Dr. Laurin Bellg writes: “I am a critical care physician working with very ill patients in the ICU. My training prepared me to help care for the very sick, but it did not prepare me for encounters with the unknown. Over the past twenty years I've heard numerous mysterious and beautiful stories that patients have returned from the brink of death to share with me. They are both incredible and life affirming. “I don’t think at this point in human evolution we have the scientific theory, language, or methodology to untangle and understand consciousness phenomena.” Until we can, she urges that we hold these experiences “in curious regard, rather than dismissing them as preposterous impossibilities,” as this attitude “will better facilitate both an eventual understanding of these events and a supportive relationship with those who have them.”

“Helen had been in a very bad car accident,” Dr. Billg reports. “She didn’t remember the actual impact that crumpled four vehicles at an intersection. What she did remember, however, was shortly after the crash getting out of her car in somewhat of a panic, with the intention of surveying the damage and making sure everyone was all right. She knew how many vehicles were involved—there were four—and that one was a gray floral-delivery van with company decals on the side, composed of blue writing superimposed on a spray of red roses. That was correct.

“She described walking over to a dark-green, four-door sedan that was smashed against her hood at a sharp angle where it had hit her from the left side after running a stop sign. She described the dark-haired man with a beard, slumping over the steering wheel, moaning. She correctly concluded that the impact of the two vehicles—her car and the bearded man’s—had been the initial catalyst that had created a pileup when the delivery van that was behind her and the white SUV behind it couldn’t stop in time. She noted that the van had slammed into the back of her car, causing it to be wedged like an accordion between the green vehicle and the van. This left her pinned in and unable to move—physically, that is.

“The white SUV merely rear-ended the delivery van behind Helen, and the woman driving seemed none the worse for wear. Helen pointed out that it was this driver she had heard making the call on her cell phone to emergency services, as clearly as if she were right beside her. This was also correct. The driver of the least damaged vehicle, the white SUV, had indeed made the initial call for help.

“Helen was unresponsive and trapped in her car, according to the paperwork. Her consciousness, however, seemed to have surveyed the scene and remembered it accurately from a vantage point not just outside of her vehicle, but also actually outside of her physical body itself, which was still trapped in the car. She knew the driver of the delivery van was relatively unharmed but unable to open his door, which was rendered unusable by the impact.

“She also knew that after placing the 911 call, the driver of the white SUV was rushing frantically from vehicle to vehicle to survey the damage. She saw her reach into the green sedan, weaving her arm underneath the injured driver, to turn off the engine that was starting to generate billowing smoke from underneath the wrinkled hood. Hearing him groan, she then leaned in to comfort him, rubbing his back in a soothing gesture. Helen heard the lady trying to reassure him that he would be okay and help was on its way.

“She also saw the woman in the passenger’s seat beside the bearded man, crying, obviously upset. Seeing that the owner of the white SUV was focused on the driver, Ellen walked over to the passenger side of the car and tried to offer comfort and support to the crying woman through the shattered window, but she didn’t answer. She didn’t seem to notice her.

“It was then that Helen heard the wailing sirens of approaching police cars and ambulances. She took that as a cue to get back to her own vehicle so that they could all be properly cared for. Walking back to her own car, a sudden realization stopped her in her tracks—she was looking at a woman, apparently unresponsive, in the driver seat of her car and realized that she was that woman.

“She was standing outside of her own car, looking at what appeared to be her body trapped in the driver seat of a very damaged vehicle. It took her awhile to orient to the fact that she was looking at her own body while somehow being separated from it. In doing so, she eventually came to the sobering conclusion that if she was outside of her body looking at herself trapped in the heap of mangled metal, she must be dead.

“The official police report indicated that Helen was quite entangled in the debris of her car, and that it took nearly thirty minutes to extricate her. It was unclear at that time exactly what was injured or broken, but soon enough, the odd angles of her ankles revealed the truth of her injuries and that information was called into the hospital ahead of her arrival. Not only was she trapped in the rubble of the car, both of her ankles were clearly broken and she was observed by experienced rescue workers to be unconscious at the scene. There is no physical way that she would have been able to get out of her vehicle, let alone walk around and report was such great accuracy what she later described.”

Laurin Billg, Near Death in the ICU: Stories from Patients Near Death and Why We Should Listen to Them (Sloan Press, 2016), 177-181. Dr. Billg is a Critical Care Medicine Specialist in Appleton, WI and has over 24 years of experience in the medical field.