“There are no atheists in hospice nursing.”

a reply to: Annee

I believe that some day science may even crack the code of consciousness using quantum mechanics. We may get the answers on things like life after death, ghosts, telepathy, multiple dimensions, and all sorts of other previously mysterious subjects.

Probably not in my lifetime, but someday...

originally posted by: VegHead
That quote in the title is probably hyperbole, and a play on “no atheists in foxholes”, but it came from a very interesting person I recently met. I wanted to share her story with all of you.

We had a new face join our bible study last month (please don’t stop reading now just because I said “bible study”… this story does not require a Christian worldview). I didn’t recognize this woman from our church… but that wasn’t too unusual because we welcome people from all churches and people that don’t attend church at all into our group. She was quiet the first couple of weeks but then on the third week she started talking. I’ll call her Amber. Wow. She had stories that could fill a book!

Amber attended church a few times when she was a kid (before the age of 10) but was agnostic through her teen years and an atheist by college. She got married, had kids, raised them, and wanted to go back into the work force so she went back to school for nursing. She didn’t set out to be a hospice nurse, but that is where she ended up.

The experience of being a hospice nurse changed her worldview profoundly. At first, Amber wrote off so-call “deathbed visions” as a side effect of medication or a dying brain. But writing them off became increasingly difficult. After a couple of years of hospice nursing, the consistency of these deathbed visions were too much for her. What Amber believed previously (that death was the end, there was no more… that we are all just matter interacting as matter does, nothing more) began to look very incorrect.

Moments or days before dying, Amber’s patients were (and are) seeing loved ones that have already died. A few saw Jesus, but it is (according to Amber) more common to see a relative that has already died. Even those who were barely commutative are suddenly lucid and telling her what they are seeing. “My grandma is here! Do you see her? She is so lovely. She wants to take me with her. It’s so beautiful…”

Why would the visions be so consistent and so lucid if it were due to medications? (this is the question Amber asked) She became convinced that there is “something more” to death than just turning off a switch and disappearing into nothingness. So… here she was at our bible study, looking for that “something more”.

I wondered how true Amber’s statement was : “There are no atheists in hospice nursing”… I mean, how common is her experience for people in a hospice healthcare profession?

I found an abstract of an article from The American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine:
Source: journals.sagepub.com...

The purpose of this study was to determine the incidence of deathbed communications (DBCs) during the 30 days before death and their impact on the dying process. A total of 60 hospice chart audits and 75 survey responses by hospice nurses across the United States were analyzed. Chart audits revealed 5 (8.33%) of the 60 included descriptions of DBCs. The survey of 75 hospice nurses identified 363 incidences of DBCs, with an average of 4.8 patient occurrences per nurse per 30 days. In all, 89% of the hospice nurses reported patients who experienced a DBC had a peaceful and calm death, with only 40.5% reporting a peaceful and calm death without the DBC. These DBCs have a positive impact on the dying process but are underreported in patient records and under described in textbooks.

An average of 4.8 occurrences per hospice nurse per month. That would be enough to make most people want to look into what on earth is going on. Why are deathbed visions so common and why are they so consistent?

I also came across this in Social Work Today…
Source: www.socialworktoday.com...

According to Leslee Curtis, MSW, LGSW, a social worker at Mary T. Hospice, though some patients are able to report that they are experiencing such visitations, others may simply "point to something, maybe in the corner of the room, at the end of the bed, or out the window that they can see but which others cannot." She says other signs include comments such as, "Oh, there is Larry sitting in the chair" or, "Look at the angel;" gestures like reaching out one's arms as if to greet an unseen presence; or a patient who appears to be asleep or in a light coma opening her eyes and saying the name of a deceased loved one. 

"Clinically," Curtis says, "deathbed visions may be an indicator that death is near." Though research into DBVs is limited, studies thus far confirm this. The largest to date, a retrospective survey of medical professionals in the United States and India by Osis and Haraldsson, concluded that DBVs occur across cultures, tend to be of short duration, and that in 62% of cases reported in their study the patient died within 24 hours of reporting or showing signs of such a vision (Osis & Haraldsson, 1997).

So these deathbed visions appear to be both common and commonly known in the world of hospice care – with nurses and social workers that are in the privileged position of being at many people’s bedside the in their last days of life.

What do you make of all of this? (And, to be clear, we are talking about death bed visions (DBVs), which are different than NDEs)

Do you think it is the dying brain that conjures up dead relatives to keep us calm as our body goes about the business of dying? (And, if so, what evolutionary advantage would that have? How would “dying well” be selected for? I’m not totally opposed to this concept, I’ve just never understood the mechanism that would have allowed such a thing to evolve – because it serves no reproductive advantage. So I’d love to hear insights on this angle if anyone has some to share.)

Are these hallucinations caused by medications? If so, why are they more orderly and consistent than typical drug-induced hallucinations?

Do you think these death bed visions are glimpses into what we will all experience one day? That none of us will die alone, but that we will be lovingly escorted to our next realm?

I’d love to hear your stories of death bed visions if you’ve been at someone’s bedside in their last days. I know my grandpa became suddenly lucid right before death, but I don't believe he reported seeing anything. But he was reaching for something and he was peaceful.

Thanks!

(PS- My apologies but I had no idea where to place this thread... health? religion? paranormal?)

It's a very simple explanation. People are spoonfed heaven and "loved ones!!!!" that when they KNOW they are going to die; their brain starts rationalizing for them. As parts of the brain are affected from dying; they start losing sense of reality and very literally hallucinating. They aren't literally talking to dead people, like -- come on, if they were; they'd be able to tell you information that they could not know, and they can't.

a reply to: VegHead
One thing you have to take in to account is that different cultures/upbringings have different ideas. For example Indian visions appear different than western ones. Importantly, people always see what they know - if you are Christian you see Jesus, Hindus could see Indra or Brahma, Scientologists see Xenu (ha). And when it comes to ancestors, people see whoever meant the most to them.

To me it seems archetypal. People witness their favourite relatives doing fine and since you knew them well in life, it is easy for your imagination to extrapolate something *they would say* and make it appear genuine. All peoples across the world worshipped their dead ancestors at one time, so its a normal development from that, but more appealing to the modern sensibility.

Not to mention the theory that the pineal gland releases '___' on death to ease transition. It would naturally cause hallucinations.

None of that is to deny an afterlife, just another explanation for it. The fact its not a universal experience makes me think it is subjective (mental).

originally posted by: mrperplexed
Your post is an utter lie. One second of searching came up with mounds of testimony from athiest hospice nurses.

Dude, the FIRST line in the OP is "That quote in the title is probably hyperbole, and a play on “no atheists in foxholes”, "

a reply to: Ridhya
Excellent points... she did say a few saw "Jesus" but the vast majority who report DBVs to her see dead loved ones. Also in a few cases she said people saw someone they did not recognize at all. Of course many aren't speaking at all and do not have an apparent DBV.

Seeing dead loved ones at the point of death isn't really in line with Christian beliefs... but I agree that this has become a Western cultural "expectation". Along the lines of seeing a light at the end of a tunnel. The brain could subconsciously pull from these cultural references at the point of death as a coping mechanism.

But if our brains and bodies are simply being kind to us to help us deal with the dying process, you still have to wonder why? This serves no biological advantage that would allow natural selection to act upon it... right?

If you like reading, I suggest Surviving Death by Leslie Kean.

It is basically a case study on non-local consciousness.

Notice how all the Atheists feel the need to come in here and educate everyone on what atheism "really is"?

Because, after all, Atheists are much smarter than the lot of you and they want you to know it.

How that helps anyone or anything other than the Atheist's ego, I have no idea.

Anything to keep the conversation sidetracked.

originally posted by: OtherSideOfTheCoin
awesome thread!

I am a nurse, I have been around death a lot, while I have not personally witnessed anything I would describe as supernatural I know plenty of people I work with who claim to have either seen or heard stuff that makes them believe that there is something more to this life that our physical reality.

Same here, I have never witnessed anything strange when a patient have died and, just like you, I have been around death a lot.

However, I had one strange experience once which taught me that perhaps there are things out there that we don't know yet and taught me that perhaps we do have a soul. As a hard die agnostic I am still looking for that 'perfect' evidence, but that experience spooked me and it made me more open to certain possibilities. Here it is: www.abovetopsecret.com...





a reply to: VegHead

Hallucinations are a part of the dying process, I have witnessed them several times. They can be caused by so many factors: chemical imbalances (very common when a body is dying), medications, dehydration, even brain hypoxia (due to the person not getting enough oxygen).

But the quote in your OP is not truth: many atheist die as such and many nurses I know (including myself) are very comfortable knowing we are not immortal and that there is no God or, in my case, I am comfortable not knowing whether there is a God or not. Perhaps there is, perhaps heaven is real, perhaps Nirvana is real, perhaps we reincarnate over and over and over.... I guess I'll wait for my time to come to get an answer. Or maybe not.

a reply to: mrperplexed

Yes...even with war, famine, innocents and the suffering all over the world.

I dont profess to understand the reasoning of God (or to argue if there is One)....it may be only to convey something....to learn. To grow. To understand. Why? I dont know. But, there is something to learn from all living, life and death...

It will take me all of this one and perhaps more lifetimes....to understand and make my own contributions....IMO

originally posted by: kaylaluv
a reply to: Annee

I believe that some day science may even crack the code of consciousness using quantum mechanics. We may get the answers on things like life after death, ghosts, telepathy, multiple dimensions, and all sorts of other previously mysterious subjects.

Probably not in my lifetime, but someday...

I agree.

I think there's a thread about that on ATS.

I haven't had time to get into it.

originally posted by: NthOther
Notice how all the Atheists feel the need to come in here and educate everyone on what atheism "really is"?

Because, after all, Atheists are much smarter than the lot of you and they want you to know it.

How that helps anyone or anything other than the Atheist's ego, I have no idea.

Anything to keep the conversation sidetracked.

How do you equate clarifying what atheist actually means - - - to "they think they're smarter - - - and it's ego"?

a reply to: Agartha

Wow - what an intriguing story. I hope everyone clicks on that link to read your previous post. This was a near death vision (actually I'm not sure if the patient was near death) that gave the patient info she wouldn't have through apparent "natural" means. Thanks for posting that link and sharing your perspective!

originally posted by: VegHead
You are absolutely right ... atheism is much more complex and nuanced than simply not believing in God. It's shorthand but not especially accurate to lump atheists together - they are diverse.

Watch this and especially take note from 4 minutes and 20 seconds.
youtu.be...

a reply to: Annee

What if we're pieces of the same, source consciousness? Would it qualify as God? I'm not really expecting a 'yes' or 'no', its a general speculative question.

And OP, thanks for the non-political thread!

originally posted by: mrperplexed
a reply to: mysterioustranger

And yet if there is a God he or she or it ignores our plea's and allows us to get maimed, disfigured, PTSD'd and killed... Awesome....

Unless us being here to experience these things was the point. I couldn't say if this is why it is or not, just playing devil's advocate...which may be an odd turn-of-phrase for this post.

originally posted by: Annee

originally posted by: NthOther
Notice how all the Atheists feel the need to come in here and educate everyone on what atheism "really is"?

Because, after all, Atheists are much smarter than the lot of you and they want you to know it.

How that helps anyone or anything other than the Atheist's ego, I have no idea.

Anything to keep the conversation sidetracked.

How do you equate clarifying what atheist actually means - - - to "they think they're smarter - - - and it's ego"?

Have you never had this conversation before? It is quite common to appeal to a low IQ or intelligence for the most frequent reason for believing in "God". I have done it myself more times than I would like to admit. I am not claiming you did that or that it was done in this thread, just pointing out why they might have said that.

When I was 12 - I was left to care for an elderly friend of the family while my parents were away.
We made a blackberry cobbler - put it in the over - and sat down for a cup’a.
Within moments her eyes went wide.
She was looking at something that was not me.
She went on to tell me how her ‘stuff’ should be ‘divided up’.
She spoke of her wishes that her sister should never have her bed (made for her by her husband) as her sister had lain with this woman’s husband in her bed.
She told me in a few moments what she wanted done with her ‘things’ and what she did not want.
After this she said she needed to ‘take lay down’ and wanted an aspirin.
I asked if that was good for her, the aspirin and she replied, of course, her doctor said it was good for her.
She lay down in the sitting room.
I checked on the cobbler in the oven.
Hearing a strange sound coming from the sitting room I ran in to find her hands in claws above her head, her face black-blue, her mouth gapping like a fish out of water.
I called for the medics.
They could not revive her.
A police officer stayed with me waiting for the coroner.
Later, not by much, the timer on the oven went ding ding ding.
The cobbler was done.
She was dead.
To this day I know this woman knew she was going to die, made her peace and then, graduated to heaven.
Still a very poignant and freaky thing for me to remember at my age as then I was only 12.
Point being.
I believe there are some of us who are fortunate enough to have the precognition we’re about to leave this place for heaven.
Others, not so much.
From there in later years of course I went into the field of emergency medicine.
I became a Firefighter/Paramedic witnessing on many sad occasions when people ‘leave’ this place.
Many saw their mothers and had conversations with them.
Others their various loved ones.
Some - nothing at all.
Makes you wonder.

a reply to: VegHead

These are the type of threads I come to ATS for -- thank you (S & F).

I have two stories to tell regarding this phenomenon. My wife has a good friend who about three months ago was staying with her 96 year old grandmother who was dying. During the last three days of her grandmother's life, my wife's friend reported seeing gray shadow-like entities moving throughout the house. She would get glimpses of these things out of the corner of her eye, about 4 or 5 instances during those last three days. They would usually be moving by the kitchen, across the living room, but always toward the bedroom where her grandmother was. Though the visions were but glimpses, they were human height, with the shape of a head and shoulders that went straight down so you could not make out arms or legs. They also moved very quickly. There was no sense of malevolence; rather, she had the feeling that something was about to happen and others were coming to check on her (her grandmother at this point was mostly unconscious).

This friend of my wife had one of her friends stay with her as well on one of these evenings, and when this women was sitting in a recliner next to the grandmother's bed, experienced one of these entities moving in front of her, again going toward the grandmother. A third witness, the hospice nurse, was sitting in another chair at a different time during these three days and noticed a much smaller, lower to the ground shadow entity passing over her feet toward the grandmother. My wife's friend suspects that this may have been a beloved pet dog or cat. The hospice nurse also reported to the two friends that "I see this type of thing all the time".

The second story, which happened just this past week, involved another of my wife's friends. The friend's sister was dying of cancer, and was so weak that she could barely speak or even clasp a person's hand. The day before her sister's death, the friend went in to check on her, and was amazed to see her sitting up at the edge of her bed. She was very alert, and told my wife's friend that "Mary is here". The sister had previously made a trip to Lourdes, and was told that the greatest gift that one could receive (even if illness was not cured) was having Mary "carry you to Jesus" upon death. After the trip and several days before she died, a friend brought a small statue of Mary to be placed in her room. At that time, the friend's sister interpreted that her gift was to soon be escorted to heaven by Mary. The day after she told her sister that "Mary is here", she died.

a reply to: Monsieur Neary

WOW!
So much like what I just posted.
Your wife must be an amazing woman.
Thanks for posting.

originally posted by: SRPrime

originally posted by: VegHead
That quote in the title is probably hyperbole, and a play on “no atheists in foxholes”, but it came from a very interesting person I recently met. I wanted to share her story with all of you.

We had a new face join our bible study last month (please don’t stop reading now just because I said “bible study”… this story does not require a Christian worldview). I didn’t recognize this woman from our church… but that wasn’t too unusual because we welcome people from all churches and people that don’t attend church at all into our group. She was quiet the first couple of weeks but then on the third week she started talking. I’ll call her Amber. Wow. She had stories that could fill a book!

Amber attended church a few times when she was a kid (before the age of 10) but was agnostic through her teen years and an atheist by college. She got married, had kids, raised them, and wanted to go back into the work force so she went back to school for nursing. She didn’t set out to be a hospice nurse, but that is where she ended up.

The experience of being a hospice nurse changed her worldview profoundly. At first, Amber wrote off so-call “deathbed visions” as a side effect of medication or a dying brain. But writing them off became increasingly difficult. After a couple of years of hospice nursing, the consistency of these deathbed visions were too much for her. What Amber believed previously (that death was the end, there was no more… that we are all just matter interacting as matter does, nothing more) began to look very incorrect.

Moments or days before dying, Amber’s patients were (and are) seeing loved ones that have already died. A few saw Jesus, but it is (according to Amber) more common to see a relative that has already died. Even those who were barely commutative are suddenly lucid and telling her what they are seeing. “My grandma is here! Do you see her? She is so lovely. She wants to take me with her. It’s so beautiful…”

Why would the visions be so consistent and so lucid if it were due to medications? (this is the question Amber asked) She became convinced that there is “something more” to death than just turning off a switch and disappearing into nothingness. So… here she was at our bible study, looking for that “something more”.

I wondered how true Amber’s statement was : “There are no atheists in hospice nursing”… I mean, how common is her experience for people in a hospice healthcare profession?

I found an abstract of an article from The American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine:
Source: journals.sagepub.com...

The purpose of this study was to determine the incidence of deathbed communications (DBCs) during the 30 days before death and their impact on the dying process. A total of 60 hospice chart audits and 75 survey responses by hospice nurses across the United States were analyzed. Chart audits revealed 5 (8.33%) of the 60 included descriptions of DBCs. The survey of 75 hospice nurses identified 363 incidences of DBCs, with an average of 4.8 patient occurrences per nurse per 30 days. In all, 89% of the hospice nurses reported patients who experienced a DBC had a peaceful and calm death, with only 40.5% reporting a peaceful and calm death without the DBC. These DBCs have a positive impact on the dying process but are underreported in patient records and under described in textbooks.

An average of 4.8 occurrences per hospice nurse per month. That would be enough to make most people want to look into what on earth is going on. Why are deathbed visions so common and why are they so consistent?

I also came across this in Social Work Today…
Source: www.socialworktoday.com...

According to Leslee Curtis, MSW, LGSW, a social worker at Mary T. Hospice, though some patients are able to report that they are experiencing such visitations, others may simply "point to something, maybe in the corner of the room, at the end of the bed, or out the window that they can see but which others cannot." She says other signs include comments such as, "Oh, there is Larry sitting in the chair" or, "Look at the angel;" gestures like reaching out one's arms as if to greet an unseen presence; or a patient who appears to be asleep or in a light coma opening her eyes and saying the name of a deceased loved one. 

"Clinically," Curtis says, "deathbed visions may be an indicator that death is near." Though research into DBVs is limited, studies thus far confirm this. The largest to date, a retrospective survey of medical professionals in the United States and India by Osis and Haraldsson, concluded that DBVs occur across cultures, tend to be of short duration, and that in 62% of cases reported in their study the patient died within 24 hours of reporting or showing signs of such a vision (Osis & Haraldsson, 1997).

So these deathbed visions appear to be both common and commonly known in the world of hospice care – with nurses and social workers that are in the privileged position of being at many people’s bedside the in their last days of life.

What do you make of all of this? (And, to be clear, we are talking about death bed visions (DBVs), which are different than NDEs)

Do you think it is the dying brain that conjures up dead relatives to keep us calm as our body goes about the business of dying? (And, if so, what evolutionary advantage would that have? How would “dying well” be selected for? I’m not totally opposed to this concept, I’ve just never understood the mechanism that would have allowed such a thing to evolve – because it serves no reproductive advantage. So I’d love to hear insights on this angle if anyone has some to share.)

Are these hallucinations caused by medications? If so, why are they more orderly and consistent than typical drug-induced hallucinations?

Do you think these death bed visions are glimpses into what we will all experience one day? That none of us will die alone, but that we will be lovingly escorted to our next realm?

I’d love to hear your stories of death bed visions if you’ve been at someone’s bedside in their last days. I know my grandpa became suddenly lucid right before death, but I don't believe he reported seeing anything. But he was reaching for something and he was peaceful.

Thanks!

(PS- My apologies but I had no idea where to place this thread... health? religion? paranormal?)

It's a very simple explanation. People are spoonfed heaven and "loved ones!!!!" that when they KNOW they are going to die; their brain starts rationalizing for them. As parts of the brain are affected from dying; they start losing sense of reality and very literally hallucinating. They aren't literally talking to dead people, like -- come on, if they were; they'd be able to tell you information that they could not know, and they can't.

Yeah, selfish bastards won't pass on the winning lotto numbers.

I don't think info is the point of them being seen by the dying.

originally posted by: AntiDoppleganger
a reply to: Annee

What if we're pieces of the same, source consciousness? Would it qualify as God? I'm not really expecting a 'yes' or 'no', its a general speculative question.

And OP, thanks for the non-political thread!

I responded earlier today - - but, my internet is being flaky and lost the post.

IMO - - God (in atheist debate) is that of those with religious belief. A single entity overseeing His flock.

Gods/Goddesses - - I personally am a believer in Ancient Aliens. I believe many stories are from encounters with off planet beings, more evolved then humans/earth. I believe there were other worlds before Earth.

God consciousness - - you're getting into Oneness - - I am my own God, etc.

If you are asking if I believe in a separate, single, omnipotent, energy consciousness, force? NO

We are all ripples in the same pond.