Clinically Dead and Back to Life Experiences


A deathbed confession is an admittance or confession when someone is nearing death, or on their "death bed". This confession may help alleviate any guilt, regrets, secrets, or sins the dying person may have had in their life. These confessions can occur because the dying want to live the last moments of their life free of any secrets they have been holding in for a portion - or entirety - of their life. Or, if religious, the person may perhaps believe they will be forgiven by a higher power before they die, allowing them entrance to a better place, such as Heaven, after death. A deathbed confession can be given to anyone, but a family member is usually with their loved one during this time. Doctors and nurses may also hear a deathbed confession because they are often present in a person’s last moments.

These confessions can range from a confession of sins that have been committed to crimes that have been committed or witnessed. Often, these confessions are made to clear the dying’s conscience. A common type of confession is either religious or spiritually based. On the death bed, the dying will confess sins or mistakes they have made in their lifetime, and ask for forgiveness, so that they may move on to the afterlife according to their religion. Different religions have different protocols for the deathbed confession, but all religions seek to provide relief for the dying. People may also confess their feelings for another person while dying. This can relieve the dying of the internal struggle with hiding how they actually feel for someone. These emotions can range from hatred to love, and everything in between.

Many confessions have involved the admittance of a crime that the dying has committed, which obviously cannot be prosecuted once the perpetrator has died. On the other hand, someone can confess that they have knowledge of or witnessed a crime that has been committed: This kind of confession, known as a "dying declaration", can sometimes be admissible in court to get a conviction, depending on the circumstances of the statement. Another use for a deathbed confession in the criminal justice system is to re-open a case that may have gone cold to get closure for the victim's family or friends, even if prosecution is not an option.

Working in health care will teach you that death is inevitable. You’ll be one of those few people to know how life starts and how it will end.

1. “But I don’t know how to get there…” Grandpa in hospice. Hadn’t spoken in days. Died about two hours later.

2. Not a doctor but I overheard an old lady whisper this to her old husband dying of kidney problems.

“You are going to beat this, you got away with murder, this is nothing.”

3. I work in a cardiac ICU. We had a patient who had a pulmonary artery rupture (a rare, but known complication of a Swan-Ganz catheter).

One minute he was joking around with us and the next bright red blood was spewing out of his mouth. His last words before he died were “why is this happening to me?”

It still haunts me years later.

4. Nurse here – had a patient come into the ER with shortness of breath. He started deteriorating in the ER, and then quite rapidly on the transport up the ICU.

We got him wheeled into his room, replaced the ER lines and tubes with our own, and transferred him from the transport stretcher to his ICU bed.

He actually did most of the transfer himself. He didn’t say anything, but just before he died he pleasantly adjusted his own pillow, laid his head down, and then his eyes went blank. This man just made himself comfortable before laying down to die.

5. I’m a nurse and was previously working at an assisted living community on the dementia/Alzheimer’s unit.

My very favorite patient had been declining pretty steadily so I was checking on him very frequently. We would have long chats and joke around with each other, but in the last two weeks of his life, he stopped talking completely and didn’t really acknowledge conversation directed at him at all.

I finished my medication rounds for the evening and went to see him before I left. I told him I was leaving for the night and that I’d see him the following day, and he looked me in the eyes and smiled SO genuinely and said, “You look like an angel.” I thought it was so sweet because he had not seemed lucid in weeks.

He died the next morning. It really messed with me.