Afterlife

[xoxoxoBruce]

From imgur

I'm 25 and have been declared dead three times. Though the circumstances leading up to the event were all different, heart failure was the ultimate ruling for each death. Whenever it comes up in conversation I have no qualms with saying what happened and how, but I put on a fake smile and talk about the 'light' or the 'other side' when people ask about the afterlife, heaven and whether or not there were voices or tunnels, etc.

When asked about the actual dying as opposed to asking about some kind of afterlife, THAT'S when I can tell the truth. Those people aren't asking for comfort, they're asking for my perception or experience of death. Don't read further if you don't want to know the feeling of dying.

It was an odd feeling, but the same each time, it begins by being completely adrift in empty, black space. It isn't warm or cold, I'm not flying or falling, it's simply a secession of the world. There's some mild distortion to the abyss, a sort of old TV-static effect, oddly blue/gray fuzz that's only barely detectable and some random, pulsing colors blending effortlessly with the darkness.

My mind is intact but not completely self aware. Sounds are still around me and sometimes, at the beginning, I could still hear what's going on around my body but it's like listening through water or a muffling wall and sped up too fast. Things blur together until it's just incoherent noise, the mind begins to see ghostly colors in the black as it struggles for some kind of stimuli when there is none.

I was aware of my limbs without seeing them, they shook violently as my body shut down but the feeling was of dull thuds on body parts mostly numbed. They calm and slump to my sides, then they fade. Slowly at first with a bit of static tingling, starting from the fingertips and toes, the sensation inches closer to the core. I somehow knew in the back of my mind that I was slowly dying and fading into the void, but there's no panic, no fear or anxiety. Simple recognition of a transition, from something real and solid into... nothing.

I became oddly aware of my chest and gut as well, feeling the muscles in my barrel twitch and spasm, ultimately going silent. As arms and legs were fading, so too went the rest of the body piece by piece. Some of the more obvious ones were there right away; the lack of a heartbeat, the emptiness of breath and yet no burning in it's absence, the growling of a stomach now made useless and some other oddly specific spots in the gut that twitch and numb.

But then the smaller things, like despite the generally ambient feeling of the emptiness surrounding me, a chill goes up my spine and spreads the cold throughout me. Much like the sensations of stepping from a cool spring day's sunlight into a shadow. It isn't a biting chill, no shock to be had, just a simple change into a lower energy state, barely noticeable... but there just the same. It travels upward, just ahead of the vanishing line of the body parts and chills the tissue. Nerves go silent, muscles release tensions held unknowingly, blood sinks back and changes the weight of my body ever so delicately.

Once my limbs and body had faded, complex thought was dying rapidly, I figure that the oxygen content in my brain must have gotten low enough at this point. Things like not recognizing the faint bluish-gray background static behind ghostly colors of the void. The deep crimsons, emeralds and violets gently pulsing adrift in the endless abyss. Any sensory input the mind could hold on to starts slipping, becoming more along the lines of 'dark... not dark, but dark'. Wondering about those distant muffled sounds around me, auditory and cognitive functions winding down and becoming 'sound, not sound... a loud quiet'. Whatever is making the hushed buzz is as interesting to me as a distant conversation about the stock exchange is to a fish.

No recognition of what was once the 'self' or how I was simply reduced to shapeless thoughts left adrift, dissipating into shadow. I can't exactly put it into words, probably because I as dangling dangerously over the brink at that point, but I saw this comic posted a while back and the mental steps in the beginning are fairly close to how my mind faded (in reverse, obviously).

But then...

Light slammed into me. It burned my eyes and set the whole of existence aflame. Pain was everywhere, my body made flesh again. Lungs burned and heaved, heart pounded angrily against my ribs and pushed heavy blood back through limbs I thought were long lost. Terrible, impossible electricity wracked my muscles as my nerves reawakened and my very guts writhed in protest. Down. I was down. Need to get up, get away, get off the floor. The floor was cold, each and every time I was revived. But I could feel it, the cold, I could feel warmth in the air. I struggled but my hands couldn't move far, and my legs were pinned. Straining my spine to lift only revealed weight upon me, urgent sounds loud in my ears.

The EMTs had brought me back and my brain reeled at the overload of stimuli and confusion took over. I simply gave up and lay there, wide eyed and filled with a desperate, fleeing panic as my consciousness rebooted. After a minute or two, I was back, I was alive and at least mildly aware of what had happened within the last five to fifteen minutes while my classmates or coworkers had been giving me CPR, waiting for paramedics. Luckily, each of the three times I had died so far there were people around who could handle that kind of thing, so I guess that counts for something.

All in all, getting back to the post, I kinda feel bad for lying to him, but I don't want to be that fucking guy that goes and tarnishes someone's belief with what I'd gone through. For all I know, maybe there is a heaven with bright light and fluffy clouds, a rainbow bridge with all the pets we've ever loved and lost, but for me... I don't want to tell them

He also posted a link to this cartoon/graphic.. Darwin's Defeat.

[BigV]

Nice, very, very nice, both of them. Thanks xoB.

[Rhianne]

Declared dead three times? By whom?

There's some real incompetency going on there.

I imagine there are a few genuine cases across the world each year of people 'coming back to life' after being declared dead but I very much doubt that one person has ever really been declared dead three times and told the tale.

[xoxoxoBruce]

[Billy Crystal]It depends if they are dead, or mostly dead. [/Billy Crystal]

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Rhianne

Declared dead three times? By whom?

There's some real incompetency going on there.

I imagine there are a few genuine cases across the world each year of people 'coming back to life' after being declared dead but I very much doubt that one person has ever really been declared dead three times and told the tale.

Maybe he's using a bit of hyperbole with "declared" dead, but medical personnel bring people back all the time from complete heart failure. You can be dead for a solid couple of minutes without even sustaining brain damage.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Yes, mostly dead.

[Rhianne]

Am I too cynical?

Surely if a reader is willing to accept such hyperbole, or 'bullshit' some might say, in the very first sentence then he's going to have no difficulty whatsoever in believing anything the writer might have to say in his following piece.

[Clodfobble]

He's talking about the physical feeling of dying. It's like describing your pain level to someone else--of course it would have been subjective, no matter what. But obviously people are interested in his subjective experience, since they keep asking him. We'll all be doing it someday, but few have managed to put the brakes on and come back and tell us what it felt like, so people are curious in whatever details they can scrounge up.

I'm confused as to why you seem so angry with the guy, unless maybe you're religious and you're pissed that he's brazenly declaring there's no afterlife.

[Rhianne]

Haha, no, nothing like that. I was only remarking on that first sentence and hadn't actually felt compelled to read on - I've only just done that now.

Did I really come across as angry or pissed? I'll need to have a look at my own writing style!

[xoxoxoBruce]

You shouldn't be put off by the click bait lead in, 99% will temper that statement.