NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCES

Heaven is for Real, I just finished watching this movie. I truly believe this story was true. I have had a few near death experiences in this lifetime, and the explination of colors you can’t describe, peace like you have never felt, and the ability to see below you; even people and things going on in other places, while you are in a state of in between this world and the next, which I believe we call heaven.

When I was 6 years old, I went to sleep in my bed at night, and never woke up for 2 weeks. I had contraced encephallitis. There are many types, mine was an airborne strain. At the time I lived in Syracuse New York, and my parents Beth and Jack had just got married a few months before. I had not been adopted by Jack yet, and we had moved from a small town to the city.

I was in first grade at the time, and I believe it was around October when this happened. It took quite awhile for the doctors to decide what was to be done with me. It turns out at least 60 other people had contracted this disease also, and many were either dying, or having severe complications. Encephallitis is a swelling of the brain, and of course if it swells too much they have to drill a hole in your head. This happened in the early sixties, so medicine was very much less advanced than it is now.

I know that I don’t remember any of the time I was in a coma, but my mother said I would scream in pain, and for awhile I was in a quarantine room, even she couldn’t see me. Eventually they let her stay with me, and then one night, the doctors told her that they did not expect me to make it through the night, and they should prepare for this.

Well the next morning I woke up and asked for my monkey. I had a stuffed monkey and of course it was brought to me pronto. I believe you could call that a miracle.

I have no recollection as I said of what went on when I was in the coma. I do know when I came out of it I had an unwavering faith that cannot be explained. My family was religious, but not over the top, as we visited church on holidays.

I also know that I had a person in the spirit world, who I talked to often. This spirit gave me calm and the faith to always act on my gut feelings. (at the time my mother said I had an imaginary friend)

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I knew it was spirit, and learned to not speak of it anymore. I never really had a fear of death, and was a rebellious child; who would try any dare made.

For two years I had to be on many drugs given for seizures, and I wasn’t allowed to go near water, for fear I would drown, if I lost my balance.

I do know that I had to relearn the alphabet, and learn how to feed myself again, as I had lost motor control. I have been told that I am written up in the medical journals as I came out of the event perfectly unscathed mentally. Many others were forever incopassitated mentally. This was in first grade, and I passed without having to repeat the grade.

Needless to say Jack and Beth decided to move to a smaller town in upstate NY with cleaner air. As a result of the encephallitis, I lost most of my memory of my childhood; though over the years it turns out I remembered some through my dreams.

Eventually they had a son, my brother, and at that time Jack adopted me as his own. All through my young life, I never had fear of dying, which made for an interestingly free feeling time of adventures. I often think of that as a miracle and blessing.

SECOND EVENT

In 1969 my Aunt and Uncle came to visit. My grandmother had died and we had bought a triler for camping that slept 6. My aunt and uncle stayed in the trailer during their visit, and they had a TV in there, which was plugged into an extension cord, attached inside the garage, all the comforts of home.

Well the second day of their visit, while deciding what they would like to have for dinner, my father said “ I sure would like some sardines.”

After looking for them in the house, mom said “They must be in the camper.”

So I jumped up and ran out to the trailer to get the sardines for my dad.

Well as I grabbed the handle of the trailer, I could not let go. I felt a funny buzzing, tingling through my body. I also saw a jagged whitish yellow line that was the outline of my whole body next to myself connected to my hand. I couldn’t figure out what the heck was going on, and I couldn’t let go of the doorknob either.

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I saw a few kids were riding their bikes down our road, and it all looked like they were moving in slow motion. I know these kids were riding fast as they were racing, but to me it looked slow.

I ran into the house to tell my parents what had happened and that I had burned my hand. They gave the following accounting of the episode to me:

When I came into the house and up the stairs smoke was rising from my head and my clothes, there was a burnt smell, and I was talking so fast that they couldn’t understand what I was saying. They made me sit down, and tried to understand me.

I proceeded to tell them that I burnt my hand on the door of the trailer, and saw jagged whitish yellowish outline of my body. It was a truly odd experience.

My Uncle said “ I felt a little jolt like static electricity in the morning when we came to the house, but we had our slippers on.

Apparently the trailer was hit by lightening, and the tv was fried. But no one knew that until a lot of checking out what could have happened. It turns out I grounded 1/3 of the trailer, as it had one metal wheel, and two rubber ones. (When lightening hit the trailer it should have had 3 or 4 rubber wheels to be grounded, but since the metal wheel was there it only grounded part of the lightening strike. The rest was grounded when I, with bare feet, on wet grass acted as a conductor; hence grounding the voltage.)

The next morning I was takento the doctor, I guess they didn’t think smoke coming out of my body was reason to go to the hospital??

The doctor said to watch me for a few days, and thankfully that it wasn’t my brother who had gone to get the sardines, if so, he would have died as he was too small for his body to handle that much electricity.

You can’t make this stuff up, It is the Gods honest truth. I still can remember the jagged outline, and decided that whoever had made that representation in cartoons had been electrocuted themselves.

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Another miracle, I don’t know, but I had total faith that I would be ok. I never really thought about it until a few years ago, many years later.

THIRD EVENT

Skipping ahead a year, in the time LSD “turn on, tune in, drop out”. I had been meditating as I learned after the Beatles went East, transcendental meditation. Still a young teen, 15, I was given a tiny orange pill, and told it was a great time, and very mind opening. (You must recall my being fearless of death)

What the heck, myself and a friend cut it up with a razor, and I recall my neighbor who dated her, saying “Dont’t let her take too much, she might not be able to handle it.”

So I took 2/3 of it and she took 1/3 of it, it was such a tiny thing about the size of a match head, but orange. Well let me tell you I learned about traces (when you observe someone throwing a basketball; and you see an arc of 30 basketballs instead of one, heading toward the basket.

Your perception is totally off, and you go into another realm. I truly saw a funeral procession in my wood paneling. I thought I was seeing my future.

I had terrible pains in my stomach and saw spider webs in the corners of the walls. It turns out the LSD was 4 way orange barrel, meaning it was 4 doses in one.

This was yet another time when many kids were flipping out, having mental breakdowns, etc. It turns out that there was Strychnine added to the tablet, which is rat poison.

The doctor I saw the next morning just told my parents to watch me for a few days, that I could have a flashback, which I never have…yet only a brush with death.

Still I had no fear of dying, even though I came close again. I have learned at my older age that that initial brush with encephalitis must have changed me some way, which I still can’t explain.

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FOURTH EVENT

Electrocuted once again in 1986…..I was 6 months pregnant with my daughter. I was making macaroni on the stove where I rented. It was an old stove all electric, and I put a pot of water on the stove to make the pasta for dinner.

When I went to pick up the pan and hold the handle to put pasta in, the bottom totally fell out of the pan, water went everywhere, and once again my hand was burned.

Turns out this time that the electric coil on the stove was faulty, the pan was metal, not stainless steel. When I grabbed the pan without a mitt, (It had a metal handle not wood), the bottom stuck and like welded right to the burner. I could not believe it, and was scared to death as I was pregnant.

Well I called the ob gyn, and that doctor said not to worry, the baby would be fine, as she was in the amneonic fluid, and electricity travels around the outside of your body when electrocuted.

I was hesitant to believe it, but my daughter was born later that year, on time, with no problems. I did however, reflect on the prior time with electricity and realize that was why I saw the jagged outline of my body with the trailer incident. And once again I had the burned skin to prove it.

Needless to say electricity is one thing I am weary of.

FIFTH EVENT

Lets fast forward to 1986, I have a daughter who is 3 years old, and am pregnant for the third time, as I lost a baby a few months before. I go to the doctor and he says I have a condition called Placenta Previa, that I have to go on total bed rest at 5 months through the pregnancy. It was a very high risk pregnancy, and without bedrest the baby might not make it.

After a few weeks at home on bed rest, I had a little bleeding, so I had to go into the hospital on total bed rest there. It was explained to me that if I started bleeding, the placenta would pass before the baby, leaving it with no oxygen, and barely a chance of surviving.

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I remember this was a terrible time,I was just turning 30. My three year old had to stay with her grandmothers during the day, and her father had to stay with her at night, I don’t even know how they explained what was going on to her. My daughter was not allowed to visit often, there were no cell phones, and I could not let my feet even touch the floor to go to the bathroom, bed pan only. They had to take me on a gurney to wash my hair even. (Odd fact, back then you could smoke in your hospital room, and I remember them letting me have one or two a day.)

I remember my mom bringing up a whole Thanksgiving Dinner to me at the hospital, and my daughter was allowed to be there there, a rarity! That was a treat, and now 3 weeks have passed, Christmas was coming.

I told the doctors and nurses I was leaving the hospital no matter what. I was not going to have my 3 year old daughter go without me home for Christmas and that was that!

I was at this time 8 months pregnant, and the baby would live if I had it at that time. With a promise I would stay off my feet, we headed home, bought a tree, and everyone shopped for me. I was just so happy to be home, it had been two long months. I still had to be very careful, no picking up my daughter or anything heavier than a glass of water. My daughter could not even jump on my belly, for fear of early birth of her brother, but at least I could be with her.

Well a week later the doctor misread my sonogram and told me the placenta had moved, I could regain movement, but not lifting of my daughter, etc. and no driving! So I could be home alone with my daughter, even when my husband was working at night. Before this I had to have someone with me at all times.

Well to my surprize, I put my daughter to bed, upstairs, and went to the bathroom. Blood, blood, more than you can imagine came out, no telling how much was water. I was afraid for the baby, as living that far from the hospital, I might not make there in time if I started bleeding. (That is what the nurses had told me when I left the hospital.)

Now, back then there were no cell phones, so I called my mother who had to come to be with my daughter, and then I called the ambulance.

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Needless to say, my husband was at work second shift, my mom called him, telling him to just meet us and the ambulance at the hospital.

I was told that it was 24 below zero that night. My mom showed up at the same time the ambulance did. Well can you believe it, they couldn’t figure out how to get me out of the house, as the gurney wouldn’t fit through the door, with the setup in the house. So they had to put me on a seated stretcher from the fire truck, and then onto the gurney, and into the ambulance.

Then they couldn’t find a vein to get in the IV, and they couldn’t leave without it as I had lost so much blood, I wouldn’t make it if they didn’t get a line in.

I don’t remember it being cold, but they said it was terribly cold, and finally they got the pick line in. Off we went to the hospital, with them talking to me the whole way, as I was in shock and BP low. (I did not realize this at the time)

I was taken right through the entry to the hospital and up to the Maternity ward, they never even stopped at the front desk. Straight up to maternity floor, and all the nurses knew me from when I was on bedrest for so long the months before.

Meanwhile, my husband had been waiting for 15 minutes, wondering where the heck I was, I should have been there by now.

Well the doctor put in another pick line, and they let him come in to see me at that point, I had needles in both arms. I remember clearly the doctor asking should he save the child or me if the choice had to be made.

I immediately screamed “Save the baby, I am the patient you have to do what I want!”

After that it gets a little fuzzy, I am in the OR, and the doctor gave me the epidural, I could not believe he was moving my legs and I couldn’t feel anything. There is a sheet put up between your head and belly so you cannot possibly see over it. All I felt was a little tugging on my skin. Of course that was the caserean. My husband was there watching the other side of the sheet, and I hear a man counting out loud over and over again.

“Doctor, her BP is dropping, we are going to lose her!” the anestesist said.

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I also remember the doctor saying “Stitches or stapels?”

I said “Stitches .” and remember floating off to sleep.

Next thing I know I wake up to my baby crying, and a nurse holding him in her hands , screaming “Look at your son, look at your son!!! “

I believe that is what brought me back, though at the time I didn’t know anything had happened. They quickly took him away and put me in the recovery room.

Now I open my eyes to one of the nurses who says “It is so good to see color back in those cheeks, you were so pale, we thought you wouldn’t make it.”

I asked, “Where is my son, I thought he could be in the room with me?”

She said “Due to the difficulty in birth he has to be kept in the ICU, and watched. We will bring him to you only for feeding.”

The doctors of course were gone, and it was early in the morning, I was feeling my heart racing, and wondered if the doctor could come to see me and possibly change my meds. I was told the head nurse could come to see me and possibly do that.

In she came and I asked her to change my meds as I was having crazy dreams. She asked me what kind of dreams, what did I mean.

I said “I saw myself floating above the room and watching everything going on. I saw you pumping in him oxygen by hand, into his face, and he looked bluish. I think that is why he has marks on his head above his nose”

“What else?” she asked

“You put drops in his eyes instead of salve like I had wanted. I also saw the doctor counting and counting some white gauze pads saying there weren’t all there.he was kind of acting stressed, and they were all bloody like gauze pads. “

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She looked at me and said, “ I am going to tell you something I shoudn’t but I know you well. You had an out of body experience. You exactly described everything that happened in the surgery room even though you had flatlined. It took over 3 units of blood to bring you back to normal, that is more than half the blood in your body. You are a miracle and your son has to be watched as he was born blue, but he is responding well. You get some rest, I will change your medicine. Also he is the longest term (two weeks early) placenta previa baby ever born in Syracuse, good work on your part.”

I remember feeling much calmer after they changed my drugs, and the nurse explained what had happened, that it wasn’t a nightmare, it truly was the events. By the way, it turns out two of the gauze pads had stuck together, and that was the delay for sewing me up, which led to the extra blood loss and my event.

Now, I did not cross into the white light, where you family members. All I can tell you is I know I had no fear, and I believe if not for my sons cries and the nurse yelling at me to look at him, I would not be here today.

I was totally at peace, more than I have ever felt in my life.

Obviously I started reading about near death experiences, and realizing that is probably what happened in first grade with the encephalitis.

I am truly of the belief that the reason for my blind faith was brought upon by my childhood experience. I do know that the colors up there are indescribable to our perception of color down here, and also the music you hear is not able to be reproduced on this plane of existence.

As has happened to many others with near death experiences, I have since honed my meditative skills. I can also communicate with others who have passed, and connect with my spirit guides, but that is another story.