Have you ever had a near-death experience (NDE)?

[Ben Zioner]

12 hours ago, PJPom said:

raising the nose only reduced the airspeed bringing us close to a stall.

Well, lower the nose and throttle up somewhat, but you had only 30 seconds to do that.

 

AF447 had minutes, and they crashed.

[Ben Zioner]

16 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

I got the Bends while scuba diving in Egypt, unconscious etc. Didn't change my thinking after except i gave up scuba

Same here, in the Geneva lake, 50 meters, pitch dark, 4 degrees water and both my regulators jammed. Some Bends too. Kept diving but avoided depth in cold water with unsuited gear.

[save the frogs]

On 3/20/2025 at 3:13 AM, scubascuba3 said:

I got the Bends while scuba diving in Egypt, unconscious etc. Didn't change my thinking after except i gave up scuba

I know most people don't believe in past lives, but I'm sure I drowned or nearly drowned in a past life because I am terrified of water and won't go near it. 

 

[sanuk21]

11 hours ago, connda said:

NDE are generally an experience of consciousness after clinical death.  You were clinically dead as far as your heartbeat, just not conscious.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near-death_experience

Many posters seem to have missed that 'near-death experience' is an idiom, not a strictly literal term.

A good example of an NDE is an out-of-body experience (OBE) during resuscitation or a critical medical event, such as cardiac arrest.

[crazykopite]

Yes twice during my military career and yes I live each day to the full as tomorrow may never come !

[newbee2022]

18 hours ago, connda said:

Have you ever had a near-death experience (NDE)?  If you have had one, what was your experience?  Has it altered your perspective on life?  Do you now fear death more, or do you view death with acceptance?  Do you believe that consciousness transcends death or that the jaws of nothingness slams shut at the end of life?

If you believe that NDEs are just a DMT hit before you expire into nihilistic nothingness, that's Ok too, explain why you hold that opinion as well as what led you to believe the way you do?

If you read scientific expertises you'll find different impressions of NDE.

There you'll find what you want to know 👍

[klauskunkel]

New company offered skydiving in Hawaii and they invited me on a familiarization jump, so I would recommend them to tourists. Small airfield on Oahu's Northshore, an even smaller Cessna we had to push onto the field for take off. Inside sitting on the bare floor 2 jumpers (me and GF) strapped to 2 instructors and the cabin was full. Took forever to get to altitude. Went out the door and freefall for a few seconds, then instructor deployed chute. On the way down he started handing me things: a piece of strap, broken plastic ring and some other stuff, yelling "keep that for me in your pocket". After landing (face first), he explained that when he pulled the strap to deploy the chute, it broke and went thru and he was able to grab a hold of it in the nick of time before it would go thru some rings, which would've been the end...

The stuff he handed me he wanted to use as evidence when suing the chute manufacturer...

I had a weeklong Adrenaline high.

I never got around to referring any customers to them...

[1FinickyOne]

18 hours ago, Jingthing said:

Some might not call this one but feel it was.

I was on a deep woods Appalachian camping trip with friends at the site of a cliff (at age 15).

At night swallowed some "articles" that turned out be an unspeakably massive overdose. If I had to guess it felt like 100 times or more OD.

Experienced warp speed psychedelic hell and it seemed endless. Impossible to ever forget that.

My friends were aware and I guess were trying to help but I was beyond help. 

I felt like jumping off the cliff or what was known back then as doing a Diane Linkletter. I don't know exactly what stopped me as I don't think I was being physically restrained.

However, experiencing what I felt as endless hell in my brain and coming razor thin close to the big jump to me qualifies as a near death experience.

As as a result of that I did seek medical evaluation to determine if I had damaged my brain. They said no, but it was definitely changed.

Very powerful and you are probably lucky to be alive...

 

However, I think NDE's are defined as when your heart stops and you are considered dead for a period of time and then come back to life and tell of your tales.. a friend of mine had a couple of them and seemed well versed in what occurs... walking towards the light and re-meeting past generations who can serve as spirit guides... and typically the people enjoy being dead but choose to go back into their bodies.,

[actonion]

1965, British Amy, in Aden  (Yemen),  posted in  a  Sangar, 3 Mortar  Bombs  dropped on us,   2 collegues died, i escaped  with lifetime Deafness  / VIsion problems, that's as near death as you wanna be

[Mason45]

Many years ago I was a mainetance man at several high rise public housing estates. After I checked the problem I went back to my van and picked up the required tools. As I approached the front door I heard a decent thud sound several metres behind me. When I looked back a man lay there motionless with blood coming from his, mouth, ears and nose . Several years later when driving past that property I noticed scuff marks  on the wall exactly from where  the guy jumped from so it's obvious he lost lost his grip. So I suppose if I had've walked a bit slower then he would've lasnded on top of me.

[giddyup]

When the roof blew off and the walls collapsed of the top floor flat I was in during Cyclone Tracy (1974) I felt my number could be up.

[Cameroni]

The Greyson NDE scale has improved the rigor of near-death experience research by providing a standardized framework for analysis. Notably, American radiation oncologist Dr. Jeffrey Long has used the scale to amass a large database of NDEs through the Near Death Experience Research Foundation (NDERF).^[34] His first line of evidence shows that 835 out of 1,122 people who had experienced NDE seemed to feel an increase in alertness and consciousness although studies proved no sign of electrical brain activity.^[35] His second line of evidence studies the increase of accuracy developed by NDErs defining their resuscitation process with a 97.6% accuracy rate.^[35] Long documented seven more lines of evidence that all point to realism in NDE experiences, yet not all of them verifiable or defined by today's medical advances and technology.^[35] Having such an abnormally large amount (95.6% of 1,000 participants) of those who had experienced NDE proclaiming NDEs as real experiences, he concludes that although NDE are medically inexplicable, they are most probably a real phenomenon.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near-death_experience

[IsaanT]

Back in 1977 I had a motorcycle accident.  As I was sliding across the road, everything slowed down and my life did, indeed, flash before my eyes.  The experience at that moment was remarkably peaceful.  To me, that is the classic near-death experience.  Normality returned when I stopped sliding and realised I was OK and unhurt (full motorcycle suit, gloves and boots).

I had been overtaking a line of traffic slowly, picking off each car in turn.  I was doing 40-50mph.  I must have failed to see that the particular car I was overtaking was itself lining up for an overtake because it pulled out unexpectedly and my front wheel hit its rear offside bumper, which threw me off.  Me and my bike slide across the oncoming lane, coming to rest in the oncoming lane's kerb.  Obviously, if there had been any oncoming traffic there would have been a different outcome (but I hope I wouldn't have been so stupid as to try to overtake between oncoming traffic).

For those that haven't experienced it, when someone says that 'their life flashed before their eyes' it is like being in a video presentation of significant moments in your life.  Each 'slide' in the presentation only lasts a fraction of a second but long enough to be able to recognise it.  Perhaps 15-20 of these images occurred.  The 'slow motion' aspect is also interesting.  I must have been sliding across the road for no more than five seconds but it seemed like 10-15 seconds and, as I said, very peaceful, as though someone had turned the sound down and isolated me from all that was happening around me.  If that is how the mind prepares one for death in exceptional circumstances, I recommend it!

That's as close to death as I wish to experience until my time is finally up.

p.s. My bike was a Honda 250 G5.  I can still remember the registration.

[sanuk21]

11 minutes ago, IsaanT said:

Back in 1977 I had a motorcycle accident.  As I was sliding across the road, everything slowed down and my life did, indeed, flash before my eyes.  The experience at that moment was remarkably peaceful.  To me, that is the classic near-death experience.  Normality returned when I stopped sliding and realised I was OK and unhurt (full motorcycle suit, gloves and boots).

I had been overtaking a line of traffic slowly, picking off each car in turn.  I was doing 40-50mph.  I must have failed to see that the particular car I was overtaking was itself lining up for an overtake because it pulled out unexpectedly and my front wheel hit its rear offside bumper, which threw me off.  Me and my bike slide across the oncoming lane, coming to rest in the oncoming lane's kerb.  Obviously, if there had been any oncoming traffic there would have been a different outcome (but I hope I wouldn't have been so stupid as to try to overtake between oncoming traffic).

That's as close to death as I wish to experience until my time is finally up.

p.s. My bike was a Honda 250 G5.  I can still remember the registration.

That was definitely a close call, and your brain seems to have gone into full cinematic mode with the time dilation and life-flash effect. It’s a well-documented response to extreme situations.

What was previously discussed, though, is that ‘near-death experience’ (NDE) in the strictest sense usually refers to cases involving clinical death—like OBEs during cardiac arrest.

Your experience was undoubtedly intense, but it falls more into the category of a high-adrenaline survival response rather than the classic medical NDE.

IMHO

[Wrwest]

Four Wisdom Teeth out at one go. Told the Oral Surgeon to go easy with the anesthesia as I am a "soft touch". Right, male, how much do you weigh? How tall? So ... I stopped breathing. They brought me round ... no remembrances of anything but sleep.

 Then there was the five by-pass open chest surgery. Heart arrest on the operating table. Could not have been more timely. Again ... just sleep. Third was another Heart Attack but they placed a stent and did two additional angioplasties ... sleep.

[Cameroni]

https://www.nderf.org/Archives/NDERF_NDEs.html

[jcmj]

I was on an IVIG drip to battle a severe case of GBS and it didn’t agree with my body. I crashed hard and flat lined. I felt as if I was just floating above my body looking down at myself getting padded back to life. It seemed bright in the room, but I didn’t get that big bright light or any pictures of my life passing by. Feel kinda screwed on that one, but when I was finally stable the doctors told me that I coded and……., but I already knew that. I Felt a bit off, but I guess much better than it could have gone. Wish I would have had the full experience. 

[IsaanT]

On 3/20/2025 at 2:13 PM, scubascuba3 said:

I got the Bends while scuba diving in Egypt, unconscious etc. Didn't change my thinking after except i gave up scuba

That's rather ironic, given your handle on this forum.

I'm pleased you came to no harm.

[Stargeezr]

I had a heart attack on Dec 5th, and if my Sisdter in Law had not given me CPR

and the heart surgeon would not have put in a stint, i would be dead, so

yes I think that was a near death experience.

[freedomnow]

Yes, It never really dropped till now but I am passing through a future I saw in 1999 right now....specific motifs and images were remembered...exact to the penny....very dark...I either get through it or perish.

 

The youtube near-death vids are pretty amazing at times.

If you are a disbeliever, that is your right...I have no need to debate on this stuff.

 

You can touch upon it with psychedelics...is why terminally ill lose a fear of death as their egos already died second by second to reveal their glassy essence.