r/NDE

Those were the last words my cousin with cancer said just hours before she passed away.

I’m genuinely curious. Does anyone who has had an NDE have an explanation for what she might have seen?

The Pam Reynolds case is the one that got me completely stuck.

In 1991, she underwent a surgery called Hypothermic Cardiac Arrest

at the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix. Her heart was

stopped completely. Her body was cooled to 60°F. All blood was

drained from her brain. Her EEG went flat.

To confirm her brain was producing zero activity, the surgical team

played continuous clicking sounds directly into her ears at 100

decibels — and monitored her brainstem response. The clicking

stopped registering.

By every clinical measure, there was no one left in there.

When she woke up, she described:

— A surgical tool she had never seen before (a Midas Rex bone saw)

in specific detail, including how its case was arranged

— A conversation she couldn't have heard — a female surgeon saying

her arteries were "too small" — which matched the surgical record

— Both of these from a perspective above the table, looking down

Cardiologist Dr. Michael Sabom spent years cross-referencing her

account against the actual surgical records. He couldn't explain it.

What gets me is that this isn't a "I saw a light and felt peaceful"

story. It's specific mechanical and verbal details — verified against

documented evidence — occurring during a window when her brain

showed no detectable activity.

Has anyone here looked into this case deeply? Curious what people

who've actually had NDEs think about the verified-detail aspect

specifically.

I went pretty deep into the medical documentation on this one

recently — happy to share more if anyone's interested.

One thing I've been wondering about lately is grief after an NDE.

Not grief over dying. Not grief over coming back. Just... grief.

Since my NDE, I carry it with me almost every day. I wouldn't call it depression. I'm grateful to be alive. I enjoy life. I laugh. I still find joy in ordinary things.

But grief has become part of me. It's almost always there, just below the surface. It doesn't take much to bring it out. A song. A movie. An act of kindness. A husband putting his wife's dreams ahead of his own. Someone willingly sacrificing themselves for another.

I've spent months trying to make sense of it.

The best way I've found to describe it is this: I wonder if grief is simply another expression of love.

Or maybe grief is the shadow cast by love.

After all, we don't grieve what we never loved.

Before my NDE, I would have said love and grief were almost opposites. Now I don't think that's true anymore.

The more I think about it, the more they seem connected. Maybe grief isn't the absence of love at all. Maybe it's the continuation of love when it's separated from the thing it longs for.

I don't know.

I'm not presenting that as truth. It's simply the best words I've found for my own experience.

Since my NDE, I seem to feel both love and grief more deeply than I ever did before. They almost seem to travel together now.

I'm curious whether anyone else has experienced something similar.

Not fear.

Not depression.

A quiet grief that coexists with gratitude. A grief that seems tied to love rather than opposed to it.

Has anyone else experienced that after an NDE?

I’ve been sitting here thinking about the whole philosophical part of life and how time isn’t linear. And then it hit me.

If we choose to forget and to suffer in order to learn and grow…is that technically even ethical? I can understand wanting to experience life and all its suffering and love, etc. That’s not the part that’s bothering me.

I’m wondering how it’s acceptable to sign away your own right to remember away…and say that no matter how much you regret the decision, you can’t leave. You can’t choose to suffer less. You can’t check out if it ends up being too much. You can’t even get a hint of what’s on the other side to get you a little extra motivation or drive to keep moving forward through the tough times.

Thankfully, I’m not someone who’s severely depressed. But when I think of people who are…how is their higher self allowed to make a choice like that? I don’t know how to explain it.

This whole thing is kind of like signing an agreement to have someone torture you and giving them the right to not stop even if you change your mind and beg them to when you realize that getting beat to a pulp is even worse than you initially thought it would be. If your torturer didn’t stop even when you said enough…I don’t think that would hold water in a court because it’s still unethical. Even if you signed a contract with a torturer. Common decency says that you should be allowed to not be tortured if you change your mind in the midst of getting your teeth pulled out with pliers. Granted, it’s unethical to beat someone at all…but that’s the closest “life can be torture” example I can think of.

So, while I understand the concept of us knowing it’s what you want when you’re in a more “intelligent” level of thinking…isn’t that still a little…wrong on some level? You’re not technically the same “person” when you’re here. You’re being filtered and “nerfed” by being in a body.

It’s easy to say “yeah, I’ll do it” when you’re not currently experiencing the trauma. But, once you’re in the trauma, I don’t know how I feel about not being able to say “ok, nevermind. I don’t want this anymore”.

Is this making any sense? I feel like I might not be explaining this very well.

The reason I ask this is because everyone who has had an NDE seems to talk about unity and being one etc. Did your perspective on immigration change after your NDE?

Experience Description

I was the anesthesiologist, and not the person who had the near death experience.

The patient was having surgery on his right lung as I recall. During the operation, the surgeon accidentally transected the right pulmonary artery, causing catastrophic bleeding. The blood loss was so severe that, in order to identify and repair the damaged vessel, the surgeon allowed the patient’s blood so that he could clearly see the blood vessel. It took a couple of minutes before the vessel could finally be seen. Once control of the bleeding was achieved, we began aggressive resuscitation and gradually restored the patient’s blood volume.

During that time, the patient was pulseless for approximately six to eight minutes. Immediately before the event, he had been under deep general anesthesia, appropriate for major lung surgery, and he remained under anesthesia for the rest of the procedure. During the resuscitation effort, both the cardiac surgical team and the cardiac anesthesia team were called into the operating room to assist.

At the end of surgery, the patient was brought to the intensive care unit. He was sedated with medications for a day or two. After a couple of days, the sedatives were allowed to wear off. Upon waking, the patient was fairly confused. I visited the patient several times a day for the next few days, and the confusion lifted after two or three more days.

Once the confusion lifted, the patient still had a persistent belief that although he had intended to have surgery on his lung, he had in fact had heart surgery. When I asked him why he believed that, he told me that he was floating at the ceiling of the room. He was watching his body be resuscitated. He noted that what he described as the cardiac team had come into the room and was working on him. He reasoned that since he saw the cardiac team in the operating room, he must have had surgery on his heart.

Have you ever shared this experience with others? Yes
I shared it with clinical colleagues.

Did you have any knowledge of near death experience (NDE) prior to your experience? No

What did you believe about the reality of your experience shortly (days to weeks) after it happened? Experience was probably real
Considering that the patient was under general anesthesia and pulseless at the time he was making accurate observations about what happened in the OR, it's hard to discount the experience.

What do you believe about the reality of your experience now? Experience was probably real
As above.

https://www.nderf.org/Experiences/jonathan_w_patient_nde_33349.htm

this one is hard to explain away

I hate the idea. I can't stand the idea of not having a personality but I need to know what you think? Do you believe in Ego death?

I'm curious about Near Death Experiencers who're interested in the philosophy of not birthing (basically like antinatalism, but not with the negative associations or history around it)

I totally respect near death experiencers and believers of NDEs who're pro natalism because I understand because of the concept of eternal life there may be a great deal of positivity and wholeness about birthing souls into material form to learn lessons and to bring back that knowledge with them to the spirit realms or other realms.

But what about people who like have a physical aversion to the idea of birthing souls into a material realm, it just doesn't fit right, it feels like a black hole inside your heart or basically insensitive to whatever you hold dear.

I used to think that it was mainly alot of people who had mental health syndromes who're likely to be the people who're interested in the philosophy of not birthing beings onto earth.

But I'm really interested in near death experiences, the after life, morality and antinatalism (or better specifically not giving birth rather than any negative associations associated with antinatalism).

Do you guys want to talk about it?

Often times from many of these NDEs I see this notion of having to return back to your body by either some sort of entity asking you to do so or a general abstract feeling. Many NDEs speak about the unconditional love of the universe, and the whole reason for us being here is:

- To keep the balance of infinity. If there is love, then there must be suffering, so we voluntarily come here to keep that balance.

- To experience unconditional love through the means of extreme suffering.

I've read many reports of people talking to entities upset about how we have to suffer, and almost everytime these beings go "We know." Like they are aware it's unfair, and oh-so terrible.

Does anyone else have similar stories they've read with this idea of our purpose and the universe? Or your own stories?

I read in a source that experiences occurring under general anesthesia—without cardiac arrest—pose a greater challenge for materialist science, because they can no longer rely on post-arrest gamma waves. It is also said that in this state, brain activity is suppressed by anesthetic drugs, making the conditions for generating a coherent experience extremely difficult. Has anyone here had a near-death experience while under anesthesia—specifically without cardiac arrest?

Does praying to saints, God, or Jesus actually do anything?

Suppose a person has a hard life, there are those who'll say that this person is responsible for their own hardships since their soul planned it all along. So it's better to accept whatever comes. Some say that help will come from the other side for that person to **endure** their trials.

But what I want to know is whether the Divine will assist anyone who asks for help. What if a person suffers from a terminal illness like cancer and doesn't want to go just yet? What if someone is an addict and can't see a way out? Will the Divine/Higher Self/Higher Beings answer their request and provide a solution? Or will that person have to accept that they are own their own?

I'm an addict and have been struggling with it for many years now. I haven't seen improvements despite multiple rehabilitation. An idea has occurred to me that maybe this is the life that I'm supposed to have.

Prepare for some stupidness in my choices ahead. When I was 18, my friends gifted me acid for my birthday. Shortly after, my boyfriend at the time and I took the acid together in a beautiful park on a Sunday afternoon. It was my first time doing acid, though I’d had several shroom trips, all of which were positive experiences.

At first, it was mesmerizing. I remember looking up in the sky and seeing rainbows around the clouds, following airplanes, and bouncing around throughout the sky. I remember looking at a tree and seeing it as something which held wisdom, it was so beautiful. For the sake of time, I will jump forward a bit.

At some point I remembered I was on my period and felt the overwhelming need to get a new tampon, but I didn’t have any with me (yup). I told my boyfriend I wanted to go home, our only choice was for him to drive us (I know). Being the dumb teens we were, he said he didn’t feel comfortable being around my parents, and that he was going to take me to my friends apartment instead. This apartment was basically a trap house that a bunch of semi-neglected seniors in high school rented and trashed. I didn’t want to be there, it was the last place I wanted to be. But there we went.

I remember feeling an emptiness I’d never experienced in my life. A great discomfort with everything and everyone. My friends had the wonderful suggestion I take a shot of tequila and hit the bong, maybe then I’d feel better.

Instead my trip took a sharp turn towards ego death that 18-year old me was not prepared for. I cant possibly share every detail, so I’m going to share a few that stand out, all of which led up to the NDE. At one point I was laying in my friends bed with my boyfriend next to me. I remember feeling the spirit of his father, who had died in his arms 3 years prior when my bf was only 16, telling me he needed to use my body to share a message with him. I felt his spirit reach into the side of my stomach and I resisted so hard out of fear. The spirit was strong and ripped my soul out of my body. I was looking down on my body, watching it speak to my boyfriend. At first, it repeated the experience of dying in his son’s arms, which was awful. Despite being out of my body, I could still feel some things happening within it. it felt like I was having a heart attack, this is how his father died. My boyfriend held my body in his arms, crying over it and begging his father not to die. The spirit in me then made my body sit up, and looked at him directly in the eyes. The spirit (or me, in a highly psychotic state, who’s to say for certain) told him that he needed to let go of what happened and “be a man“ for his sister and mom and to change the path he was on. My body hugged my boyfriend and gave him a firm kiss on his forehead, then I immediately felt my spirit fall back into my body. My boyfriend was sobbing and was definitely fearful of me. Before I mention this next piece, just a reminder that my boyfriend was also tripping hard. He told me I’d been speaking to him in his native tongue, Arabic. Of course I couldn’t really think about this at the time, my body felt like a vessel where more spirits were trying to enter me and I was terrified.

Again I can’t possibly share all the details, so jumping ahead I experienced my past life which I’ve recently shared in another post and will link here. edit- (https://www.reddit.com/r/pastlives/comments/1ujbd9h/saw\_my\_past\_life\_while\_on\_acid\_years\_ago\_i\_always/)

On to the NDE. At some point, things took a dark turn and I needed to go to the hospital. I believe this part happened either just before I was in the ambulance, or while I was in it. As far as I am aware I never actually died, but with all of the chaos I believe it’s possible I may have for a moment. They did tell me later that my heart rate was incredibly high, somewhere in the 230s+, so part of thinks it may have stopped for just a moment before starting back on its own, no idea if that’s even possible. Suddenly I was going through a tunnel, and unlike most NDE’s, as I traveled through the tunnel, and yes, towards the light, all around me I saw my loved ones who were all still living. They were waving bye to me, and telling me not be scared, and telling me they loved me. It felt warm and comforting, I felt no fear. At some point the faces became unfamiliar, but they were still warm and friendly with overwhelming love coming from them. I reached the light and it was nothing but overwhelming bliss inside, I was so happy to be there. The same voice who showed me my past life told me that it wasn’t my time, but he had something to show me first. He took me into the universe, I was flying through the stars, I felt so much joy I cannot even describe it. I was told that we all must reincarnate until we reach enlightenment, and that when we do, we come back as a new star, but also that this wasn’t the end either. didn’t get to find out what came after that. I wanted to become a star, it was all I wanted lol. The voice reminded me that it wasn’t my time yet. I didn’t want to believe it, I didn’t want to go back. After moving through the universe, the voice told me it would see me again one day and that it was time to return to my body. It told me my job on earth was to help other people, and that I wasn’t done yet. I felt some acceptance, and then suddenly I was falling back to earth, and back to my body being put in an ambulance on the way to the hospital, my mom next to me.

I know this story fits a typical NDE in many ways, but I cannot say for certain whether thats what it was. The experience transformed me, but I remain skeptical of all of the details. Still I thought it worth sharing here, so thanks for reading. Here to answer any questions, and am also open to people saying this may not have been a NDE, it was spiritual regardless.

I have not had an NDE but rather an OBE and it seems that I started expereincing the "vu" several times a day on a daily basis about a year after all of that happened. I have been evaluated by 2 different neurologists and was medically cleared and am not suffering from seizures or neurological issues of any sort so there's that. I think some of it may be depersonalization from trauma but that doesn't explain the other...stuff.

I'm kind of a regular in the precognition sub (in addition to déjà vu I have a lot of precognitive dreams) - but now but I thought I'd pop in here and just ask you guys since reading NDEs has helped me in more ways than one and I did read on nderf about experiencers getting déjà vu after their experiences.

Did you get any insight as to why this happens or experience it yourself after your NDE?

Lately I have been reading a lot of Reddit posts, articles and scientific studies about consciousness, and the more I read the more I find myself leaning toward a materialist view, although I am still undecided and genuinely trying to understand both perspectives.
I’m curious to hear what convinced you that there is something after death and what convinced you that NDEs are not simply a product of brain activity.
For example I came across research suggesting that during the dying process some patterns of brain activity resemble those seen during REM sleep or memory recall, I know this doesn’t prove that NDEs are dreams but it made me wonder how proponents of NDEs interpret these findings
I also struggle with the idea that if consciousness truly ends at death life might just have no objective purpose. It seems strange to think that someone could live a long happy meaningful life and then 20 minutes after they die, no longer have any awareness that they ever existed
I’m genuinely interested in hearing what evidence, arguments or personal experiences convinced you that consciousness survives death. I am not looking for an argument, im simply trying to understand the reasoning behind your views.
Thanks.

A brief introduction to near-death experiences among the congenitally blind, with some philosophical considerations.

1. In various OBE accounts, the experiencer often describes it as real and not dream-like, but at the same time, they don't always realize that they are seeing their own body. Why would you not recognize you are looking at yourself, especially if you know the context behind everything (for example, someone in a surgery room or seeing yourself from above the scene from an accident), plus you would know what you look like?

2. I would think that people would show surprise or shock at seeing their loved ones in an NDE, and this is actually common for deathbed visions. But in NDEs, people often react as if they are simply happy and not questioning of it at all. Why do you think that is? Maybe it's just how people tend to describe the experience after the fact.

And of course, if your experience was different than what I described, I would be curious how so! Thank you!