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 Roundtrip Death, everybody, and a warm welcome to our special guest today,
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Matt Hendrick, coming to us from the Denver, Colorado area.
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Hey, Matt.
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Hey, Eric.
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How you doing?
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Good.
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It is good to see you.
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How are you feeling today?
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I'm doing good.
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Good to see you too.
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I don't know if people can tell, but let's get this out of the way.
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You're in a wheelchair.
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What happened about 30 years ago?
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Yeah, I was in a pretty bad car accident when I was 21.
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I was sleeping in the passenger side and I had the seat leaned all the way back and it
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was one of those cars where you had to fasten the lap belt yourself.
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You would shut the door and the shoulder belt would come on automatically and got in for
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a ride.
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I leaned the seat back and I was sleeping and I hadn't fastened the lap belt.
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We got in a car accident and we hit something going about 25 to 30 miles an hour.
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I came around the shoulder belt and it saved my life, but also broke my neck at the same
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time.
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I became a quadriplegic, C5, C6 quadriplegic.
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Wow.
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I know that makes life tough, but you have such a great attitude.
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You're like my hero here.
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The fact that you can do artwork, beautiful paintings really says something about you and
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your resiliency.
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Yeah, thank you.
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I do a little bit of abstract type artwork.
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Let me tell you first that I can move my shoulders and my biceps, but I have very little use,
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probably hardly any at all, use of my triceps.
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I have a little bit of wrist function, but no hand movement, no fingers.
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The definition of quadriplegic is partial or full paralysis in all four limbs.
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I have the partial paralysis.
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I'll do my artwork.
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I've come up with a technique where I can use my hands to do an abstract, colorful background.
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Then I'll do mouth painting with the brush in my mouth as well.
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I can then I'll switch and I'll do a portrait or some sort of more detailed picture, whatever
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the subject of the picture.
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I'll do it a little bit more detailed with the mouth painting.
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It's like using your hand for me.
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It's actually a little bit better because I can get my eyes right near the brush.
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I don't know.
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It's something to try if you haven't tried it.
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I haven't tried it.
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By the way, people can see your artwork, your book that we'll also talk a little bit about,
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and a beautiful video about your mouth painting at Hendrickmedia.com.
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I wish I had filmed your video.
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That's very well done.
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Is that the documentary?
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Yeah, it's about two minutes long.
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Yeah, it's done by the Denver Post.
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I don't know who produced it, but if it was Denver Post, that's a nice job of filming
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for some newspaper guys.
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Yeah, they did good.
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They actually had me on the front page that day and had my whole story on there.
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It's pretty cool.
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Well, is there anything else that you can tell us about you personally just so people
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can get to know you?
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Well, yeah.
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I'm an author as well.
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I like to work out.
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I'm very active in the disabled community in Colorado.
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I found that this injury, there's a lot of lemons involved, but there are some good days.
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I try to send a message to people of some of the little things in life that seem so
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horrible that they're not really that bad.
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You can get over it.
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I try to encourage people to have a good attitude.
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I just try to be that way myself as an inspiration or role model, maybe, to encourage people
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to not give up when things are rough and stuff like that.
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Great attitude.
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All right, let's jump right into the near-death experience.
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I need to put an S on that because you've had four.
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Yes, I've had four.
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Yeah.
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We're going to mostly talk about your last one, your most recent one, but I do want to
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touch briefly on a couple of the first ones.
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I think we should go back to 1991 when you had the car accident because this was your
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first experience with a near-death experience.
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Would you mind telling us a little bit about that?
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Just briefly what happened in the accident.
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You mentioned the seat belt thing, but what happened immediately after that?
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Immediately after that, I woke up and people were knocking on the window and asking if
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I was okay.
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I blacked out quite a bit.
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I have little slideshow, like video clips of what happened for the next, probably, month.
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The next thing I remember, I'm being hoisted up into the helicopter for the flight for life.
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Some other little memories of the hospital people wake up and I'm telling them I need
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to get to class, get back to college, and do my homework and stuff.
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They're basically telling me that I'm paralyzed and I go in and out of consciousness.
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Then eventually, I got back to Colorado.
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We had a medical jet bring me home.
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I had a surgery to stabilize my neck.
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It's a halo procedure, what they call it.
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They don't really do those anymore.
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And it's pretty horrific.
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They put screws into your head, in the front, in your forehead, and in the back.
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They put this contraption on you that you can't move your neck at all for eight weeks.
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You have to move your eyes around like this to see stuff.
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I've seen pictures of people with those on it.
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It's just like a torture chamber device.
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Yeah.
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I can tell you it is.
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It's really weird when they take it off and they unscrew it because they don't put you
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under for that.
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But you're under when they put it on.
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You can hear the screws coming out.
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It's pretty wild.
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But I think it was during that surgery when I had my first experience.
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It's the tunnel of light kind of thing.
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Yeah.
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Go ahead and start to give us some detail on that.
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I just sort of came to it and lifted up this tunnel.
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There's a white light at the top.
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I could see three darker silhouettes up there.
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It was like human voices.
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They're encouraging me to relax and give up and just give up.
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They would say, this is over.
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This one's over.
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It was very, very comforting.
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That's one thing I remember like, whoa, this is better than anything I'd experienced in
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reality.
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I had a bunch of friends from high school and college visiting.
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Right when the medical jet landed, they were all there and they were hanging around the
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hospital to support me before this surgery.
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And there was lots of girls from high school and college that had showed up.
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I remember it meaning a lot to me that they actually had cared about me.
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Some of them I thought didn't know I existed.
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I went into that surgery and I remember trying to talk to the voices at the top of the tunnel
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and say, I don't want to go.
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Wait, hang on.
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I don't want to go.
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I've never seen how many women are coming to visit me.
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I love it.
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And they laughed.
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They laughed so hard and I went right back down into my body.
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That was my first experience.
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So that was the beginning and end of it.
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Pretty girl saved you.
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I love that.
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The second one was how many years later?
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It was about 15 years later, I would say.
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And this was also in a hospital stay.
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Were you having surgery again or what happened?
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I had a collapsed lung and I had a complication in the hospital where the chest tube clipped
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an artery between my ribs and I started bleeding out, bleeding to death.
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They did a code blue in the hospital and they brought the troops, everybody that was available.
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They came and each person tried to revive me.
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That one, as my blood pressure started going down, they were announcing the blood pressure
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and I can remember it got pretty low.
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It got as low as I am 60 for the high number.
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I can't remember the lower number but as it was going down like that, I would see the
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white plasma like this milky kind of strange white light and I could see people moving
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around.
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There was one nurse with some blue glasses and a ponytail and she was whipping her ponytail
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around and it was making trails through the white.
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Very bizarre and when they would come in real close to my face and say, are you okay?
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I would see their whole face.
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That was a little bit strange too.
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Eventually they got one of the doctors, I think it was a doctor, had come in and she
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got something into my neck and down into the like a catheter down into my heart area almost
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and they pumped some stuff in there and I came back immediately.
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But that one, the white and it was weird.
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It was very calming.
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I wasn't scared, I wasn't like, oh, I'm dying or anything like that.
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So that was my second experience.
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Some people in that kind of situation have told me that they found themselves out of
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their body like up near the ceiling in the corner of the room and sort of watching what
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was going on.
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Was that happening to you or were you still in your body just looking up at people as things
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were happening?
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I was still in the body looking and looking up.
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Okay.
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All right, let's move on to number four because this is one that's more of the traditional
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out of the body really went someplace.
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So let's talk about this one.
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This was just February of last year.
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So it was much more recent and I know your memory is clear on this one.
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Tell me what led up to this.
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Yeah, that one, I was in the hospital for a bladder infection that had crossed the blood
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barrier and became sepsis.
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I was pretty sick.
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They had me on some antibiotics for three days in the hospital.
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And for me, it's really hard to do time in the hospital because I'm not at home with
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my caregivers and people that help me roll around in bed or they can focus just on me.
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When you're in the hospital, you have these nurses with like 40 or 80 people that they
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have to worry about.
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So they kind of leave you alone and I can't move my hands like I said earlier.
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And I have to try to get them to do things the way I do it at home.
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And one of the nurses there, so let me tell you too that I have a catheter for urine and
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when you're a quadriplegic, they will do this procedure called a super pubic procedure
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where they put a hole in your stomach right below your belly button.
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And so you'll have a catheter coming out of that hole.
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It goes into your bladder and that's how you manage your urine and bladder system when
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you're in this condition.
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So the nurse told me, I'm going to put this sticker on your leg and you're supposed to
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put the catheter into the sticker so it doesn't get pulled basically.
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And I'm kind of an old guy, old school guy and I don't use those.
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I just put it, I put the catheter kind of up in my waistband to secure it.
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And when I sleep, I just have it coming off the bed.
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And I told her that's how I do it.
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And she was like, okay.
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But she went and did it anyway and put it on and I didn't know.
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I went to, I asked them to roll me onto my left side in the middle of the night and they
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turned me that way.
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I'm thinking in my head, I don't need to check the catheter because it's going to be
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covered off like I do at home.
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I had rolled right on top of it and it kinked.
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For me, that's, it can be really dangerous.
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It causes another medical thing called autonomic dysreflexia that it's basically a pain response
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when you have a spinal cord injury and you can't really, your body's trying to tell your
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brain that there's something wrong, but the connection in your spinal cord is kind of
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a little bit messed up.
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So your blood pressure goes up and you can have, well, ultimately you just have a stroke
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and die.
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So that was happening.
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But I was sleeping and in my, I guess it would be a dream.
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I felt like I had to go to the bathroom real bad because it was kinked and my bladder was
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filling up and I could tell that my head was pounding and I'm like, okay, I need to get
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somebody in here to help.
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But I didn't wake up.
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Usually I would wake up in that situation.
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And this time I kind of went into this, it was pretty cool actually.
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All of a sudden I'm looking up at the sky and it's like purplish black, like a magenta,
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just real vast sky, like, you know, nothing like that would be on earth.
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And I was standing with the person that I couldn't really see, but I felt like I really
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knew them well.
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And we were waiting for the hawks to show up, which is interesting.
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Not sure why.
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We kept waiting and it's just an overall feeling of, you know, this is home, this is fantastic,
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00:17:43,000 --> 00:17:44,080
just comfortable.
242
00:17:44,080 --> 00:17:51,240
Like when I talk about stuff like this, I like to tell people that I was in Hawaii once.
243
00:17:51,240 --> 00:17:59,520
And the water was 85 degrees and I was underwater and I was like, this is so pleasant, you know.
244
00:17:59,520 --> 00:18:01,920
That's the only thing I can really compare it to.
245
00:18:01,920 --> 00:18:03,320
But it was better.
246
00:18:03,320 --> 00:18:06,880
You know, it just feels real like you're supposed to be there.
247
00:18:06,880 --> 00:18:08,640
It's comfortable.
248
00:18:08,640 --> 00:18:14,120
And I could see often the distance while we were waiting for the hawks, I could see like
249
00:18:14,120 --> 00:18:16,800
a city kind of in it.
250
00:18:16,800 --> 00:18:24,520
It looked like geometric, like figure outlines and they were like purple, like fluorescent
251
00:18:24,520 --> 00:18:26,040
purple.
252
00:18:26,040 --> 00:18:34,880
And the background was sort of black and pinks and purples and almost like crystals.
253
00:18:34,880 --> 00:18:40,280
It was very interesting, very, very cool looking.
254
00:18:40,280 --> 00:18:48,000
And then the hawks showed up and it was like, they were like these big black, it was sort
255
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:50,480
of, it's very hard to describe.
256
00:18:50,480 --> 00:18:58,720
They were kind of like a black circle, but the wings looked like almost like a windmill
257
00:18:58,720 --> 00:18:59,720
kind of thing.
258
00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:04,680
And they were kind of spinning around like in a clockwise motion and they were coming,
259
00:19:04,680 --> 00:19:06,320
you know, and they went over the top of us.
260
00:19:06,320 --> 00:19:13,480
It was nothing like a hawk that we're used to seeing here in our lives.
261
00:19:13,480 --> 00:19:21,680
And then it kind of moved into where I was walking through a field of like, it was kind
262
00:19:21,680 --> 00:19:24,720
of brownish tall grass.
263
00:19:24,720 --> 00:19:27,720
And you know, there's like a little path.
264
00:19:27,720 --> 00:19:33,040
And once again, this super comfortable feeling just was there.
265
00:19:33,040 --> 00:19:35,920
You know, like this is, this is just awesome.
266
00:19:35,920 --> 00:19:40,880
I don't really want to go back to my paralyzed body for sure.
267
00:19:40,880 --> 00:19:49,200
I didn't want to, but I remember looking down and seeing these little insects on the grass
268
00:19:49,200 --> 00:19:51,480
blades on the top.
269
00:19:51,480 --> 00:19:57,480
And they got on my hand and they would look, they were kind of looking at me and it was
270
00:19:57,480 --> 00:20:04,880
kind of like a little cartoonish looking insects.
271
00:20:04,880 --> 00:20:10,600
And they, they looked at me and they made these little noises and I got the knowledge
272
00:20:10,600 --> 00:20:12,640
or I don't know what happened.
273
00:20:12,640 --> 00:20:21,640
They didn't talk or anything, but all of a sudden I knew that they were responsible for
274
00:20:21,640 --> 00:20:23,440
making crop circles.
275
00:20:23,440 --> 00:20:25,760
That's what I got from that.
276
00:20:25,760 --> 00:20:27,960
Okay, hold on.
277
00:20:27,960 --> 00:20:33,720
These, okay, something just blew my mind for a second.
278
00:20:33,720 --> 00:20:40,200
So you got, you had some kind of communication that insects let you know they're the ones
279
00:20:40,200 --> 00:20:46,360
that make the crop circles that we assume are from aliens or from people trying to play
280
00:20:46,360 --> 00:20:47,840
tricks with us.
281
00:20:47,840 --> 00:20:51,920
That's, yes, that's what I got from that.
282
00:20:51,920 --> 00:20:52,920
All right.
283
00:20:52,920 --> 00:20:53,920
Interesting.
284
00:20:53,920 --> 00:20:57,720
Hey, before we move on, I want to ask you a couple of questions about some of the things
285
00:20:57,720 --> 00:20:59,880
you've mentioned so far.
286
00:20:59,880 --> 00:21:04,120
First of all, in what way did this feel different than a regular dream that you have when you
287
00:21:04,120 --> 00:21:05,120
sleep?
288
00:21:05,120 --> 00:21:08,120
Okay, that's, that's a great question.
289
00:21:08,120 --> 00:21:14,840
Well my dreams when I sleep are always really fragmented.
290
00:21:14,840 --> 00:21:20,240
They're very like something that's always real weird and not, you know, they're not
291
00:21:20,240 --> 00:21:21,320
real linear.
292
00:21:21,320 --> 00:21:26,920
They're kind of just you're dropped in this situation and something weird happens and
293
00:21:26,920 --> 00:21:28,480
nothing makes sense.
294
00:21:28,480 --> 00:21:32,760
And they're very short and I don't usually remember my dreams.
295
00:21:32,760 --> 00:21:34,520
You know, it's always like, oh, that was a dream.
296
00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:37,000
That was just a little piece of that dream.
297
00:21:37,000 --> 00:21:40,880
This is like, this is a lot different.
298
00:21:40,880 --> 00:21:41,880
More real.
299
00:21:41,880 --> 00:21:47,800
It's very, you know, there's no like this last one we're talking about.
300
00:21:47,800 --> 00:21:49,440
There's no like fogginess.
301
00:21:49,440 --> 00:21:51,440
There's, it's very laniier.
302
00:21:51,440 --> 00:21:54,720
It's just like your day would be in life, you know, where.
303
00:21:54,720 --> 00:21:57,200
Does it seem more real than a dream?
304
00:21:57,200 --> 00:21:59,080
Exactly, yeah.
305
00:21:59,080 --> 00:22:00,920
Like you really were there.
306
00:22:00,920 --> 00:22:04,280
Yeah, even more real than what we're doing here.
307
00:22:04,280 --> 00:22:08,120
Well, I'm not sure how to take that.
308
00:22:08,120 --> 00:22:12,720
Okay, you mentioned somebody was with you.
309
00:22:12,720 --> 00:22:17,480
Can you give any idea who that was or what kind of being that was?
310
00:22:17,480 --> 00:22:20,200
No, I don't.
311
00:22:20,200 --> 00:22:25,800
But they were definitely either from there or they were, they had knowledge of that place
312
00:22:25,800 --> 00:22:29,680
because they were the ones telling me about waiting for the hawks.
313
00:22:29,680 --> 00:22:33,800
And, you know, I felt like I was kind of new.
314
00:22:33,800 --> 00:22:37,160
You've had a year to think about the hawks.
315
00:22:37,160 --> 00:22:39,600
That sounds so, it's just different.
316
00:22:39,600 --> 00:22:41,240
It's just kind of bizarre.
317
00:22:41,240 --> 00:22:47,360
Do you have you come up with any conclusions as to why hawks, were they symbolism of something
318
00:22:47,360 --> 00:22:49,680
or what's the deal with hawks?
319
00:22:49,680 --> 00:22:56,600
I really, I mean, I've seen hawks and eagles in the sky around here and I'm fascinated
320
00:22:56,600 --> 00:22:58,960
with those.
321
00:22:58,960 --> 00:23:05,640
But I don't know why they would pop, why that would have popped up in the NDE.
322
00:23:05,640 --> 00:23:13,360
Did you feel like you were still in your paralyzed kind of state or you were free from that when
323
00:23:13,360 --> 00:23:14,680
you were there?
324
00:23:14,680 --> 00:23:17,720
Oh, definitely free from it.
325
00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:19,520
Tell me about that.
326
00:23:19,520 --> 00:23:23,800
Like, were you walking or were you, what do you remember about that?
327
00:23:23,800 --> 00:23:27,200
Yeah, walking.
328
00:23:27,200 --> 00:23:30,680
When I put my hand down, I was moving my hand.
329
00:23:30,680 --> 00:23:33,800
I could kind of show you my hand here.
330
00:23:33,800 --> 00:23:36,800
I can't move my fingers.
331
00:23:36,800 --> 00:23:44,040
But in that world, I put my arm down and I could, you know, I was moved, the insects
332
00:23:44,040 --> 00:23:48,240
were on my fingers and I was moving my hand around.
333
00:23:48,240 --> 00:23:50,520
And I definitely was walking.
334
00:23:50,520 --> 00:23:53,400
Have you been able to paint what you saw there?
335
00:23:53,400 --> 00:23:55,480
No, I have not.
336
00:23:55,480 --> 00:24:00,920
I haven't even thought about it until right this second when you just gave me the prompt
337
00:24:00,920 --> 00:24:01,920
there.
338
00:24:01,920 --> 00:24:04,520
Okay, I'm your muse for your next project.
339
00:24:04,520 --> 00:24:06,400
Yeah, yeah.
340
00:24:06,400 --> 00:24:09,960
I can't wait to see it.
341
00:24:09,960 --> 00:24:13,800
And then one last thing that we're going to keep going with your story.
342
00:24:13,800 --> 00:24:18,680
I love how you were trying to describe feeling comfortable.
343
00:24:18,680 --> 00:24:22,840
I believe you mentioned the word home.
344
00:24:22,840 --> 00:24:23,840
Dig a little deeper.
345
00:24:23,840 --> 00:24:28,760
Why at all were you feeling comfortable means a lot of different things?
346
00:24:28,760 --> 00:24:31,680
Yeah, exactly.
347
00:24:31,680 --> 00:24:39,320
Just, you know, in how you feel like when the temperatures just right and you're like,
348
00:24:39,320 --> 00:24:41,760
this is, you know, there's no wind.
349
00:24:41,760 --> 00:24:48,360
There's, I guess it was, it was those kind of things just the, I don't, I really was
350
00:24:48,360 --> 00:24:54,960
key in in on temperature and just how the body feels, you know, like, it almost felt
351
00:24:54,960 --> 00:24:58,520
like there was nobody involved.
352
00:24:58,520 --> 00:25:04,480
You know, there's no like, oh, my ankle hurts or you know, my, you know, there's no hunger,
353
00:25:04,480 --> 00:25:06,360
no thirst.
354
00:25:06,360 --> 00:25:10,520
I can't come up with anything other than, you know, I just kind of felt like I was home.
355
00:25:10,520 --> 00:25:15,560
I was like kind of relieved that something was done.
356
00:25:15,560 --> 00:25:19,160
I'm finally, finally back.
357
00:25:19,160 --> 00:25:20,840
Okay.
358
00:25:20,840 --> 00:25:22,800
Let's pick it up from the Hawks.
359
00:25:22,800 --> 00:25:24,800
You said the Hawks finally arrived.
360
00:25:24,800 --> 00:25:25,800
Yes.
361
00:25:25,800 --> 00:25:28,640
Like two Hawks or 200 Hawks?
362
00:25:28,640 --> 00:25:35,560
I think it was about three or four, but definitely didn't look like a hawk that you would think,
363
00:25:35,560 --> 00:25:39,160
you know, here, one of the Raptor types.
364
00:25:39,160 --> 00:25:40,960
What did it look like?
365
00:25:40,960 --> 00:25:49,560
It was kind of like a black center and like, geez, like kind of like the thing behind you
366
00:25:49,560 --> 00:25:53,040
there that, that's interesting.
367
00:25:53,040 --> 00:25:55,040
Oh, the shipwheel?
368
00:25:55,040 --> 00:25:59,520
Yeah, that shipwheel is kind of like how to center like that.
369
00:25:59,520 --> 00:26:01,600
It's an antique shipwheel.
370
00:26:01,600 --> 00:26:02,600
Interesting.
371
00:26:02,600 --> 00:26:09,080
But the blades coming off of the center were more like curved, kind of like, like, like
372
00:26:09,080 --> 00:26:17,000
a, like a futuristic high tech windmill kind of thing, like a fan.
373
00:26:17,000 --> 00:26:18,840
And they were kind of spinning.
374
00:26:18,840 --> 00:26:23,080
I guess they were animals, but not, I mean, they don't look like an animal that I've ever
375
00:26:23,080 --> 00:26:24,080
seen.
376
00:26:24,080 --> 00:26:25,760
What else did you see?
377
00:26:25,760 --> 00:26:28,200
What happened next?
378
00:26:28,200 --> 00:26:38,160
After I saw the insects, I remember continuing through that field on a path and there was,
379
00:26:38,160 --> 00:26:45,320
there was a lot of people with me and we were in a line, a single file line and it kind of
380
00:26:45,320 --> 00:26:51,960
curved around and there was a cave and it just kind of had a dark entrance and I couldn't
381
00:26:51,960 --> 00:26:52,960
really see.
382
00:26:52,960 --> 00:26:54,880
I was pretty far away.
383
00:26:54,880 --> 00:27:05,000
I was in a line to get to this cave and everybody was very happy to be in that line and it was
384
00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:13,200
just, it just had a feeling, a positive, like happy vibe, you know, like, okay, you know,
385
00:27:13,200 --> 00:27:14,200
we're here.
386
00:27:14,200 --> 00:27:19,680
There was, I felt like there were people there that I knew, but I can't tell you who they
387
00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:20,680
were.
388
00:27:20,680 --> 00:27:23,080
Fair enough.
389
00:27:23,080 --> 00:27:24,520
Anything else?
390
00:27:24,520 --> 00:27:27,200
That's pretty much where it ended.
391
00:27:27,200 --> 00:27:35,400
After that, I woke up in my hospital bed and on my head it's just boom, boom, boom, pounding,
392
00:27:35,400 --> 00:27:38,400
pounding, pounding from the autonomic dysreflexia.
393
00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:41,680
It had gotten pretty bad.
394
00:27:41,680 --> 00:27:46,680
When I'm in the hospital, they have like a little ball that they hang down kind of by
395
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:52,000
my face and I can, I can hit it with my hand like this.
396
00:27:52,000 --> 00:27:58,560
It sets off a call button for them to come in and I set it off and they were like, well,
397
00:27:58,560 --> 00:28:04,480
you know, we're busy feeding patients right now and you're going to have to wait.
398
00:28:04,480 --> 00:28:10,360
You know, I was, and then I had to hit it again and I was like, you guys don't understand.
399
00:28:10,360 --> 00:28:12,360
I need help immediately.
400
00:28:12,360 --> 00:28:13,360
Get in here now.
401
00:28:13,360 --> 00:28:20,760
And after I hit it the second time, they rushed in and took my blood pressure and it was 250,
402
00:28:20,760 --> 00:28:30,000
260 over, I never remember the lower number, but you know, my normal blood pressure as a
403
00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:34,560
quadriplegic is 85 over like 50.
404
00:28:34,560 --> 00:28:38,160
You know, 250, 260 is way up there.
405
00:28:38,160 --> 00:28:40,040
The head is pounding.
406
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:42,640
I'm about ready to have a stroke.
407
00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:50,720
They rolled me over and the catheter got unkinked and the bag filled up immediately.
408
00:28:50,720 --> 00:28:54,400
And then it filled up again after they had emptied it.
409
00:28:54,400 --> 00:29:00,600
The night urine bag and that was definitely the cause.
410
00:29:00,600 --> 00:29:05,800
And I started to slowly come back to normal.
411
00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:09,040
But yeah, that was, that was the fourth one.
412
00:29:09,040 --> 00:29:13,080
That's the last one I've had and I'm trying my best not to have another one.
413
00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:14,160
Good idea.
414
00:29:14,160 --> 00:29:18,680
So what have you learned from all this that you can share with people?
415
00:29:18,680 --> 00:29:25,920
Well, I mean, I've learned that each time I really, I feel like it changes you.
416
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:28,680
You almost gain some abilities.
417
00:29:28,680 --> 00:29:33,040
Like I've noticed psychic type stuff.
418
00:29:33,040 --> 00:29:35,880
I've noticed a lot of that.
419
00:29:35,880 --> 00:29:41,240
I noticed a lot of synchronicities in my life.
420
00:29:41,240 --> 00:29:45,160
And I'm not sure if I would notice that otherwise.
421
00:29:45,160 --> 00:29:53,160
These like, you know, people I meet are very similar to other people I've met over the
422
00:29:53,160 --> 00:29:55,320
years.
423
00:29:55,320 --> 00:30:00,320
Another thing, since I need so much help, I have a lot of caregivers.
424
00:30:00,320 --> 00:30:03,960
I've had a lot of caregivers over these 33 years.
425
00:30:03,960 --> 00:30:11,200
I'll be, I'll be starting my 34th year of being a quad in October.
426
00:30:11,200 --> 00:30:18,200
So it's quite a long time and I've, you know, I've met tons and tons of people, different
427
00:30:18,200 --> 00:30:26,640
kinds of people from every different country, every kind of person, every religion and race.
428
00:30:26,640 --> 00:30:30,720
And you get to know them on a really personal level.
429
00:30:30,720 --> 00:30:38,040
And there's a lot of like really bizarre synchronicities I've noticed between a couple of people.
430
00:30:38,040 --> 00:30:41,600
Can you give me an example of what you mean by that?
431
00:30:41,600 --> 00:30:43,480
Yeah, for sure.
432
00:30:43,480 --> 00:30:48,520
Let's see, I can give you, let's see, it was in probably 2013.
433
00:30:48,520 --> 00:30:56,640
I, I, well, and I hire all my own caregivers and I was given an insurance, an insurance
434
00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:58,160
settlement.
435
00:30:58,160 --> 00:31:01,960
So I manage all my own money and pay them.
436
00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:06,640
I don't use any government stuff, which is nice, you know, I don't have any control.
437
00:31:06,640 --> 00:31:10,000
I, I get to hire and work with the people I want.
438
00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:11,520
I want to.
439
00:31:11,520 --> 00:31:13,520
So it was probably 2013.
440
00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:21,800
I hired a girl that I can just give you some of the things that I learned about her that
441
00:31:21,800 --> 00:31:23,800
are similar to another.
442
00:31:23,800 --> 00:31:31,440
So she basically, she's a massage therapist and she was a blonde, blonde girl with blue
443
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:35,680
eyes and she's from New Jersey.
444
00:31:35,680 --> 00:31:39,800
And she was driving a black Jeep after I hired her.
445
00:31:39,800 --> 00:31:43,880
Her name was Rachel and, you know, we got to know each other.
446
00:31:43,880 --> 00:31:45,880
We worked together for two years.
447
00:31:45,880 --> 00:31:51,720
Her dad was from New Jersey and he had a, he had a house in the mountain, in a mountain
448
00:31:51,720 --> 00:31:54,920
town in Colorado.
449
00:31:54,920 --> 00:32:00,360
She would go up there, you know, on holidays and 4th of July and stuff like that.
450
00:32:00,360 --> 00:32:09,120
Anyway, so that's her and then I probably like, let's see, that had to be like 2017
451
00:32:09,120 --> 00:32:17,480
when I met another lady through the same interview process and Rachel no longer had worked for
452
00:32:17,480 --> 00:32:19,480
me.
453
00:32:19,480 --> 00:32:25,560
And this, this lady drives up in a black Jeep and she gets out and I kind of watched to
454
00:32:25,560 --> 00:32:30,160
see who's coming to my door to make sure that it's not, you know, so I make sure it's who
455
00:32:30,160 --> 00:32:33,720
is supposed to be coming before I opened my door.
456
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:39,600
And she's walking up and she's got blonde hair and went, you know, she's got blue eyes.
457
00:32:39,600 --> 00:32:44,840
I noticed when we're doing the interview and she tells me that she's from New Jersey.
458
00:32:44,840 --> 00:32:50,960
We started working together and I learned that her dad has a house in the same mountain
459
00:32:50,960 --> 00:32:53,000
town that Rachel's did.
460
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:56,840
And she's like, and, you know, he has a party on the 4th of July.
461
00:32:56,840 --> 00:32:59,840
So if I have to work that day, it would be nice.
462
00:32:59,840 --> 00:33:02,280
If you could try to have that covered.
463
00:33:02,280 --> 00:33:05,440
And I'm sitting there going, is this real?
464
00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:09,840
You know, and that's happened like two or three times.
465
00:33:09,840 --> 00:33:13,240
I have some other stories about that.
466
00:33:13,240 --> 00:33:15,160
I don't know what that is.
467
00:33:15,160 --> 00:33:18,840
I talked to people about that, but there's never a clear thing.
468
00:33:18,840 --> 00:33:24,160
And I don't know if that's connected to the NDE's or not, but I do notice that I see
469
00:33:24,160 --> 00:33:31,800
things, you know, I start to match things up and see a lot of connections like that.
470
00:33:31,800 --> 00:33:33,400
Interesting.
471
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:38,160
Before we wrap up, I just want to give you a little background here.
472
00:33:38,160 --> 00:33:44,240
We have listeners from all over the world and there's a lot of turmoil out there right
473
00:33:44,240 --> 00:33:45,240
now.
474
00:33:45,240 --> 00:33:46,240
Right?
475
00:33:46,240 --> 00:33:52,200
There's, there's wars, there's terrorists, there's natural disasters.
476
00:33:52,200 --> 00:33:57,560
Sorry, I'm not trying to bring everybody down, but I would love to hear a message of hope
477
00:33:57,560 --> 00:33:59,560
from you.
478
00:33:59,560 --> 00:34:00,560
Brighten our day.
479
00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:03,600
You are a good shining example.
480
00:34:03,600 --> 00:34:06,120
What do you have to say to lift everybody today?
481
00:34:06,120 --> 00:34:14,320
Eric, I would have to say, if you, if you think about what it would be like to have to live
482
00:34:14,320 --> 00:34:23,080
in a wheelchair and not be able to move your hands, that's bad.
483
00:34:23,080 --> 00:34:25,320
I've been able to overcome that.
484
00:34:25,320 --> 00:34:34,880
And when I look at the world and the hatred and the divisive, the division that people
485
00:34:34,880 --> 00:34:43,840
are trying to create over like really small things that I really, they don't matter.
486
00:34:43,840 --> 00:34:50,360
Those problems that people fight about and, you know, they'll go to war and for the, just
487
00:34:50,360 --> 00:34:58,800
their opinion, you know, and that's not, that's not good, obviously, but those little things
488
00:34:58,800 --> 00:34:59,880
really don't matter.
489
00:34:59,880 --> 00:35:02,120
We have it good right now.
490
00:35:02,120 --> 00:35:09,480
The way, I mean, we live inside, we have electricity and running water and that, that should be
491
00:35:09,480 --> 00:35:12,440
really good enough for us, I think.
492
00:35:12,440 --> 00:35:13,920
What's the headline from that?
493
00:35:13,920 --> 00:35:15,720
Where are you going with that?
494
00:35:15,720 --> 00:35:20,600
I guess I'm saying that like, don't sweat the little stuff.
495
00:35:20,600 --> 00:35:27,400
You know, it's not, it's not worth digging in to where we have a giant war over these
496
00:35:27,400 --> 00:35:28,400
small issues.
497
00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:30,400
It's very petty.
498
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:38,720
I mean, if we could get over that and have humanity be together as one, I think that
499
00:35:38,720 --> 00:35:40,240
would be better.
500
00:35:40,240 --> 00:35:41,240
Yeah.
501
00:35:41,240 --> 00:35:42,720
Amen to all that.
502
00:35:42,720 --> 00:35:47,280
If anybody wants to find your artwork, your book, Hendrickmedia.com, it'll be in the show
503
00:35:47,280 --> 00:35:49,080
notes.
504
00:35:49,080 --> 00:35:52,720
And Matt, thanks a ton for being with me today.
505
00:35:52,720 --> 00:35:54,920
Hey, Eric, thank you for having me.
506
00:35:54,920 --> 00:35:57,920
I love it.
507
00:35:57,920 --> 00:36:00,680
Thanks again for listening and sharing this podcast.
508
00:36:00,680 --> 00:36:06,760
Don't forget to hit the follow or subscribe button and sign up for our newsletter at roundtripdeath.com.
509
00:36:06,760 --> 00:36:11,040
If you want to share your near-death experience or if you have questions or comments about
510
00:36:11,040 --> 00:36:15,600
the show, send an email to ericatroundtripdeath.com.
511
00:36:15,600 --> 00:36:34,560
Until then, I wish you everything good that you're looking for in this life and the next.
