Transcript
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From the time that they pronounced me deaf was a good 45 minutes.
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They cut my clothes and then they paddled my heart, my heart had stopped.
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And I could see people screaming and crying, but I didn't realize that was actually my
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physical body because I was somewhere else.
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The only thing that I could feel, if you could imagine, absolute love and peace, there wasn't
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anything else to be felt.
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I was greeted by people I'd known in the past.
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I'm back home again.
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Incredibly safe and felt at home.
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Welcome, welcome to Round Trip Death, everybody.
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And I'd like to welcome our special guest today, Dr. Barbara Mack from the good state
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of Washington.
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How are you today?
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Very good.
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Thank you.
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Good.
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Well, welcome to the show.
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I know you haven't shared your experience publicly before.
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And I appreciate you trusting us to be able to do that here.
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This is a non-judgmental place, so you can open up your heart, tell us what happened
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to you and what you learned from it or all those kinds of things.
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But before we do, I want our listeners to get to know you a little bit.
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So tell us who's Barbara.
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Okay, so I am a mother of four kids, a grandmother of two, a wife and a physician.
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Used to be in the ER mostly, and then about 15 years ago or so.
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I kind of transitioned over to more of a private practice where I really try to help people
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find the underlying causes of their distress.
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I do like bio-dentical hormones, natural things, totally outside of the insurance and
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pharmaceutical, well, it's not pharmaceutical, I do prescribe drugs, but I don't take insurance
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and it's just my own small practice.
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Are you a DO?
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No, I'm an MD.
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Okay.
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Medical doctor.
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And I'm not sure that I understand all the differences between those things.
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DO and an MD are pretty much the same.
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They're just a lot more MD schools than their IDO schools.
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But the default is a little bit different on the DO side.
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They're more holistic perhaps, but really pretty much the same.
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There's a natural path that's all the way a lot more holistic.
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So I'm not a natural path.
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I kind of tend that way now.
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It's very refreshing to hear from a doctor that is rooted in the causes of what's going
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on versus just writing your prescription to take care of the symptoms.
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So thank you for that.
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Trying to do, yes.
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That is awesome.
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Okay.
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Near-death experience time.
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You're ready to talk about this?
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This was what, 10 years ago?
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2006, so a little more than that.
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You had to run in.
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I'm sorry, this is not funny.
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I'm wiping the laugh off my face because this is not funny.
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It just sounds very unusual and that is that you had to run in with fire ants.
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What was going on that day?
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How did you find yourself there?
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My husband was stationed in North Carolina at Fort Bragg.
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He was going to play golf with his teammates.
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He's in Special Forces and they were going to play golf.
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And so I went basically to be their designated driver because they were drinking.
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So at the end of the day, golfing and everything, it was a beautiful day.
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And at the end of the day, we're all kind of rough housing a little bit and playing,
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just kidding.
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And I ended up falling on my back and there are a lot of fire ant hills in North Carolina
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and those things are, they're really painful.
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And I stay clear of those things.
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You can usually see them because they're huge mounds of fire ant hills.
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They're big and they're easy to recognize.
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But on a golf course that's been manicured, you don't see that.
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It was flat.
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So I didn't know and I just ended up on my back on top of one of these hills and I suddenly
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felt all this stinging all around me and especially on my neck and I got up and they were, I had
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fire ants swarmed like hundreds or maybe thousands of them.
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There were just so many and I just, they sting.
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They really hurt when they sting.
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And they just kind of rubbed them all off, wiped them off, brushed them off and got up
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and I'm really itchy and it hurts but I'm otherwise fine.
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So at that point we were going to drive home.
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And so I started driving my husband home and to get through the base, they were playing
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on the off course that is on the base in Fort Bragg and to get back to where we lived in
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southern Pines, I had to drive through an area that's very remote.
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It's a training area where people jumped in their parachutes off so there's really nothing
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out there.
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There's no convenient stores or place where you could make a phone call and no signal for
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our own through the cell phones either.
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Then about 18 miles of that and about halfway through that I told my husband, I don't feel
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really well.
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I think you better drive it.
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He's already had a DUI, he did not want to drive and he started to say no but then he
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looked at me and he said, oh okay.
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Because I guess my face was really swollen from all the iran stains.
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I was having a little trouble breathing but mostly I just didn't feel well.
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Probably my blood pressure was dropping from the toxin.
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So he took over the driving and I told him, you need to take me, I need something.
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I knew I was not going to make it all the way home.
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I knew that the venom was dropping my blood pressure and I would need something.
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Epinephrine would have been the medication of choice but I knew that there was no way
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of getting that in time but that we could drive off the base to a convenience store
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or a gas station and I could buy some benadrym.
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So I asked him to do that and he started driving that way and then we finally get to the gas
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station.
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My husband pulls up and he goes in and I actually don't even remember that part.
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I vaguely remember pulling up but I don't remember much after that.
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He's in there but the next thing I know, I'm in this place.
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It's kind of like a maybe a large room and I'm sort of at the bottom of this big gray
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space.
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Everything was kind of like misty but it was not a cold mist.
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It was like a warm mist and I was comfortable but I'm sitting there and everything was just
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gray and it was nothing.
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I didn't have my body.
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It was sort of an amorphous something and then I noticed above me there were two and
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then three kind of beings.
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And they were like me, they were sort of this amorphous substance.
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They were lighter than the gray background but they were sort of just these kind of blobs.
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They didn't have arms or a face or hands or anything or feet but they were beings.
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I knew that they were beings and I also knew that they, especially one of them, it chokes
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you up to talk about it now.
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It didn't keep it so long after.
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One of them especially was very close to being and knew me very well, knew me intimately
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and had my best interests at heart.
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I didn't feel like what some people describe as love and stuff like that.
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I just felt comfortable and safe.
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I understood these two or three beings above, somewhere above me, to have my best interests
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at heart.
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And then there appeared kind of an opening, a circular opening in the top of this area.
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It wasn't really an enclosure either but it was sort of an area and I kind of had my back
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to something, it wasn't a wall but it was like it didn't continue past my back.
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I looked up and there was this large disc circle, a circle in this enclosure and white light
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was coming from it, some kind of light.
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And the three beings were kind of hovering near that opening but inside where I was,
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inside the place I was.
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And they were discussing my fate without words, without speaking.
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I came to understand that I was going to die and I said, wordlessly, I said, I'm going
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to die and that's okay.
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And then there was a bit of a pause and then what came back from the being that was closest
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to me was, no, it's not okay.
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You have to, I don't know, I can joke about this still.
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But the being said, you have to go back.
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And I didn't understand why I would be okay with dying because I was never, I was not
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suicidal, I was enjoying life.
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I had four kids, they were old enough to be okay on their own, I guess, they were in their
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teens and twenties.
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So I guess I could have left but I was fine with going but anyway, when they told me I
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had to go, I wasn't going to die and I had to go in there.
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They said you have to go in there and tell them what to do, which I knew meant I had
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to go get out of the car and go to the convenience store and tell them I needed Benadryl.
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And I knew that I would have to bite and chew it because it wouldn't be the injectable kind
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but biting and chewing it would get enough of the chemical and could be absorbed through
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the mucus membranes in your mouth that I could get enough to probably help me with the toxin,
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the venom.
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So that's what I did.
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I got up out of the car and I walked in and I opened the door to the store and I thought
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that I told them what I had to tell them but apparently what they say I did is I just
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crashed forward and took down a rack of candy with me and so then I'm on the ground.
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So I guess I passed out but then I, once on the ground, I guess down by pressure is at
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least getting blood going, flowing to my brain when I'm on the ground, even if my pressure
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is low.
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So I was able to speak again and I said, I told them I need Benadryl and then this storekeeper
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quickly got me a packet of Benadryl.
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There were three tablets in there and I just opened it up and I chewed them all still on
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the ground and then I got better and I was able to get up, walk out of there.
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A little embarrassed that I'd created such a mess including I lost my control of my bladder
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so I left a puddle of urine on the floor and let the poor shopkeeper to mop that up but
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I got in the car and my husband drove me home and that was pretty much the end of it.
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But I kept thinking about this.
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What was this?
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What would it happen?
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For years I thought about it.
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I told people about it and I really couldn't figure it out and then only recently I started
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watching some of these YouTube videos of the near-death experiences and I thought that's
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what it is.
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I tried many other things.
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Meditating which was helpful but it never got me near.
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I even tried LSD or psilocybin with a, you know, I hired somebody to pay this woman $700
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to babysit me to do this even trying to do it correctly.
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But I didn't get anywhere like this with that experience.
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It was interesting but nothing, it was not the same.
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I've had people tell me that they've tried mushrooms, they've tried ketamine, other things
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like that to reproduce what happened to them and it never works.
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Yeah, especially those that feel the intense love on the other side.
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I'm so sorry you missed that part that you didn't really get that experience but so many
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people do, that's part of what just can't be recreated when people hope to be able to
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recreate it some other way.
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Which is also why when people say, well, gee, I want one of those cool NDEs for myself,
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too.
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No, you can't, you may not come back for one thing and trying to do it with drugs just
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usually doesn't work.
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So, well, not usually.
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I've never heard of it working.
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It doesn't work.
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So don't try.
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I definitely would not recommend anybody attempting this but I still find it reassuring.
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After listening to other people's stories and I think we need to get these stories out,
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we need to tell people about these things because I'm sure there's many, many others
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that have not been told and I think now it's kind of safe for people to talk about them.
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I think maybe even 10 or 15 years ago talking about this, Mike, had you labeled as crazy
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or churches would not agree, would not go along with this because some of this might
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contradict the teachings of some religious organizations who might be well-meaning but
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maybe they don't want to hear this stuff.
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You're right about all of that.
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And luckily it's changing.
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I've met with so many people that had experience, especially in maybe the 70s and 80s, okay,
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long before you did.
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And they told a doctor or a nurse or some other professional and they were like, don't
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talk about that.
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We're going to have to take you up to the psych ward.
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And so they bottled it up all these years but it is safe to talk about now in most cases.
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And so I'm glad that you're able to do that and you don't have to fear, gee, I'm a doctor.
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Is this going to ruin my credibility to talk about this?
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I'm glad we're at a place where you can just open up about it now because 20 years ago
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you couldn't.
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Yes, I can see that.
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And probably these things have been occurring a lot more than we know and I think people
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need to understand because the message is wonderful.
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And I didn't get the full experience that many other people got and I don't regret that
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because that might have just brought me closer to death and I'm glad to be alive.
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But I no longer fear death.
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And that's always one of my questions is, what level of fear of death do you have?
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I used to be afraid of death.
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I used to scare me a lot.
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I was brought up Catholic but I'd become more or less agnostic at that point and I was mostly
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concerned that there wouldn't be an afterlife and this was it.
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And so it's really encouraging to me to hear that not only is there an afterlife, there
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absolutely is an afterlife, not only that but it's encouraging that it's a good thing.
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It's beautiful.
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It was comfortable for me.
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It wasn't beautiful, it wasn't fantastic.
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I didn't feel all the love that I hear people talk about.
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But I did feel that I did understand that the beings that were with me might have been
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my guides or something.
233
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I don't know.
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But those beings did love me and they knew me.
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And from my medical mind, I tried to rationalize it as maybe this part of my brain was talking
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to that part of my brain and I really tried to come up with a story that would fit a medical
237
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model for it.
238
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I really did.
239
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But I didn't and it wasn't until I came across a near death experience and I thought, wait
240
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a second, I listened to several of them and then I realized that's the same thing.
241
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And then the more I listened to, the more consistencies I heard from people's stories.
242
00:14:40,080 --> 00:14:43,440
I mean, not everybody's story is consistent but there are a number of things that are
243
00:14:43,440 --> 00:14:49,000
consistent in each and everyone's story or in many stories that aligned with what I had
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been through.
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00:14:50,000 --> 00:14:56,400
It was really, really positive and encouraging and makes me feel happy because I know that
246
00:14:56,400 --> 00:14:57,880
experience was real.
247
00:14:57,880 --> 00:14:58,880
It was very real.
248
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It's not something I imagined because even today it is so much, I don't have to think
249
00:15:05,760 --> 00:15:07,520
back and try to remember it.
250
00:15:07,520 --> 00:15:08,920
It's as though it happened yesterday.
251
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I still get choked up when I think about parts of it, even as brief as mine was.
252
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Well I appreciate that.
253
00:15:15,720 --> 00:15:19,000
It's interesting that, well, a couple of things.
254
00:15:19,000 --> 00:15:24,680
One is everybody's experience is different, although there are commonalities.
255
00:15:24,680 --> 00:15:30,240
And some people feel like, hey, I really saw heaven.
256
00:15:30,240 --> 00:15:36,560
And these are sometimes people that were clinically dead for a few minutes and other
257
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people just have sort of a toe dipped in.
258
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That's sort of like what yours was.
259
00:15:44,600 --> 00:15:45,760
Maybe there wasn't time.
260
00:15:45,760 --> 00:15:50,600
Maybe there wasn't the depth of the experience for you to be quite that immersed as some
261
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other people are.
262
00:15:52,200 --> 00:15:56,920
But it's amazing that even dipping your toe in can be so profound for you, isn't it?
263
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It was still very profound.
264
00:15:58,360 --> 00:16:03,120
It's still something I thought about constantly.
265
00:16:03,120 --> 00:16:04,800
It never left my mind.
266
00:16:04,800 --> 00:16:10,000
I was thinking about it, trying to learn about it and trying to figure out what was that.
267
00:16:10,000 --> 00:16:15,520
It's recently that I'm finding these stories, they align with what I went through.
268
00:16:15,520 --> 00:16:21,080
Well I hope that's been helpful for you to comprehend what you went through, maybe cycle
269
00:16:21,080 --> 00:16:24,480
it through your brain and understand it a little bit better.
270
00:16:24,480 --> 00:16:32,120
Tell me, in your medical training, was there any talk of near-death experiences or out-of-body
271
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or anything like that at all?
272
00:16:34,000 --> 00:16:35,000
No.
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00:16:35,000 --> 00:16:41,160
I mean, I had heard out-of-body experiences, but I never did we have any kind of training
274
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on that.
275
00:16:42,520 --> 00:16:48,960
Maybe they are now, I graduated in 1986 from medical school, but maybe now there are.
276
00:16:48,960 --> 00:16:54,280
Well some are, but I don't know if it's regular med school training or something beyond that.
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I know that IANS, I was at their annual conference not too long ago, and they had specific presentations
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00:17:03,280 --> 00:17:10,240
for medical people and they were able to get a sign off as X amount of hours of training.
279
00:17:10,240 --> 00:17:14,560
Yeah, there were doctors and nurses and other people there getting some of that training
280
00:17:14,560 --> 00:17:21,800
and being able to count it as, I don't know, how many hours do you need every year of training?
281
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There's no difficulty in reaching them, but I would love to do that.
282
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Training just for the experience, not too much for the credit.
283
00:17:27,120 --> 00:17:30,040
Okay, we'll see you there next year, you can give both.
284
00:17:30,040 --> 00:17:31,040
Okay?
285
00:17:31,040 --> 00:17:32,640
Yeah, I'll take the credit.
286
00:17:32,640 --> 00:17:34,200
I'd love to hear it, I'd love to.
287
00:17:34,200 --> 00:17:36,400
So there will be another one coming up?
288
00:17:36,400 --> 00:17:40,320
Every year it's usually just before Labor Day.
289
00:17:40,320 --> 00:17:46,960
This most recent one was down in Phoenix before that Washington and Salt Lake City and next
290
00:17:46,960 --> 00:17:48,760
year is in Chicago.
291
00:17:48,760 --> 00:17:52,880
Now I don't work for IANS, I don't get paid by IANS or anything else, it's just a really
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good nonprofit organization where you can spend time meeting with other people that
293
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have had experiences like yours and that can be very helpful, very therapeutic.
294
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Also, there are IANS chapters all over the country and in a lot of other countries too.
295
00:18:10,160 --> 00:18:14,640
So if you feel like it would be helpful for you, I-A-N-D-S.
296
00:18:14,640 --> 00:18:17,040
I-A-N-D-S, okay.
297
00:18:17,040 --> 00:18:23,160
DS.org, it stands for International Association of Near Death Studies.
298
00:18:23,160 --> 00:18:24,160
Oh, cool.
299
00:18:24,160 --> 00:18:28,640
Yeah, I'd love to read some studies or find out more about it.
300
00:18:28,640 --> 00:18:32,960
It can be helpful because when people come back from these experiences, we don't know
301
00:18:32,960 --> 00:18:36,840
how to process them and that's normal and that's okay.
302
00:18:36,840 --> 00:18:40,240
Let me ask you a couple of questions about some of the things that you went through and
303
00:18:40,240 --> 00:18:42,360
you gave a good description by the way.
304
00:18:42,360 --> 00:18:47,040
The three beings, you weren't able to explain what they looked like.
305
00:18:47,040 --> 00:18:49,080
Could you get into that anymore?
306
00:18:49,080 --> 00:18:54,720
I think you've called them like blobs, were they light, dark, colorful?
307
00:18:54,720 --> 00:18:56,920
They had no shape really.
308
00:18:56,920 --> 00:19:01,560
They had no features, no faces, no arms, legs, no-and neither did I.
309
00:19:01,560 --> 00:19:04,280
I was just, I was one of them also.
310
00:19:04,280 --> 00:19:10,840
I kind of experienced them as having more light than the background light, than the background
311
00:19:10,840 --> 00:19:12,800
fog or mist.
312
00:19:12,800 --> 00:19:16,560
I'm in Washington State where we have fog and mist and drizzle all the time.
313
00:19:16,560 --> 00:19:17,760
It's not like that.
314
00:19:17,760 --> 00:19:23,160
It was just sort of these, everything was gray, but it was warm and comfortable gray
315
00:19:23,160 --> 00:19:27,320
and they were sort of, they were more, they were lighter.
316
00:19:27,320 --> 00:19:32,960
They were just sort of an oval kind of blob that even kind of changed.
317
00:19:32,960 --> 00:19:36,600
It wasn't, its outline wasn't the same all the time.
318
00:19:36,600 --> 00:19:38,440
They got smaller or bigger.
319
00:19:38,440 --> 00:19:41,400
They had really no shape, amorphous really.
320
00:19:41,400 --> 00:19:44,160
So I guess that they were just a made of energy.
321
00:19:44,160 --> 00:19:49,080
I wanted to be closer to them, especially the one, why do I get so choked up every time
322
00:19:49,080 --> 00:19:50,840
I think of that one?
323
00:19:50,840 --> 00:19:54,600
I guess maybe now I'm saying, I'm using the pronoun heat, so maybe it's a male thing,
324
00:19:54,600 --> 00:19:56,640
but I don't know.
325
00:19:56,640 --> 00:20:03,360
But it seemed closer to me and it seemed to, you know, it seemed to know me very well.
326
00:20:03,360 --> 00:20:05,080
Just a brief interruption.
327
00:20:05,080 --> 00:20:09,760
This month we're asking you, our favorite listener to support the show.
328
00:20:09,760 --> 00:20:15,160
It's definitely a labor of love for Will and me, but it takes a ton of time and money and
329
00:20:15,160 --> 00:20:17,840
we need donations to keep things going.
330
00:20:17,840 --> 00:20:18,840
It's easy.
331
00:20:18,840 --> 00:20:23,240
Go on over to roundtripdeath.com, click on the little donation button in the upper right
332
00:20:23,240 --> 00:20:24,600
hand corner.
333
00:20:24,600 --> 00:20:28,320
You can show your support for the podcast and help us move forward.
334
00:20:28,320 --> 00:20:29,560
We appreciate it.
335
00:20:29,560 --> 00:20:31,720
Merry Christmas and thank you, thank you.
336
00:20:31,720 --> 00:20:36,640
Now back to the guest.
337
00:20:36,640 --> 00:20:41,680
And it cared for me or had love for me, although I didn't experience the overwhelming love
338
00:20:41,680 --> 00:20:42,680
that I've heard described.
339
00:20:42,680 --> 00:20:45,960
I just knew that this, that I could trust this being.
340
00:20:45,960 --> 00:20:48,120
Whenever it said I would do.
341
00:20:48,120 --> 00:20:53,360
I think that is so amazing that you had an experience with beings that you can't describe
342
00:20:53,360 --> 00:20:55,240
how they looked.
343
00:20:55,240 --> 00:20:59,480
They didn't talk out loud and yet communication happened.
344
00:20:59,480 --> 00:21:00,480
Yes.
345
00:21:00,480 --> 00:21:01,480
Yes.
346
00:21:01,480 --> 00:21:02,760
How do you explain that?
347
00:21:02,760 --> 00:21:04,200
I think about that a lot.
348
00:21:04,200 --> 00:21:08,880
And this morning when I was running and I had my headphones on, I was listening to a version
349
00:21:08,880 --> 00:21:12,200
of Simon and Garfunkel's Silence.
350
00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:13,200
Sounds of silence.
351
00:21:13,200 --> 00:21:14,200
Silence.
352
00:21:14,200 --> 00:21:16,880
I've heard that song a zillion times before.
353
00:21:16,880 --> 00:21:17,880
Run to it.
354
00:21:17,880 --> 00:21:20,280
I've listened, you know, everyone's heard that song since the seventies, I guess, when
355
00:21:20,280 --> 00:21:21,880
it first came out.
356
00:21:21,880 --> 00:21:24,320
And I was listening to a different rendition of it.
357
00:21:24,320 --> 00:21:30,560
And then the words, um, yeah, hello, darkness, my old friend, that, even the very beginning,
358
00:21:30,560 --> 00:21:35,800
it's like I was in this dark gray place, but it was like, it was, you know, the old friend.
359
00:21:35,800 --> 00:21:37,800
Go ahead and read the first verse.
360
00:21:37,800 --> 00:21:38,800
Okay.
361
00:21:38,800 --> 00:21:40,000
Hello, darkness, my old friend.
362
00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:44,400
I've come to talk with you again.
363
00:21:44,400 --> 00:21:49,520
Because a vision softly creeping left its seeds while I was sleeping.
364
00:21:49,520 --> 00:21:56,480
And the vision that was planted in my brain still remains within the sound of silence.
365
00:21:56,480 --> 00:22:02,440
So yeah, that reminds me of this experience and, and it still remains the vision, whatever
366
00:22:02,440 --> 00:22:05,800
that vision was, even though it was really nothing I could, not much I could see.
367
00:22:05,800 --> 00:22:08,480
I was just more of aware than using my eyes.
368
00:22:08,480 --> 00:22:15,080
And then they talked further about, um, people talking without speaking, people hearing without
369
00:22:15,080 --> 00:22:21,120
listening, people writing songs that voices never share.
370
00:22:21,120 --> 00:22:24,760
There was talking and listening, but no speaking.
371
00:22:24,760 --> 00:22:25,960
And I wasn't using my ears.
372
00:22:25,960 --> 00:22:30,960
It was just an under, I understood, like I understood from their talk that from what
373
00:22:30,960 --> 00:22:34,720
they were telling me, what they were saying that I was going to die.
374
00:22:34,720 --> 00:22:38,920
And then, then they told me differently without words.
375
00:22:38,920 --> 00:22:43,520
We need to get Paul Simon on this show and see if he had an NDE and maybe that, maybe
376
00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:45,160
that was his inspiration.
377
00:22:45,160 --> 00:22:46,160
Yeah.
378
00:22:46,160 --> 00:22:51,920
And, and I wonder how much else out there is also, is also related to this and maybe
379
00:22:51,920 --> 00:22:56,640
people, artists who made these songs, had these experiences, couldn't talk about them
380
00:22:56,640 --> 00:22:59,760
in another way, but they could write songs about them.
381
00:22:59,760 --> 00:23:01,880
I think there's a lot.
382
00:23:01,880 --> 00:23:04,600
And I think people have been afraid to talk about it.
383
00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:10,360
If you think about, for example, Charles Dickens, what was his inspiration for the Christmas
384
00:23:10,360 --> 00:23:11,360
story?
385
00:23:11,360 --> 00:23:12,360
Yes.
386
00:23:12,360 --> 00:23:13,360
Yes.
387
00:23:13,360 --> 00:23:19,280
The Christmas story, yeah, the Christmas past, future, and the whole message is the same.
388
00:23:19,280 --> 00:23:20,800
Be good to people.
389
00:23:20,800 --> 00:23:25,120
Just all you have to do is just love people genuinely.
390
00:23:25,120 --> 00:23:31,080
And it's, that's really, the message is so simple and that's all it is.
391
00:23:31,080 --> 00:23:32,680
And it's beautiful.
392
00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:37,960
And I've found since then, that's what I try to do.
393
00:23:37,960 --> 00:23:42,440
Now I've left the emergency room and I've created my own practice where I can spend
394
00:23:42,440 --> 00:23:47,920
an hour with each patient, I don't take insurance, but I could spend an hour with each patient
395
00:23:47,920 --> 00:23:50,040
and really hear their story.
396
00:23:50,040 --> 00:23:53,800
Because you really have to listen and you will learn much more that way.
397
00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:58,560
You have to listen and allow, allow people to tell you their stories.
398
00:23:58,560 --> 00:24:02,720
One other thing about these beings, you felt like they were communicating.
399
00:24:02,720 --> 00:24:07,040
They were talking about you, about the fact that you needed to go back.
400
00:24:07,040 --> 00:24:09,040
And you explained that any more detail?
401
00:24:09,040 --> 00:24:14,160
Yeah, first they said, or I came to understand that I was going to die and I said, where
402
00:24:14,160 --> 00:24:17,120
at the sleep, I'm going to die and that's okay.
403
00:24:17,120 --> 00:24:22,240
Then there appeared to be some more conversation among them or they were, and I didn't hear
404
00:24:22,240 --> 00:24:23,640
everything that they were saying.
405
00:24:23,640 --> 00:24:25,880
I really wanted to be closer to them.
406
00:24:25,880 --> 00:24:29,920
They were, they were, you know, out of my reach, not that I had arms that I couldn't
407
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:34,400
reach to, but they were, you know, they were too far from me and I wanted to get closer
408
00:24:34,400 --> 00:24:37,160
to them, but they, they weren't allowing that.
409
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:41,440
And then, then when they told me I had to go back, then that was the end of my, of my
410
00:24:41,440 --> 00:24:42,440
time with them.
411
00:24:42,440 --> 00:24:45,920
But it seemed like they were discussing, well, no, it looks like not.
412
00:24:45,920 --> 00:24:48,760
It's not going to, no, she can't, she can't go back.
413
00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:51,200
She, I mean, she has to go back.
414
00:24:51,200 --> 00:24:53,320
And it wasn't, they didn't use pronouns either.
415
00:24:53,320 --> 00:24:55,240
They were all talking about me without using the pronoun.
416
00:24:55,240 --> 00:24:57,400
Like they weren't talking about me in the third person.
417
00:24:57,400 --> 00:25:00,240
It was like I was in the first person talking.
418
00:25:00,240 --> 00:25:01,240
They were me.
419
00:25:01,240 --> 00:25:02,240
They were part of me.
420
00:25:02,240 --> 00:25:04,040
They knew me that well.
421
00:25:04,040 --> 00:25:07,720
They were part of everything, but they were a part of me.
422
00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:09,360
Hard to understand, isn't it?
423
00:25:09,360 --> 00:25:14,360
I only understood those things and I accepted them and I was fine with all that.
424
00:25:14,360 --> 00:25:17,800
So when they told me, no, you have to go back.
425
00:25:17,800 --> 00:25:21,560
I was like, okay, that's what I do.
426
00:25:21,560 --> 00:25:23,280
And so I got up to do what they told me to do.
427
00:25:23,280 --> 00:25:27,400
And it's like the part that controlled my body came back to my body and controlled my
428
00:25:27,400 --> 00:25:30,200
body to walk into the convenience store.
429
00:25:30,200 --> 00:25:33,880
And then my pressure, I guess, dropped again and I couldn't, I wasn't told I landed on
430
00:25:33,880 --> 00:25:38,160
the floor that my pressure came back up enough for me to, to manteed enough.
431
00:25:38,160 --> 00:25:43,480
And you know, maybe I did die and if I hadn't, if I had been left in that car any longer,
432
00:25:43,480 --> 00:25:44,480
I probably would have died.
433
00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:46,960
You know, it was such a massive dose of venom.
434
00:25:46,960 --> 00:25:53,120
I don't have an allergy to hymenoptero, which is the kind of, they're like bees.
435
00:25:53,120 --> 00:25:54,120
They're related to bees.
436
00:25:54,120 --> 00:25:59,720
They sting, fire ants, you know, and have an allergy to that venom as far as I know.
437
00:25:59,720 --> 00:26:02,760
And I've been stung since, you know, but one or two, no big deal.
438
00:26:02,760 --> 00:26:08,160
But it was just the massive amount of venom that I got from that many stings that caused
439
00:26:08,160 --> 00:26:09,440
my blood pressure to drop.
440
00:26:09,440 --> 00:26:12,400
And probably I would have died if I hadn't done something.
441
00:26:12,400 --> 00:26:15,840
Yeah, that's a scary thing, a really scary thing.
442
00:26:15,840 --> 00:26:21,800
When we spoke previously, you mentioned something about your father visiting you after he died.
443
00:26:21,800 --> 00:26:23,680
Would you mind telling that story too?
444
00:26:23,680 --> 00:26:24,680
Sure.
445
00:26:24,680 --> 00:26:25,680
Yeah.
446
00:26:25,680 --> 00:26:30,440
So right around the pandemic, the beginning of the pandemic, my dad got sick.
447
00:26:30,440 --> 00:26:36,960
It wasn't COVID, but he was in his late 80s, 89, and he was on the East Coast and there
448
00:26:36,960 --> 00:26:37,960
were lockdowns.
449
00:26:37,960 --> 00:26:40,040
And it was really hard to get him good care.
450
00:26:40,040 --> 00:26:42,040
And I was flying back and forth.
451
00:26:42,040 --> 00:26:43,040
It happened to him in Florida.
452
00:26:43,040 --> 00:26:44,120
He lives in New York.
453
00:26:44,120 --> 00:26:49,640
I had to fly back and forth to Florida quite frequently to try and help him.
454
00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:50,880
He ended up on dialysis.
455
00:26:50,880 --> 00:26:52,200
There were, you know, he had heart disease.
456
00:26:52,200 --> 00:26:56,280
He had to have heart surgery twice and a number of things.
457
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:59,000
And coordinating his care was just terrible.
458
00:26:59,000 --> 00:27:03,120
And it was really, really a traumatic, you know, difficult thing for me because I'd been
459
00:27:03,120 --> 00:27:06,080
very close to my dad.
460
00:27:06,080 --> 00:27:08,880
So but he passed away.
461
00:27:08,880 --> 00:27:13,520
And finally, and you know, after two years of that, he passed away.
462
00:27:13,520 --> 00:27:20,560
And then as it was 2022, my brothers and my mother and I and my sister, the family went
463
00:27:20,560 --> 00:27:23,560
to the Bahamas, which was his, he used to, he loved to sail.
464
00:27:23,560 --> 00:27:26,440
He loved the water and his favorite place in the Bahamas.
465
00:27:26,440 --> 00:27:27,440
We went there.
466
00:27:27,440 --> 00:27:31,840
We went to El Boqui and we went there to spread his ashes.
467
00:27:31,840 --> 00:27:33,880
And so I flew there with my husband.
468
00:27:33,880 --> 00:27:39,240
And that night after I flew there, we got in our hotel, the cottage that we were renting.
469
00:27:39,240 --> 00:27:44,760
And my husband went out to look at the ocean and I was alone in our little cottage and
470
00:27:44,760 --> 00:27:46,560
I lay down and on the bed.
471
00:27:46,560 --> 00:27:51,920
And then next thing I knew, my father was standing right next to me, standing next to
472
00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:53,560
the bed.
473
00:27:53,560 --> 00:27:56,040
And his, I saw him.
474
00:27:56,040 --> 00:28:00,920
He looked to me as he did, back when he was young and healthy, like his 30s, late 30s,
475
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:03,720
early 40s is how I remember him.
476
00:28:03,720 --> 00:28:08,040
He was healthy when he back when he was healthy and surfing and stuff like that.
477
00:28:08,040 --> 00:28:10,000
That's how he came to me.
478
00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:14,720
And he didn't say anything to me, but I understood he wanted to see my mother.
479
00:28:14,720 --> 00:28:19,800
And then I remembered that the, the, I realized the place that we were renting was the place
480
00:28:19,800 --> 00:28:24,040
that he had, then my mother had stayed in last time when we had been in the Bahamas at
481
00:28:24,040 --> 00:28:25,160
El Boqui.
482
00:28:25,160 --> 00:28:30,200
And so I knew where my mother was staying at in a different cottage, a little ways down.
483
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:34,880
So I got up and I started walking that way so that he, for him to follow me.
484
00:28:34,880 --> 00:28:36,160
And I don't know if he followed me.
485
00:28:36,160 --> 00:28:40,480
I just, I just kind of understood that that's where I, or I believe that that's what he
486
00:28:40,480 --> 00:28:41,560
wanted.
487
00:28:41,560 --> 00:28:45,060
And so I walked down to where my mother was staying and it was after midnight.
488
00:28:45,060 --> 00:28:46,760
So I didn't wake her up or anything.
489
00:28:46,760 --> 00:28:52,200
I just took my dad there or at least that's what I'm regretting.
490
00:28:52,200 --> 00:28:57,200
And then one other time he came to me, it sounds kind of silly, but he kind of, he told
491
00:28:57,200 --> 00:28:59,040
me to buy chickens.
492
00:28:59,040 --> 00:29:00,280
We live in the city.
493
00:29:00,280 --> 00:29:02,280
We have a little quarter acre in the city.
494
00:29:02,280 --> 00:29:07,840
So, but we did, I told my husband and we went and bought baby chicks and started, and started
495
00:29:07,840 --> 00:29:09,400
to receive chickens.
496
00:29:09,400 --> 00:29:12,360
It turned out to be just a wonderful, fun blessing.
497
00:29:12,360 --> 00:29:16,760
And so now we have, you know, I had chickens and in a little plot in the city here.
498
00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:18,240
And they're really so much fun.
499
00:29:18,240 --> 00:29:21,960
And my dad had written a story about he had chickens during the depression.
500
00:29:21,960 --> 00:29:25,920
And it was really great having them during recent years when every grocery's got real
501
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:27,440
expensive and everything.
502
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:30,040
And we had AIDS and stuff like that.
503
00:29:30,040 --> 00:29:32,560
But their personalities and everything was just so wonderful.
504
00:29:32,560 --> 00:29:38,520
And he came to me at third time when my husband and I were laughing over the antics of the
505
00:29:38,520 --> 00:29:39,520
chickens.
506
00:29:39,520 --> 00:29:43,680
It's just kind of, it was just a light kind of fun.
507
00:29:43,680 --> 00:29:49,160
I think message he was giving me, I don't, nothing, I don't know what to make of it.
508
00:29:49,160 --> 00:29:52,600
You know, now we want to get a farm and live off career and stuff.
509
00:29:52,600 --> 00:29:54,520
Come out and live by us.
510
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:56,360
That's what we're doing.
511
00:29:56,360 --> 00:29:57,960
Is it up here in the mountains?
512
00:29:57,960 --> 00:29:59,600
We'll talk about this later.
513
00:29:59,600 --> 00:30:02,200
Just a couple more things that I'm going to let you go.
514
00:30:02,200 --> 00:30:05,880
One of them is in what ways to this change your life.
515
00:30:05,880 --> 00:30:09,400
And you've mentioned it a little bit, but tell me a little bit more.
516
00:30:09,400 --> 00:30:10,400
Yeah.
517
00:30:10,400 --> 00:30:17,080
So I've been, I had been really pretty fearful before, you know, fearful of dying, but fearful
518
00:30:17,080 --> 00:30:18,800
of lots of things.
519
00:30:18,800 --> 00:30:20,280
And I'm not anymore.
520
00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:22,160
I'm definitely not afraid of dying.
521
00:30:22,160 --> 00:30:26,720
I don't want to die and I don't want to experience pain before death.
522
00:30:26,720 --> 00:30:28,600
But now I'm, I'm okay.
523
00:30:28,600 --> 00:30:32,720
I'm happy about it because I know it's not going to be a bad thing.
524
00:30:32,720 --> 00:30:37,440
You know, I think of my, I didn't have a life for you, but I realized that everything I've
525
00:30:37,440 --> 00:30:41,480
done in my life, I will need to answer to at some point.
526
00:30:41,480 --> 00:30:48,080
And I must always think about the other people that I affect with every action with my actions.
527
00:30:48,080 --> 00:30:49,800
It gives me a feeling of peace.
528
00:30:49,800 --> 00:30:54,560
Just knowing that, that that's all I need to do is just listen, try to understand the
529
00:30:54,560 --> 00:30:56,640
people around me and do what I can to help.
530
00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:59,400
We're not matter how it brings me to content.
531
00:30:59,400 --> 00:31:03,680
Whether it's a patient, a family member, a stranger on the street, every interaction
532
00:31:03,680 --> 00:31:07,360
is an opportunity to do the right thing.
533
00:31:07,360 --> 00:31:11,280
And I no longer feel as bad about all the bad things I've done, all the mistakes I've
534
00:31:11,280 --> 00:31:14,200
made in my life, which have been plenty.
535
00:31:14,200 --> 00:31:20,280
So I no longer feel so bad about, about that because I know that I can ask forgiveness
536
00:31:20,280 --> 00:31:22,400
and it will be okay.
537
00:31:22,400 --> 00:31:25,800
And I just have to do better in the future.
538
00:31:25,800 --> 00:31:27,480
The best I can do.
539
00:31:27,480 --> 00:31:29,720
Can you say something to those people out there?
540
00:31:29,720 --> 00:31:36,040
What are really wondering if there's an afterlife or maybe don't believe it?
541
00:31:36,040 --> 00:31:40,600
Yeah, I was, you know, although race, Catholic, I had become agnostic.
542
00:31:40,600 --> 00:31:42,520
I now consider myself a Christian.
543
00:31:42,520 --> 00:31:44,520
I do go to church sometimes.
544
00:31:44,520 --> 00:31:45,520
I am confident.
545
00:31:45,520 --> 00:31:50,240
I know I don't have any hard evidence, but there is, there is some hard evidence.
546
00:31:50,240 --> 00:31:54,840
Now, not in my story, but, but from listening to other people's story gives me enough that
547
00:31:54,840 --> 00:31:59,080
I am absolutely convinced that, that there is an afterlife and that it's a good one.
548
00:31:59,080 --> 00:32:01,120
We don't, we don't need to fear it.
549
00:32:01,120 --> 00:32:06,160
Even if we've done wrong, we can ask for forgiveness and we can just try to do better in the future.
550
00:32:06,160 --> 00:32:11,880
And I want people to be reassured as I am because I wasn't reassured until, until learning
551
00:32:11,880 --> 00:32:13,040
about these things.
552
00:32:13,040 --> 00:32:17,360
I was anxious about dying and about what's going to happen in the future.
553
00:32:17,360 --> 00:32:18,520
And I no longer am.
554
00:32:18,520 --> 00:32:21,160
And none of this on earth really matters.
555
00:32:21,160 --> 00:32:22,520
Not quite so much.
556
00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:28,600
What really matters is just how we treat people, which is, which is the teachings of Christ.
557
00:32:28,600 --> 00:32:31,960
That's really, in my mind, all that he was teaching.
558
00:32:31,960 --> 00:32:35,800
And so I don't really, not, not so sure about religion all the time.
559
00:32:35,800 --> 00:32:40,360
Christ's teachings were just to, to do the right thing for other people, to, to love
560
00:32:40,360 --> 00:32:41,360
them.
561
00:32:41,360 --> 00:32:42,360
All right.
562
00:32:42,360 --> 00:32:43,760
Barbara, I really appreciate it.
563
00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:47,600
I know you've touched somebody today, so thank you for your time.
564
00:32:47,600 --> 00:32:48,600
Thank you.
565
00:32:48,600 --> 00:32:51,400
Thank you for doing this.
566
00:32:51,400 --> 00:32:52,760
Thanks again for listening.
567
00:32:52,760 --> 00:32:55,920
If you haven't already, hit that follow or subscribe button.
568
00:32:55,920 --> 00:32:57,880
Now is a great time to do it.
569
00:32:57,880 --> 00:33:01,960
And if you want to help us continue to put out this kind of quality content, head on
570
00:33:01,960 --> 00:33:04,200
over to roundtripdeath.com.
571
00:33:04,200 --> 00:33:07,360
Look for that itty bitty donate button in the upper right hand corner.
572
00:33:07,360 --> 00:33:09,040
You know what to do from there.
573
00:33:09,040 --> 00:33:12,360
And while you're there, go ahead and sign up for our email newsletter and you'll be
574
00:33:12,360 --> 00:33:15,520
the first to know when new episodes go live.
575
00:33:15,520 --> 00:33:40,320
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