What Happens When You Have a Near-Death Experience?

It’s hard not to wonder about what happens when we die. This curiosity is reflected in popular media — think movies where someone sees their life flash before their eyes or shows that depict someone “choosing” to return to their physical body from the afterlife.

In fact, some people who have nearly lost their lives really do claim to be able to report what we can expect when we cross over. This phenomenon is called a near-death experience. If it sounds spooky and inexplicable, it’s because it kind of is.

While more research is needed to understand and explain these experiences, one thing is for sure: 17% of people who nearly die, regardless of age or religion, report having a near-death experience, making it a common phenomenon for those who enter — and survive — the dying process.  

But what’s actually happening during these experiences?

How are near-death experiences defined?

A near-death experience is typically defined as coming close to death during a life-threatening emergency and having a vivid, subjective out-of-body experience. While these stranger-than-fiction moments typically happen without actual heart or respiratory failure, it’s also been reported that people will have these intense moments after being revived from clinical death.

Many people describe them as strange, illuminating, terrifying or beautiful experiences. Sometimes life-changing in nature, near-death experiences occur before medical intervention helps their body regain stability (aka, when they “come back to life”).

Nimmy Simon, MD, a palliative care specialist and an acting assistant professor in the Department of Family Medicine at the UW School of Medicine, has heard about several different near-death experiences from her patients and their loved ones.

“All the experiences I hear are so similar,” says Simon. “There’s often a feeling of floating above the body or the patient seeing some type of light. When I see patients in hospice who are dying, I’ve seen patients reach out as if they’re pulling for something — maybe for whatever it is after this life.”

Simon also adds that almost all people who report a near-death experience say they have a very distinct exit or return to their body.

“There’s a debate that it could be a hallucination or even a perceived spiritual experience,” says Simon. “It’s so interesting.”

What causes near-death experiences?

Near-death experiences are controversial in the medical and academic communities, and there isn’t any way to definitively know what’s happening or why certain people have these experiences.

Some suggest that these vivid experiences can be explained scientifically by, for example, the brain being starved of oxygen during a medical emergency or drugs given during life-saving medical intervention, such as anesthesia. 

Others believe that these experiences are purely spiritual in nature. Simon says that in her work, she’s seen enough from patients that she can’t deny that near-death experiences could be a combination of scientific and spiritual, and that there could be something after this life.

A common misconception about this phenomenon is that it only happens when someone is brought back from a clinical death, aka cardiac arrest. However, many times, near-death experiences happen when someone gets close to death but doesn’t clinically die.

“Often, what you see on TV isn’t accurate,” Simon says. “For example, reviving someone from a cardiac arrest is incredibly rare, which, by extension, means they wouldn’t survive to report a near-death experience.”

Are near-death experiences guaranteed?

Ultimately, there is no way to know what dying or a near-death experience is like until it happens. You may walk into a big light or see your life flash before your eyes. Whatever the case, you can trust that when you’re close to your time, your doctors will do everything they can to support you.