Have you ever been close to death and experienced an out of body incident?

Mine happened many years ago after a very serious motorcycle accident.
I had several major internal injuries including ruptured bladder, ruptured intestines and a few things I can't even pronounce never mind spell.

It was about 3 weeks later after I finally got out of the ICU. I was confined to my hospital bed because I was in traction(broken femur)and I developed Phlebitis (blood clots in my legs).

This moron doctor, who probably never even looked at my chart, gave me a huge dose of Heparin(a strong anti-coagulant)to breakup and dissolve the clots.

What happened next was that the Heparin also opened up all the internal injuries and I literally started to bleed to death internally.

I remember feeling my body get very heavy and sinking deep into the bed.
Next thing I know I'm floating up by the T.V. and looking down at me and my room mate.
He was looking at me(in my bed) and frantically calling for a nurse. I saw a nurse take a few steps into the room and run back out. A few moments later there was a rush of doctors and nurses working on me, pumping blood into me and giving me CPR.

It was a very strange feeling, I watched in amazement and really didn't grasp the severity of what was taking place.

I soon realized what it all meant and that I needed to get back to my body. It was almost like swimming to get back there.

After the Dr's and nurses had left when I was stabilized, my roommate said to me "You were whiter then the sheets, I thought you were dead"
I just said "I was"

your mind controls all of your reality, there is no limit as to what can do...

But it raises many questions...is your "mind" the same as your brain?
We think of the brain as a bunch of neurons and chemical interactions that control our functions and emotions etc.
But when you are clinically dead, how does the "mind" still function outside the body?
Just interesting that we understand so little about life itself.

not sure if the mind and brain are different, seems like a metaphysical question... but i do know that research has shown that our neurons continue to fire for months after death...

but my main point was that everything we see, touch, feel, hear and sense is all controlled by these same neurons...

i'm not trying to take anything away from your terrible experience, and not saying it did or didn't happen, just trying to show a somewhat scientific explanation...

I died when I was a teenager from an overdose. I remember the things I saw & no one ever believed me back then. It was the ramblings of a half dead junkie...can't say I blame them from doubting me, but it was terrifying. I saw no light. I saw my own corpse and a room full of people leaning over me, who were never really in the room. For years after that, there were about 7 times where I saw 2 of these people again. One of them I've seen numerous times. Every time under strange circumstances and in odd places. I always felt like I had a demon following me and waiting, similar to how some have guardian angels. If there is a hell then it's probably where I'm headed and seeing those people gives me the feeling that they are just waiting. They are obviously not good and even though I feel uneasy every time I see them, I'm never scared. I havent spoken about this since back when I was a junkie destroying myself, and back when I did, everyone just basically thought all the things I've put in my body had caused flashbacks or hallucinations. Who knows, maybe they are right, but it sure feels real every time.I don't ask for it and it's not from fear and I havent been a junkie in 12 years, so I cant make sense of it. Perhaps it's just lasting effects.
When my son was born, I stopped doing everything, literally everything...I stopped every drug..hell even the cigarettes. He didn't ask to be born, so I owed him a childhood unlike the one I had, so I changed my actions (even though my outlook on myself and life still hasn't changed), so I assumed everything associated with that lifestyle would go away. I was wrong though, because what I saw back then still returns. Whether it was twice in the same year or once in 5 years. I wish I had an answer, simply out of curiousity, but I'm sure I'll find out someday. Anyways **** it, we reap what we sow and whatever awaits me, I definitely have coming to me, so no reason to whine or be scared.

Moe, didn't take your comment as a dig in anyway...it always good to hear different perspectives
I know some may think that these "experiences" are made up by the mind or hallucinations etc. But when everything that happened can be confirmed by hospital staff and my roommate than I can't just dismiss it as a "dream". And I could see if I was just laying there and overheard conversations and see what they are doing over me, that would be one thing. But I could see the whole room, my bed and my body from a completely different aspect.
Anyway it was an experience I'll never forget and just makes me wonder how or if our "minds" might not be part of the physical body.

truly amazing experiences

To: Serchin4MyRedWine
i suppose you did report your experience to the doctors. if so, what was their take? the reason for this Q is obviously to eliminate any known induced 'hallucinatory' effects of the drug.
did read somewhere that the brain releases (one of the p-glands) some chemicals that allow passage from pain to death. this is presented in '5 unexplained mysteries' on y.tube.

To: MM,
about the neurons firing well after 2 months?
my understanding was their electrical activity consumed energy supplied through blood flow.
unless, neurons cannibalize other neurons or brain fat - plausible.
would definitely like to read up if you could provide a link.

To: BHawkins,
first congratulations. knowing myself, i stayed away from experimenting with drugs; would never have got out of it. Heck, barely managed to give up drinks in Saudi Arabia & reverted back on return.

i agree that you experienced 2 different things.
1. the 'nd' experience - i have no knowledge on this

2. the repeated dreams (the lasting effects)
is it possible that the '2 demons' are a reminder to stay away? i do know that our brain is not exactly a 'unified whole'. We do have some components - brain-stem unit and the diencephelon (mammalian brain) that functions independently of our thinking brain (neo-cortex). To explore this you may like to read 'The Chimp Paradox' by Dr. Steve Peters. Again, this is not my field but a recent interest.
--xx--
from the said experiences it appears there are 2 kinds or stages of death:

1. where the heart stops - the brain-stem responsible 'dies'
the eyes don't respond to flashing light

2. where the cerebrum (neo-cortex) 'dies' - turning us to vegetables.

it is plausible that if stage 1 alone happens; otherwise healthy patients could be revived. The cortex pulls up the body so to speak.

all this may sound a bit 'cracked up' but in the absence of any model on death - this is something. i started thinking on these lines when my Dad passed away few months ago.
--xx--

thanks for sharing. very big of you guys.

In the paranormal section read my post on Near Death Experiences.

this relates to the dying brain.

http://jonbarron.org/article/brain-functions-even-after-death#.VyAlVL5vPIU

http://scitechdaily.com/study-shows-electrical-activity-in-the-brain-after-clinical-death/

v.interesting. MM
thanks for the link.

Well it's an interesting study and I have no doubt that "brain activity" in some form exists for a short period after "clinical death" but all that does not explain how I could see the room and my own body and the BACKS of those working on me from the outside. As I said, I was confined to my bed in traction and thereby could only see half the room from my vantage point, yet when floating up by the T.V., I could see my roomate's part of the room in full detail which I never saw from my bed.
I guess what I'm getting at is that I'm not sure if physical brain activity(like neuron interactions) equals our real consciousness.

in one of the links mice are subject to NDE and their neural activity fired up in all regions of the brain; in other words, even mice experience NDE similar to us.

that begs the question what do we mean by 'consciousness'?
by neural definitions, mice would have mice level consciousness;
may also have floating experiences; going by their known commonalities with the human brain; drug researching & so on.

so i am assuming by 'real consciousness' it should mean something transcending death: like immortal soul.

which if extrapolated would mean that if man was to have a soul
then how may mice be denied one?

'..all creatures great and small'

my intentions are not to trivialize this subject; just thinking aloud.

I guess that is what I'm getting at....maybe this out of body experience is more then just brain related, maybe it is our "soul" which leaves the physical body until the body is able to maintain it's physical functions.

I remember the first time I witnessed the death of someone not related to me. I had no emotional ties to this person and barely knew them unlike others in the room. At the moment of death I could feel this person's presence rise up( I actually looked up toward the ceiling) and felt a very strong presence that could see "through" me, like they knew everything I ever did in my life. It was a very strange experience that I will never forget. Others in the room did not notice this because I think they were to caught up in the emotional aspect of the death.
This all happened many years before my NDE.
Just don't think "science" can fully explain these phenomena.

i think everyone would agree there is not that much difference between our brains and other mammals brains, we basically do the same things... but just think about different things... while other mammals might not have 100's of billions of neurons firing, they still play, eat, sleep, dream and reproduce the same way humans do... i was always told when growing up the animals do not think, which from personal observation know this is wrong...


but my point of what i was saying earlier in the thread, the elevated neuron firings at the moment of death kind of confirms this... since all of your reality (perceptions of) is nothing but chemical reactions that happens inside your brain, how could someone perceive to outside of their body where no neurons are available? if your brain controls everything you see, touch, feel, smell, and sense, how could you be able to tell the difference between whats real and not real at the time of death?

everything is interpreted inside your head, nowhere else...

You state that as fact, but we don't know this to be true.
We know the brain controls functions,reflexes, emotions, euphoria and pain. But there may be a part or"soul" that is beyond the physical.
As an example, and not sure if this is a good one but when I was "out of the body" why didn't I feel pain or anxiety or for that matter, any physical properties like legs or arms if my brain is still in control?

I certainly don't have the answers but completely eliminating the possibility of a meta-physical state or world without proof is just opinion.

maybe not, but i'm pretty sure it is...


i don't know how to explain it any better, everything is controlled by our minds, including pain, feelings and everything our senses tell us...

maybe certain neurons were not firing the way they should? nobody has that answer, if they did, the questions about god and a soul would be answered..

agreed

Have I experienced an out-of-body incident? No.
However, I have been accused of experiencing an out-of-mind incident. Does that count?

isn't that an everyday thing for you?

Being accused by you Humans? Umm . . . I plead a fifth.

appears like death has 2 stages.
bodily followed by 'mind driven brain'

let's say body dies, heart / lungs & all those autonomous
functions - all those associated with the brain-stem, dies..

but the mature brain, the neo-cortex is an evolved creature
it has all the experiences and memories....
& ego to the point that it commanded attention while
'all the while the body aged, it managed
as teeth fell out, vision blurred, memory became unreliable

IT with age, started losing trust on it's body,
and what is deemed as our lower brain, the reptilian brain

So when the reptilian gives up, dies..

the neo-cortex, the higher up, the boss, says hell!
"the ship got torpedoed;
the engine room is on fire, the control room got shorted,
abandon ship.."

IT experiences loss of sensory inputs,
feels pain allover, 'agony of death'
but IT won't give in; a whisper says 'i am too young to die'
IT resists death - naturally

or the whisper says, 'my job is done'
IT accepts death - naturally
--xx--

taking the first case, 'too young..'
the brain 'misinterprets the death signal as it had not
expected / experienced sufficiently to catalogued it in memory
and so interprets the death signal as "abandon ship"

now here is where the mind takes over & says:
'abandon the neuron base we know as home
lets swiftly move outside of this sinking skull..'

i.e. assuming that we have a mind
then such a projection; a demand to the computer not to 'crash'
is plausible.

So when the Mind 'knowing' that it is superior to all that bodily / brain universe;
and yet not in denial that it needs this 'soil' to exist
but for a moment resists its 'death'.
(whatsoever the state the body may be in)

now the Mind prompts the only soil it really controls
it prompts all of the neo-cortex to battle stations - keep firing
(explains the brain arousal reported at NDE)

and by this process of extreme arousal
the mind 'periscopes' out
(let's keep in mind this is a death upheaval)

and what does the Mind necessarily do?
if it could periscope outside of the body?
yes, using it's ethereal mirror (for seconds) it to looks down
and asks - "am i really dead?"

--xx--
this is a fairy tale

yet, after going through the links provided by MM
there does seem to be a time lapse between the death by cessation of heart beat and 'brain death' or cessation of NDE!!

In fact it is possible that this time lapse could be in hours..

which brings us to the point that
we may all experience some form of NDE before final brain death.