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What It Feels Like to Die
The Atlantic ^ | 09/09/16 | Jennie Dear

Posted on 09/11/2016 6:14:34 PM PDT by BunnySlippers

A week or two after we spoke to the nurse, my mother sank into a state where she was rarely conscious. When she was awake, it was only the most basic part of her that was there: the part that told her legs to move to get her to the bathroom, the automated steps in brushing her teeth and then wiping the sink afterward. Her mind turned away from her children and husband for the first time.

I wanted to know what she was thinking about. I wanted to know where her mind was. Being at the bedside of an unresponsive dying person can feel like trying to find out whether someone is home by looking through thick-curtained windows. Is the person sleeping, dreaming, experiencing something supernatural? Is her mind gone?

For many dying people, “the brain does the same thing that the body does in that it starts to sacrifice areas which are less critical to survival,” says David Hovda, director of the UCLA Brain Injury Research Center. He compares the breakdown to what happens in aging: People tend to lose their abilities for complex or executive planning, learning motor skills—and, in what turns out to be a very important function, inhibition.

(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; Health/Medicine; Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: dying; health; medicine
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To: Eroteme; sparklite2

Was it in cursive?


21 posted on 09/11/2016 7:12:32 PM PDT by TigersEye (~Putin made me post this!~)
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To: carriage_hill

Thank you.


22 posted on 09/11/2016 7:14:22 PM PDT by BunnySlippers (I Love Bull Markets!!!)
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To: sparklite2

I was sick a couple of times. I felt like I was floating. But I wasn’t reading anything.


23 posted on 09/11/2016 7:14:48 PM PDT by Vermont Lt
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To: be-baw

I’m thinking suffocation might be a relatively painless way of dying.
______

Maybe for you. When I was a child I dreamed that I was swimming in the ocean and all the salt had crusted over my head like ice. I could not break through and it was terrifying - not being able to breathe. I woke up face down jerking my head out of the pillow.

One reason that palliative care includes benzodiazepines like Valium and Ativan is for “air hunger” the terror that comes from not being able to breathe sufficiently.


24 posted on 09/11/2016 7:16:14 PM PDT by heartwood (If you're looking for a </sarc tag>, you just saw it.)
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To: newfreep

my condolences


25 posted on 09/11/2016 7:18:47 PM PDT by Chode (You Owe Them Nothing - Not Respect, Not Loyalty, Not Obedience, NOTHING!)
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To: Nifster

Vale.........


26 posted on 09/11/2016 7:19:09 PM PDT by Red Badger (Make America AMERICA again!.........................)
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To: Eroteme

LOL!!!!!!!!!.........


27 posted on 09/11/2016 7:19:53 PM PDT by Red Badger (Make America AMERICA again!.........................)
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To: Nifster
< This is why I volunteer at hospice. It is a sacred thing to help someone from this veil of tears

Hospice provided so much comfort at both my mother and father-in-laws' deaths. We couldn't have made it without them. It's was bad to see them in horrible pain and the nurses and staff really helped ease them towards the light. You have no idea how much what you do is a blessing to everyone involved. Thank you for your service.

28 posted on 09/11/2016 7:23:59 PM PDT by jsanders2001
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To: sparklite2

Other doctors have had different results.

https://www.amazon.com/Evidence-Afterlife-Science-Near-Death-Experiences/dp/B005WFVZZC


29 posted on 09/11/2016 7:27:27 PM PDT by HerrBlucher (For the sake of His sorrowful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world.)
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To: Eroteme

Perfect


30 posted on 09/11/2016 7:27:53 PM PDT by Magic Fingers (Political correctness mutates in order to remain virulent.)
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To: HerrBlucher

Please elaborate. Floating patients could read signs inaccessible to people in bed?


31 posted on 09/11/2016 7:31:28 PM PDT by sparklite2 (The game overs whether you play it or not.)
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To: jsanders2001

“...the nurses and staff really helped ease them towards the light.”

That’s the most beautiful description of bodily death I’ve ever heard. It’s not an end, but a beginning for those alive in the Spirit.

“Don’t bother coming to my funeral because I won’t be there!”

I also believe that nobody is buried in a cemetery.


32 posted on 09/11/2016 7:41:53 PM PDT by elcid1970 ("The Second Amendment is more important than Islam. Buy ammo.")
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To: sparklite2

I think there is one case of that. However most of the evidence revolves around people being able to describe what the doctors are doing from an angle above them and even events in other rooms while they are under anesthesia and in the middle of surgery. It is a very interesting book.


33 posted on 09/11/2016 7:43:19 PM PDT by HerrBlucher (For the sake of His sorrowful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world.)
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To: Red Badger

Thanks you are correct....as in hill and vale


34 posted on 09/11/2016 7:45:01 PM PDT by Nifster (Ignore all polls. Get Out The Vote)
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To: jsanders2001

It truly is my pleasure and honor


35 posted on 09/11/2016 7:46:59 PM PDT by Nifster (Ignore all polls. Get Out The Vote)
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To: HerrBlucher

I’ve read a lot of books like that. My favorite is probably Life After Life by Moody. You’re right. Some of the things are uncanny. The good thing is, we’ll all find out someday.

I have had surgery under anesthesia that contains memory blocking so that you don’t wake up groggy; you are so alert, you may not even think anything has happened. It’s like taking videotape, cutting out footage, and resplicing the tape. If there is any sort of continuity, the viewer is completely unaware a section is missing.

That, to me, is what death is like. Except the tape doesn’t continue after the splice, and you never wake up.


36 posted on 09/11/2016 7:50:12 PM PDT by sparklite2 (The game overs whether you play it or not.)
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To: sparklite2

Well I think it is best to live your life as if you do wake up into the next life and have to be accountable for everything you thought said and did. If there is no afterlife then of course it doesn’t matter. But if there is..... a comfortable and happy eternity is nothing to sneeze at.


37 posted on 09/11/2016 8:04:18 PM PDT by HerrBlucher (For the sake of His sorrowful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world.)
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To: HerrBlucher

I think what we do matters, but empirically and in this world. It is sad to think the only thing that keeps some people from barbaric behavior is fear of afterlife punishment, but if that’s what it takes, I won’t complain. :)


38 posted on 09/11/2016 8:07:25 PM PDT by sparklite2 (The game overs whether you play it or not.)
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To: sparklite2

Actually refraining from Evil Deeds out of fear of punishment doesn’t help you in the next life. It is your desires and intent that matter. If you desire to murder someone but don’t out of fear of going to jail or being executed, you are still a murderer at heart. Just like lusting after other women other than your wife makes you an adulterer at heart. You will be accountable for that in the next life.

Death strips away the false fronts we carry around with us in life, and leaves only the bare naked soul in all its glory and or depravity of heart.


39 posted on 09/11/2016 8:16:05 PM PDT by HerrBlucher (For the sake of His sorrowful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world.)
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To: HerrBlucher

Just like lusting after other women other than your wife makes you an adulterer


I remember when this subject was breached in the Carter years. I decided the next time they passed around the collection plate, I would only THINK about putting something in. Yeah, I’m going to hell. LOL


40 posted on 09/11/2016 8:18:14 PM PDT by sparklite2 (The game overs whether you play it or not.)
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