My grandfather told me that it was time for me to go back. I felt all of these strong emotions, the biggest two were a deep sense of sorrow and grief and a real connection of love, a deep feeling of having a knowledge of him that only he and I share. I tried to lock in my memory everything I could about him, the way he looked, talked, smiled, and how wonderful he smelled. We held each other for a long time and I cried like I had never done before. I just knew I did not want to leave him. As we walked down the street towards the white light and clouds, I asked him if I would see him again. He told me he would always be with me, like the warm light. I entered the tunnel and walked back to my room, and found the same nurse still rocking in her chair. I know she smiled at me.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:59 pm:

It was July 1966 in that late afternoon. I was playing with my friends near the edge of a wooded area next to my home. My Mom told me to come inside as a storm was approaching and thunder could be heard in the distance. I was having too much fun, so I ignored her and continued to play. Suddenly there was a very loud BOOM and I felt as if I had been hit by a car from behind. I was thrown to the ground, at which time I tried to move and was unable to. I had been hit by "ball" lightning - I could see the "ball", it was big, made of fire and had spikes poking out of it. At this time I was seeing myself and the entire area from above the trees. Some of the trees were on fire and I could also see my Dad getting back to his feet (he had been thrown to the ground from the force), as he had already been heading out to get me since I did not come in per my Mom's orders. I was not afraid at all. I had no pain and I started to say "good-bye" to my siblings, parents, friends and neighbors. I did not know where I was headed to, but fear and pain were not present at all. I could see my Dad pick me up off of the ground and shake my limp body; he was crying out my name. Suddenly I was looking into his eyes and I was no longer looking down on this scene. Dad then ran back to the house with me as the fire department arrived to put out the fire, and then I was taken to the hospital for follow-up. My exam was completely negative except for some strange burns that looked like jagged lightning in the sky. They started at my right shoulder and traveled diagonally down my body and ended at my left foot. At the time of this blast, my tennis shoes were tied, but I was thrown completely out of them. They were about 20 feet from my body and the left one had the bottom blown out of it. I stayed in the hospital that night for simple observation and then in the AM there were some photographers that came to take pictures of my burns. They said that most people die from this type of incident, so to have these pictures would be great for medical books, etc. The burns stayed for a few days and then went away. My Mom says that I was a very scared and insecure child for quite some time after that, but eventually life was normal once again. Needless to say - I have never spent any time outside in the presence of lightning or thunder since!!

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:58 pm:

It is now February, 2004. To the best of my memory and writing style, this is a complete accounting of what I experienced thirty-three years ago. My intent is to record this while I still am able. The reader should appreciate that some of this is memory that I did not want to ever remember. I tried to push it from consciousness. Over the years I have tried to focus only on the good and not on the evil. But, I am acutely aware that there are both.

This is my account. It happened to me and I am stuck with it.

The year is 1971. I’m fourteen years old and it is the summer of my freshman year of high school. I applied to work at a Boy Scout summer camp for the third year running. The first two summers I applied I wasn’t offered a position. This year was my last chance and the camp director offered me a job working in the camp kitchen. It’s not what I had in mind but I accepted.

The camp ran like clock work. Each Saturday all of the scouts left the camp and on Sunday, a new bunch of troops arrived. On the first day of their arrival, campers were required to pass a swim test to be allowed to participate in lake activities. Since working the kitchen was hard with little time off, and since I was a certified Junior Lifeguard, I volunteered to watch over the new campers as they performed their swim test. Each of the guards was supplied a long aluminum pole to act as lifeline in the case someone had to be pulled dockside. Swimmers were required to swim two laps unassisted along a boat slip bordered on three sides by dock. For the swim test, the open side was bounded by buoys along a length of rope.

On this particular day, I had watched several groups perform their test without incident. However, during one of the evaluations, one swimmer, a boy of 13 years old or so, started to struggle and cried out for assistance. All I had to do was lower the pole so he could grab on and I would pull him out. But, instinctively, my life guard training came into play and I jumped feet first into the water with legs spread apart like on a bicycle. Quickly I grabbed the boy, spun him around and placed him in a carry position with my arm across his chest diagonally. It is a very secure hold and one that prevents him from fighting me if he panics. Since he was quite docile and since this hold is tiring, I decided I could place him in a chin carry instead. That was a mistake since the boy felt less secure and became anxious. In a split second of panic and before I knew what happened, he struck the side of my head with a round house right hook. The blow to my head was severe and dazed me. I fought to maintain consciousness. As my awareness slipped from me, I began to sink into the water deeper and deeper. Because I had been exerting myself carrying the boy back to dockside, my body needed oxygen. My chest instinctively heaved, forcing my lungs to breath water into them. To my amazement it wasn’t so bad. My lungs were full which took the pressure off. But, I knew I was going to die today. I felt my arms and body go limp. I was sinking watching the water go from light green to dark.

What’s happening? What is that? It doesn’t make sense. I think I see people running here and there along wooden paths. Oh, that’s water I see, and those are the wooden docks. The boy I was saving is alone in the water now. He’s looking around frantically. He’s crying. I get it. I’m floating above everything and I’m looking down onto the lake and the docks. I don’t see me because I’m under water. But how can I be seeing this? Why? I’m at maybe 50 feet above the water. I want down. I belong down there. How do I get down?

As if I have a rubber band attached to my back that reaches its limit, I am pulled higher into the sky. Holy cow, I don’t see the lake anymore. I’m in the clouds. The earth pulls away from me. I can see it and it’s getting smaller. I’m in space. It’s dark except for the stars. Slowly, they start to move streaking the black backdrop and forming lines of light. As I pick up speed, I feel I am moving to the end of the universe with the stars whizzing by me. The lights create a walled effect like warp drive in Star Trek. I’m moving fast -- faster than is possible yet there is no real sensation except for sight. Then into darkness.

It’s black. Pitch black. I see nothing. There is nothing. I strain to see something, anything. I don’t like this. I’m scared. I feel I am in a universe devoid of all things. It is vast without end and completely and utterly empty. There is no one else, nothing else. I am alone. There is no person, no life, no death, no love, no hate, no salvation. There is only a vast emptiness except…for me. The loneliness overwhelms my senses. I would welcome anything. Please. Please. I can’t stay here.

Wait. I see something. Do I hear something too? Is my mind playing tricks? I hear laughter. I don’t know if I like the sound of it though. I see a pin point of light. It’s getting larger but I can’t make out what, if anything, it is. The laughing is getting louder too. The light starts to form a shape. Huh? I can’t believe what I am seeing. It can’t be. It is. It can’t be. I see a face. Except it’s not a face. I don’t quite recognize it because it’s a skull and it’s laughing. It isn’t a good laugh. It’s sinister. He’s mocking me, gleeful at my plight. It’s a terrible sound that sends shutters through me. It speaks and tells me I am there forever, with him. I begin to hear others talking. They are coming nearer with conspiratorial voices that are evil and menacing. The skull brought them or they followed. I’m scared. I feel their presence encircling me. These are creatures of the darkness. I can’t see them. I sense them. They’re near. They are as dark as the surroundings. The skull continues laughing. Ouch. Something clawed me and I am being bit as if being tasted. Then, they are set loose upon me clawing, scratching and biting. It feels like my skin is being stripped off. Oh, the pain. God help me please. I can’t take this. God, please help me. The attacks continue. Then I recall an old parish priest told me that evil cannot remain in the presence of God. I call out, Lord, Jesus Christ help me please. Help me. The attacks subside and soon stop altogether. The dark entities of evil slink away into the darkness. I am alone again in the black emptiness but I am relieved.

Some moments later I see something again. It’s another pin point of light. Oh god, please don’t let it be that skull again. It’s coming closer and separates into more than one light. What are these? They get larger. They look like soap bubbles. Lots of soap bubbles. Lots and lots and lots of soap bubbles. They’re everywhere. Hundreds, thousands and then millions of them. The colors are magnificent, lively and translucent. Each bubble dances about in its own way. They are alive. They don’t harm me. They are good. I’m confused why I am seeing this. What are they? The bubbles begin to move past me slowly at first and then faster. I’m moving or they are. I’m not sure which. The movement of the bubbles past me generates streaks of red and violet light bars encapsulating me into a tube of colored light culminating in a far away vortex. I have no choice but to move through it.

When I reach the end I hear, “It is time to review your life experiences.” Who’s there? Who said that? I don’t see anyone. “I’m the one watching over you.” Are you my guardian angel? “If you like. Yes.” It was nice to be in the presence of another. And with that, like watching a big movie screen, my life was portrayed before me instance by instance, moment by moment. It would be normal to think that this would take some time, but time doesn’t exist.

There’s Billy. He’s about 5 or 6 years old. I used to play with him when I was a little kid. We’re playing with cars behind the orange-brick duplex across the street from where I live. I say something bad to Billy. It’s not a nice thing. I’m being mean and spiteful. The difference now is I feel him hurting. He’s crying. I feel his anguish. Oh, I’m sorry Billy. I shouldn’t have hurt you like that. And so it went on, moment by moment, review by review feeling the results of my actions until my time in the lake.

Why am I going through this? My Angel replied, “You review your life in order to cleanse your soul. How do you feel?” Terrible. I am such a mean person. I didn’t realize I hurt others that much. “It’s important that you learn from this.” I have. I take responsibility and I’m so sorry. “Would you like to see it again?” No, I get the message. I hope that I am not judged poorly. “Your life is evaluated by the most powerful judge there is.” When does that happen? “It already has. That judge is you.” It all becomes clear to me and I feel as if a weight has been removed. I am refreshed. I am ready now. The cleansing is over and I am left in darkness once again but not for long.

Wow -- a blast of light like a door opening into the darkness. I’m confronted with streaks of bright, white, brilliant light. It’s overwhelming. It is the purest and whitest light I have ever seen. It covers me like a blanket. Light this bright should be impossible to look at but it isn’t. It’s warm and wonderful. The light bathes me with a glow of overpowering love and inner peace. It’s absolutely wonderful. I move closer.

Someone is standing in the doorway. Streaks of white light stream around his body. He’s dressed in a white robe. His arms are down, outstretched with palms upward. I can’t seem to make out his face no matter how hard I try. There’s too much light.

“We have been waiting for you. But, this isn’t your time to be here.” I know that voice. He is familiar to me. Why can’t I recognize who you are? I must know you. I feel such a sense of inner serenity that I have never felt before. I like this place. I want to stay here. I sense that if I take his hand I can stay. In fact, if I touch him I must stay. I will not be allowed to return to my prior existence. I don’t want to return. I reach out to him but can’t quite touch him.

“Before you go you may look into the future.” He motions to his left. To my right, I notice a white table. It is stone, perhaps marble. On the table is a flat gold bowl filled with a liquid like oil or water. It’s reflective and dark. Behind the table are three old men in white. Two are sitting. One is standing next to something like a pillar or a podium. There may be a book on it. They motion for me to come closer and I do. “Look into the bowl and see the future of mankind.” I peer into the black liquid and see devastation. Cities are on fire. It’s horrific. I turn away. I don’t want to see this. Why are you showing me this? “We want you to take a message back with you. Man must change his ways.” But, I’m only one person. What can I do? “Spread the message.” He continued, “You have a special ability.” I know he was referring to my paranormal senses. “I am going to ask you a question. Whatever is your first response is the one we will accept. You cannot change your mind afterwards. Do you understand?” Yes. I do. What’s the question? “Do you want these powers you have and the ability to see into the future?” Immediately, I respond, no, I just want to be normal. “Very well then. It is done.”

I withdraw from this area and once again I find myself before the man in the white robe blocking my access. I want to enter. It feels so wonderful here. Can I stay here? “You have work yet to do. You cannot remain. It is not your time.” But, I want to stay. Please, let me. “I will show you something.” With that, three small bubbles appeared from the darkness on the left. They get larger. They are like the bubbles I had seen before. As they get nearer I can see the faces of three small children, two boys and one girl. Who are they? “They are your children.” But, I’m only fourteen. I don’t have any children. “You will and these are them. Don’t you see? You must return in order for these children to be born.” As I look at their faces, I realize one bubble stands off from the other two. Why is he separate? “He is never born. He is your child but he will remain here.” Huh? How can that be? He’s not born but he’s my child? “You will understand one day. You must remember that while he remains here that he exists and that he loves you.” With that said, the other two children depart becoming smaller until they disappear. “It is now time that you return.”

I try again to reach out and touch him but I am being yanked backwards. The light becomes smaller. I am in darkness again moving backwards. I know I am returning. Then, CRACK. With a jolt I am back in my body. I find that I am sitting on the bottom of the lake in the mud. I have to get up for air. My legs flex. My arms start to paddle upwards. Will I make it? I don’t think I can. It’s got to be 10 or 12 feet or more. I need air. Struggling, I finally feel air with my right hand. With another stroke or two I break the surface. Immediately I cough up water from my lungs. The swimming boy is terrified. I see it in his eyes. He begins to help me. That’s ironic. Still coughing and gasping little by little I get air into my lungs and it feels good. One of the senior waterfront instructors runs towards us down the dock. Quickly I resume pulling the boy to shore. I’m exhausted but somehow I manage to do it. The boy is saying, ‘I was helping you.’ I cut him off and push him up onto the dock with the assistance of the senior instructor. He congratulates me on saving the boy. I’m dazed and confused. I say nothing and get out of the water. My body is in tact but my mind reels with what just happened.

Prior to this episode in my life I had many paranormal experiences. Afterwards, the activity subsided. It wasn’t eliminated by any means but I can live with it and interpret things better. All in all, the old men I had talked to made me ‘normal’ and I am grateful.

Over the years I have asked myself why a fourteen year old would encounter such an evil entity. After all, how bad can a fourteen year old boy’s life be that he should deserve such treatment? I have concluded that mine was an unplanned journey to the other side so family members and friends there were not prepared for my arrival. Since no one knew I was coming, I became a target of opportunity for the dark side entities. Conversely, I like to think at the appropriate time someone will help me navigate a safe passage.

At the time of this near-death experience, I was a Catholic. Afterwards, I continued to go to a Catholic school. In fact, the school was a pre-seminary grooming boys for the priesthood. But I was changed. Religion, any religion didn’t matter to me anymore. I no longer saw the church as the endpoint but rather as a vehicle some people use to the endpoint. My view now centers on the concept of a Creator with a divine plan that is revealed to us at his pace in his own time. Had I met the Creator? I don’t know.

An interesting side note to this story is that I studied classical Greek the following two years in school. During that time I learned of the ancient Greek belief in the Fates. These were old sages typically depicted in white robes with white beards. If I recall correctly there were three of them. One Fate determined a person’s time of birth, another the time of death and the third measured a man’s life. I have to admit that the similarity to my near death experience unnerved me when I learned of this. Could I have talked to the Fates?

Years later, I met the woman I would marry. Although she still doesn’t believe me, the very instant I saw her my head went boing like a spring releasing its energy. I instantly knew I had met my future wife. And, as predicted, we had three children although one was miscarried and was never born. And so, indeed, I did come to understand.

What else have I learned? I know that our actions affect others in both positive and negative ways and that we will come to appreciate this fact in the next place. I know there are indeed evilness and goodness, darkness and light, suffering and serenity. I know that mankind has the capability of extinguishing itself. But above all else, I know that our souls, our being, what it is that we are does not die. The journey continues for us beyond this world. At a minimum, we gain a new perspective in the next place. It just may not be a complete understanding of all things. And while we search for the solution to life’s equation we may return to this world in a new instantiation but wearing the same fabric of our existence. I also like to think that we are born afresh with those other souls with whom we choose to travel. That is how I recognized my wife when I first saw her. And so it is. After every life we live we become stronger and truer, tempered by our experiences until such time as we may complete our journey and we are truly born.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:56 pm:

I was driving to school in the rain when my car hydroplaned in front of an 18wheeler truck. I tried to avoid the accident by turning the steering wheel. We hit driver side to driver side and my car slid down the side of the truck. I don't remember hearing the crash. The next thing I knew was I was surrounded by black, almost like black velvet. I felt like I was floating up and to the right. I felt good, safe, not hot or cold, just wonderful. Then I saw the most beautiful light. It was this great bright white light, but it didn't hurt my eyes. It was beautiful. He (the light) asked "ARE YOU READY?" Only he didn't talk in words it was more like mental telepathy. I said "Yes, but of the children." Which doesn't even sound like I normally talk. I don't remember Him saying anything else, but it was like all knowledge was there and all your questions were answered. I can't remember the answers. But I did come back with the feeling that we are very much all connected and the only thing that matters is LOVE. I felt like I was sucked back and to the left into my body. I woke up laying across the seat of my car saying "Oh, my God." I was cold, wet, covered in blood and glass. I saw the truck driver standing in the rain and he looked so scared. I thought "Shut up Jan you are scaring this guy to death." I was in my first year of nursing so I started to evaluate my wounds. I was having trouble breathing, and I thought my leg was broken. It turned out I had a 70% pneumothorax on the left side and a 30% pneumothorax on the right side. The windshield had fallen in my lap and cut through three muscles in my leg which caused the pain in my leg. I was taken to a small rural hospital They were all busy and rushing around. Putting in chest tubes and such. I remember looking at my hands and thinking. Oh so this is what cyanosis looks like, and what’s the big deal: if I die I die. I know that dying is no more traumatic than walking from the living room to the kitchen at least for the one who is dying. I also know this is the most real thing in my life no one will ever convince me otherwise.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:54 pm:

About 8 years ago, I had emergency heart surgery, because I had contracted a severe infection from pericarditis. Which my physician stated it was by god's grace I was still alive!

When I was in recovery (ICU), I had a dream. I use this word loosely because it was unlike any "dream" I had ever experienced before. I will not go into all of the details now, but I must state that never does a day pass that I don't recall and relive the experience. It changed my whole intellectual and spiritual approach to "religion"! I am currently an individual very much aware that this experience we call "life" is only transitory. It is a place of preparation, of choices, of opportunities to grow, unlike any other place. I found thru my experience a "universality" that all religions and religious beliefs are merely vain attempts to express a simple truth. That the golden rule was the central rule in which to live our lives! I must admit also that it has been difficult at times to continue on with this process called "living" after experiencing an indescribable experience! Life here pales in comparison to what awaits us. But I was clearly told: "it is not your time!"...and like a rebellious child I rebuked this voice and wanted to remain in this realm of total "completeness", but found that it was an effort fought in vain... and I can still recall returning to my body like a hand in a glove... and bouncing back from the floor beneath me back into my body. As I began to slowly awaken, I still experienced this wonderful feeling of complete unconditional love and acceptance... and as I awoke I began to re-experience my 5 senses in a new way, as if I had never used them before! And also, the feeling of "completeness" began to slowly fade away and I began to feel the coldness of my body, and I began to cry, both out of gratitude and also out of selfishness.

I have no fear of death now. I see each day as a gift and an opportunity. I try every day to live the golden rule in all my affairs, and honestly some days I fail miserably. But the "living one" is patient like a parent would be with a child, and for this I am thankful...because I now realize there is a "universality", an inter-connectedness of all people, things, nature, etc. A divine plan if you will. So with this I will close for now. Shalom.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:49 pm:

It was the end of winter 1971. I was a part of the hippie culture of the late 60s & 70s which was mostly based around drugs like LSD and cannabis plus others. My 3 friends & myself had rented a house together here in England. We all 'worked' together each day as salesmen. Most of our evenings were spent in the house on drugs, parties along with girlfriends, etc. This particular night I had taken a LSD tablet and was having my third bad trip. During my horrible hallucinations, I fell down the hallway stairs.

Suddenly I found myself within this beautiful white Light. It was so nice being there and I felt wonderfully blissful. I was not conscious of having a body like we have here, but nevertheless I felt I was a whole person. There were other 'things' within the Light, but not near enough for me to make them out, even whether they were animate or inanimate? Either way I was very, very happy and would have liked to have stayed there.

Then I heard this voice. It was such a beautiful voice. I 'knew' it to be the voice of God, though I could not see Him. His voice had no source that I could make out and seemed to be all about me. He simply said, 'Come to Me.' Three words only, yet each one seemed to me to be full of infinite meaning and so beautifully spoken and so full of love.

And then I awoke on a hospital trolley.

Prior to this event I had never even thought much about God or religion. My family were never church goers. But from that point onwards up to today, I have had an unshakeable belief in the existence of God and hardly any fear of death. From that time onwards, I gave up the drugs scene and later joined a religious organisation called 'The Hare Krishna Movement'. For the next 10 years or so I devoted my whole life to the study of God realisation. I gave up smoking also and alcohol. Even tea and coffee. And I tried to remain celibate too. Today, though I have left the movement, my faith in God is still unshakeable. And though the church has no attraction for me for various reasons, I still pray regularly and am always trying to make myself a better person, and pray that God will forgive me my many sins before this life ends.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:46 pm:

I had overdosed on a combination of prescription and non-prescription drugs and alcohol. To this day neither I nor the attending physicians know what the non-prescription drugs were, although I have been told that they were most likely opium based (e.g. heroin).

My brother called the paramedics after breaking down the door to my bedroom after I had locked myself in the bedroom for almost two days straight. My brother later told me that he could not detect a significant pulse. The paramedics (and later attending physician) confirmed that I was apparently clinically dead for either one minute or perhaps a little longer.

I was later in a coma for just over three days.

During the time of my death and (I assume, but still am not sure) the coma, I experienced what I would consider two NDEs. The first, and by far the more disturbing, began immediately, I believe, after the onset of clinical death. I felt that I had left my body in an excruciatingly painful manner, as though I were being ripped from my own body. The best way I could describe it is as if I were giving birth to my own disembodied consciousness and experiencing the exact same pain that a woman might experience when giving birth to a child. I was also unbelievably frightened at the prospect of having to leave my own body since I had never experienced anything like it in my life before.

I vaguely remember seeing the team of paramedics working on my body and my brother standing in the doorway of my bedroom. My brother was visibly shaken, clutching the doorway, crying I believe. But the scene quickly evaporated beneath me as I flew through the ceiling of my house, through the air, the atmosphere, and then into "outer space". I remember seeing the entire earth vanish below me as I continued my journey. The earth was beautiful, but somewhat disappointing for some reason that I did not understand. It was at that moment that I apparently realized the significance of what had just happened, that I was dead, and immediately I stopped being afraid.

I then experienced what I think of as restrained or "cautious" bliss. I was not the least bit sorry that I had died and immediately began marveling and wondering at what I could now do in this new existence. All of these emotions came incredibly quickly and were not really "emotions" as I have ever experienced the concept. Also, "thoughts" (again I would have to say not thoughts in the human sense) came even more quickly than the speed of light it seemed. The actions attached to those thoughts, or perhaps actions as consequences of those thoughts, came just as quickly. I seemed to be able to perceive space and time outside of my locality because I did not perceive concepts such as "locality", "time", or "distance". I could "think" of a location (again for lack of a better word) and immediately I was there. I could leave the Milky Way or even return to the vicinity of the Earth if I wanted to. I also sensed that I was no longer who or what I used to be. I seemed to lose all memory of what I used to be (a human being) and now I purely "existed" without a clear cut sense of my self or my own existence. Yet I also felt somehow alone, as if no other consciousness existed in addition to my own. It was an extremely confusing feeling that still boggles my imagination, even some ten years after the experience.

After some "time" (again the concept really had no meaning) existing in this state, I felt the urge to travel beyond what I perceived (after waking up from the ensuing coma) the known universe. I remember stars, galaxies and nebulas zooming passed me as I traveled. I did not actually feel as though I was traveling, but more as though I was stretching my unique consciousness to its unknown limits. All the while, I felt (again after waking up) that I was still trying to get used to this new existence.

After traveling for I do not know how long, I apparently came upon what I can only describe as an intelligent, or at least conscious, entity of some sort. The entity appeared blacker than black, like a black hole itself. Its blackness seemed to eclipse everything else around it. I sensed somehow that this entity was extremely malevolent, unimaginably angry and hostile towards me and everything else. While the entity did not seem to communicate verbally or audibly, I sensed that it had drawn me to itself somehow. It seemed to be in judgment of me somehow, "telling" me that I was once a human being (which seemed to be news to me at the time), that I had lived (another new, unknown concept to me), and that I either had done or been an accomplice to some heinous act while I was human, and that I was essentially worthless as a human being (as indeed were all humans). The entity just seemed to radiate hatefulness, anger, and also loneliness, as though it were somehow disconnected from the great consciousness that allegedly bound all reality. It was at that moment as well that I had an epiphany of sorts, that I was not alone but part of that greater consciousness which all conscious creatures and beings join when they die.

The entity continued to berate me and I became afraid of it as it threatened to show me my previous existence as a human being. I became even more afraid at that possibility; even as it began to dawn on me that the entity was right and that perhaps I was once something other that what I was at that moment. All of a sudden, I started to become aware of concepts such as space, time, distance. I even started to become self aware again. For the first time in what felt like uncountable ages, I perceived myself as separate from the universal consciousness. At that point I became unspeakably sad and felt that I wanted to kill myself, if only I could. The entity seemed to revel in my sadness and confusion and it faded from me as apparently it was exiling me from that blissful existence.

It was then that I was myself again. I was immediately in the company of a being who identified himself as "Satan". I did not believe the being, who appeared to be a very shiny, almost opalescent gray. He wore a fedora style hat and was dressed in what looked like 1930's era men's clothing, including a neck tie, a suit vest, and dress pants. He had no face. I was not the least bit afraid of this "Satan" and got the impression that he was something very different from a devil or demon or any kind of evil spirit. By then I was "myself" again, plain old Benjamin who had died (shamefully) of an overdose.

We walked in what looked like a beautiful grassy meadow for some time on what felt like a perfect, sunny, spring or summer day. While we walked, the being talked of God, explaining that God was either dead or had forsaken the entire Universe altogether and was no nowhere to be found. He stressed that human beings were all on their own, that human life was essentially meaningless, but that that was the way God had intended it anyway. He said that there was no point in trying to do good or help one's fellow man because the physical universe was cyclical (as the Hindus believe I later learned) and that whatever we experience now we have experienced before in another cycle and would experience again in a future cycle. In this way, he explained, the universe was predetermined and there was nothing anyone could do to change it.

The being explained many other things to me, the details of which I have forgotten (at least consciously) but which have a somewhat vague, yet "matter of fact" and very firm foundation of my post-NDE life philosophy. These include the above described universal cycle, the inherent (almost comical) meaninglessness of human existence, the very strong belief in non-locality (very close to the same concept as described in quantum physics theory), belief in the inherent meaningless of time and distance, belief in a universal consciousness that envelops all individual consciousness, belief in so-called psychic phenomena (related to non-locality somehow), an inherent and extremely strong aversion to the idea or belief in reincarnation (an aversion which I still cannot explain), and an inherent and equally strong belief in biological evolution, though guided by an agnostic intelligence that I believe indirectly maintains physical reality as we know it.

My belief in God as described by the three major Middle-Eastern religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) was also effectively destroyed by that particular NDE (with the being who called himself Satan). After that NDE, which I feel somehow took place simultaneously with the first NDE described above, I absolutely refused to believe in God anymore, even feeling a great deal of anger and resentment towards the whole idea of God and anyone who worshipped God. I immediately stopped going to church (I was raised Protestant), severed all ties with the church, and basically told the minister from my congregation to go to hell when he came to visit me after my release from the hospital. I have never regretted that decision.

The "Satan" being was very sarcastic towards me during the entire encounter, making fun of me and calling me stupid for so carelessly overdosing on drugs. I never felt scared of him or angry towards him though. He seemed to take a real interest in me personally, again telling me that I had done something very bad earlier in my life, most likely my childhood. He was not the least bit judgmental in that regard, but he told me that I needed to come to terms with that experience. Again, I got the very odd feeling that the other NDE was happening at the same time. As the being and I spoke, I got very strange and disturbing images of what looked like outer space, and even very strong feelings of malevolence and hostility directed at me from very far away.

After delivering that parting advice, the being sent me on my way. I woke up three days later, gagging on the intubator, trying to scream for help, the simultaneous (it seemed) memories of both NDEs fresh in my mind.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:43 pm:

I saw the light of the truck coming at our car and heard a bang. I was then above a street light watching the car flip over and over to rest on the sidewalk. Then I saw greyish cement-looking material and thought I was in a conduit of some kind. I was quite afraid and felt very cold I wanted to get out. Then I sensed I was moving and the cement-like conduit started to speed past my eyes. I was scared but turned and looked ahead and saw a light and was increasing with greater and greater speed until I left the conduit into brilliant white light which was extremely bright but not hard on the eyes. I did not know where I was but soon sensed that I was not alone. I then saw what I can best describe as an opaque window or screen. Like a shower curtain. I saw a silhouettes of sorts and sensed that it was my mother who died in 1971, my friend who died in 1976 and my grandfather who died in 1979. I wanted to go to them but heard from them that "no" not yet. I was disappointed and angry as I wanted to see them, especially my mom. Then I was in a beautiful place a kind of endless sprawling landscape that was warm and sunny. I wanted to stay there and felt fantastic in that there were no more questions to be asked nor problems to overcome. all is so simple. I just knew all the answers: there was nothing other than love and service... that was it. Then I sensed something in front of me and heard a voice (thought) encourage me to look at my life. I didn't want to do that since I was enjoying my experience, but did so anyway. I looked over my life and saw incidents that quickly showed me that there were things I had to do. I said "I think I gotta lot of work to do" to which the reply was " well, you had better get at it." I then found myself back and awake staring at the back side of the driver's clutch pedal. I had been in the passenger seat before. I moved my feet and was relieved that my back was not broken, and then waited until the firemen smashed the back window and pulled me out of the car.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:41 pm:

On New Years Eve, myself and two of my friends decided to stay at one of their houses to party. I had done the drug E once in tablet form before this night and had no problems. We decided on New years we would do E again. Over the course of the night before midnight, I took a line of E, then drank a small amount in milk, and at about 10:00pm I took another tab of E.

At first I was having a "good" trip if you could call it that, but getting closer to midnight when the last tab I took was fully kicking in, I just kept getting higher and higher, everything was getting over whelming, beyond anything I have ever experienced. I left my friends and went into the bathroom and shut off the light to try to have a quiet and dark environment to weather the storm. Even the washroom could not help and I could feel inside that I was in danger. I have never done any hard drugs before and had only smoked pot before my two experiences with E, but I knew I was overdosing. I was trying to stay calm and focused because I knew I was in trouble. Even though I was on a drug, there was a huge sobering quality at least for my thought process. I knew that in order to survive I had to stay awake and get help. I had waited too long before getting help and up to that point I had told my friends repeatedly that I was OK because I had not wanted to worry them. The high was getting overwhelming again; I could not get off the floor or move. In order to try to keep my mind focused, I was trying to count backwards from 10-0 over and over again. Once again I knew I was in trouble when while in my head I could count all the way back when I was counting the number out loud but I was counting over and over only 10, 9, 8, 7, 6 then 0 and when I tried to change this I would then count 10,9,8,7,3,2,1,0. I was missing whole sections of numbers even though in my head I knew they where there. I got myself up resting on the toilet but getting up took too much, and then it was like just my heart and all my veins in my body were seizing and Ii couldn't move, and it happened again, but just more intense, and as I was half lying on the toilet before I blacked out, all over my body it felt like every single pore opened and released all the moisture in my body, because in the matter of moments my whole body was soaked in sweat. I could feel that my heart was not beating anymore after that, the moment before blacking out.

My experience after this point seemed to happen very quickly, I did not see anything. It was much different than that: in order to see you need eyes. It was like being alone in the dark with nothing around that "exists" Something "spoke" to me but it was like the words were given straight to my conscience. The things it (god? I don't really know) told me were "New Year, New Birth." I knew it referred to me dying, and that I was to die that night no matter the circumstances. The second thing it "explained" (and this is one thing I am still trying to grasp it's meaning, but nothing makes any more sense to me), it "said," "In heaven (obvious god or Christian reference), what you need to understand is you do not need eyes to see." The rest I knew just from a "knowing” that came with it's messages. The only thing I understand about the second message is it is something I am supposed to share, because so many people don't understand the concept of physical life and non-physical life. I knew that I had to share this because it felt too many people are living under misconceptions and are blaming their gods or god for this. I knew that people need to understand you don't see with eyes in heaven because eyes are part of the body and are necessary to see physically. When you are dead, you no longer have eyes to see with. Once people understand this concept, as simple as it is, then they will have the ability to be able to understand the concepts of the afterlife better and in the way they need to be thought of as.

Then I was back. Boom! My eyes opened, and I was still lying on the toilet; my body was still damp. I just realized now as I am writing this that when I came back the bathroom light was on. I had turned the light off and none of my friends had been able to enter to turn the light on because I had locked the door. More mystery. Great. Anyways, all my clothes right down to my socks where soaked as if having been recently immersed in water. I was not felling high anymore from the E, even though the effects should have had still been in my system for another 5 hours at least. I felt so different than even before taking the E. I felt strong and healthy, but tired. I called my friends in one at a time to tell them what happened and then took a shower. It was the most glorious shower I ever had. It was like I had never taken a shower before in my life. In the shower, a ravenous thirst took me and for 10 minutes I stood cupping my hands and gulping down as much water as I possibly could. I rested with my friends sitting, not believing what happened, not understanding how I could be sitting there. It was like my mind and body knew it had died and should not be sitting there, but my conscience was definitely alive and it was not a dream, I kept wondering if I was dead and this is what it was like.

For the rest of the night I also noticed a heightened ability psychically (I always had small talent with these things, but I had increased by far.) I was able actually with one of my friends to know what he was feeling and what surface thoughts he was having. I knew this because every time he spoke I already knew every word he was going to say. This has come stronger then goes dormant, but even now I am stronger psychically than I have ever been.

I don't know who to turn to. This happened. Every word is real. I don't think people will believe anything I say. I actually believe that anyone I tell will hear I did drugs and the skeptical part of everyone's mind will not allow them to believe me just chalking my experience up to the drugs. I can understand even if you who are reading this feel the same way, I can understand. The only thing I can say is some things are true whether you believe in them or not.

I just need help getting as much understanding as possible on this because I feel the most is that I am living on borrowed time and I feel like I was given time back, but who is to say exactly how much time.
If I thought this was even a 1% chance this was because of the E I took that night (I am not and have not touched drugs since that night), I would not be writing this to you now. Please believe me on this. I would have had this never happen but I can't change that now.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:40 pm:

It was suppose to be a normal delivery of the birth of my second child. I experienced a rare condition known a Disseminated Intravascular Coagulation; I had lost my ability to clot blood. I was bleeding out, so they called it. I remember the rush of physicians and hospital staff rushing around me, I was so cold. Later, I was told the blood was pouring out like a faucet was on. I was in full arrest due to shock caused from the blood loss. I was rushed to the operating room, which felt to me like everyone was in slow motion, but were really frantically rushing running me on the gurney to the operating room.

I was so cold. Then, I saw a beautiful light. Very warm, inviting. I wanted to go to the light. I was warm. It was so bright, comforting, I was at peace and was drawn towards the light. I heard nothing. Then, all of a sudden, I heard faintly in the background, "we’re loosing her". The voices started to get louder and louder. I heard my doctor yelling at me that she wasn't going to give up. I remember getting cold again. The light was gone. I woke up 6 hours later on a ventilator, unable to breathe on my own. I believe something spectacular happened that day. I am a Christian, I have always believed in God, and now... I have confirmation that something is waiting out there for me, and I will not be afraid to go there again when invited the next time. My after-thoughts on this situation vary. Sometimes I wonder why I was allowed to survive what most don't. There is not a good logical explanation why I survived. For whatever reason, be it my children, family, or destiny... I have a purpose for something.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:38 pm:

For almost ten years, just the thought of talking about the details of my experience with death and the afterlife would make me sob uncontrollably. I don’t know why, because the experience was so wonderful and enlightening. Maybe it was the intensity of that love and enlightenment. No words could truly describe it. Since that experience, I have noticed that I have had heightened sensations and increased intuitive and psychic abilities. Even though I tried to dismiss it as nothing, something inside me won’t let me shake it. Now it is time to share my experience. Keep in mind that I am not a writer, nor professor, but simply a person with a few pages from my soul’s book of life.

When a woman knows there is something dreadfully wrong with her health, yet doctor after doctor tells her, “It’s all in your head – You’re just getting older”, she doesn’t know what to think. If it weren’t for the love of her family, she probably would give up. This was true for me. I knew I was getting worse and if someone didn’t find the cause soon, I most certainly would die.

In my case, I don’t know if the doctors couldn’t see past a trauma I experienced or if women are more complex than men and can’t be diagnosed as easily. All I know is that I was dying, senselessly and needlessly, and no one was doing anything about it. To them, I was a picture of physical health that was being drained by post-traumatic stress. Deep inside, I felt there was more to it.

I told myself I would try one more doctor. That’s it. Then I would give up my fight for life if she found nothing wrong with me. Having to wait a couple months for the appointment was tough. A couple months here, there, and everywhere added up to years. Five years in my case. It would be five long years of trying to find out what was wrong with me. Unbelievable! Yet life’s everyday turmoil continued around me.

Beginning at the end of 1989, I struggled for every ounce of strength I had to get through selling our home to move out to the family farm that we purchased. My father-in-law wanted us to fix up the farm and make him proud. After we remodeled the farmhouse with our life’s savings, we suffered a major setback in 1990 when the farmhouse burnt to the ground. The only clothes that we had left were the ones we had on and those in the hamper at the empty house we were selling. Then in 1992, we suffered the loss of my father-in-law, after which, we began to unveil the truth about my mother-in-law. It was sheer determination that kept me alive with all the stress upon stress I endured during those five years.

At the appointment in March of 1994, the woman doctor did a thorough exam and felt everything looked good. I was told I would hear from her office when the results of the routine Pap smear came back. Since I had regular Pap smears and was told yet again that I was a picture of health, my family and I went ahead with our planned trip to Colorado.

While in Colorado, I grew weaker and weaker. I could feel the strength draining from my body. I barely managed to smile my way through the weekend. When we arrived home, our answering machine was full with messages from the doctor’s office. It was easy to hear the urgency in each message left.

When I called the office, I was told to come in right away. The doctor told me that the Pap smear indicated I needed further testing. I was assured that even if I had cervical cancer it could be easily cured with a cone biopsy. However, after further tests and the cone biopsy, she stated that the cancer was already in the late stage and had invaded my outer tissues and lymph nodes. At first she tried to scold me for not having regular exams that should have caught this cancer earlier, in which event, minor procedures would have cured it. When I reminded her that I did go to doctor after doctor and had Pap smear after Pap smear, she eased up on me. I could sense that she felt this cancer should never have gotten to this point. I agreed with her.

The doctor told me that I needed radical surgery immediately and that it could not wait. She stated that I would have a radical hysterectomy and removal of the affected lymph nodes. Since she never removed lymph nodes, another doctor would assist her. I was told that if I survived, once lymph nodes were removed, my lower body would swell until it could not swell any more. The pain from the skin being so swollen and tight could become unbearable. Before I even left the doctor’s office, the pre-surgery testing and surgery were scheduled for the following week.

Friends begged me to get another opinion, so I called a hospital in New York that had been recommended. After I provided my background information and diagnosis, they made an emergency appointment for me. At the appointment, I was basically told the same thing. Surgery was needed without further delay. I was told that I needed to have a radical hysterectomy, in which my uterus, cervix, and a major part of my vagina would be removed. I wouldn’t know till after the surgery if my ovaries were removed or not. That option depended on how everything looked during the operation. Lymph nodes from hip to hip and up under the rib cage would also be removed and tested to see how far the cancer had spread.

I couldn’t believe what was happening. I didn’t have time to think. Part of me felt relieved that after going to doctor after doctor for years, someone finally discovered that I was really sick. The other part of me wanted to cry when I remembered all the cruel things those doctors told me throughout those years. The most common remark was, “It’s all in your head”. Another was, “You women make me sick. You’re all afraid of getting older. It’s just your hormones changing.” They were so off base, but it never mattered what I said.

The doctor that made me feel the worst sat engrossed, using a ruler to draw lines with different colored markers on my chart. When I attempted to say I was there because I deeply sensed something was really wrong with me, he rudely and abruptly cut me off and said, “Did I tell you to speak? You will speak when I ask you to and not before.” When I started to say, “But-” he interrupted me, pointed his finger just inches from my face, and rudely said, “I didn’t tell you to speak.” I felt so bad that I almost gave up wanting to find out what was wrong with me.

During those five long years of being told over and over again that nothing was wrong with me besides stress, I knew something was killing my body. I felt it so strongly that I caught myself beginning to watch women at the stores to see if I could find someone that could finish raising my son and be a good wife to my husband when I died. My heart ached at the mere thought of not being able to be with them forever. To know I was right all along was dreadful. To think, I only had a few days to prepare myself and my family for the possibility that I might die from a cancer that could have, and should have, been stopped in its track early on. I felt numb, but not scared.

It was hard to put on my faithful smile, but I did, as I bought my twelve-year-old son’s Easter presents before my scheduled surgery. I didn’t know if I would ever get the chance to do it again. The thought of not being there Easter morning to see his face light up as he opened his presents and searched for all the plastic eggs filled with money broke my heart. I didn’t know if the adorable little green suit and multi-colored tie that I purchased for him would be his Easter suit or the one he’d be wearing to my funeral.

With no time to think, I was talked into having the surgery in New York. The day of surgery came too fast. I undressed and got into the ugly hospital gowns. Then my father and husband waited nervously with me until I went down to surgery. As I was put onto the gurney, my lips quivered and my eyes filled with tears while I told them, possibly for the last time, that I loved them. I didn’t know if I’d ever see them again.

When I awoke and realized that I made it through the surgery, I looked up toward the ceiling, closed my eyes and said, “Thank you Lord” under my breath. Then I began to feel tugging from the tubes that seemed to be sticking from me everywhere. They were down my nose, in my neck, in my spine, two on each side of my abdomen, in my hand, and, of course, I had the awful pee bag.

After a few days, the results of the lymph node testing revealed that one in every three nodes were cancerous and radiation treatment was strongly advised. On a less serious note, I discovered that I had developed pesky allergies. One was to the orange solution that they poured on my stomach and vagina in the operating room to help sterilize the area. The other was from simple plastic tape that covered the whole length of my spine and around my neck. It took the skin right off my body. In addition, the morphine began to give me terrible headaches, so it was stopped.

As for the two drain tubes that they put in on each side of my abdomen, I was told that they weren’t stitched tightly enough during the surgery. This caused my body fluid to leak profusely out around the tubes instead of into them. The fluid leaked out so fast that they had to tape big, thick pads around the tubes. Guess what kind of tape they used? That’s right, plastic tape that took even more skin off my body! I had bright red patches of raw skin all over me. The pads needed changed so often that the nurses told me to change them myself. After watching the one nurse drop an opened gauze pad on the sticky floor, bend down and pick it up, and then attempt to put it on my open wounds before I stopped her, I guess I didn’t mind having to put them on by myself. So I thought.

The following day I got up and awkwardly pushed the equipment that held my IV’s and monitors slowly down the hall for my daily exercise. On my way back to my room, I noticed the pads taped around my abdomen’s drain tubes were totally saturated from all the fluid leaking from my body. The fluid began running profusely down my legs and I couldn’t stop it. I went back to my room, climbed into bed, and attempted to lift my wet hospital gown to change the pads, but I was too weak. While I waited to see if my strength would come back, the fluid continued to soak my blanket and sheets. I felt weaker, so I pushed the call button for a nurse.

Patiently, I waited for a nurse to bring in a dry hospital gown, sheets, and a blanket to replace the soaked ones I was lying in. As I waited, I got colder and colder. My body began to tremble with chills. As the body fluid continued to leak out around the two tubes, I sensed something wasn’t right. I was so cold by now that my teeth began to chatter.

After about an hour, I buzzed the nurse again. The nurse rudely replied, “I’ll get there when I get there.” About an hour and a half later, the door to my room opened, and in bounded a nurse. She didn’t even look to see if anything was wrong as she threw the hospital gown, sheets, and blanket right onto my face and chest. As the nurse turned away to rush out, she rudely said, “I don’t have time for this. I’m having problems with my husband.”

When the linens landed on me, something strange sort of clicked in my body. I began to gasp for air, but I couldn’t breathe. My body was too weak to lift my hand up to pull the linens off of my face. A tingling feeling came over my chilled shaken body. The tingling grew so loud, that the sound drowned out all of the hospital noises. I knew I was about to die. My last thought was that I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to my son, husband, and family. Then everything was silent.

Next, I briefly was above the bed looking down. Just as I realized that was my lifeless body in the bed below, my thoughts were abruptly distracted. Suddenly, I was pulled into complete darkness. Amidst the total darkness, I smelled an indescribable odor. At about the same time, my fluid-soaked body felt coolness in the air. I remember wishing that I had a coat to wear to keep me warm.

Then I began to feel myself moving upward. As I was being pulled upward, I began to feel as if I was in a tunnel, an endless, pitch-black tunnel. The speed at which I rose began to increase, faster and faster. It seemed swifter than anything imaginable or possible. As I continued to speed upwards through the seemingly endless darkness, there were puffs of clouds brushing across my eyelids and cheeks. It felt nice, like cool dew. That’s when my eyes looked upward.

There I saw such a magnificently, wondrous light which was white and pure. At first it seemed very far away. One glance at this bright, splendid light made me feel safe, loved, and serene. I didn’t feel pain or sadness, just an overwhelming peaceful love that grew more intense the closer I got to it. This white light was extraordinarily bright. It was almost blinding. I felt myself squinting just so I could gaze at it. I looked away from the light for a second because it seemed intense enough to burn right through my eyes, yet it didn’t. Maybe the cool mist brushing across my face helped in some way. When I glanced away, all I saw was the vast blackness around me and below me, so I gazed back up toward the light and never looked down again. As I watched the light get closer and brighter, the sense of tranquil love grew stronger and stronger.

Suddenly, I was no longer accelerating upwards. While I still squinted from the extreme brightness of the light, my eyes began to adjust to it. I began to notice thick white puffs of clouds continuously moving about. A breeze from the moving clouds gently blew the lightweight, long, flowing garment that I was now wearing. I could also see that I was barefoot as I began to slowly walk amidst the clouds.

Before I knew it, I was gazing upon this magnificent gate that was gloriously glistening. I just stared with amazement at its beauty. Rays of prismatic light were bouncing off the exquisite gems in all directions. It was totally breathtaking. Since I always longed for a driveway gate back on the farm, I caught myself engulfed in trying to remember every astonishing detail about it. As I peered even closer, I watched as pearly gems sparkled radiantly in the light.

A remarkable peace drew me in beyond the gates. I felt so safe that fear never entered my thoughts. I began to squint real hard in attempt to see through the beaming light and continuously moving clouds, but I couldn’t. Then in the near distance toward the right, I got a glimmer of something, so I squinted even harder. The clouds seemed to part enough just to show a hint of a shadow of two people. It seemed to be a man with a woman standing by his side. I didn’t feel as if I knew them, but I felt as if they were waiting for me for a reason. Just as the clouds were about to thin out enough for me to see clearer, they abruptly thickened and closed up around the couple. All I could see again were the clouds passing by me in the light. I wondered why the clouds thickened up so fast just as I was about to see who was there.

At that same time, I realized there was someone right in front of me. The clouds also thickened around that shadow so I could not see him. There are no words to describe the incredibly intense love I felt, standing there in front of him. No one could ever imagine a love so powerfully strong. At that moment, it hit me. I was in heaven standing before our Lord. As I stood there before Him, I felt that He knew every detail of my soul. I felt dumb that I didn’t realize the gates I had passed through were the pearly gates until that moment. My eyes turned away for a second and looked down to my right. I didn’t know if the light was just so bright or if I felt unworthy of such wondrous love. It seemed as if He could hear my thoughts because I heard, “Fear not; for thou art worthy of my love.” As I heard those words, my throat grew tight and my eyes swelled with tears. I thought, “Are you sure?” With each question came an answer and reassurance. It seemed as if my whole life was reviewed and clarified in a flash.

If I could only choose one word to describe our Lord, it would have to be “Love”, an indisputable love. I don’t know how to explain it. I couldn’t see Him through the clouds and light, but I felt His love so deeply. He was right there in front of me, so close to me. I felt incredible love, power, and peace in His voice, but I don’t know if He actually spoke. It was as if we felt, heard, and responded to each other without the need to speak. I was told I had to go back; I wasn’t supposed to die when I did; and I had more work to do. In addition, I was told that I had to protect my husband and son from someone.

Just as I was about to ask more, it became dark again. While gasping for air, I realized I was back in the hospital bed. This time when my right arm reached up to pull the blanket, sheets, and hospital gowns off my face, it had the strength to pull them off. I could breathe. I began to hear the noises of the hospital and feel pain again. My body was shivering and my teeth were chattering uncontrollably. Once again, my body was extremely weak. My hospital gown and bed linens were still soaked. I sort of felt sad that I was back. When I was in heaven, there was no pain. My body was not all cut up. I didn’t have any tubes hanging from me. I was whole. I was strong. I was loved more than anyone could imagine. As I looked up to the heavens, I meekly nodded as if to say that I understood. Then I closed my eyes.

A while later the nurse came in. She walked over to my bed and nonchalantly said, “You’re right. You are soaked.” She went to change my hospital gown but realized the linens that she brought in and threw on me earlier were also wet by now, so she went to get more. As she was putting a dry hospital gown on me, she told me about her bad day and about the problems she was having with her husband. I was only half listening to her as she rambled on because I was remembering how I died because of the bad day she was having. I don’t believe I said a word while she was there. I had a thousand thoughts going through my head about my glorious time in heaven.

Now not only did my struggle for life begin again with the many medical complications that followed – especially the radiation therapy – but also my ability to occasionally feel presences or spirits of those whom had previously passed on began to spark inside me. When a feeling comes over me, I can’t shake it no matter how hard I try. It completely overwhelms my every thought. I can’t even sleep. My mind doesn’t shut down, but it is totally drained. Each time I have one of these experiences, it takes a major toll on me.

I haven’t been able to talk about this to anyone. Who would believe me? For instance, who would believe that I had a vividly clear glimpse of horrifying hell as I shook an attorney’s hand; I felt a mournful presence in a friend’s cottage that wouldn’t let me leave until I helped her; while driving past New York City, I felt an enormous death toll in store for the city weeks before the terror attack; when I awoke on Sept. 11th, I knew that was the day; I discovered the identity of the couple from heaven and what they wanted me to do; I sensed the stock market was going to fall drastically well before it had even started to decline; I knew Vice-President Gore should be President but would lose; and as I watched NBC News Correspondent David Bloom appear on television covering the war of Iraq, I felt he was going to die – not be killed, but die? The feelings I have concern small and major things, people close to me or those I only know through friends. Simply hearing, seeing, or touching a person or their possessions can trigger these inexplicable moments.

This very powerful emotional experience has definitely changed me. I am not afraid of death now since I have seen a glimpse of the amazing realm that lies beyond. As I stated in the beginning of my story – I am not a writer, but I hope that my words touch the hearts of those seeking hope, comfort, or purpose.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:34 pm:

I was driving the family station wagon in the mountains in December, it was starting to rain and I had not been driving long. The engine died and the car locked up and I lost control. The car went end over end twice and rolled about 7 times. The witness to the accident said he did not know how anyone survived the accident. My 15 year old brother and his friend were also in the front seat. None of us had our seat belts on, but I was the only one injured. While the car was rolling, at first everything went black and it got very cold. All of a sudden it became very warm, a nice warm, and a light started to appear before me. In the light my father started to appear to me and seem to hold out his hand, as if to motion me to come with him. It was such a nice feeling that I wanted to go. My father was smiling as if to say everything was alright. My father appeared to me only from the waist up, and there was this warm light all around him. But after a couple of minutes his imaged disappeared and I realized where I was. I only received a bad gash behind my left ear. I did [not] have to even stay in the hospital except to get stitches. To this day I cannot explain what happened.

P.S. There was another time in the summer of 1979 or 1980. I was dating this girl from Stockton, CA and we were trying to sleep at her house. That night before we went to bed, my girlfriend, myself, her mother, and a friend of the family were sitting at the kitchen table talking. I was in chair against the wall facing out, her mother proceeded to say how her brother always sat in that chair whenever he came to visit. I didn't think too much about it until the next day.

That night it was very hot, so her mother was sleeping on the couch, and my girlfriend and I were sleeping on the floor. Sometime in the middle of the night something woke me up and I perched myself up on my arm. I looked at the chair I was sitting earlier and a figure started appearing in the chair that I was previously sitting in. It formed from the head down, and I did not know what was going on, but I could describe everything in color: what the man looked like and what he was wearing. He just seemed to be staring at me for about 10 minutes, then he dissipated the way he appeared. The next morning about 7 AM the 3 of us were having coffee and I told them I had a bad dream, probably from sleeping on the floor. I told them everything I had witnessed. Her mother said I described her brother, whom I have never met, to a tee. About 8 AM that morning, her mother received a phone call telling her that her brother had hung himself just at the moment he appeared to me. But I was in the way; he was appearing to her, but I was between her and me. It was her that he was appearing to. I just wonder sometimes if I can feel things.

One other time, it was either 1977 or 1978, circa. I was sleeping on my mother's patio and it was approximately 1 or 2 in the morning. I wasn't quite asleep yet and was lying on my back when a voice called my name. I instantly thought it was one of my younger brothers. I went to check, they were all asleep. I thought I was hearing things so I lay back down. A couple of minutes later the voice called me again and said get up, but louder this time. I thought for sure my brothers were playing some kind of joke on me. I went into their bedroom, and they were fast asleep. By now I am thinking that maybe I am just very tired. As I lay down again, wide awake by now, something grabbed my foot very hard and yelled my name to get up. I went into the living and heard someone trying to break into the house. I scared them away; I was able to sleep after that.

P.S. I just want to say that not now, nor have I ever drunk a lot nor have I ever been involved with drugs. I have also had other things happen that have come true. Please respond. Thank you.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:31 pm:

Hi, please excuse my bad notions of English, but I'll try to explain myself as clear as possible. My mother has been ill for about 4 years, she had cancer, after three years she had an embolism, became paraplegic, aphasic, agnosic, ... After three months of constructive revalidation, she had another embolism. I had such a relation with her that I could understand her even without words. I was at her side ‘til she died a year after her first embolism. During that period I tried to do everything I could to help her have the best possible time, but I messed up all my familial and friends-relations, so I had to move from my town to another town. Over there, I started to have all symptoms of what you call near dead after effects. They lasted for about a year; life was so complete, I understood everyone, I loved everything, I was indestructible, and so on. After that period, things came to regression and I tried to find that state of mind back. I still have some of them in me, but I don't have them all the time. The nearest thing I found about that subject was the Tibetan Book of Death and it's not only near, it was THAT!! Tonight I'm trying to write something about a guy with a near dead experience and most of the symptoms mentioned on various sites mention the feeling I had during that period.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, March 4, 2004 - 08:29 pm:

I underwent ventricular tachycardia and required defibrillation to be resuscitated. I had accidentally overdosed on massive amounts of over-the-counter caffeine, which caused the condition to occur.

Though this was years ago, I still remember it well. I remember extreme pain in my chest, as if I were being crushed in a huge vise, then a lot of emotional distress knowing I was probably dying (on the way to the hospital) being driven to the hospital, I eventually lost my vision and was transported by ambulance from a freeway off-ramp where an ambulance was standing by for us (truckers had alerted them someone was being transported at high speed to the hospital).

I remember the out-of-body experience well. I was several ceiling heights above myself in the E.R., watching them working on me, trying to get my heart to beat again. Voices were echo-y and distant, but I remember a sense of calmly being there watching myself dying and not being concerned by it.

Then it was as if I were floating backwards away from the room, into a tunnel of white illuminating warmth. It was nearly orgasmic it felt so good throughout my body. There was a feeling of acceleration towards the source of the light, and I was so very glad to be going to it. Then, almost as if something were pulling me from below, the other way, I felt a deceleration and slowing, then a reverse direction away from the light, and this really confused me. I felt really cheated, really wanted to go all of the way to that light but now I couldn't.

The next thing I know I am in the E.R. with very very blurry vision, a chest that hurt like hell, and the physician asking me how I felt. I told him I could barely see him and that my chest hurt like a son of a gun. He told me I would have to stay there for a while ‘til they were certain it was okay to release me. Inside the hour, I was released by the doctor and told I could go. The two navy personnel who had stopped on the freeway and drove me to get medical help were still there, as were the police. The police found the empty container of the pills I had purchased and consumed, and were satisfied from talking to the doctor that it was an accidental overdose and not a narcotic related overdose.

All of these years later, I still remember it pretty clearly. I have told a few others of this experience,e but of course many are skeptical and are not sure they're getting the truth, though they know I am telling them in sincerity and without trying to change their own feelings about this sort of thing. I guess it helped when my mother was dying; I was able to guide her to the light, told her to go to it. She affirmed with a hand squeeze that she saw the light I was talking about. I feel this helped her, and it helped me as well.

Not much else to say. It was a number of years ago, but it changed my life forever.

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  By Anonymous on Saturday, January 3, 2004 - 01:49 pm:

Five friends took off to ski in Austria for a week. Everything was beautiful, the mountains were huge. My girlfriend and I decided to take an expert trail and ended up traversing back and forth just trying to stay on the face of the mountain. It was that steep. One of the guys with us, 6'4", and a very good skier, decided to take the jump at the top of the run. We were directly below about 200 yards down from him when we heard him yell, "Watch out!" We scrambled to get out of his way, but the next thing I felt was a crushing pain, so intense it was unbearable. When the pain suddenly stopped, I will never forget having the thought "So this is what it's like to die!" It was as if I had suddenly found the answer to some great mystery. I had a smile on my face, although I was no longer a 'body'.

My soul was smiling. I went 'up'. I remember just feeling like a 'head' looking around. No body. I was unable to go beyond the layer of white that surrounded me, white was everywhere. Then, in the distance I saw some white robed figures, faceless, hunched-over like, and walking in a single row coming towards me. I couldn't move towards them. I just had to stay there and wait for them. No one talked. It was like 'thought transfer' or something. Then, I realized that the person in front was my beloved Uncle, my closest deceased relative, and behind him was my grandmother, his mother. I was SO EXCITED to see Uncle. I wanted to run up to him and hug him, but I couldn't move. He came within ten feet of me, stopped and shook his head. He told me it wasn't my time and I had to go back. He turned and my grandmother followed, still in their 'line' of white hooded robes. Next thing I knew I felt like someone had taken a knife and sliced my chest open left to right. That first breath was a killer. I was so angry, mad, at coming back. I didn't know what had happened or why I was there lying across Danny's lap and why he was crying. Everyone was trying to calm 'HIM" down and make "HIM" feel better because I was breathing again. "It's O.K. Danny. See, she's fine, she's fine." Everyone always asks me, "So what did they say when they took you to the hospital?" I reply with "What hospital? They took me to the bar on top of the mountain, bought me a beer and stared at me saying 'do you feel better yet? Can we go back out and ski now?' Ah... human psychology. I finally told them I was OK although my head was still pounding and every time I tried to stand I would fall over. I tried to ski, but I couldn't stand up. It was extremely frustrating.

It wasn't until a few years later that I started making comments about my memory. "Maybe I did? Maybe I didn't? I don't know...." I started hearing voices talk to me when I took naps during the day. Deep LOUD voices telling me things, scary things. I had a dream during my first pregnancy in 1989, a year later. It was in a dark tunnel, I was walking through it, not knowing why when all of a sudden my Uncle appeared. Yes, the deceased Uncle. He was in his robe again, but this time he was holding something. I couldn't tell what he had in his arms until he finally got closer to me. Then, he handed me a baby and said "I have been taking care of her for the past eight months and now it is your turn." And before I could even look up from the baby to thank him, he was moving away back through the dark turning tunnel.

I had two more children afterwards and a few months after my last daughter was born, I had seven seizures in one day, never having had them before. That is when the MRI showed dead brain tissue indicative of clinical death for about three minutes. I continue to be medicated for partial complex seizures and narcolepsy. I have no sense of smell, no appetite, no longer form new memories. I can't organize, sort, etc., although all memories prior to ‘88 are still intact. The good part is I don't hold grudges or remember things like my parents funerals; the bad part is I don't remember things like my children’s activities, family events, etc. Oh well, such is life!

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  By Anonymous on Monday, December 29, 2003 - 07:07 pm:

Although I prayed, my religious life was non existent until I reached 38 years of age. I was a spiritual, curious person, and wanted to "know" and learn, thus I searched in many fields. In the summer of 1977, I had 3 surgeries in 10 days, as a result of an infection in my Fallopian tubes that wouldn't go away. After the third one I felt very sick and crushed by the excruciating pain that the air accumulated in my joints caused, due to the three consecutive Laporotomies. Then one day I was trying to lay flat in bed but found it quite thorny to do, so tears of desperation flooded my eyes. I closed them, feeling very tired of hurting. Right at that moment I heard the voice of my nanny, clear as if she would be by my side (she had remained in Spain because she was quite old), and was saying: "[Jane], you are better now". I opened my eyes thinking that somebody was talking to me and I had made up the rest, but the hospital room was empty except for me. I closed my eyes again, ready to keep on with my endeavor. Then at 11 o’clock, I saw the most beautiful man I have ever encountered in my existence. He was dressed in dark, very elegant wear; his shoes were of patent leather, and his white, ruffled shirt shone like the sun light. I fell in ecstasy and said: "You are God... I want to kiss Your feet!" As I saw myself kneeling before His feet, that shone as well, they were bare.

Something very strange occurred: next I was getting out of my body through my head, horizontally, as if I were crawling inside a tube, tummy up, helping my advance with my hands. Once outside that... cylinder, I stood up and saw my own body in front of me, lying on the bed. I felt MARVELOUS. Immeasurable joy inundated all my being. [A being that] felt no pain, no sorrows, nothing but wellness and delight as I had never experienced before. I looked around, and in the Light, I could see every thing as through a very delicate sheer curtain. By the feet of my bed, my husband and my three children cried, looking at what seemed my dead body. I wanted to console them and instantly found myself floating towards them. I caressed their faces, kissed them and told them not to cry for me, that I was fine and perfectly happy and well. But I could see they didn't sense me or hear me.

Right at that moment I felt sucked back into my physical body, and then realized that again all was dark, very heavy, and the pain of my body was unbearable. My first word, only one, was: "S...!" My husband said: "I beg you pardon?"

People ask me often if I believe that I really saw God. I smile, then I answer that God was the One Who saw me, and He presented to me an Image that I could comprehend in my limited understanding. My life has not been the same after that experience. Of course I lost all fear of death (and look forward to going), for I have the absolute conviction that there is a wonderful Life after this physical expression.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, December 11, 2003 - 09:41 pm:

After the car hit my car, I rose above the accident and said "My God, I can't die yet; I still haven't finished my finals!" (I was attending Chiropractic College.) Archangel Michael came to me and said "You have another school to go to; don't worry, you will continue on with your college." He escorted me to a magnetic tunnel where Jeshua (Jesus) was waiting for me, who comforted me. I then found myself at the door step of a type of school, where there were a few students learning geometric shapes and physics with the accompanying healing energy involved. I though the better way would be to directly go to the energy that is involved in the healing, direct from Source.

At this point, Mother Mary came in, and motioned for me to follow Her. She asked my thoughts about what we were learning, I told her it would be best to go right to Source for the healing energy. She said she had something for me to look at, so I followed Her out of the class. I first sat in a healing chair to help my physical body heal on earth. Then we went to a vault that held information from souls’ life cycles and growth. I was told I could have access to this information whenever I desired, it was important with the process of uncovering the dense dramas on earth.

We also looked into a type of screen, that reminded me of a TV screen, and I saw a gathering of people in a field. They were all releasing the density that held back Unconditional Love, then holding the Light within and living within Peace above the dramas. After one man cleared himself out, another individual came up to him who was also cleared, then they shook hands. Both bringing the Reality of Peace into their creative engagement, they both shared Light instead of any fear thoughts or actions. At this point, the Light streamed through them, all the density was then released into the Light.

"It's gone! It's all gone!" I exclaimed! “I can see how this works, but who will believe me? I'm a nobody, my dad was a carpenter in Washington and I'll be a small town chiropractor. I think you should get somebody else! Besides that, I'm a bit shy!"

A few months went by after I came out of the ten day coma, when I remembered that there was a NDE. It took many years after that to begin a journal which records the mechanism that Mother Mary introduced me to. I have compiled much of the information into a manuscript, and am editing and continue writing about the tools that are guided by Mother Mary, Mary Magdalene, Jeshua, Arch Angel Michael, and many other Enlightened Beings.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, December 11, 2003 - 03:46 pm:

I took about 96 pills, Trazidon, Soma and Zanex. I was taking about half of whichever pill came out of the bottle for the past couple of nights to help me sleep. Right after I took the pills I remember saying out loud "Please God forgive me for what I've just done." I was in full cardiac arrest, and my body had absorbed all of the pills, my body temperature dropped to 91 degrees, and for the next 14 hours I was completely brain dead. The nurse told my husband and parents that there was 99 percent chance I would not make it, and if I did I would be a vegetable. When I was seizing and posturing I remember being next to my body and looking at my toes seeing how tense I was. I was trying to calm myself. My sister gave me a titty twister as she pronounced me dead. I opened my eyes and said "This isn't heaven." I do not have much of a memory of my life before this; I lost a lot. They say I am completely different.

I do remember being with three others, one in the middle was a little above the two, on one side was my brother, who died at 11days, the other was my grandpa. I don't know how we got there, but it was such a beautiful color blue surrounding, not ground but not like we were hovering. We talked a lot, but I can’t remember our mouths moving. I paid [attention] mostly to my brother, his clothes, his hair, how tall, but can not remember the one in the middle. I know he said a lot to me, but I don't know what. My sister says when I first opened my eyes I said "God says I'm a ••••• and won’t let me stay"

My parents took pictures all through this, from the beginning until I went home.

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  By Anonymous on Thursday, December 11, 2003 - 03:39 pm:

My father had been ill on and off for the past 12 years. He had had several bouts with cancer, aneurisms and heart problems. He always came through each battle with the same strong, positive attitude he went into it with. My mother and I, through all the times we waited for Dad to come out of a surgery that was more likely to kill rather than save him, never had the slightest doubt that he would be fine.

This past February he had gotten to the point where all the aneurisms were over, he had a mechanical aortic valve and he had been free of cancer for over five years. He had started going out again and was in better spirits then we'd seen him in years. So when both my mother and I heard the same young, male voice call (we were in different places in the house and we heard it different days) we knew we were going to loose someone but not Dad. We tried to figure who and could only come up with my sister who had just won a bout with breast cancer, but that didn't feel right. So we just waited to see who it was. About one week after our hearing this voice, my father started feeling bad. He lost a tremendous amount of weight in what seemed like days and had become very tired and agitated. We both pressed him to go to the doctor and be checked. He did and his doctor had both brain and full body CAT scans done along with various other tests. Everything was Ok, but Dad just didn't feel right. This was in June.

In August, while I was sitting in the car waiting for my mother, I felt an overwhelming feeling of loss. I asked out loud "Who are we losing?" but I had no feeling for a particular person. I just knew we were losing someone very close. When my father said to me, at 1:30 a.m. Tues. morning, he thought he had a bowel blockage and needed to go to the hospital, I knew immediately who we were losing. On the way to the hospital he told me to take my time. I asked him if he was sure and he said there was still some time. I knew that he knew he wouldn't come back this time.

In the emergency room I stayed with him while they ran tests. He did have scar tissue blocking his intestine. They would admit him and schedule surgery. The ER doctor took me aside and told me that this would be very hard for Dad. I was amazed because this was not the first time they had to remove scar tissue from him and it had never been a major concern before.

But none of this was like any other time I had taken him to the hospital. I was grateful for this doctor, who I had never talked to before, for letting me know that my feelings were right. I literally stood next to my father that morning for four hours while they finished the tests and he waited for a room. He held my hand the whole time and had gotten so weak that he could only talk in a whisper. When it was time for them to move him, I told him I would go and get my son so my mother could be with him. He held my hand tightly and didn't want me to go.

He had surgery at 8:00 pm Tues. evening. He came through it fine. His doctor put him in the Cardiac Care Unit because of the valve in his heart, but this was normal. That evening my mother and I talked and we both knew Dad was going to die. It was strange to come out and say it to each other. Nothing the doctors said backed up the feelings, we just knew.

The following evening, as my mother and I stood over him in the C.C.U. he had a stroke. The CAT scans showed three baseball size soft tissue masses, one in the brain, one between the heart & lungs and one in the abdomen. They also found several smaller masses up and down his spine. There was nothing that could be done. No cure that could handle all three masses. We had some serious decisions to make. We told Dad at the next visit and he understood. By now the bottom half of both lungs had collapsed, he was paralyzed on his right side and couldn't speak. He could communicate by pointing at letters and his facial expressions. I had to ask him in the presence of a doctor if he wanted to keep the respirator on and if he understood that if it was turned off he would, in fact, die. He had no trouble making it clear to them that he wanted the artificial life support off and he fully understood what was happening. We then moved him to a private room where my sisters, brother and I took shifts staying with him. We didn't want him to be alone when he passed.

The four days he was in the private room were beautiful. Everyone who ever knew my father came to say goodbye and we, the family, allowed everyone a private moment with him. We were all amazed at how vividly aware he was and how well he communicated. It truly spoke of a life well lived and a man respected and loved by everyone.

By Saturday, the third day in the private room, he was tired. his paralysis was close to total, breathing labored, and he had a couple of bouts with violent fits of shaking. For some reason I had a very strong mental connection with my Father that had intensified to the point of my actually speaking for him. I could hear his voice in my head. I knew what he wanted and what he felt. The connection was so strong by now that I had few feelings of my own.

I had relieved my sister Saturday morning. Dad had a restless night and I knew he would rest with me there. I kept hearing him ask me to help him go. I wasn't sure how he wanted me to help. I knew he wanted to go but it felt like he was scared or lost. It seemed like he couldn't go. My brother stayed with him that afternoon and I was to relieve him that evening. I told my mother I couldn't go back that night. I knew I had to help him. I just wasn't ready for whatever it was I was supposed to do. My mother understood how I felt, she said she had the same feelings her last visit, so she arranged for my sister and her husband to spend the night with him. Since this had all started I hadn't sleep much at all and Saturday night I actually slept for a few hours. I woke early Sunday morning and felt more relaxed than I had in days. But I knew I had to go and stay with Dad, I still had no idea how I could help him.

When I settled in at the hospital I couldn't look him in the eyes. I heard him asking for help but I couldn't help, and it broke my heart to see him suffer. He wanted to go, he was ready to go - but he couldn't, and I couldn't go for him. I've never felt a pain like that - I couldn't look at him. I felt so self-conscience, the atmosphere in the room was so thick and oddly calm - peaceful almost - and waiting. As I sat reading in a chair at the foot of his bed, his breathing became heavy and sporadic, he was hyperventilating. I turned my head and looked him in the eyes (actually the third eye, where you can see both eyes at the same time) and said "I'll breathe for you Dad." I speeded my breathing up to his rate and slowly slowed it back down - he was with me and I was, literally, breathing for him. We were in perfect sync. As he calmed down he motioned, with his eyes, for me to close my eyes. I just knew that was what he wanted. I said "you want me to close my eyes?" he motioned yes. I turned my head back and rested it against the back of the chair and closed my eyes. I felt, rather than saw my father in my conscienceness. That is the only way to explain it. There was a figure, of sorts… like a vague outline, but I felt my father. I knew he wanted me to take him or help him. I said, verbally, "I can't go all the way, but I'll go as far as I can." We then 'moved' through what was like a tunnel, the walls were like a bluish-gray smoke gently moving clockwise. I was behind my father, following him. We came to an area that I can only describe as a huge wall of purple and black swirling plasma. It rose up in front of us. We stood on a dark floor, the tunnel was behind us and we were blocked by this huge wall. The purple was the predominant color and the black was more like the outline of the purple swirls. We walked along the wall but found no way through, over, under or around it. The feelings of this wall were confusion and chaos, it was swirling at a steady but chaotic pace and was quite intimidating but not frightening. More frustrating.

My father had only gotten this far - he couldn't get past this wall. That's what he wanted me to help him with. I said "no wonder you can't go - this is a mess!" Then I felt this sudden conscious awareness of what was happening and fear flooded me - a fear so shocking that I "flew" my eyes open and sat straight up in my chair! I looked over at my father and his eyes flew open, he looked at me as if I had hurt him more deeply than was humanly possible. I felt so ashamed, shocked and sorry, deeply - so very deeply sorry.

His breathing became faster and agitated. I said "it wasn't long enough, I opened my eyes too soon. I'm sorry..." he softened and I took control of the breathing again. (The whole time the breathing was the predominant sound; it was like a gauge or a line and I used it but I'm not sure how.) He, again, motioned for me to close my eyes and we started over again. This time when we reached the purple/black wall there were specks of orange dotted through it. My father was looking for his mother. He was walking up and down the wall like a lost child calling "Mama, Mama." I started looking for her too; it made sense for her to come and help him - more sense than me doing it. I called "Granmommy Florence" (I was quite young when she died and only remember her one time; I tried to feel her but I couldn't grasp it.) "Granmommy Florence" it seemed that we called and looked for a long time. I started getting angry. I didn't want my father stuck here and his body was almost dead. Why didn't she come and get him?! Where was she?? I hollered "Granmommy Florence, come and get him! He's suffered enough - don't make him suffer anymore." I felt so helpless that my demand was more of a plea.

Then, from somewhere inside of me, I heard "orange". I remembered reading something about orange but I suddenly knew the only way through the purple was through the orange. I said to my father "come on, we have to follow the orange." He came with me like a lost child would go with someone they trusted to take them home. The innocence I felt from him made me feel very protective and real.

I wasn't sure how to follow the orange, there were only specks here and there so I picked a speck and 'moved' toward it. As I did I saw more orange, so I moved toward that, and I kept doing this until I, we, were on an orange path. The path rose up out of the purple/black swirls and as we moved along the path we came into a vast horizon of soft, warm pastel yellow and green whips that curved all around us like a canopy. The purple/black was below and behind us but the yellow/green whips were above and around us. Like we were rising up into a huge dome. It was so vast and warm, safe, calm and lightly peaceful.

It seemed as if we were on a moving belt going toward a flat, swirling, circular door. Like an inverted funnel but it, the opening, was flat and was in the middle of this vast space we had entered. The circular door was a soft white light mixed with light gray shadows where the light overlapped from the swirling motion.

There was a figure off to the left side of this door. To me it looked transparent, the color of liquid coffee held up to the light. It was the shape of a tall, thin person in a long, hooded robe. It seemed more transparent in what would be the chest area and I could not see a face or any detailed features. I know my father saw his mother. I felt his joy, his sudden childish freedom. The freedom to express the abundant love and joy that only innocent children seem to have. I was overwhelmed with a love and understanding that words cannot describe. A love of being rather than having, an understanding of everything in nothing. A warmth that cleansed the very fibers of my soul.

I watched as my father moved in front of me (up to now he had been following me) and moved like a child running toward this figure. I was still going forward but at a much slower pace. As I came closer to the door I felt as if I was shedding all pain, all worry. I was home, at last I was at the place I had been looking for for so long. I had no reason to go back, nothing mattered now, I knew who I was and more importantly what I am and am to be.

Then, as my father reached the figure, a harsh, loud knock rang out, then another and another. I heard, what I thought was my father (I'm not so sure it was now) say "Lynn, go answer the door" I said "No. I'm not leaving". Again the voice said, much sterner this time, "Lynn! go and answer the door!" then, for some reason, I had the feeling that I was eavesdropping on a very private moment and I felt uncomfortable. I said "Ok. But I'm coming right back." Still seeing my father, the entire scene in my head, I got up out of the chair and opened the door of the hospital room. It was as if I was above myself looking through a funnel at the nurse in the hall. " I want to get his blood pressure… is it Ok?" she asked. The hospital staff had been real good about not disturbing him without our OK. I looked at her and tears started streaming down my face, "He's going now" I said. "I'm with him, he's just found his mother, he's going now!". The nurse starred at me for a moment then said "Are you alright? Is there someone I can call? Can you handle this?" "Are you kidding!!" I said "It's beautiful, I'm with him. Of course I can handle this." Then she said "I knew you were psychic. I knew you were." Then she started to tell me how her mother died and she wasn't there but she knew when it happened… I didn't want to be rude but I said "I have to go back... I want to be with him." She squeezed my arm, and said if I needed anything she would be right out side the door.

I closed the door, went back to the chair, my fathers breathing was so slow and calm. I sat back and closed my eyes… I was back on the orange path but I was further back from the door then when I left. My father and the figure were just entering the light. My father said "Bye honey, and thank you." As they entered the light, his breathing slowed; I knew the breathing would stop. I watched them move further into the light and heard the final breath of my father’s body. I just sat in the chair. I left the place we were, I was back here, and I waited for the silence. Hoping for another breath but knowing he was gone. After a few seconds, I looked at his body. He was definitely gone. I went to the door and told the nurse. She came in and confirmed that he was dead. She called the supervising nurse and she noted the time. The supervisor asked me if I was all right and I just looked at her and said "I went with him. I watched him… I showed him where to go!" She said "Do you know what a blessing that is?" and I couldn't speak.

I called my mother and told her that I took him. She said she was so grateful, she tried to help him the day before and couldn't. She would have someone come and get me. When my sister picked me up at the hospital, I tried to explain what had happened, but it was very hard to find any words, much less the right ones. Later she told me that I was "glowing" when she picked me up. The rest of the family had mixed reactions, they were actually angry at me.

It's hard to describe how I felt. I remember telling a minister, who wanted me to recount the experience, that to let go of someone that deeply was the ultimate test of love. You cannot let go on that level if you are concerned with what it means to you. Only if you want what is right for that soul. That's the love of being - not having, the force that connects all life to all life. I guess you could say selfless or fear-less love. I know now that "hell" is the fear that holds us. "HELL" is being stuck between the physical world and the next world. We need to have felt and understood the "love - of - being", that selfless, fear-less love, at some point in our existence to pass that wall. That's the message of love. Not the feeling most of us call love. There has to be nothing in it for us. It doesn't matter how we understood it or what we felt it for - just as long as we did.

A couple of hours after I got home from the hospital, I laid down, closed my eyes and was back at the purple/black wall. It's funny but it wasn't so intimidating this time. I looked behind it and found that it was a curtain. I slipped behind the curtain and went up the path and I saw my father much farther into the light. I wanted to go - but the curtain was suddenly in front of me and I was told "not yet." I'm still trying to understand how and why I was able to go with my father. From what I have read and tried to research, this is not a very common thing, though I'm not the first person to have an experience like this.

There are a couple of things that I am very sure of now and they are that we are much more than flesh, bones and blood. That our actions and even our thoughts here mean a great deal more than we can ever imagine. That "love" is much more and much more powerful than most of us has even an inkling about.

I also know that my father and any other soul (here or passed) who has known real love for another being is OK and will be OK through eternity. I now KNOW we can ALL go home.

I flat-lined three times in the hospital. I got in a car accident in New Orleans while on vacation. The airbag gave me a blunt trauma to my liver. I went to the hospital in an ambulance from the scene of the accident and they did not catch my injury. Thinking that I was fine they let me go and I returned home. A week went by and I started feeling sharp pains around my abdomen. It got severely worse until I could not walk. I went to a family doctor in my parent’s small town and she misdiagnosed me with the flu and bronchitis. After a week on medication that was supposed to clear up my "flu," I returned to the doctor again. She prescribed some pain medication. I went home and the pain medication didn't work. Returning to the office one more time, she told me not to come back and that she has prescribed me enough medication. At that point, I wasn't even able to walk and my abdomen was swollen dramatically. I went to another doctor and he told me to go home and put a heating pad on my tummy.

The next day in near-death health, I was taken to the Emergency Room. As soon as I got there, I was diagnosed with sepsis (an infection in my blood) which has a 40% mortality rate. Then after a cat scan, they found my liver abscess that took up half of my liver (liver abscess has a 30% mortality rate), so they prepared for emergency surgery. I flat-lined once during surgery because of my liver condition and my blood infection. I also died once in the ER after catching Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) from my body going into shock, and then once again on the helicopter when they were sending me to a bigger trauma center . I don't remember seven days out of a month of hospitalization. During those days my sister came down because the doctors told my parents to call the immediate family because they thought I wouldn't make it. She spent three days with me at the hospital. I talked with her and many other people, but I don't remember any of it.

When I woke up it felt a feeling like I knew where I was and what happened, but I really had no idea what happened to me that week. I don't remember anything like a light or a spirit, but I was very calm and in good spirits during and even after realizing what happened. All I know is that I am a totally different person. People tell me that I look better than before my NDE, but I think I pay more attention to my appearance now since I feel sort of dirty with experiences: like I am a veteran with a thousand stories and no one to tell, or no one to understand my issues, or a innocent looking girl, but underneath she has some baggage that has more scars than an unlucky stuntman. No man will ever feel stronger than me since I have been through war with life and death. But now I am not scared of death anymore, because I felt a peace in the hospital that was warming and calm. I know now that it is a very peaceful place and god puts a fake terror of dying in everyone so we won't want to die right away so we can live our life.

I am having many problems keeping my friends right now. A lot of so-called friends before my NDE have abandoned me (maybe because of the fear of getting close to someone that is on the edge of death or there fake death phobia is kicking in). But on the plus side, I have gotten really close to my family now and less so with friends. I do have some weird sort of psychic ability now, like finishing other people's sentences. or asking questions they were just about to ask. .Plus I have been motivated more in learning now. I still go to school even though it’s only been a few months since I died in the hospital. .I can't have a normal conversation with anyone now (unless they don't know me). They have that look in their eyes like an overprotecting mom, or a sort of pity for me. No one asks questions about this; or if I bring it up they get too frightened and change the subject, or they just flat out tell me they cannot talk about it.

My life has always been a little bit stranger than other's lives, but what I experienced a few months ago has to top it all. Now I just wish someone could really understand and not just act like they understand. But in the end I will be okay.

I was experiencing a difficult time in my life and I was filled with a lot of internal anger. I was doing methamphetamine regularly; it would help my emotional pain. (Or so I thought at the time.) I was realizing a lot of realities about the world that were evil and not what I wanted them to be. I had been hurt and taken advantage of by several of my friends. I was so full of anger I thought I would explode. One night, it was late, I sat down, very, very tired. I asked God from the bottom of my heart, to take away my anger, cause I knew that was not the way I was meant to feel.

All of a sudden, I was in a different place. I didn't see anyone, but I saw a wide, open green field about me. It was beautiful. I felt a sense of peace and happiness that was so wonderful, I can't even begin to explain it. Suddenly, questions I had pondered about started "just coming into my mind". I knew the answers to them. I "just knew". I understood why people sometimes "harden their hearts" and hurt others, whether purposely or not. I understood that my body was my shell for my time on this earth and that I was here to learn and to grow (should that be what I chose to take from my experiences. Here, Love had no boundaries. There was love everywhere, it was soo strong, you could feel it. I had no needs, wants or worries; I felt like all was ok.

I came out of it and was totally in awe. It changed a lot with me. At first, the bad came. It was like I lost all my boundaries. I had a hard time in this world as I was so focused on my experience. People would get upset with me, I did "inappropriate things" as perceived by this world. Everyone thought it was just the drugs, but I knew it was not. I attempted off and on to quit the drugs, but not before some trouble with the police, a divorce, identity theft, and the loss of my job. I hit rock bottom and truly got to know the Lord. I had some hard times, but slowly pulled myself up to where I am now. I still see society totally different from others; many times my view makes others dislike me. But I am ok with that.

I absolutely do not fear death; I had felt like I had a choice to die, like I was being asked, no voices, it was just in my head. When I was really down, I so wanted to die, I even asked God to take me, but he didn't and I know it was because the other part of me was battling the thought of leaving my kids. My mom died when I was 18 and I wanted my kids to have their mother for a long time. I eventually quit the drugs all together, I am back with my husband and my view remains. It has helped me to understand a lot, which has helped me to better deal with those around me. It has also helped me learn to love myself. (I work on this daily.) I know that no one will ever love me the way God does; they don't have the ability to. I now understand that. I wouldn't trade my experience for anything, I think it SAVED my life. I wasn't sure what happened to me at first, but I started reading and found others who have had NDE's , but had not been in any health danger. I now know, this is what I had.

My daughter had died in 1994, age 33, of breast cancer. I was devastated about her death and was grieving. One day I was coming home, driving my car, when all of a sudden I felt my body drifting to the passenger side of the car. I felt as light as a feather and such a wonderful peace. I then said “I think I am having a out-of-body experience,” and after I had said that, I flew back into my body. To be honest I did not want to come back, the peace I felt while out of my body was the most wonderful feeling I have ever had. The learning experience I got out of this was that I believe God was telling me that my daughter felt that wonderful all the time now as she was with him. I have a deeper belief in religion now. I have shared this with a few people, whether they believe me or not, I do not know, but I know it happened as I was fully awake and driving my vehicle.

I don't remember how I fell down while horse jumping . I was in a dark narrow round tunnel, and moving towards a bright white light that was no hurt for the eyes, rather mild . As I stood still, someone behind my shoulder said “don't be scared, no harm, no sweat, take it easy, you can go forward, it's really great!” I felt most peaceful and happy that in my entire life . But I knew I was not in the earth dimension any more. Approaching the ridge of the tunnel widening, I was inside the white light, being a small light in the infinite light. I hesitated and went back on earth suffering and crippled. I wish I had never come back was my last reborned thought.

I only thought I was just tired, I didn't know what I was about to encounter. I'll try to make this to the point as much as I can possibly. When I was 17 years old, I had migraine headaches (like many people!), but I went to a clinic doctor at the hospital when I got an especially painful migraine and subsequently received a new medication. Little did I know that I was supposed to tell them about the other medicine I was taking (I was just a teenager and was not paying attention). As they discovered later, those were the worst medicines to mix because it can severely affect circulation and affect the heart, which it did.

I went home and lay down and closed my eyes. I could not sleep because the headache was too painful and after a short time (after taking both the different medicines), my body felt tense and tight, and then the necklace charm I was wearing was bouncing a tiny bit off my chest. My friend and my Mom were both there and saw the necklace charm bouncing (they saw it happen). The main thing I remember is that I went from feeling tense physically to suddenly feeling like I was lighter than air so to speak. Then I suddenly was surrounded by a churning black darkness and it was like swirling around me, like I wasn't standing in it but kind of floating in it. I heard a very frightening moan that even though it wasn't quite a sound, it was a feeling that made me think of a scary creature, and I felt its presence and I started to see a light at the same time. At first the light looked small then grew larger really fast. I am a Christian but I don't remember thinking of Jesus immediately. I felt more like a sitting duck just in awe. Then it was like a giant vacuum force grabbed me away from the darkness and pulled me into the light, but gently. It did not hurt me; it was like I already knew who was grabbing me away as if I was not surprised at all. That part I don't understand, but I just remember feeling safer than when I was in the swirling black stuff. I remember after that I was pulled into a realm I did not recognize, But the very clear memory I have held onto was that a peaceful presence came next to me and I felt confused. Then it manifested into what I feel was a being that reminded me of the feeling I had when I prayed to Jesus during life. It said (rather I felt the 'words') that "You are not ready yet, you have to return." I recall refusing to, but respectfully and almost like begging. I remember after that I felt the being surround me with the most incredible feeling of being loved, like a parent or a mother holding her child in her arms, that's the comfort and intensity of love I felt. The only other part I remember is being shot back into my body.

People around me were really freaked out because they said I stopped breathing, and could not hear them, and the ambulance was on its way. I was frustrated to be back on earth in my body; but I was elated to know that I experienced the love of that being, and that it would be there for me again one day, so maybe I just hold onto that sometimes. I really feel strongly that because of this experience, that there really are evil forces and good forces, and I wonder if this life shapes our souls, but that is just my feeling.

In 1961, when I was thirteen-years-old, I lived near a test pit. the pit/pool had been surplused out of service, and with the addition of water and pool ladders had been turned into a fairly nice swimming pool.

The only drawback was that the pool water was not heated, and as anyone who has lived [there], would tell you, with only slight exaggeration, that a summer there could be compared to a winter in Seattle. Even though the water temperature was less then 55 Fahrenheit (13 Centigrade), it could not have been much more of a shock to my thirteen-year-old skinny, 100 lbs., system than had I jumped into a vat of ice cubes.

My Near Death Experience

So this is what happened. It was on a Saturday afternoon, late in summer just after school commenced.
We got there just before 2:15 that afternoon, where we met many of our Canadian friends.

After the usual chitchat and junior high horseplay we all went around to the deep end of the pool. I was the first to enter the water by attempting a stylish racing dive. Wham, I mean it was like standing in a puddle and sticking your finger in a light socket, and I was off to the other end, swimming like hell as I realized how freaking cold it was. All of a sudden, after a few numbing strokes, something happened. The cold was gone and I was swimming in a cloud and it was easy, as easy as I have ever known anything in my life, but a lot easier than that. I mean it was like my body was perfect, and I was flying, and it was unbelievably easy and very, very comfortable. The cloud was iridescent white, like mother of pearl, and as I moved forward it got brighter and brighter. It was so bright and so white, yet my eyes were not bothered by it in the least, it was perfect. I kept moving forward as I felt I was being drawn to something and all I knew is that I wanted to go there. Further along, I began to make out shapes that I began to distinguish as two beings. The light was getting brighter and I was warm all over. One being was very much larger than the other one. They were cloaked in white even more radiant and pure than the light. The diminutive one was to the left, from my perspective, and a little behind. Their faces were without any features, but I knew that I was basking in a love and warmth that to this day I could never describe except to say that within it dwells perfection and all that there is, everything, is known and understood. Finally, I began moving away, although I remember resisting with all of my being as I didn’t want to leave, not then, not ever. It was getting darker and finally dark when all of a sudden I became conscious. Two lifeguards were standing over me and I didn’t feel too well as I had apparently taken in lots of water. They said that I hadn’t been breathing for several minutes, approximately ten minutes. I couldn’t speak. I was back and I would never be the same.

The Kicker

Remember the time line. I went in the pool at approximately 2:30 PM. I was pulled out about five minutes later, not breathing. The lifeguard worked on me for approximately ten to twelve minutes, as he recalled, without a response. Shortly before 3:00 PM his replacement came on. His replacement had just arrived back that same afternoon from the International Red Cross, where he had just been taught the new technique of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. He saved my life.

From that day forward I’ve never been afraid of crossing over to the other side. Remember though, you can’t defeat your purpose.

In 1997 I became a near death survivor, and I want to share my story because I hope that somewhere someone else might understand.

I saw myself lying in my hospital bed from both above and next to it. I saw that there was only one nurse in the room, sitting in a rocking chair watching over me, I knew it was okay for me to leave the room. I walked down the hall and began to feel a warm sensation, I followed it into a tunnel that grew brighter, and as I walked along I began to smell wonderful flowers, I knew they were carnations. As I reached the end of the tunnel I realized that I was dressed as woman dressed in 1940. As I reached the end there were clouds that seemed to be parting, and there I saw a pair of hands. At the sight of them I was overcome with emotion, a deep in-my-soul feeling of grief, happiness, and love. I knew without looking at the face of the person who he was, my grandfather, who had died in WWII, 20 years before I was born.

As I stepped out I was aware that we were in a town, and walking down the sidewalk of main street. Everyone who we passed or talked to knew my grandfather and was real excited to see that I had come to see him. All of the woman in town were dressed in there Sunday best. We passed a hat store, a butchers market, a pharmacy, and the streets were lined with dogwood trees in full bloom. As we walked, we did some talking. He told me he had been waiting a long time to talk to me, that he knew I would be the only one who could correct things. He told me he had watched my dad (his only child) grow, and had grieved with my grandmother (his wife) for all that they missed, but that he was proud of her for raising my dad alone. We talked about when I was born, how my mother kept stating that a man in a uniform had walked into the room, smiled and left, the doctors told her it was from the medication. She had never told me this but when I asked her, she turned real pale.

Anyway, we decided to have fried chicken for supper and after we went to his house, which I knew very well, my grandmother had kept it until the 1980's, I slept in a huge bed with blankets fresh from hanging on the line. It was such a real feeling of being home, safe and loved. I felt such a peace that night. Over the next few days we really talked, and he asked me to tell him what I had been told growing up about him. I felt such sorrow, I had really never been told much, other than he was killed while training in flight school in WWII; that was it. It was a subject that was not brought up, and I honestly had no interest in. My grandfather took my hands and asked me to do something for him. He asked me to look into his crash because the Army had not given the families the correct findings, and that they all (his crew) needed there families to know. I asked him how to do this, and he just looked real deep into my soul and said I would know how. He also asked that I take our family history and continue it, that it would be a wonderful journey.

My grandfather told me that it was time for me to go back. I felt all of these strong emotions, the biggest two were a deep sense of sorrow and grief and a real connection of love, a deep feeling of having a knowledge of him that only he and I share. I tried to lock in my memory everything I could about him, the way he looked, talked, smiled, and how wonderful he smelled. We held each other for a long time and I cried like I had never done before. I just knew I did not want to leave him. As we walked down the street towards the white light and clouds, I asked him if I would see him again. He told me he would always be with me, like the warm light. I entered the tunnel and walked back to my room, and found the same nurse still rocking in her chair. I know she smiled at me.

It was July 1966 in that late afternoon. I was playing with my friends near the edge of a wooded area next to my home. My Mom told me to come inside as a storm was approaching and thunder could be heard in the distance. I was having too much fun, so I ignored her and continued to play. Suddenly there was a very loud BOOM and I felt as if I had been hit by a car from behind. I was thrown to the ground, at which time I tried to move and was unable to. I had been hit by "ball" lightning - I could see the "ball", it was big, made of fire and had spikes poking out of it. At this time I was seeing myself and the entire area from above the trees. Some of the trees were on fire and I could also see my Dad getting back to his feet (he had been thrown to the ground from the force), as he had already been heading out to get me since I did not come in per my Mom's orders. I was not afraid at all. I had no pain and I started to say "good-bye" to my siblings, parents, friends and neighbors. I did not know where I was headed to, but fear and pain were not present at all. I could see my Dad pick me up off of the ground and shake my limp body; he was crying out my name. Suddenly I was looking into his eyes and I was no longer looking down on this scene. Dad then ran back to the house with me as the fire department arrived to put out the fire, and then I was taken to the hospital for follow-up. My exam was completely negative except for some strange burns that looked like jagged lightning in the sky. They started at my right shoulder and traveled diagonally down my body and ended at my left foot. At the time of this blast, my tennis shoes were tied, but I was thrown completely out of them. They were about 20 feet from my body and the left one had the bottom blown out of it. I stayed in the hospital that night for simple observation and then in the AM there were some photographers that came to take pictures of my burns. They said that most people die from this type of incident, so to have these pictures would be great for medical books, etc. The burns stayed for a few days and then went away. My Mom says that I was a very scared and insecure child for quite some time after that, but eventually life was normal once again. Needless to say - I have never spent any time outside in the presence of lightning or thunder since!!

It is now February, 2004. To the best of my memory and writing style, this is a complete accounting of what I experienced thirty-three years ago. My intent is to record this while I still am able. The reader should appreciate that some of this is memory that I did not want to ever remember. I tried to push it from consciousness. Over the years I have tried to focus only on the good and not on the evil. But, I am acutely aware that there are both.

This is my account. It happened to me and I am stuck with it.

The year is 1971. I’m fourteen years old and it is the summer of my freshman year of high school. I applied to work at a Boy Scout summer camp for the third year running. The first two summers I applied I wasn’t offered a position. This year was my last chance and the camp director offered me a job working in the camp kitchen. It’s not what I had in mind but I accepted.

The camp ran like clock work. Each Saturday all of the scouts left the camp and on Sunday, a new bunch of troops arrived. On the first day of their arrival, campers were required to pass a swim test to be allowed to participate in lake activities. Since working the kitchen was hard with little time off, and since I was a certified Junior Lifeguard, I volunteered to watch over the new campers as they performed their swim test. Each of the guards was supplied a long aluminum pole to act as lifeline in the case someone had to be pulled dockside. Swimmers were required to swim two laps unassisted along a boat slip bordered on three sides by dock. For the swim test, the open side was bounded by buoys along a length of rope.

On this particular day, I had watched several groups perform their test without incident. However, during one of the evaluations, one swimmer, a boy of 13 years old or so, started to struggle and cried out for assistance. All I had to do was lower the pole so he could grab on and I would pull him out. But, instinctively, my life guard training came into play and I jumped feet first into the water with legs spread apart like on a bicycle. Quickly I grabbed the boy, spun him around and placed him in a carry position with my arm across his chest diagonally. It is a very secure hold and one that prevents him from fighting me if he panics. Since he was quite docile and since this hold is tiring, I decided I could place him in a chin carry instead. That was a mistake since the boy felt less secure and became anxious. In a split second of panic and before I knew what happened, he struck the side of my head with a round house right hook. The blow to my head was severe and dazed me. I fought to maintain consciousness. As my awareness slipped from me, I began to sink into the water deeper and deeper. Because I had been exerting myself carrying the boy back to dockside, my body needed oxygen. My chest instinctively heaved, forcing my lungs to breath water into them. To my amazement it wasn’t so bad. My lungs were full which took the pressure off. But, I knew I was going to die today. I felt my arms and body go limp. I was sinking watching the water go from light green to dark.

What’s happening? What is that? It doesn’t make sense. I think I see people running here and there along wooden paths. Oh, that’s water I see, and those are the wooden docks. The boy I was saving is alone in the water now. He’s looking around frantically. He’s crying. I get it. I’m floating above everything and I’m looking down onto the lake and the docks. I don’t see me because I’m under water. But how can I be seeing this? Why? I’m at maybe 50 feet above the water. I want down. I belong down there. How do I get down?

As if I have a rubber band attached to my back that reaches its limit, I am pulled higher into the sky. Holy cow, I don’t see the lake anymore. I’m in the clouds. The earth pulls away from me. I can see it and it’s getting smaller. I’m in space. It’s dark except for the stars. Slowly, they start to move streaking the black backdrop and forming lines of light. As I pick up speed, I feel I am moving to the end of the universe with the stars whizzing by me. The lights create a walled effect like warp drive in Star Trek. I’m moving fast -- faster than is possible yet there is no real sensation except for sight. Then into darkness.

It’s black. Pitch black. I see nothing. There is nothing. I strain to see something, anything. I don’t like this. I’m scared. I feel I am in a universe devoid of all things. It is vast without end and completely and utterly empty. There is no one else, nothing else. I am alone. There is no person, no life, no death, no love, no hate, no salvation. There is only a vast emptiness except…for me. The loneliness overwhelms my senses. I would welcome anything. Please. Please. I can’t stay here.

Wait. I see something. Do I hear something too? Is my mind playing tricks? I hear laughter. I don’t know if I like the sound of it though. I see a pin point of light. It’s getting larger but I can’t make out what, if anything, it is. The laughing is getting louder too. The light starts to form a shape. Huh? I can’t believe what I am seeing. It can’t be. It is. It can’t be. I see a face. Except it’s not a face. I don’t quite recognize it because it’s a skull and it’s laughing. It isn’t a good laugh. It’s sinister. He’s mocking me, gleeful at my plight. It’s a terrible sound that sends shutters through me. It speaks and tells me I am there forever, with him. I begin to hear others talking. They are coming nearer with conspiratorial voices that are evil and menacing. The skull brought them or they followed. I’m scared. I feel their presence encircling me. These are creatures of the darkness. I can’t see them. I sense them. They’re near. They are as dark as the surroundings. The skull continues laughing. Ouch. Something clawed me and I am being bit as if being tasted. Then, they are set loose upon me clawing, scratching and biting. It feels like my skin is being stripped off. Oh, the pain. God help me please. I can’t take this. God, please help me. The attacks continue. Then I recall an old parish priest told me that evil cannot remain in the presence of God. I call out, Lord, Jesus Christ help me please. Help me. The attacks subside and soon stop altogether. The dark entities of evil slink away into the darkness. I am alone again in the black emptiness but I am relieved.

Some moments later I see something again. It’s another pin point of light. Oh god, please don’t let it be that skull again. It’s coming closer and separates into more than one light. What are these? They get larger. They look like soap bubbles. Lots of soap bubbles. Lots and lots and lots of soap bubbles. They’re everywhere. Hundreds, thousands and then millions of them. The colors are magnificent, lively and translucent. Each bubble dances about in its own way. They are alive. They don’t harm me. They are good. I’m confused why I am seeing this. What are they? The bubbles begin to move past me slowly at first and then faster. I’m moving or they are. I’m not sure which. The movement of the bubbles past me generates streaks of red and violet light bars encapsulating me into a tube of colored light culminating in a far away vortex. I have no choice but to move through it.

When I reach the end I hear, “It is time to review your life experiences.” Who’s there? Who said that? I don’t see anyone. “I’m the one watching over you.” Are you my guardian angel? “If you like. Yes.” It was nice to be in the presence of another. And with that, like watching a big movie screen, my life was portrayed before me instance by instance, moment by moment. It would be normal to think that this would take some time, but time doesn’t exist.

There’s Billy. He’s about 5 or 6 years old. I used to play with him when I was a little kid. We’re playing with cars behind the orange-brick duplex across the street from where I live. I say something bad to Billy. It’s not a nice thing. I’m being mean and spiteful. The difference now is I feel him hurting. He’s crying. I feel his anguish. Oh, I’m sorry Billy. I shouldn’t have hurt you like that. And so it went on, moment by moment, review by review feeling the results of my actions until my time in the lake.

Why am I going through this? My Angel replied, “You review your life in order to cleanse your soul. How do you feel?” Terrible. I am such a mean person. I didn’t realize I hurt others that much. “It’s important that you learn from this.” I have. I take responsibility and I’m so sorry. “Would you like to see it again?” No, I get the message. I hope that I am not judged poorly. “Your life is evaluated by the most powerful judge there is.” When does that happen? “It already has. That judge is you.” It all becomes clear to me and I feel as if a weight has been removed. I am refreshed. I am ready now. The cleansing is over and I am left in darkness once again but not for long.

Wow -- a blast of light like a door opening into the darkness. I’m confronted with streaks of bright, white, brilliant light. It’s overwhelming. It is the purest and whitest light I have ever seen. It covers me like a blanket. Light this bright should be impossible to look at but it isn’t. It’s warm and wonderful. The light bathes me with a glow of overpowering love and inner peace. It’s absolutely wonderful. I move closer.

Someone is standing in the doorway. Streaks of white light stream around his body. He’s dressed in a white robe. His arms are down, outstretched with palms upward. I can’t seem to make out his face no matter how hard I try. There’s too much light.

“We have been waiting for you. But, this isn’t your time to be here.” I know that voice. He is familiar to me. Why can’t I recognize who you are? I must know you. I feel such a sense of inner serenity that I have never felt before. I like this place. I want to stay here. I sense that if I take his hand I can stay. In fact, if I touch him I must stay. I will not be allowed to return to my prior existence. I don’t want to return. I reach out to him but can’t quite touch him.

“Before you go you may look into the future.” He motions to his left. To my right, I notice a white table. It is stone, perhaps marble. On the table is a flat gold bowl filled with a liquid like oil or water. It’s reflective and dark. Behind the table are three old men in white. Two are sitting. One is standing next to something like a pillar or a podium. There may be a book on it. They motion for me to come closer and I do. “Look into the bowl and see the future of mankind.” I peer into the black liquid and see devastation. Cities are on fire. It’s horrific. I turn away. I don’t want to see this. Why are you showing me this? “We want you to take a message back with you. Man must change his ways.” But, I’m only one person. What can I do? “Spread the message.” He continued, “You have a special ability.” I know he was referring to my paranormal senses. “I am going to ask you a question. Whatever is your first response is the one we will accept. You cannot change your mind afterwards. Do you understand?” Yes. I do. What’s the question? “Do you want these powers you have and the ability to see into the future?” Immediately, I respond, no, I just want to be normal. “Very well then. It is done.”

I withdraw from this area and once again I find myself before the man in the white robe blocking my access. I want to enter. It feels so wonderful here. Can I stay here? “You have work yet to do. You cannot remain. It is not your time.” But, I want to stay. Please, let me. “I will show you something.” With that, three small bubbles appeared from the darkness on the left. They get larger. They are like the bubbles I had seen before. As they get nearer I can see the faces of three small children, two boys and one girl. Who are they? “They are your children.” But, I’m only fourteen. I don’t have any children. “You will and these are them. Don’t you see? You must return in order for these children to be born.” As I look at their faces, I realize one bubble stands off from the other two. Why is he separate? “He is never born. He is your child but he will remain here.” Huh? How can that be? He’s not born but he’s my child? “You will understand one day. You must remember that while he remains here that he exists and that he loves you.” With that said, the other two children depart becoming smaller until they disappear. “It is now time that you return.”

I try again to reach out and touch him but I am being yanked backwards. The light becomes smaller. I am in darkness again moving backwards. I know I am returning. Then, CRACK. With a jolt I am back in my body. I find that I am sitting on the bottom of the lake in the mud. I have to get up for air. My legs flex. My arms start to paddle upwards. Will I make it? I don’t think I can. It’s got to be 10 or 12 feet or more. I need air. Struggling, I finally feel air with my right hand. With another stroke or two I break the surface. Immediately I cough up water from my lungs. The swimming boy is terrified. I see it in his eyes. He begins to help me. That’s ironic. Still coughing and gasping little by little I get air into my lungs and it feels good. One of the senior waterfront instructors runs towards us down the dock. Quickly I resume pulling the boy to shore. I’m exhausted but somehow I manage to do it. The boy is saying, ‘I was helping you.’ I cut him off and push him up onto the dock with the assistance of the senior instructor. He congratulates me on saving the boy. I’m dazed and confused. I say nothing and get out of the water. My body is in tact but my mind reels with what just happened.

Prior to this episode in my life I had many paranormal experiences. Afterwards, the activity subsided. It wasn’t eliminated by any means but I can live with it and interpret things better. All in all, the old men I had talked to made me ‘normal’ and I am grateful.

Over the years I have asked myself why a fourteen year old would encounter such an evil entity. After all, how bad can a fourteen year old boy’s life be that he should deserve such treatment? I have concluded that mine was an unplanned journey to the other side so family members and friends there were not prepared for my arrival. Since no one knew I was coming, I became a target of opportunity for the dark side entities. Conversely, I like to think at the appropriate time someone will help me navigate a safe passage.

At the time of this near-death experience, I was a Catholic. Afterwards, I continued to go to a Catholic school. In fact, the school was a pre-seminary grooming boys for the priesthood. But I was changed. Religion, any religion didn’t matter to me anymore. I no longer saw the church as the endpoint but rather as a vehicle some people use to the endpoint. My view now centers on the concept of a Creator with a divine plan that is revealed to us at his pace in his own time. Had I met the Creator? I don’t know.

An interesting side note to this story is that I studied classical Greek the following two years in school. During that time I learned of the ancient Greek belief in the Fates. These were old sages typically depicted in white robes with white beards. If I recall correctly there were three of them. One Fate determined a person’s time of birth, another the time of death and the third measured a man’s life. I have to admit that the similarity to my near death experience unnerved me when I learned of this. Could I have talked to the Fates?

Years later, I met the woman I would marry. Although she still doesn’t believe me, the very instant I saw her my head went boing like a spring releasing its energy. I instantly knew I had met my future wife. And, as predicted, we had three children although one was miscarried and was never born. And so, indeed, I did come to understand.

What else have I learned? I know that our actions affect others in both positive and negative ways and that we will come to appreciate this fact in the next place. I know there are indeed evilness and goodness, darkness and light, suffering and serenity. I know that mankind has the capability of extinguishing itself. But above all else, I know that our souls, our being, what it is that we are does not die. The journey continues for us beyond this world. At a minimum, we gain a new perspective in the next place. It just may not be a complete understanding of all things. And while we search for the solution to life’s equation we may return to this world in a new instantiation but wearing the same fabric of our existence. I also like to think that we are born afresh with those other souls with whom we choose to travel. That is how I recognized my wife when I first saw her. And so it is. After every life we live we become stronger and truer, tempered by our experiences until such time as we may complete our journey and we are truly born.

I was driving to school in the rain when my car hydroplaned in front of an 18wheeler truck. I tried to avoid the accident by turning the steering wheel. We hit driver side to driver side and my car slid down the side of the truck. I don't remember hearing the crash. The next thing I knew was I was surrounded by black, almost like black velvet. I felt like I was floating up and to the right. I felt good, safe, not hot or cold, just wonderful. Then I saw the most beautiful light. It was this great bright white light, but it didn't hurt my eyes. It was beautiful. He (the light) asked "ARE YOU READY?" Only he didn't talk in words it was more like mental telepathy. I said "Yes, but of the children." Which doesn't even sound like I normally talk. I don't remember Him saying anything else, but it was like all knowledge was there and all your questions were answered. I can't remember the answers. But I did come back with the feeling that we are very much all connected and the only thing that matters is LOVE. I felt like I was sucked back and to the left into my body. I woke up laying across the seat of my car saying "Oh, my God." I was cold, wet, covered in blood and glass. I saw the truck driver standing in the rain and he looked so scared. I thought "Shut up Jan you are scaring this guy to death." I was in my first year of nursing so I started to evaluate my wounds. I was having trouble breathing, and I thought my leg was broken. It turned out I had a 70% pneumothorax on the left side and a 30% pneumothorax on the right side. The windshield had fallen in my lap and cut through three muscles in my leg which caused the pain in my leg. I was taken to a small rural hospital They were all busy and rushing around. Putting in chest tubes and such. I remember looking at my hands and thinking. Oh so this is what cyanosis looks like, and what’s the big deal: if I die I die. I know that dying is no more traumatic than walking from the living room to the kitchen at least for the one who is dying. I also know this is the most real thing in my life no one will ever convince me otherwise.

About 8 years ago, I had emergency heart surgery, because I had contracted a severe infection from pericarditis. Which my physician stated it was by god's grace I was still alive!

When I was in recovery (ICU), I had a dream. I use this word loosely because it was unlike any "dream" I had ever experienced before. I will not go into all of the details now, but I must state that never does a day pass that I don't recall and relive the experience. It changed my whole intellectual and spiritual approach to "religion"! I am currently an individual very much aware that this experience we call "life" is only transitory. It is a place of preparation, of choices, of opportunities to grow, unlike any other place. I found thru my experience a "universality" that all religions and religious beliefs are merely vain attempts to express a simple truth. That the golden rule was the central rule in which to live our lives! I must admit also that it has been difficult at times to continue on with this process called "living" after experiencing an indescribable experience! Life here pales in comparison to what awaits us. But I was clearly told: "it is not your time!"...and like a rebellious child I rebuked this voice and wanted to remain in this realm of total "completeness", but found that it was an effort fought in vain... and I can still recall returning to my body like a hand in a glove... and bouncing back from the floor beneath me back into my body. As I began to slowly awaken, I still experienced this wonderful feeling of complete unconditional love and acceptance... and as I awoke I began to re-experience my 5 senses in a new way, as if I had never used them before! And also, the feeling of "completeness" began to slowly fade away and I began to feel the coldness of my body, and I began to cry, both out of gratitude and also out of selfishness.

I have no fear of death now. I see each day as a gift and an opportunity. I try every day to live the golden rule in all my affairs, and honestly some days I fail miserably. But the "living one" is patient like a parent would be with a child, and for this I am thankful...because I now realize there is a "universality", an inter-connectedness of all people, things, nature, etc. A divine plan if you will. So with this I will close for now. Shalom.

It was the end of winter 1971. I was a part of the hippie culture of the late 60s & 70s which was mostly based around drugs like LSD and cannabis plus others. My 3 friends & myself had rented a house together here in England. We all 'worked' together each day as salesmen. Most of our evenings were spent in the house on drugs, parties along with girlfriends, etc. This particular night I had taken a LSD tablet and was having my third bad trip. During my horrible hallucinations, I fell down the hallway stairs.

Suddenly I found myself within this beautiful white Light. It was so nice being there and I felt wonderfully blissful. I was not conscious of having a body like we have here, but nevertheless I felt I was a whole person. There were other 'things' within the Light, but not near enough for me to make them out, even whether they were animate or inanimate? Either way I was very, very happy and would have liked to have stayed there.

Then I heard this voice. It was such a beautiful voice. I 'knew' it to be the voice of God, though I could not see Him. His voice had no source that I could make out and seemed to be all about me. He simply said, 'Come to Me.' Three words only, yet each one seemed to me to be full of infinite meaning and so beautifully spoken and so full of love.

And then I awoke on a hospital trolley.

Prior to this event I had never even thought much about God or religion. My family were never church goers. But from that point onwards up to today, I have had an unshakeable belief in the existence of God and hardly any fear of death. From that time onwards, I gave up the drugs scene and later joined a religious organisation called 'The Hare Krishna Movement'. For the next 10 years or so I devoted my whole life to the study of God realisation. I gave up smoking also and alcohol. Even tea and coffee. And I tried to remain celibate too. Today, though I have left the movement, my faith in God is still unshakeable. And though the church has no attraction for me for various reasons, I still pray regularly and am always trying to make myself a better person, and pray that God will forgive me my many sins before this life ends.

I had overdosed on a combination of prescription and non-prescription drugs and alcohol. To this day neither I nor the attending physicians know what the non-prescription drugs were, although I have been told that they were most likely opium based (e.g. heroin).

My brother called the paramedics after breaking down the door to my bedroom after I had locked myself in the bedroom for almost two days straight. My brother later told me that he could not detect a significant pulse. The paramedics (and later attending physician) confirmed that I was apparently clinically dead for either one minute or perhaps a little longer.

I was later in a coma for just over three days.

During the time of my death and (I assume, but still am not sure) the coma, I experienced what I would consider two NDEs. The first, and by far the more disturbing, began immediately, I believe, after the onset of clinical death. I felt that I had left my body in an excruciatingly painful manner, as though I were being ripped from my own body. The best way I could describe it is as if I were giving birth to my own disembodied consciousness and experiencing the exact same pain that a woman might experience when giving birth to a child. I was also unbelievably frightened at the prospect of having to leave my own body since I had never experienced anything like it in my life before.

I vaguely remember seeing the team of paramedics working on my body and my brother standing in the doorway of my bedroom. My brother was visibly shaken, clutching the doorway, crying I believe. But the scene quickly evaporated beneath me as I flew through the ceiling of my house, through the air, the atmosphere, and then into "outer space". I remember seeing the entire earth vanish below me as I continued my journey. The earth was beautiful, but somewhat disappointing for some reason that I did not understand. It was at that moment that I apparently realized the significance of what had just happened, that I was dead, and immediately I stopped being afraid.

I then experienced what I think of as restrained or "cautious" bliss. I was not the least bit sorry that I had died and immediately began marveling and wondering at what I could now do in this new existence. All of these emotions came incredibly quickly and were not really "emotions" as I have ever experienced the concept. Also, "thoughts" (again I would have to say not thoughts in the human sense) came even more quickly than the speed of light it seemed. The actions attached to those thoughts, or perhaps actions as consequences of those thoughts, came just as quickly. I seemed to be able to perceive space and time outside of my locality because I did not perceive concepts such as "locality", "time", or "distance". I could "think" of a location (again for lack of a better word) and immediately I was there. I could leave the Milky Way or even return to the vicinity of the Earth if I wanted to. I also sensed that I was no longer who or what I used to be. I seemed to lose all memory of what I used to be (a human being) and now I purely "existed" without a clear cut sense of my self or my own existence. Yet I also felt somehow alone, as if no other consciousness existed in addition to my own. It was an extremely confusing feeling that still boggles my imagination, even some ten years after the experience.

After some "time" (again the concept really had no meaning) existing in this state, I felt the urge to travel beyond what I perceived (after waking up from the ensuing coma) the known universe. I remember stars, galaxies and nebulas zooming passed me as I traveled. I did not actually feel as though I was traveling, but more as though I was stretching my unique consciousness to its unknown limits. All the while, I felt (again after waking up) that I was still trying to get used to this new existence.

After traveling for I do not know how long, I apparently came upon what I can only describe as an intelligent, or at least conscious, entity of some sort. The entity appeared blacker than black, like a black hole itself. Its blackness seemed to eclipse everything else around it. I sensed somehow that this entity was extremely malevolent, unimaginably angry and hostile towards me and everything else. While the entity did not seem to communicate verbally or audibly, I sensed that it had drawn me to itself somehow. It seemed to be in judgment of me somehow, "telling" me that I was once a human being (which seemed to be news to me at the time), that I had lived (another new, unknown concept to me), and that I either had done or been an accomplice to some heinous act while I was human, and that I was essentially worthless as a human being (as indeed were all humans). The entity just seemed to radiate hatefulness, anger, and also loneliness, as though it were somehow disconnected from the great consciousness that allegedly bound all reality. It was at that moment as well that I had an epiphany of sorts, that I was not alone but part of that greater consciousness which all conscious creatures and beings join when they die.

The entity continued to berate me and I became afraid of it as it threatened to show me my previous existence as a human being. I became even more afraid at that possibility; even as it began to dawn on me that the entity was right and that perhaps I was once something other that what I was at that moment. All of a sudden, I started to become aware of concepts such as space, time, distance. I even started to become self aware again. For the first time in what felt like uncountable ages, I perceived myself as separate from the universal consciousness. At that point I became unspeakably sad and felt that I wanted to kill myself, if only I could. The entity seemed to revel in my sadness and confusion and it faded from me as apparently it was exiling me from that blissful existence.

It was then that I was myself again. I was immediately in the company of a being who identified himself as "Satan". I did not believe the being, who appeared to be a very shiny, almost opalescent gray. He wore a fedora style hat and was dressed in what looked like 1930's era men's clothing, including a neck tie, a suit vest, and dress pants. He had no face. I was not the least bit afraid of this "Satan" and got the impression that he was something very different from a devil or demon or any kind of evil spirit. By then I was "myself" again, plain old Benjamin who had died (shamefully) of an overdose.

We walked in what looked like a beautiful grassy meadow for some time on what felt like a perfect, sunny, spring or summer day. While we walked, the being talked of God, explaining that God was either dead or had forsaken the entire Universe altogether and was no nowhere to be found. He stressed that human beings were all on their own, that human life was essentially meaningless, but that that was the way God had intended it anyway. He said that there was no point in trying to do good or help one's fellow man because the physical universe was cyclical (as the Hindus believe I later learned) and that whatever we experience now we have experienced before in another cycle and would experience again in a future cycle. In this way, he explained, the universe was predetermined and there was nothing anyone could do to change it.

The being explained many other things to me, the details of which I have forgotten (at least consciously) but which have a somewhat vague, yet "matter of fact" and very firm foundation of my post-NDE life philosophy. These include the above described universal cycle, the inherent (almost comical) meaninglessness of human existence, the very strong belief in non-locality (very close to the same concept as described in quantum physics theory), belief in the inherent meaningless of time and distance, belief in a universal consciousness that envelops all individual consciousness, belief in so-called psychic phenomena (related to non-locality somehow), an inherent and extremely strong aversion to the idea or belief in reincarnation (an aversion which I still cannot explain), and an inherent and equally strong belief in biological evolution, though guided by an agnostic intelligence that I believe indirectly maintains physical reality as we know it.

My belief in God as described by the three major Middle-Eastern religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) was also effectively destroyed by that particular NDE (with the being who called himself Satan). After that NDE, which I feel somehow took place simultaneously with the first NDE described above, I absolutely refused to believe in God anymore, even feeling a great deal of anger and resentment towards the whole idea of God and anyone who worshipped God. I immediately stopped going to church (I was raised Protestant), severed all ties with the church, and basically told the minister from my congregation to go to hell when he came to visit me after my release from the hospital. I have never regretted that decision.

The "Satan" being was very sarcastic towards me during the entire encounter, making fun of me and calling me stupid for so carelessly overdosing on drugs. I never felt scared of him or angry towards him though. He seemed to take a real interest in me personally, again telling me that I had done something very bad earlier in my life, most likely my childhood. He was not the least bit judgmental in that regard, but he told me that I needed to come to terms with that experience. Again, I got the very odd feeling that the other NDE was happening at the same time. As the being and I spoke, I got very strange and disturbing images of what looked like outer space, and even very strong feelings of malevolence and hostility directed at me from very far away.

After delivering that parting advice, the being sent me on my way. I woke up three days later, gagging on the intubator, trying to scream for help, the simultaneous (it seemed) memories of both NDEs fresh in my mind.

I saw the light of the truck coming at our car and heard a bang. I was then above a street light watching the car flip over and over to rest on the sidewalk. Then I saw greyish cement-looking material and thought I was in a conduit of some kind. I was quite afraid and felt very cold I wanted to get out. Then I sensed I was moving and the cement-like conduit started to speed past my eyes. I was scared but turned and looked ahead and saw a light and was increasing with greater and greater speed until I left the conduit into brilliant white light which was extremely bright but not hard on the eyes. I did not know where I was but soon sensed that I was not alone. I then saw what I can best describe as an opaque window or screen. Like a shower curtain. I saw a silhouettes of sorts and sensed that it was my mother who died in 1971, my friend who died in 1976 and my grandfather who died in 1979. I wanted to go to them but heard from them that "no" not yet. I was disappointed and angry as I wanted to see them, especially my mom. Then I was in a beautiful place a kind of endless sprawling landscape that was warm and sunny. I wanted to stay there and felt fantastic in that there were no more questions to be asked nor problems to overcome. all is so simple. I just knew all the answers: there was nothing other than love and service... that was it. Then I sensed something in front of me and heard a voice (thought) encourage me to look at my life. I didn't want to do that since I was enjoying my experience, but did so anyway. I looked over my life and saw incidents that quickly showed me that there were things I had to do. I said "I think I gotta lot of work to do" to which the reply was " well, you had better get at it." I then found myself back and awake staring at the back side of the driver's clutch pedal. I had been in the passenger seat before. I moved my feet and was relieved that my back was not broken, and then waited until the firemen smashed the back window and pulled me out of the car.

On New Years Eve, myself and two of my friends decided to stay at one of their houses to party. I had done the drug E once in tablet form before this night and had no problems. We decided on New years we would do E again. Over the course of the night before midnight, I took a line of E, then drank a small amount in milk, and at about 10:00pm I took another tab of E.

At first I was having a "good" trip if you could call it that, but getting closer to midnight when the last tab I took was fully kicking in, I just kept getting higher and higher, everything was getting over whelming, beyond anything I have ever experienced. I left my friends and went into the bathroom and shut off the light to try to have a quiet and dark environment to weather the storm. Even the washroom could not help and I could feel inside that I was in danger. I have never done any hard drugs before and had only smoked pot before my two experiences with E, but I knew I was overdosing. I was trying to stay calm and focused because I knew I was in trouble. Even though I was on a drug, there was a huge sobering quality at least for my thought process. I knew that in order to survive I had to stay awake and get help. I had waited too long before getting help and up to that point I had told my friends repeatedly that I was OK because I had not wanted to worry them. The high was getting overwhelming again; I could not get off the floor or move. In order to try to keep my mind focused, I was trying to count backwards from 10-0 over and over again. Once again I knew I was in trouble when while in my head I could count all the way back when I was counting the number out loud but I was counting over and over only 10, 9, 8, 7, 6 then 0 and when I tried to change this I would then count 10,9,8,7,3,2,1,0. I was missing whole sections of numbers even though in my head I knew they where there. I got myself up resting on the toilet but getting up took too much, and then it was like just my heart and all my veins in my body were seizing and Ii couldn't move, and it happened again, but just more intense, and as I was half lying on the toilet before I blacked out, all over my body it felt like every single pore opened and released all the moisture in my body, because in the matter of moments my whole body was soaked in sweat. I could feel that my heart was not beating anymore after that, the moment before blacking out.

My experience after this point seemed to happen very quickly, I did not see anything. It was much different than that: in order to see you need eyes. It was like being alone in the dark with nothing around that "exists" Something "spoke" to me but it was like the words were given straight to my conscience. The things it (god? I don't really know) told me were "New Year, New Birth." I knew it referred to me dying, and that I was to die that night no matter the circumstances. The second thing it "explained" (and this is one thing I am still trying to grasp it's meaning, but nothing makes any more sense to me), it "said," "In heaven (obvious god or Christian reference), what you need to understand is you do not need eyes to see." The rest I knew just from a "knowing” that came with it's messages. The only thing I understand about the second message is it is something I am supposed to share, because so many people don't understand the concept of physical life and non-physical life. I knew that I had to share this because it felt too many people are living under misconceptions and are blaming their gods or god for this. I knew that people need to understand you don't see with eyes in heaven because eyes are part of the body and are necessary to see physically. When you are dead, you no longer have eyes to see with. Once people understand this concept, as simple as it is, then they will have the ability to be able to understand the concepts of the afterlife better and in the way they need to be thought of as.

Then I was back. Boom! My eyes opened, and I was still lying on the toilet; my body was still damp. I just realized now as I am writing this that when I came back the bathroom light was on. I had turned the light off and none of my friends had been able to enter to turn the light on because I had locked the door. More mystery. Great. Anyways, all my clothes right down to my socks where soaked as if having been recently immersed in water. I was not felling high anymore from the E, even though the effects should have had still been in my system for another 5 hours at least. I felt so different than even before taking the E. I felt strong and healthy, but tired. I called my friends in one at a time to tell them what happened and then took a shower. It was the most glorious shower I ever had. It was like I had never taken a shower before in my life. In the shower, a ravenous thirst took me and for 10 minutes I stood cupping my hands and gulping down as much water as I possibly could. I rested with my friends sitting, not believing what happened, not understanding how I could be sitting there. It was like my mind and body knew it had died and should not be sitting there, but my conscience was definitely alive and it was not a dream, I kept wondering if I was dead and this is what it was like.

For the rest of the night I also noticed a heightened ability psychically (I always had small talent with these things, but I had increased by far.) I was able actually with one of my friends to know what he was feeling and what surface thoughts he was having. I knew this because every time he spoke I already knew every word he was going to say. This has come stronger then goes dormant, but even now I am stronger psychically than I have ever been.

I don't know who to turn to. This happened. Every word is real. I don't think people will believe anything I say. I actually believe that anyone I tell will hear I did drugs and the skeptical part of everyone's mind will not allow them to believe me just chalking my experience up to the drugs. I can understand even if you who are reading this feel the same way, I can understand. The only thing I can say is some things are true whether you believe in them or not.

I just need help getting as much understanding as possible on this because I feel the most is that I am living on borrowed time and I feel like I was given time back, but who is to say exactly how much time.
If I thought this was even a 1% chance this was because of the E I took that night (I am not and have not touched drugs since that night), I would not be writing this to you now. Please believe me on this. I would have had this never happen but I can't change that now.

It was suppose to be a normal delivery of the birth of my second child. I experienced a rare condition known a Disseminated Intravascular Coagulation; I had lost my ability to clot blood. I was bleeding out, so they called it. I remember the rush of physicians and hospital staff rushing around me, I was so cold. Later, I was told the blood was pouring out like a faucet was on. I was in full arrest due to shock caused from the blood loss. I was rushed to the operating room, which felt to me like everyone was in slow motion, but were really frantically rushing running me on the gurney to the operating room.

I was so cold. Then, I saw a beautiful light. Very warm, inviting. I wanted to go to the light. I was warm. It was so bright, comforting, I was at peace and was drawn towards the light. I heard nothing. Then, all of a sudden, I heard faintly in the background, "we’re loosing her". The voices started to get louder and louder. I heard my doctor yelling at me that she wasn't going to give up. I remember getting cold again. The light was gone. I woke up 6 hours later on a ventilator, unable to breathe on my own. I believe something spectacular happened that day. I am a Christian, I have always believed in God, and now... I have confirmation that something is waiting out there for me, and I will not be afraid to go there again when invited the next time. My after-thoughts on this situation vary. Sometimes I wonder why I was allowed to survive what most don't. There is not a good logical explanation why I survived. For whatever reason, be it my children, family, or destiny... I have a purpose for something.

For almost ten years, just the thought of talking about the details of my experience with death and the afterlife would make me sob uncontrollably. I don’t know why, because the experience was so wonderful and enlightening. Maybe it was the intensity of that love and enlightenment. No words could truly describe it. Since that experience, I have noticed that I have had heightened sensations and increased intuitive and psychic abilities. Even though I tried to dismiss it as nothing, something inside me won’t let me shake it. Now it is time to share my experience. Keep in mind that I am not a writer, nor professor, but simply a person with a few pages from my soul’s book of life.

When a woman knows there is something dreadfully wrong with her health, yet doctor after doctor tells her, “It’s all in your head – You’re just getting older”, she doesn’t know what to think. If it weren’t for the love of her family, she probably would give up. This was true for me. I knew I was getting worse and if someone didn’t find the cause soon, I most certainly would die.

In my case, I don’t know if the doctors couldn’t see past a trauma I experienced or if women are more complex than men and can’t be diagnosed as easily. All I know is that I was dying, senselessly and needlessly, and no one was doing anything about it. To them, I was a picture of physical health that was being drained by post-traumatic stress. Deep inside, I felt there was more to it.

I told myself I would try one more doctor. That’s it. Then I would give up my fight for life if she found nothing wrong with me. Having to wait a couple months for the appointment was tough. A couple months here, there, and everywhere added up to years. Five years in my case. It would be five long years of trying to find out what was wrong with me. Unbelievable! Yet life’s everyday turmoil continued around me.

Beginning at the end of 1989, I struggled for every ounce of strength I had to get through selling our home to move out to the family farm that we purchased. My father-in-law wanted us to fix up the farm and make him proud. After we remodeled the farmhouse with our life’s savings, we suffered a major setback in 1990 when the farmhouse burnt to the ground. The only clothes that we had left were the ones we had on and those in the hamper at the empty house we were selling. Then in 1992, we suffered the loss of my father-in-law, after which, we began to unveil the truth about my mother-in-law. It was sheer determination that kept me alive with all the stress upon stress I endured during those five years.

At the appointment in March of 1994, the woman doctor did a thorough exam and felt everything looked good. I was told I would hear from her office when the results of the routine Pap smear came back. Since I had regular Pap smears and was told yet again that I was a picture of health, my family and I went ahead with our planned trip to Colorado.

While in Colorado, I grew weaker and weaker. I could feel the strength draining from my body. I barely managed to smile my way through the weekend. When we arrived home, our answering machine was full with messages from the doctor’s office. It was easy to hear the urgency in each message left.

When I called the office, I was told to come in right away. The doctor told me that the Pap smear indicated I needed further testing. I was assured that even if I had cervical cancer it could be easily cured with a cone biopsy. However, after further tests and the cone biopsy, she stated that the cancer was already in the late stage and had invaded my outer tissues and lymph nodes. At first she tried to scold me for not having regular exams that should have caught this cancer earlier, in which event, minor procedures would have cured it. When I reminded her that I did go to doctor after doctor and had Pap smear after Pap smear, she eased up on me. I could sense that she felt this cancer should never have gotten to this point. I agreed with her.

The doctor told me that I needed radical surgery immediately and that it could not wait. She stated that I would have a radical hysterectomy and removal of the affected lymph nodes. Since she never removed lymph nodes, another doctor would assist her. I was told that if I survived, once lymph nodes were removed, my lower body would swell until it could not swell any more. The pain from the skin being so swollen and tight could become unbearable. Before I even left the doctor’s office, the pre-surgery testing and surgery were scheduled for the following week.

Friends begged me to get another opinion, so I called a hospital in New York that had been recommended. After I provided my background information and diagnosis, they made an emergency appointment for me. At the appointment, I was basically told the same thing. Surgery was needed without further delay. I was told that I needed to have a radical hysterectomy, in which my uterus, cervix, and a major part of my vagina would be removed. I wouldn’t know till after the surgery if my ovaries were removed or not. That option depended on how everything looked during the operation. Lymph nodes from hip to hip and up under the rib cage would also be removed and tested to see how far the cancer had spread.

I couldn’t believe what was happening. I didn’t have time to think. Part of me felt relieved that after going to doctor after doctor for years, someone finally discovered that I was really sick. The other part of me wanted to cry when I remembered all the cruel things those doctors told me throughout those years. The most common remark was, “It’s all in your head”. Another was, “You women make me sick. You’re all afraid of getting older. It’s just your hormones changing.” They were so off base, but it never mattered what I said.

The doctor that made me feel the worst sat engrossed, using a ruler to draw lines with different colored markers on my chart. When I attempted to say I was there because I deeply sensed something was really wrong with me, he rudely and abruptly cut me off and said, “Did I tell you to speak? You will speak when I ask you to and not before.” When I started to say, “But-” he interrupted me, pointed his finger just inches from my face, and rudely said, “I didn’t tell you to speak.” I felt so bad that I almost gave up wanting to find out what was wrong with me.

During those five long years of being told over and over again that nothing was wrong with me besides stress, I knew something was killing my body. I felt it so strongly that I caught myself beginning to watch women at the stores to see if I could find someone that could finish raising my son and be a good wife to my husband when I died. My heart ached at the mere thought of not being able to be with them forever. To know I was right all along was dreadful. To think, I only had a few days to prepare myself and my family for the possibility that I might die from a cancer that could have, and should have, been stopped in its track early on. I felt numb, but not scared.

It was hard to put on my faithful smile, but I did, as I bought my twelve-year-old son’s Easter presents before my scheduled surgery. I didn’t know if I would ever get the chance to do it again. The thought of not being there Easter morning to see his face light up as he opened his presents and searched for all the plastic eggs filled with money broke my heart. I didn’t know if the adorable little green suit and multi-colored tie that I purchased for him would be his Easter suit or the one he’d be wearing to my funeral.

With no time to think, I was talked into having the surgery in New York. The day of surgery came too fast. I undressed and got into the ugly hospital gowns. Then my father and husband waited nervously with me until I went down to surgery. As I was put onto the gurney, my lips quivered and my eyes filled with tears while I told them, possibly for the last time, that I loved them. I didn’t know if I’d ever see them again.

When I awoke and realized that I made it through the surgery, I looked up toward the ceiling, closed my eyes and said, “Thank you Lord” under my breath. Then I began to feel tugging from the tubes that seemed to be sticking from me everywhere. They were down my nose, in my neck, in my spine, two on each side of my abdomen, in my hand, and, of course, I had the awful pee bag.

After a few days, the results of the lymph node testing revealed that one in every three nodes were cancerous and radiation treatment was strongly advised. On a less serious note, I discovered that I had developed pesky allergies. One was to the orange solution that they poured on my stomach and vagina in the operating room to help sterilize the area. The other was from simple plastic tape that covered the whole length of my spine and around my neck. It took the skin right off my body. In addition, the morphine began to give me terrible headaches, so it was stopped.

As for the two drain tubes that they put in on each side of my abdomen, I was told that they weren’t stitched tightly enough during the surgery. This caused my body fluid to leak profusely out around the tubes instead of into them. The fluid leaked out so fast that they had to tape big, thick pads around the tubes. Guess what kind of tape they used? That’s right, plastic tape that took even more skin off my body! I had bright red patches of raw skin all over me. The pads needed changed so often that the nurses told me to change them myself. After watching the one nurse drop an opened gauze pad on the sticky floor, bend down and pick it up, and then attempt to put it on my open wounds before I stopped her, I guess I didn’t mind having to put them on by myself. So I thought.

The following day I got up and awkwardly pushed the equipment that held my IV’s and monitors slowly down the hall for my daily exercise. On my way back to my room, I noticed the pads taped around my abdomen’s drain tubes were totally saturated from all the fluid leaking from my body. The fluid began running profusely down my legs and I couldn’t stop it. I went back to my room, climbed into bed, and attempted to lift my wet hospital gown to change the pads, but I was too weak. While I waited to see if my strength would come back, the fluid continued to soak my blanket and sheets. I felt weaker, so I pushed the call button for a nurse.

Patiently, I waited for a nurse to bring in a dry hospital gown, sheets, and a blanket to replace the soaked ones I was lying in. As I waited, I got colder and colder. My body began to tremble with chills. As the body fluid continued to leak out around the two tubes, I sensed something wasn’t right. I was so cold by now that my teeth began to chatter.

After about an hour, I buzzed the nurse again. The nurse rudely replied, “I’ll get there when I get there.” About an hour and a half later, the door to my room opened, and in bounded a nurse. She didn’t even look to see if anything was wrong as she threw the hospital gown, sheets, and blanket right onto my face and chest. As the nurse turned away to rush out, she rudely said, “I don’t have time for this. I’m having problems with my husband.”

When the linens landed on me, something strange sort of clicked in my body. I began to gasp for air, but I couldn’t breathe. My body was too weak to lift my hand up to pull the linens off of my face. A tingling feeling came over my chilled shaken body. The tingling grew so loud, that the sound drowned out all of the hospital noises. I knew I was about to die. My last thought was that I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to my son, husband, and family. Then everything was silent.

Next, I briefly was above the bed looking down. Just as I realized that was my lifeless body in the bed below, my thoughts were abruptly distracted. Suddenly, I was pulled into complete darkness. Amidst the total darkness, I smelled an indescribable odor. At about the same time, my fluid-soaked body felt coolness in the air. I remember wishing that I had a coat to wear to keep me warm.

Then I began to feel myself moving upward. As I was being pulled upward, I began to feel as if I was in a tunnel, an endless, pitch-black tunnel. The speed at which I rose began to increase, faster and faster. It seemed swifter than anything imaginable or possible. As I continued to speed upwards through the seemingly endless darkness, there were puffs of clouds brushing across my eyelids and cheeks. It felt nice, like cool dew. That’s when my eyes looked upward.

There I saw such a magnificently, wondrous light which was white and pure. At first it seemed very far away. One glance at this bright, splendid light made me feel safe, loved, and serene. I didn’t feel pain or sadness, just an overwhelming peaceful love that grew more intense the closer I got to it. This white light was extraordinarily bright. It was almost blinding. I felt myself squinting just so I could gaze at it. I looked away from the light for a second because it seemed intense enough to burn right through my eyes, yet it didn’t. Maybe the cool mist brushing across my face helped in some way. When I glanced away, all I saw was the vast blackness around me and below me, so I gazed back up toward the light and never looked down again. As I watched the light get closer and brighter, the sense of tranquil love grew stronger and stronger.

Suddenly, I was no longer accelerating upwards. While I still squinted from the extreme brightness of the light, my eyes began to adjust to it. I began to notice thick white puffs of clouds continuously moving about. A breeze from the moving clouds gently blew the lightweight, long, flowing garment that I was now wearing. I could also see that I was barefoot as I began to slowly walk amidst the clouds.

Before I knew it, I was gazing upon this magnificent gate that was gloriously glistening. I just stared with amazement at its beauty. Rays of prismatic light were bouncing off the exquisite gems in all directions. It was totally breathtaking. Since I always longed for a driveway gate back on the farm, I caught myself engulfed in trying to remember every astonishing detail about it. As I peered even closer, I watched as pearly gems sparkled radiantly in the light.

A remarkable peace drew me in beyond the gates. I felt so safe that fear never entered my thoughts. I began to squint real hard in attempt to see through the beaming light and continuously moving clouds, but I couldn’t. Then in the near distance toward the right, I got a glimmer of something, so I squinted even harder. The clouds seemed to part enough just to show a hint of a shadow of two people. It seemed to be a man with a woman standing by his side. I didn’t feel as if I knew them, but I felt as if they were waiting for me for a reason. Just as the clouds were about to thin out enough for me to see clearer, they abruptly thickened and closed up around the couple. All I could see again were the clouds passing by me in the light. I wondered why the clouds thickened up so fast just as I was about to see who was there.

At that same time, I realized there was someone right in front of me. The clouds also thickened around that shadow so I could not see him. There are no words to describe the incredibly intense love I felt, standing there in front of him. No one could ever imagine a love so powerfully strong. At that moment, it hit me. I was in heaven standing before our Lord. As I stood there before Him, I felt that He knew every detail of my soul. I felt dumb that I didn’t realize the gates I had passed through were the pearly gates until that moment. My eyes turned away for a second and looked down to my right. I didn’t know if the light was just so bright or if I felt unworthy of such wondrous love. It seemed as if He could hear my thoughts because I heard, “Fear not; for thou art worthy of my love.” As I heard those words, my throat grew tight and my eyes swelled with tears. I thought, “Are you sure?” With each question came an answer and reassurance. It seemed as if my whole life was reviewed and clarified in a flash.

If I could only choose one word to describe our Lord, it would have to be “Love”, an indisputable love. I don’t know how to explain it. I couldn’t see Him through the clouds and light, but I felt His love so deeply. He was right there in front of me, so close to me. I felt incredible love, power, and peace in His voice, but I don’t know if He actually spoke. It was as if we felt, heard, and responded to each other without the need to speak. I was told I had to go back; I wasn’t supposed to die when I did; and I had more work to do. In addition, I was told that I had to protect my husband and son from someone.

Just as I was about to ask more, it became dark again. While gasping for air, I realized I was back in the hospital bed. This time when my right arm reached up to pull the blanket, sheets, and hospital gowns off my face, it had the strength to pull them off. I could breathe. I began to hear the noises of the hospital and feel pain again. My body was shivering and my teeth were chattering uncontrollably. Once again, my body was extremely weak. My hospital gown and bed linens were still soaked. I sort of felt sad that I was back. When I was in heaven, there was no pain. My body was not all cut up. I didn’t have any tubes hanging from me. I was whole. I was strong. I was loved more than anyone could imagine. As I looked up to the heavens, I meekly nodded as if to say that I understood. Then I closed my eyes.

A while later the nurse came in. She walked over to my bed and nonchalantly said, “You’re right. You are soaked.” She went to change my hospital gown but realized the linens that she brought in and threw on me earlier were also wet by now, so she went to get more. As she was putting a dry hospital gown on me, she told me about her bad day and about the problems she was having with her husband. I was only half listening to her as she rambled on because I was remembering how I died because of the bad day she was having. I don’t believe I said a word while she was there. I had a thousand thoughts going through my head about my glorious time in heaven.

Now not only did my struggle for life begin again with the many medical complications that followed – especially the radiation therapy – but also my ability to occasionally feel presences or spirits of those whom had previously passed on began to spark inside me. When a feeling comes over me, I can’t shake it no matter how hard I try. It completely overwhelms my every thought. I can’t even sleep. My mind doesn’t shut down, but it is totally drained. Each time I have one of these experiences, it takes a major toll on me.

I haven’t been able to talk about this to anyone. Who would believe me? For instance, who would believe that I had a vividly clear glimpse of horrifying hell as I shook an attorney’s hand; I felt a mournful presence in a friend’s cottage that wouldn’t let me leave until I helped her; while driving past New York City, I felt an enormous death toll in store for the city weeks before the terror attack; when I awoke on Sept. 11th, I knew that was the day; I discovered the identity of the couple from heaven and what they wanted me to do; I sensed the stock market was going to fall drastically well before it had even started to decline; I knew Vice-President Gore should be President but would lose; and as I watched NBC News Correspondent David Bloom appear on television covering the war of Iraq, I felt he was going to die – not be killed, but die? The feelings I have concern small and major things, people close to me or those I only know through friends. Simply hearing, seeing, or touching a person or their possessions can trigger these inexplicable moments.

This very powerful emotional experience has definitely changed me. I am not afraid of death now since I have seen a glimpse of the amazing realm that lies beyond. As I stated in the beginning of my story – I am not a writer, but I hope that my words touch the hearts of those seeking hope, comfort, or purpose.

I was driving the family station wagon in the mountains in December, it was starting to rain and I had not been driving long. The engine died and the car locked up and I lost control. The car went end over end twice and rolled about 7 times. The witness to the accident said he did not know how anyone survived the accident. My 15 year old brother and his friend were also in the front seat. None of us had our seat belts on, but I was the only one injured. While the car was rolling, at first everything went black and it got very cold. All of a sudden it became very warm, a nice warm, and a light started to appear before me. In the light my father started to appear to me and seem to hold out his hand, as if to motion me to come with him. It was such a nice feeling that I wanted to go. My father was smiling as if to say everything was alright. My father appeared to me only from the waist up, and there was this warm light all around him. But after a couple of minutes his imaged disappeared and I realized where I was. I only received a bad gash behind my left ear. I did [not] have to even stay in the hospital except to get stitches. To this day I cannot explain what happened.

P.S. There was another time in the summer of 1979 or 1980. I was dating this girl from Stockton, CA and we were trying to sleep at her house. That night before we went to bed, my girlfriend, myself, her mother, and a friend of the family were sitting at the kitchen table talking. I was in chair against the wall facing out, her mother proceeded to say how her brother always sat in that chair whenever he came to visit. I didn't think too much about it until the next day.

That night it was very hot, so her mother was sleeping on the couch, and my girlfriend and I were sleeping on the floor. Sometime in the middle of the night something woke me up and I perched myself up on my arm. I looked at the chair I was sitting earlier and a figure started appearing in the chair that I was previously sitting in. It formed from the head down, and I did not know what was going on, but I could describe everything in color: what the man looked like and what he was wearing. He just seemed to be staring at me for about 10 minutes, then he dissipated the way he appeared. The next morning about 7 AM the 3 of us were having coffee and I told them I had a bad dream, probably from sleeping on the floor. I told them everything I had witnessed. Her mother said I described her brother, whom I have never met, to a tee. About 8 AM that morning, her mother received a phone call telling her that her brother had hung himself just at the moment he appeared to me. But I was in the way; he was appearing to her, but I was between her and me. It was her that he was appearing to. I just wonder sometimes if I can feel things.

One other time, it was either 1977 or 1978, circa. I was sleeping on my mother's patio and it was approximately 1 or 2 in the morning. I wasn't quite asleep yet and was lying on my back when a voice called my name. I instantly thought it was one of my younger brothers. I went to check, they were all asleep. I thought I was hearing things so I lay back down. A couple of minutes later the voice called me again and said get up, but louder this time. I thought for sure my brothers were playing some kind of joke on me. I went into their bedroom, and they were fast asleep. By now I am thinking that maybe I am just very tired. As I lay down again, wide awake by now, something grabbed my foot very hard and yelled my name to get up. I went into the living and heard someone trying to break into the house. I scared them away; I was able to sleep after that.

P.S. I just want to say that not now, nor have I ever drunk a lot nor have I ever been involved with drugs. I have also had other things happen that have come true. Please respond. Thank you.

Hi, please excuse my bad notions of English, but I'll try to explain myself as clear as possible. My mother has been ill for about 4 years, she had cancer, after three years she had an embolism, became paraplegic, aphasic, agnosic, ... After three months of constructive revalidation, she had another embolism. I had such a relation with her that I could understand her even without words. I was at her side ‘til she died a year after her first embolism. During that period I tried to do everything I could to help her have the best possible time, but I messed up all my familial and friends-relations, so I had to move from my town to another town. Over there, I started to have all symptoms of what you call near dead after effects. They lasted for about a year; life was so complete, I understood everyone, I loved everything, I was indestructible, and so on. After that period, things came to regression and I tried to find that state of mind back. I still have some of them in me, but I don't have them all the time. The nearest thing I found about that subject was the Tibetan Book of Death and it's not only near, it was THAT!! Tonight I'm trying to write something about a guy with a near dead experience and most of the symptoms mentioned on various sites mention the feeling I had during that period.

I underwent ventricular tachycardia and required defibrillation to be resuscitated. I had accidentally overdosed on massive amounts of over-the-counter caffeine, which caused the condition to occur.

Though this was years ago, I still remember it well. I remember extreme pain in my chest, as if I were being crushed in a huge vise, then a lot of emotional distress knowing I was probably dying (on the way to the hospital) being driven to the hospital, I eventually lost my vision and was transported by ambulance from a freeway off-ramp where an ambulance was standing by for us (truckers had alerted them someone was being transported at high speed to the hospital).

I remember the out-of-body experience well. I was several ceiling heights above myself in the E.R., watching them working on me, trying to get my heart to beat again. Voices were echo-y and distant, but I remember a sense of calmly being there watching myself dying and not being concerned by it.

Then it was as if I were floating backwards away from the room, into a tunnel of white illuminating warmth. It was nearly orgasmic it felt so good throughout my body. There was a feeling of acceleration towards the source of the light, and I was so very glad to be going to it. Then, almost as if something were pulling me from below, the other way, I felt a deceleration and slowing, then a reverse direction away from the light, and this really confused me. I felt really cheated, really wanted to go all of the way to that light but now I couldn't.

The next thing I know I am in the E.R. with very very blurry vision, a chest that hurt like hell, and the physician asking me how I felt. I told him I could barely see him and that my chest hurt like a son of a gun. He told me I would have to stay there for a while ‘til they were certain it was okay to release me. Inside the hour, I was released by the doctor and told I could go. The two navy personnel who had stopped on the freeway and drove me to get medical help were still there, as were the police. The police found the empty container of the pills I had purchased and consumed, and were satisfied from talking to the doctor that it was an accidental overdose and not a narcotic related overdose.

All of these years later, I still remember it pretty clearly. I have told a few others of this experience,e but of course many are skeptical and are not sure they're getting the truth, though they know I am telling them in sincerity and without trying to change their own feelings about this sort of thing. I guess it helped when my mother was dying; I was able to guide her to the light, told her to go to it. She affirmed with a hand squeeze that she saw the light I was talking about. I feel this helped her, and it helped me as well.

Not much else to say. It was a number of years ago, but it changed my life forever.

Five friends took off to ski in Austria for a week. Everything was beautiful, the mountains were huge. My girlfriend and I decided to take an expert trail and ended up traversing back and forth just trying to stay on the face of the mountain. It was that steep. One of the guys with us, 6'4", and a very good skier, decided to take the jump at the top of the run. We were directly below about 200 yards down from him when we heard him yell, "Watch out!" We scrambled to get out of his way, but the next thing I felt was a crushing pain, so intense it was unbearable. When the pain suddenly stopped, I will never forget having the thought "So this is what it's like to die!" It was as if I had suddenly found the answer to some great mystery. I had a smile on my face, although I was no longer a 'body'.

My soul was smiling. I went 'up'. I remember just feeling like a 'head' looking around. No body. I was unable to go beyond the layer of white that surrounded me, white was everywhere. Then, in the distance I saw some white robed figures, faceless, hunched-over like, and walking in a single row coming towards me. I couldn't move towards them. I just had to stay there and wait for them. No one talked. It was like 'thought transfer' or something. Then, I realized that the person in front was my beloved Uncle, my closest deceased relative, and behind him was my grandmother, his mother. I was SO EXCITED to see Uncle. I wanted to run up to him and hug him, but I couldn't move. He came within ten feet of me, stopped and shook his head. He told me it wasn't my time and I had to go back. He turned and my grandmother followed, still in their 'line' of white hooded robes. Next thing I knew I felt like someone had taken a knife and sliced my chest open left to right. That first breath was a killer. I was so angry, mad, at coming back. I didn't know what had happened or why I was there lying across Danny's lap and why he was crying. Everyone was trying to calm 'HIM" down and make "HIM" feel better because I was breathing again. "It's O.K. Danny. See, she's fine, she's fine." Everyone always asks me, "So what did they say when they took you to the hospital?" I reply with "What hospital? They took me to the bar on top of the mountain, bought me a beer and stared at me saying 'do you feel better yet? Can we go back out and ski now?' Ah... human psychology. I finally told them I was OK although my head was still pounding and every time I tried to stand I would fall over. I tried to ski, but I couldn't stand up. It was extremely frustrating.

It wasn't until a few years later that I started making comments about my memory. "Maybe I did? Maybe I didn't? I don't know...." I started hearing voices talk to me when I took naps during the day. Deep LOUD voices telling me things, scary things. I had a dream during my first pregnancy in 1989, a year later. It was in a dark tunnel, I was walking through it, not knowing why when all of a sudden my Uncle appeared. Yes, the deceased Uncle. He was in his robe again, but this time he was holding something. I couldn't tell what he had in his arms until he finally got closer to me. Then, he handed me a baby and said "I have been taking care of her for the past eight months and now it is your turn." And before I could even look up from the baby to thank him, he was moving away back through the dark turning tunnel.

I had two more children afterwards and a few months after my last daughter was born, I had seven seizures in one day, never having had them before. That is when the MRI showed dead brain tissue indicative of clinical death for about three minutes. I continue to be medicated for partial complex seizures and narcolepsy. I have no sense of smell, no appetite, no longer form new memories. I can't organize, sort, etc., although all memories prior to ‘88 are still intact. The good part is I don't hold grudges or remember things like my parents funerals; the bad part is I don't remember things like my children’s activities, family events, etc. Oh well, such is life!

Although I prayed, my religious life was non existent until I reached 38 years of age. I was a spiritual, curious person, and wanted to "know" and learn, thus I searched in many fields. In the summer of 1977, I had 3 surgeries in 10 days, as a result of an infection in my Fallopian tubes that wouldn't go away. After the third one I felt very sick and crushed by the excruciating pain that the air accumulated in my joints caused, due to the three consecutive Laporotomies. Then one day I was trying to lay flat in bed but found it quite thorny to do, so tears of desperation flooded my eyes. I closed them, feeling very tired of hurting. Right at that moment I heard the voice of my nanny, clear as if she would be by my side (she had remained in Spain because she was quite old), and was saying: "[Jane], you are better now". I opened my eyes thinking that somebody was talking to me and I had made up the rest, but the hospital room was empty except for me. I closed my eyes again, ready to keep on with my endeavor. Then at 11 o’clock, I saw the most beautiful man I have ever encountered in my existence. He was dressed in dark, very elegant wear; his shoes were of patent leather, and his white, ruffled shirt shone like the sun light. I fell in ecstasy and said: "You are God... I want to kiss Your feet!" As I saw myself kneeling before His feet, that shone as well, they were bare.

Something very strange occurred: next I was getting out of my body through my head, horizontally, as if I were crawling inside a tube, tummy up, helping my advance with my hands. Once outside that... cylinder, I stood up and saw my own body in front of me, lying on the bed. I felt MARVELOUS. Immeasurable joy inundated all my being. [A being that] felt no pain, no sorrows, nothing but wellness and delight as I had never experienced before. I looked around, and in the Light, I could see every thing as through a very delicate sheer curtain. By the feet of my bed, my husband and my three children cried, looking at what seemed my dead body. I wanted to console them and instantly found myself floating towards them. I caressed their faces, kissed them and told them not to cry for me, that I was fine and perfectly happy and well. But I could see they didn't sense me or hear me.

Right at that moment I felt sucked back into my physical body, and then realized that again all was dark, very heavy, and the pain of my body was unbearable. My first word, only one, was: "S...!" My husband said: "I beg you pardon?"

People ask me often if I believe that I really saw God. I smile, then I answer that God was the One Who saw me, and He presented to me an Image that I could comprehend in my limited understanding. My life has not been the same after that experience. Of course I lost all fear of death (and look forward to going), for I have the absolute conviction that there is a wonderful Life after this physical expression.

After the car hit my car, I rose above the accident and said "My God, I can't die yet; I still haven't finished my finals!" (I was attending Chiropractic College.) Archangel Michael came to me and said "You have another school to go to; don't worry, you will continue on with your college." He escorted me to a magnetic tunnel where Jeshua (Jesus) was waiting for me, who comforted me. I then found myself at the door step of a type of school, where there were a few students learning geometric shapes and physics with the accompanying healing energy involved. I though the better way would be to directly go to the energy that is involved in the healing, direct from Source.

At this point, Mother Mary came in, and motioned for me to follow Her. She asked my thoughts about what we were learning, I told her it would be best to go right to Source for the healing energy. She said she had something for me to look at, so I followed Her out of the class. I first sat in a healing chair to help my physical body heal on earth. Then we went to a vault that held information from souls’ life cycles and growth. I was told I could have access to this information whenever I desired, it was important with the process of uncovering the dense dramas on earth.

We also looked into a type of screen, that reminded me of a TV screen, and I saw a gathering of people in a field. They were all releasing the density that held back Unconditional Love, then holding the Light within and living within Peace above the dramas. After one man cleared himself out, another individual came up to him who was also cleared, then they shook hands. Both bringing the Reality of Peace into their creative engagement, they both shared Light instead of any fear thoughts or actions. At this point, the Light streamed through them, all the density was then released into the Light.

"It's gone! It's all gone!" I exclaimed! “I can see how this works, but who will believe me? I'm a nobody, my dad was a carpenter in Washington and I'll be a small town chiropractor. I think you should get somebody else! Besides that, I'm a bit shy!"

A few months went by after I came out of the ten day coma, when I remembered that there was a NDE. It took many years after that to begin a journal which records the mechanism that Mother Mary introduced me to. I have compiled much of the information into a manuscript, and am editing and continue writing about the tools that are guided by Mother Mary, Mary Magdalene, Jeshua, Arch Angel Michael, and many other Enlightened Beings.

I took about 96 pills, Trazidon, Soma and Zanex. I was taking about half of whichever pill came out of the bottle for the past couple of nights to help me sleep. Right after I took the pills I remember saying out loud "Please God forgive me for what I've just done." I was in full cardiac arrest, and my body had absorbed all of the pills, my body temperature dropped to 91 degrees, and for the next 14 hours I was completely brain dead. The nurse told my husband and parents that there was 99 percent chance I would not make it, and if I did I would be a vegetable. When I was seizing and posturing I remember being next to my body and looking at my toes seeing how tense I was. I was trying to calm myself. My sister gave me a titty twister as she pronounced me dead. I opened my eyes and said "This isn't heaven." I do not have much of a memory of my life before this; I lost a lot. They say I am completely different.

I do remember being with three others, one in the middle was a little above the two, on one side was my brother, who died at 11days, the other was my grandpa. I don't know how we got there, but it was such a beautiful color blue surrounding, not ground but not like we were hovering. We talked a lot, but I can’t remember our mouths moving. I paid [attention] mostly to my brother, his clothes, his hair, how tall, but can not remember the one in the middle. I know he said a lot to me, but I don't know what. My sister says when I first opened my eyes I said "God says I'm a ••••• and won’t let me stay"

My parents took pictures all through this, from the beginning until I went home.

My father had been ill on and off for the past 12 years. He had had several bouts with cancer, aneurisms and heart problems. He always came through each battle with the same strong, positive attitude he went into it with. My mother and I, through all the times we waited for Dad to come out of a surgery that was more likely to kill rather than save him, never had the slightest doubt that he would be fine.

This past February he had gotten to the point where all the aneurisms were over, he had a mechanical aortic valve and he had been free of cancer for over five years. He had started going out again and was in better spirits then we'd seen him in years. So when both my mother and I heard the same young, male voice call (we were in different places in the house and we heard it different days) we knew we were going to loose someone but not Dad. We tried to figure who and could only come up with my sister who had just won a bout with breast cancer, but that didn't feel right. So we just waited to see who it was. About one week after our hearing this voice, my father started feeling bad. He lost a tremendous amount of weight in what seemed like days and had become very tired and agitated. We both pressed him to go to the doctor and be checked. He did and his doctor had both brain and full body CAT scans done along with various other tests. Everything was Ok, but Dad just didn't feel right. This was in June.

In August, while I was sitting in the car waiting for my mother, I felt an overwhelming feeling of loss. I asked out loud "Who are we losing?" but I had no feeling for a particular person. I just knew we were losing someone very close. When my father said to me, at 1:30 a.m. Tues. morning, he thought he had a bowel blockage and needed to go to the hospital, I knew immediately who we were losing. On the way to the hospital he told me to take my time. I asked him if he was sure and he said there was still some time. I knew that he knew he wouldn't come back this time.

In the emergency room I stayed with him while they ran tests. He did have scar tissue blocking his intestine. They would admit him and schedule surgery. The ER doctor took me aside and told me that this would be very hard for Dad. I was amazed because this was not the first time they had to remove scar tissue from him and it had never been a major concern before.

But none of this was like any other time I had taken him to the hospital. I was grateful for this doctor, who I had never talked to before, for letting me know that my feelings were right. I literally stood next to my father that morning for four hours while they finished the tests and he waited for a room. He held my hand the whole time and had gotten so weak that he could only talk in a whisper. When it was time for them to move him, I told him I would go and get my son so my mother could be with him. He held my hand tightly and didn't want me to go.

He had surgery at 8:00 pm Tues. evening. He came through it fine. His doctor put him in the Cardiac Care Unit because of the valve in his heart, but this was normal. That evening my mother and I talked and we both knew Dad was going to die. It was strange to come out and say it to each other. Nothing the doctors said backed up the feelings, we just knew.

The following evening, as my mother and I stood over him in the C.C.U. he had a stroke. The CAT scans showed three baseball size soft tissue masses, one in the brain, one between the heart & lungs and one in the abdomen. They also found several smaller masses up and down his spine. There was nothing that could be done. No cure that could handle all three masses. We had some serious decisions to make. We told Dad at the next visit and he understood. By now the bottom half of both lungs had collapsed, he was paralyzed on his right side and couldn't speak. He could communicate by pointing at letters and his facial expressions. I had to ask him in the presence of a doctor if he wanted to keep the respirator on and if he understood that if it was turned off he would, in fact, die. He had no trouble making it clear to them that he wanted the artificial life support off and he fully understood what was happening. We then moved him to a private room where my sisters, brother and I took shifts staying with him. We didn't want him to be alone when he passed.

The four days he was in the private room were beautiful. Everyone who ever knew my father came to say goodbye and we, the family, allowed everyone a private moment with him. We were all amazed at how vividly aware he was and how well he communicated. It truly spoke of a life well lived and a man respected and loved by everyone.

By Saturday, the third day in the private room, he was tired. his paralysis was close to total, breathing labored, and he had a couple of bouts with violent fits of shaking. For some reason I had a very strong mental connection with my Father that had intensified to the point of my actually speaking for him. I could hear his voice in my head. I knew what he wanted and what he felt. The connection was so strong by now that I had few feelings of my own.

I had relieved my sister Saturday morning. Dad had a restless night and I knew he would rest with me there. I kept hearing him ask me to help him go. I wasn't sure how he wanted me to help. I knew he wanted to go but it felt like he was scared or lost. It seemed like he couldn't go. My brother stayed with him that afternoon and I was to relieve him that evening. I told my mother I couldn't go back that night. I knew I had to help him. I just wasn't ready for whatever it was I was supposed to do. My mother understood how I felt, she said she had the same feelings her last visit, so she arranged for my sister and her husband to spend the night with him. Since this had all started I hadn't sleep much at all and Saturday night I actually slept for a few hours. I woke early Sunday morning and felt more relaxed than I had in days. But I knew I had to go and stay with Dad, I still had no idea how I could help him.

When I settled in at the hospital I couldn't look him in the eyes. I heard him asking for help but I couldn't help, and it broke my heart to see him suffer. He wanted to go, he was ready to go - but he couldn't, and I couldn't go for him. I've never felt a pain like that - I couldn't look at him. I felt so self-conscience, the atmosphere in the room was so thick and oddly calm - peaceful almost - and waiting. As I sat reading in a chair at the foot of his bed, his breathing became heavy and sporadic, he was hyperventilating. I turned my head and looked him in the eyes (actually the third eye, where you can see both eyes at the same time) and said "I'll breathe for you Dad." I speeded my breathing up to his rate and slowly slowed it back down - he was with me and I was, literally, breathing for him. We were in perfect sync. As he calmed down he motioned, with his eyes, for me to close my eyes. I just knew that was what he wanted. I said "you want me to close my eyes?" he motioned yes. I turned my head back and rested it against the back of the chair and closed my eyes. I felt, rather than saw my father in my conscienceness. That is the only way to explain it. There was a figure, of sorts… like a vague outline, but I felt my father. I knew he wanted me to take him or help him. I said, verbally, "I can't go all the way, but I'll go as far as I can." We then 'moved' through what was like a tunnel, the walls were like a bluish-gray smoke gently moving clockwise. I was behind my father, following him. We came to an area that I can only describe as a huge wall of purple and black swirling plasma. It rose up in front of us. We stood on a dark floor, the tunnel was behind us and we were blocked by this huge wall. The purple was the predominant color and the black was more like the outline of the purple swirls. We walked along the wall but found no way through, over, under or around it. The feelings of this wall were confusion and chaos, it was swirling at a steady but chaotic pace and was quite intimidating but not frightening. More frustrating.

My father had only gotten this far - he couldn't get past this wall. That's what he wanted me to help him with. I said "no wonder you can't go - this is a mess!" Then I felt this sudden conscious awareness of what was happening and fear flooded me - a fear so shocking that I "flew" my eyes open and sat straight up in my chair! I looked over at my father and his eyes flew open, he looked at me as if I had hurt him more deeply than was humanly possible. I felt so ashamed, shocked and sorry, deeply - so very deeply sorry.

His breathing became faster and agitated. I said "it wasn't long enough, I opened my eyes too soon. I'm sorry..." he softened and I took control of the breathing again. (The whole time the breathing was the predominant sound; it was like a gauge or a line and I used it but I'm not sure how.) He, again, motioned for me to close my eyes and we started over again. This time when we reached the purple/black wall there were specks of orange dotted through it. My father was looking for his mother. He was walking up and down the wall like a lost child calling "Mama, Mama." I started looking for her too; it made sense for her to come and help him - more sense than me doing it. I called "Granmommy Florence" (I was quite young when she died and only remember her one time; I tried to feel her but I couldn't grasp it.) "Granmommy Florence" it seemed that we called and looked for a long time. I started getting angry. I didn't want my father stuck here and his body was almost dead. Why didn't she come and get him?! Where was she?? I hollered "Granmommy Florence, come and get him! He's suffered enough - don't make him suffer anymore." I felt so helpless that my demand was more of a plea.

Then, from somewhere inside of me, I heard "orange". I remembered reading something about orange but I suddenly knew the only way through the purple was through the orange. I said to my father "come on, we have to follow the orange." He came with me like a lost child would go with someone they trusted to take them home. The innocence I felt from him made me feel very protective and real.

I wasn't sure how to follow the orange, there were only specks here and there so I picked a speck and 'moved' toward it. As I did I saw more orange, so I moved toward that, and I kept doing this until I, we, were on an orange path. The path rose up out of the purple/black swirls and as we moved along the path we came into a vast horizon of soft, warm pastel yellow and green whips that curved all around us like a canopy. The purple/black was below and behind us but the yellow/green whips were above and around us. Like we were rising up into a huge dome. It was so vast and warm, safe, calm and lightly peaceful.

It seemed as if we were on a moving belt going toward a flat, swirling, circular door. Like an inverted funnel but it, the opening, was flat and was in the middle of this vast space we had entered. The circular door was a soft white light mixed with light gray shadows where the light overlapped from the swirling motion.

There was a figure off to the left side of this door. To me it looked transparent, the color of liquid coffee held up to the light. It was the shape of a tall, thin person in a long, hooded robe. It seemed more transparent in what would be the chest area and I could not see a face or any detailed features. I know my father saw his mother. I felt his joy, his sudden childish freedom. The freedom to express the abundant love and joy that only innocent children seem to have. I was overwhelmed with a love and understanding that words cannot describe. A love of being rather than having, an understanding of everything in nothing. A warmth that cleansed the very fibers of my soul.

I watched as my father moved in front of me (up to now he had been following me) and moved like a child running toward this figure. I was still going forward but at a much slower pace. As I came closer to the door I felt as if I was shedding all pain, all worry. I was home, at last I was at the place I had been looking for for so long. I had no reason to go back, nothing mattered now, I knew who I was and more importantly what I am and am to be.

Then, as my father reached the figure, a harsh, loud knock rang out, then another and another. I heard, what I thought was my father (I'm not so sure it was now) say "Lynn, go answer the door" I said "No. I'm not leaving". Again the voice said, much sterner this time, "Lynn! go and answer the door!" then, for some reason, I had the feeling that I was eavesdropping on a very private moment and I felt uncomfortable. I said "Ok. But I'm coming right back." Still seeing my father, the entire scene in my head, I got up out of the chair and opened the door of the hospital room. It was as if I was above myself looking through a funnel at the nurse in the hall. " I want to get his blood pressure… is it Ok?" she asked. The hospital staff had been real good about not disturbing him without our OK. I looked at her and tears started streaming down my face, "He's going now" I said. "I'm with him, he's just found his mother, he's going now!". The nurse starred at me for a moment then said "Are you alright? Is there someone I can call? Can you handle this?" "Are you kidding!!" I said "It's beautiful, I'm with him. Of course I can handle this." Then she said "I knew you were psychic. I knew you were." Then she started to tell me how her mother died and she wasn't there but she knew when it happened… I didn't want to be rude but I said "I have to go back... I want to be with him." She squeezed my arm, and said if I needed anything she would be right out side the door.

I closed the door, went back to the chair, my fathers breathing was so slow and calm. I sat back and closed my eyes… I was back on the orange path but I was further back from the door then when I left. My father and the figure were just entering the light. My father said "Bye honey, and thank you." As they entered the light, his breathing slowed; I knew the breathing would stop. I watched them move further into the light and heard the final breath of my father’s body. I just sat in the chair. I left the place we were, I was back here, and I waited for the silence. Hoping for another breath but knowing he was gone. After a few seconds, I looked at his body. He was definitely gone. I went to the door and told the nurse. She came in and confirmed that he was dead. She called the supervising nurse and she noted the time. The supervisor asked me if I was all right and I just looked at her and said "I went with him. I watched him… I showed him where to go!" She said "Do you know what a blessing that is?" and I couldn't speak.

I called my mother and told her that I took him. She said she was so grateful, she tried to help him the day before and couldn't. She would have someone come and get me. When my sister picked me up at the hospital, I tried to explain what had happened, but it was very hard to find any words, much less the right ones. Later she told me that I was "glowing" when she picked me up. The rest of the family had mixed reactions, they were actually angry at me.

It's hard to describe how I felt. I remember telling a minister, who wanted me to recount the experience, that to let go of someone that deeply was the ultimate test of love. You cannot let go on that level if you are concerned with what it means to you. Only if you want what is right for that soul. That's the love of being - not having, the force that connects all life to all life. I guess you could say selfless or fear-less love. I know now that "hell" is the fear that holds us. "HELL" is being stuck between the physical world and the next world. We need to have felt and understood the "love - of - being", that selfless, fear-less love, at some point in our existence to pass that wall. That's the message of love. Not the feeling most of us call love. There has to be nothing in it for us. It doesn't matter how we understood it or what we felt it for - just as long as we did.

A couple of hours after I got home from the hospital, I laid down, closed my eyes and was back at the purple/black wall. It's funny but it wasn't so intimidating this time. I looked behind it and found that it was a curtain. I slipped behind the curtain and went up the path and I saw my father much farther into the light. I wanted to go - but the curtain was suddenly in front of me and I was told "not yet." I'm still trying to understand how and why I was able to go with my father. From what I have read and tried to research, this is not a very common thing, though I'm not the first person to have an experience like this.

There are a couple of things that I am very sure of now and they are that we are much more than flesh, bones and blood. That our actions and even our thoughts here mean a great deal more than we can ever imagine. That "love" is much more and much more powerful than most of us has even an inkling about.

I also know that my father and any other soul (here or passed) who has known real love for another being is OK and will be OK through eternity. I now KNOW we can ALL go home.