Dying at Home

[jjphere]

It was many years ago and Grandfather was old and dying at home. Many of his children came

to see him at the end and although I was not there...I heard all about it from relatives.

Grandmother was there and several children were there as he slipped closer to death.

At one point he greeted verbally people who were not there, or at least were not

visible. He greeted many of them by name and seemed to be looking at a specific spot

when he talked to them. After the end some of the children asked their mother who the named people

were and she told them that the names she knew were all people from his past, people who had died.

I have heard that such happenings were common or used to be common. Were they more common

when death happened at home?

At the very end he kept looking at the clock ticking on the dresser. Why was a dying man interested in

what time it was? They all wondered that and after he was gone they looked in that clock and found

his last wad of cash. Sounds to me that he knew more than they thought about what was going on!

[Paradoxum]

I've not heard of anything like that. I remember visiting my grandfather in hospital just before he died and he was very incoherent. I put that more down to the morphine he was on though.

Sounds like your grand father did know what was going on from your description!

[Ashotep]

I think the loved ones that went before you come back to guide you to the other side.

[Moon Gazer]

I have heard of this happening and in fact happened within my family. My nan had not so great health but was at home with my sister looking after her. My sister said that they were sat on the sofa and my nan looked at the wall and smiled. She said "ah look, they have come for me". So my sister was like who? My nan said that her parents and Joe (her brother) had come for her.

My sister was a little freaked out, but not mega worried as although nan was poorly she didn't appear seriously ill. A couple of seconds later my nan had a seizure and fell to the floor not breathing, her heart also stopped. My sister managed to give CPR until the ambulance got there and they revived her, although she was never the same and eventually had a number of strokes and died.

But this certainly made me think that your loved ones do show up when your time is up, which I find kind of reassuring.

[acute]

A similar thing happened to my grandmother just before she died. She greeted dead relatives by name, and appeared to lose both her hearing and sight impairments minutes before she passed.

Edit:

I forgot to say, she died in a care home, not her own home.

Edited April 9, 2013 by acute

[Moon Gazer]

It's strange isn't it. I guess for skeptics, there could be some kind of hallucinations that the body goes through as it is dying (or would be dying without medical intervention), but if it is common to see loved ones then maybe it really is spirits?

If there really isn't anything after this life, why would our body or mind go to the hassle of making the transition easier by imagining loved ones? if there really is nothing after this life and it is just like a switch turning off, then surely our senses would just blink out until nothing?

[Paradoxum]

It's strange isn't it. I guess for skeptics, there could be some kind of hallucinations that the body goes through as it is dying (or would be dying without medical intervention), but if it is common to see loved ones then maybe it really is spirits?

If there really isn't anything after this life, why would our body or mind go to the hassle of making the transition easier by imagining loved ones? if there really is nothing after this life and it is just like a switch turning off, then surely our senses would just blink out until nothing?

Interesting thought. A conventional possibility could be that as the body starts to shut down, the stress of the event could lead our brains to hallucinate, especially if oxygen deprivation is associated with it. The trouble is if anyone has come back they haven't told us!

[dice401]

I've seen similar things like this twice. My paternal grandfather died in hospital from cancer. Just before he went, he started acknowledging people from his past walking through the door. My maternal grandmother was a little different. She had been bed ridden for several years due to arthritis. Six months before she died she had a stroke. She never fully recovered from it. She never spoke again, she never acknowledged anyone again. She just laid there and stared up at the ceiling. Eveyone in my family figured she was not going to last for much longer. So at Easter, we had gone to visit her (we lived more than 24 hrs drive away). We arrived late in the night, the day before Easter. Upon arriving my mother ran into her bedroom to say hi. As soon as she walked in, my grandmother turned her head and smiled at mom. She said "oh you're here now." and then resumed her previous position of staring at the ceiling. The next day we got all together for dinner. Everyone ate in grandma's room to try and have her feel included. That night my grandpa woke up because he said something changed in the room. He looked over at my grandma and realized she had passed. It was as though my grandma waited for all of her kids to arrive for our ususal yearly get together at her house.