I have had a couple of clear near-death experiences in my life, both involved a clear realization that I was about to die, or was actually dying even then, and there was nothing I could do about it.
Mine both involved water, and this is why, even today, I take extra care when in the water, because at the back of my mind I can still feel the sensation of drowning if I think about it.
The first near-death experience was when I was maybe 6 years old, and was visiting an aunt & uncle in Guernsey in the channel islands. They had given me a gift of a small model sailboat that actually worked and I took it to the Guernsey tidal pool to have some sailing adventures.
I remember the little boat floating a too far from the side of the pool and reaching for it and then falling in. I couldn't swim at the time and I clearly recall feeling panic at being lost in the water with nothing to grab onto. I started sinking and remember breathing in water and opening my eyes and seeing the bottom and sides of the pool and a particular bolt recessed in the side of the pool under water. I knew I was going to die. A calm came over me and I lost consciousness.
My uncle apparently realized I wasn't around any more and searched. He saw me at the bottom of the pool and pulled me out and resuscitated me. I think they confiscated the sailboat after that. Years later, as a teen, I went back to the same tidal pool in Guernsey, and looked for the bolt I saw under the surface of the water and sure enough there it was.
My second near-death experience was in the Congo River.
I guess I was maybe 14 years old. A group of friends and I had swum out to a large rounded boulder protruding from the surface of the river to lay on it in the sun.
The Congo River is huge and notoriously treacherous in places. You can see giant boulders exposed in the dry season that have holes drilled through them by current vortexes spinning some sand grains in the same spot over time. The side currents are fickle and change in unpredictable ways. There are places in the Congo River where you can see standing waves 5 meters tall, and the banks near such places vibrate because of the strength of the passing water..
The area we were swimming in seemed calm enough though, with a very slow moving current flowing past and around the boulder. I hopped in the river to cool off. There was nothing really to grip on the boulder as the sides were smooth. Suddenly the water level dropped about half a meter and the current increased in speed dramatically and I got sucked under the boulder. There must have been a large hole in the boulder under water and I was getting extruded through that. There was no way to swim out of it. My friends above were some distance away and had not noticed the increase in current speed or that I had disappeared.
The current was so strong I was trapped inside the hole under the boulder , under water, unable to swim or even pry myself out. I started blacking out and again had this super calm serene feeling I had experience in Guernsey. I knew I was going to die. I started inhaling water.
For some reason, the current changed and began flowing in the opposite direction. I was blown out of the smooth underwater hole and surfaced, sputtering, some distance away. I had to swim back to the boulder. My friends had no idea what had just happened to me.
Have you ever had a near death experience? Tell us about it.
Mine both involved water, and this is why, even today, I take extra care when in the water, because at the back of my mind I can still feel the sensation of drowning if I think about it.
The first near-death experience was when I was maybe 6 years old, and was visiting an aunt & uncle in Guernsey in the channel islands. They had given me a gift of a small model sailboat that actually worked and I took it to the Guernsey tidal pool to have some sailing adventures.
I remember the little boat floating a too far from the side of the pool and reaching for it and then falling in. I couldn't swim at the time and I clearly recall feeling panic at being lost in the water with nothing to grab onto. I started sinking and remember breathing in water and opening my eyes and seeing the bottom and sides of the pool and a particular bolt recessed in the side of the pool under water. I knew I was going to die. A calm came over me and I lost consciousness.
My uncle apparently realized I wasn't around any more and searched. He saw me at the bottom of the pool and pulled me out and resuscitated me. I think they confiscated the sailboat after that. Years later, as a teen, I went back to the same tidal pool in Guernsey, and looked for the bolt I saw under the surface of the water and sure enough there it was.
My second near-death experience was in the Congo River.
I guess I was maybe 14 years old. A group of friends and I had swum out to a large rounded boulder protruding from the surface of the river to lay on it in the sun.
The Congo River is huge and notoriously treacherous in places. You can see giant boulders exposed in the dry season that have holes drilled through them by current vortexes spinning some sand grains in the same spot over time. The side currents are fickle and change in unpredictable ways. There are places in the Congo River where you can see standing waves 5 meters tall, and the banks near such places vibrate because of the strength of the passing water..
The area we were swimming in seemed calm enough though, with a very slow moving current flowing past and around the boulder. I hopped in the river to cool off. There was nothing really to grip on the boulder as the sides were smooth. Suddenly the water level dropped about half a meter and the current increased in speed dramatically and I got sucked under the boulder. There must have been a large hole in the boulder under water and I was getting extruded through that. There was no way to swim out of it. My friends above were some distance away and had not noticed the increase in current speed or that I had disappeared.
The current was so strong I was trapped inside the hole under the boulder , under water, unable to swim or even pry myself out. I started blacking out and again had this super calm serene feeling I had experience in Guernsey. I knew I was going to die. I started inhaling water.
For some reason, the current changed and began flowing in the opposite direction. I was blown out of the smooth underwater hole and surfaced, sputtering, some distance away. I had to swim back to the boulder. My friends had no idea what had just happened to me.
Have you ever had a near death experience? Tell us about it.
