I should probably share a bit about my life prior to the NDE, so you can understand the full impact of what happened to me.
I am 26 years old. I had my NDE when I was 22, in April of 1998. It was due to my suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. When I was little I was severely abused by my father and grandfather, I was also a victim of child pornography and prostitution. I had been involved in alcohol and drugs and had an eating disorder for many years. At the time of my “death” I was trying to get my life in order, but with little success. My past was still too painful to face, and without facing the past, I could not successfully and healthfully live in the present. I believe it was these forces which emotionally and physically ripped me in two.
One of the problems that came along with my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder was an inability to fall asleep. I was an insomniac. I was terrified of sleeping, since night time and sleep had long been equated with abuse. I started to get less and less sleep. Going from 5 hours, to 4, to 3, to 2, to 1 if I was lucky, until at the very end I wasn’t sleeping at all. I simply let myself deteriorate. I had lost my will to live, and I was starving myself as well as not drinking enough fluids. After 6 nights of not sleeping at all, I wound up in the hospital, severely ill.
The doctors told my mother that they didn’t know if I would make it or not. (She did not tell me this until years later). All I remember was that I was in the hospital room, and all of a sudden I was surrounded by this bright yellowish-white, almost golden light. It was brighter off into the distance, and I was seeing this light as though it were superimposed over the landscape out the window. All of a sudden, I was somehow being pulled towards this light, and it was the most undescribable feeling of peace and love I had ever experienced. It was pure ecstacy. My heart was alive, it felt as though I had streams of cool endlessly flowing water running through it, and it was the most exhilirating feeling! I never wanted the feeling to stop and I was so happy!! (for the first time in my life!) I was just enthralled and held in this state for what felt like a long time. It were as though all knowledge was being poured through me, that nothing was being held back. I was so loved, and all of my questions were being answered.
Then I heard a nurse screaming at me. She sounded so angry, and I could see her as though I were looking from a point near the corner of the ceiling looking down. She was grabbing me and trying to give me some medicine. I wasn’t responding to her. Finally I was somehow back in my body, and I do not remember the entire sequence of events after that, but that was when things got very weird and scary.
I hovered around death for the remainder of the day (the first experience was in the early afternoon). I was very, very sad to be back. At the same time I was able to “sense” certain things. I was able to look at my grandmother and see the pain that her past had caused. I could “hear” the guilt she felt over an abortion in her past, and how she buried that pain. I could “feel” and sense negative thoughts around people. I could literally sense what they were thinking. This really fascinated me, although it was a bit frightening. I wanted to love everyone! The only people I was not sensing negativity coming from were my mother, who had long ago worked through a lot of her own psychological issues, and a male nurse named Michael. From them, I only sensed concern over my well-being.
I remained in this state for a while, but then my own negative past took over. Since I hadn’t really dealt with the painful issues of my past they hit me full on. All the old guilt, pain, and buried anger came soaring back, only this time, I felt it was going to consume me. And consume me it did. I started thinking how unworthy I was of what I had experienced, I started thinking all these horrible, bad thoughts about myself and I sank back into my old state of gut wrenching depression. That’s when I had my second NDE. This one was the most horrible thing that anyone could imagine.
I was lying in the bed when all of a sudden I experienced this blackness. There was no light, there was nothing. It wasn’t even that I could see the blackness, it just existed, and I knew it was there. All of a sudden there were these beings all around me. I can’t remember how many, but I felt that they were beings that had been around me for a while and had been waiting for this moment. They started pulling at me and took me to this place of absolute desperation. There was nothing, and yet I existed in this horrible void. The essense of this void was that it was an ABSENCE OF GOD. I want to stress that emphatically. It was absolute torture..nothing, absolutely nothing can describe this pain. It was my worst nightmare come true. The beings there told me that all of my family was doomed to be in the void and that it would be my fault. Even talking about it is very, very hard. It was pure terror.
I don’t remember how I came back, but after what seemed like an eternity I was back in the hospital, in my body. I tried to tell people about what I had experienced, but they thought I was crazy. I told my fiance at the time about what I had experienced. I could not stop talking about it. He left me two weeks later. I recovered physically, but not emotionally. The negative effects of the second experience stayed with me for three years! (and over the past year the positive effects of the first one have been coming out). I gave up all faith in everything, but at the same time I outwardly professed a lack of belief, inwardly I feared I was doomed to that awful void, and that very many people were also going there.
I no longer believe that. The main difference between the two NDE’s, I believe, was my state of mind at the time. During the first one, I knew in my heart that I was loved, I was ready for a peaceful death and it happened. During the second one, I was letting my deepest fears play out in front of me. I thought I was beyond help and beyond hope. I truly believe that had I asked for help during the second one, it would have come. Instead, I felt not even God could help me, and I remained in that awful place.
I couldn’t escape from the after effects of these experiences, as much as I tried. Over the past three years, I have seen a “ghost” and have had other bizarre encounters with supernatural forces. Things touch me when there is nothing or no one who could possibly have done so. I have had a phone call from my dead aunt when I was in a time of distress. I’ve had prophetic dreams. I am having an awful time with thunderstorms because lightning is drawn to me like a magnet. Over the past year, lightning has come within literally inches of striking me numerous times. Usually at a distance of about two feet, but the last strike was literally within inches.
My doctor even joked that I might have a metal plate in my head that I don’t know about. I can feel energy coursing through me at times. I can sense the emotions of animals and plants. And sometimes I can sense spirits around people, their loved ones that are trying to guide them and get messages through to them. My body has also changed. I can no longer eat any kind of meat or it will sour in my stomach. Processed foods bother me and make me feel ill. I buy organic groceries. I need to exercise or I sink into a depression. I cannot ingest into my body anything that in anyway harms it.
At the time of my “death” I was a Catholic, but I have since then expanded my views to a more universal one of love, not being dictated by dogma or religion, since I firmly believe that when it comes down to it, God is pure energy, pure Love, and nothing more, but S/he will manifest in whatever form is most loving and comforting to you. I still have my good days and my bad days, days where I feel out of balance and out of touch, but as I am healing my past, those are becoming less and less frequent with each passing day.
I am no where near perfect, but I try to live my life based from my heart and share love with all those I meet. I think of all the things my near-death experiences taught me, the most important thing was to share the love I was given with others, letting them know they are not alone and that we are all very special and wonderful. I am constantly amazed at how many people deny this reality, and it can become very frustrating at times. I can see how if everyone would awaken to this beauty, what a wonderful world this place would become. There would be no more wars and hatred. There would only be love. I have lost some friends over this. They see me as being naive and childlike and have told me so. (and many of them are themselves peace and civil rights activists).
It hurts me, but I know that without a connection to that divine source I felt when I “died”, I am lost. I know one thing I need to work on is accepting people for where they are, since I have an uncanny ability now to get directly to the heart of any unresolved emotional issues and try to get them to work on them whether they are ready to or not. But I feel that if I can help just one person to realize how wonderful and loved they truly are, then my life will be worth it. I am intensely grateful to God for letting me glimpse the afterlife and to know that we are all here on a mission, each and everyone of us.
A.D.
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