Death of A Loved One, The Soul, and 21 Grams

[AhabsOtherLeg]

I have thought for a few days now (when I've had time) about whether a thread like this one is warranted or appropriate to this board, or even just appropriate in general. I enjoy people's personal stories when I read them here (especially Joe Hillhoist's, hehe - I bet most of us would agree with that) but I've always tried to resist posting anything personal about myself - partly through paranoia, and partly through occassional sobriety. I have tried to resist posting personal stuff. With a spectacular lack of success, usually, but that's not the point of this thread.

On Christmas Day, just passed, my Dad died, after a long, long struggle against alcoholism, COPD, "universal illness" as the doctors' rightly call it nowadays, and against the world and it's follies in general. I have never lived with anyone else - he was my Dad, then my drinking pal, and my best pal, and then for ten years I was his carer. That's not the point either, though.

He hated conspiracy theorists (not theories, though), and would've seen us lot as hippies. I saw the Simpsons episode today where Grandpa went in for Euthanasia, and was asked what audio and visual accompaniment he wanted for his passing. "I'll have the Glenn Miller Orchestra, and cops beating hippies." I kind of thought... ah, Dad. Though he would've wanted The Corries, and miners beating hell out of Thatcher.

Anyway... he knew his stuff, personally, about what went on unreported in Northern Ireland, so he knew that conspiracies, false flag attacks, political gangsterism was real and murderous. But any mention of spirituality that ventured beyond the Holy Ghost was anathema. That's not the point of this thread, either, though.

I had never seen anyone die before. I have seen dead people, and I have seen animals die, but the moment of passing, here, was a literal transformation, a physical metamorphosis, and you see it, right there in front of you. It was peaceful, for which I'm grateful, but the visible change, and the change in the atmosphere and tone of the room, was immense.

And the effect wasn't negative. It wasn't a subtraction from the world, as I had long feared. It was sad as hell, of course, and it always will be, for me - but it was an addition. I could feel it. He was added to me, and to something bigger than all of us, and he's still here now. More present now than he was at the end.

I believe in the soul. It was an abstract belief before, but now it's literal. What I still don't believe, though, is that the soul just leaves the body, and goes away, to Heaven, and you have to die to see them again.

He's still here.

But the 21 grams thing... I never saw the film, I'm still not realy famiiar with the concept, but he visibly lost at least that much weight when he went. Not that weight loss makes me think someone's soul has left them - hehe, women would hate it if that was true - but... well, he really did transform. He got younger as well.

Anyways. I'm not angling for sympathy or anything, I might not be back for a fair while after tonight, so feel free to use this thread for just saying whatever you feel about things of this kind. Remembrances, anecdotes, anything, about your own loved dead, the human soul, belief, disbelief, and all of that.

Oh, and partly through unavoidable attendance at many religious buildings, I hope to soon be rivalling Seamus O'Blimey with pictures in the "Esoteric Architecture" thread. But we'll see how it turns out.

Thanks for listening.

[Avalon]

I'm sorry for your loss, and I think it's appropriate to discuss it here.

I seem to be the one in my immediate family who is most comfortable with death, and so far I'm the one to hold the vigil with the dying. I don't want them to die alone, and I want their last human experience to be of unconditional love for them. Unconditional love is damn hard for most of us to muster (me included), relationships being what they are. But I've found it is a gift and a blessing that babies and the dying can give to us, the chance to just love them, no matter what they are or who they are at that point.

Dealing with the dying will bring out some things you didn't expect from people you know. Be prepared for that. Dealing with the dying can be hard, but dealing with those left behind can be far harder. [rueful grin from experience] Some people you'll just have to cut some slack. Others may show you how very toxic they are right down to their core. It's like being born all over again for you, there are a lot of major shifts possible. For those of you who are one of several people at a death, know that each of you will have a differing experience of it depending on what you bring to it. There can be startling differences in how you report your experience of the death, enough that it seems that you and the other peson weren't at the same event.

I don't know how long we hang around here afterward as a matrix of our old personality, but my personal experience is that it does happen. They'll need to move on in their time, and so will you, but there is not harm in making a gentle leaving that gives both of you a chance to let go slowly.

I didn't perceive any change as such in my mom as she slipped away in her hospital room. But one of the monitors she was hooked up to made a heart-shaped glyph at the time, which it hadn't before. I stayed with my mom as she grew cold, I wanted to be able to take her hand and understand what was happening to her body in a very real sense, not just an intellectual one. She was hideously deformed at that point after 6 weeks on machines and meds, but I cried because she was still so beautiful to me, and that was such a wonder in itself.

We usually come into this world at 7-8 pounds. The cremated ashes I've weighed were 7 pounds. There's a pleasing symmetry to that.

May your memories of your dad bring you gifts that can take you where you need to go from here.

[IanEye]

But the 21 grams thing... I never saw the film, I'm still not realy famiiar with the concept, but he visibly lost at least that much weight when he went.

Thanks for listening.

Take care Ahab....

[url=http://tinyurl.com/5s4fsg]
"God even knows when a single hair moves on your head"[/url]

[crikkett]

I could feel it. He was added to me, and to something bigger than all of us, and he's still here now. More present now than he was at the end.

Thanks Ahab for sharing your experience, you're wonderful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGhL_1tdWmE
(david bowie - rock and roll suicide)

(PS: so's yer dad)

[kurish]

null

[vigilant]

"word"......bro...

my thoughts be with you

[Uncle $cam]

Ahab, my condolences also...

My experience with death is the grief, for me, it came in waves, In the beginning often those waves were to much to handle when my mom died.

It literally felt like I couldn't breath when the big ones would come. It's been eight years and I still haven't found the bottom and it comes at the most odd times, though not as hard. A fleeting thought, a photograph, not necessarily of her, but of the past. A song, that had entirely nothing to do with her...lol what have you... anyway, I kinda felt like you expressed in that I felt we merged in some meta kind of way. Also, I remember reading, something similar to what you said, in that, "we become them" or something to that effect.

I'm reminded of Brain researcher Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight lecture and her experience watching the two parts of her brain, while in the mist of a stroke... it started out kinda hokey, I almost didn't watch it, but by the time it was over, I was near tears in a good way. Her explanation of the left/right brain and the fight to not let go into the right brain/universe blew my mind. You'd have to watch it to get it, but, perhaps, that is where the merge happens, It's like when a wave in the ocean separates momentarily from the mass, and then reemerges back into it, if that makes sense.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jill ... sight.html



One thing that has also been true for me, that I read, is that, "when our parents die, the world suddenly becomes a strange and odd place" and that you really are alone; for now?

Not even a month ago, I unconsciously picked up the phone to call my mother, and the realization came like a punch in the gut, --while dialing the number, "what am I doing, I can't call her, she's dead".

Anyway, be gentle with yourself, take some time to let it wash over you, if you can... I'm convinced, the reason I suffered the most is because I wouldn't let myself go into too deep, when I finally did, it was cathartic and healing.

I don't know what else to say, and prolly said to much, just know that I hear you.

Haven't seen 21 grams (heard good things about it) , but was moved by the 1990 movie, 'flatliners', despite Kiefer Sutherland's suck ass acting, not so much the movie as the idea around the plot even though it was bullshit, we know a great deal more today scientifically, I guess.

peace...




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatliners

[OP ED]

i do not have any words to encourage you, AOL. indeed, it is not often that we are in agreement on things here, and we are probably not friends. even so, i value your perspective and wish for you to know that you have my sympathies. take the time you require. we will still be here to argue with, when you're ready.

[Hugh Manatee Wins]

Thanks for sharing this, AhabsOtherLeg.
You bring something important to the rest of us out here in elsewhere.

Even an accused 'rational reductionist' like me can see the truth of what you wrote.

- but it was an addition. I could feel it. He was added to me, and to something bigger than all of us, and he's still here now. More present now than he was at the end.

[SonOfKitty]

Thankyou Ahab,
My father is not well and I will keep your generous post close.

[Joe Hillshoist]

Here's to your old man Ahab.

Great post, and spot on. When people die it can be good, sometimes, if they have lived a life. And they are still around, sort of. We all carry our ancestors with us once they are dead, and I spose while they are alive too. Just that you have them around in the world as well.

One morning, while it was still dark, I was driving along and a car went by. It was a 4WD tray back and for some reason I really noticed it, spose you'd call it a pickup. I went round a corner, and the truck had obviously hit a roo. It died in front of me.

It was lying on the road, and it arched itself up as it died, like an archetypal monster in a movie, giving its last groan. It pointed its snout at the sky and as it breathed its last a blue light escaped its lips and sort of rose up and disappeared.

No shit.

The body slumped to the ground.

I stopped, to check if it had a joey in its pouch, I knew it was dead, but as I approached it I was still a bit sus on it. A kangaroo could disembowel you if it got the kick right. It was a dead male.

Still drive past that spot a couple of times a week

I've never forgotten that - as it breathed out its last breath a blue light escaped.



Dunno why "escaped" seems like the right word but I typed it twice without thinking about it.

[vigilant]

Here's to your old man Ahab.

Great post, and spot on. When people die it can be good, sometimes, if they have lived a life. And they are still around, sort of. We all carry our ancestors with us once they are dead, and I spose while they are alive too. Just that you have them around in the world as well.

One morning, while it was still dark, I was driving along and a car went by. It was a 4WD tray back and for some reason I really noticed it, spose you'd call it a pickup. I went round a corner, and the truck had obviously hit a roo. It died in front of me.

It was lying on the road, and it arched itself up as it died, like an archetypal monster in a movie, giving its last groan. It pointed its snout at the sky and as it breathed its last a blue light escaped its lips and sort of rose up and disappeared.

No shit.

The body slumped to the ground.

I stopped, to check if it had a joey in its pouch, I knew it was dead, but as I approached it I was still a bit sus on it. A kangaroo could disembowel you if it got the kick right. It was a dead male.

Still drive past that spot a couple of times a week

I've never forgotten that - as it breathed out its last breath a blue light escaped.



Dunno why "escaped" seems like the right word but I typed it twice without thinking about it.

I don't know you Joe Hillhoist, but I do also.

And I love your posts. Although they be too few and too far between....

Your description of "enlightenment" in a previous thread was the best I have seen, and by far the most accurate.

Peace to your soul bro.....

[Penguin]

When my grandma died I "knew" it the night it happened. She had been in the hospital for some time then, waiting for the end, and we had visited almost daily. In the morning they called us, and we went to see her for the last time. It was weird - her body was lying there, but you could instantly see that she was gone already. Her body looked very frail, and peaceful - she had been in great pains before. I held her hands for a while, and gave a last kiss on the forehead, wished her all well.

After this, my grandmother called me 3 times in maybe a week or two, right after the death. They were semi-lucid dreams, I knew I was dreaming, and the dreams happened in a "dream-real" room - the same I lived in, everything was the same - the phone would start ringing, the old kind of turndial phone, Id answer, and on the first time I asked "Are you not dead?" and she answered "Yes I am, but I wanted to reach out to you for the last time, and hear how you are doing." Felt to me like a farewell...

Couple years ago I had a relevant experience, Ive shared it before here too, where I had a lucid dream of another relative having arrhythmia and fearing she may die that night - where I was in her home in the dream, and took her hands and told her several times it was not yet her time to die. In the morning I called her and she told me this had really just happened, down to detail - and I told of my dream to her too. That was quite an awakening of sorts for me. Who is it that dreams, and how is it that you know when the dream is real? Our nature is sometimes far wiser than we suspect a lot of the time..

Love, Ahab. And others too of course - you know I appreciate you all.

"Whatever that hurts

Decoctions of Jimsonweed
Slimy trailing plants distil
Claustrophobia and blood mixed seed
Cursed downstairs against my will

Cobweb sticks to molten years
Cockroaches served with cream
I wipe the silver bullet tears
And with every tear a dream

With every tear a dream...

Honey tea, psilocybe larvae
Honeymoon, silver spoon
Psilocybe tea

Energy trickles with the tide
Masterminds and the suicide squad
Drink acid water by my side
Stake the saviour of their daily fraud

Overfilled toothpaste tubes
Sleepless and timeless faces
Drippety drop on sugarcubes
The one eyed¹s eye twinkles and gazes

Twinkles and gazes...

Honey tea, psilocybe larvae
Honeymoon, silver spoon
Psilocybe tea"

[Username]

~

I like it too, when people are willing to share the more personal stories and experiences of their lives with us Ahab, and thank you for taking the time to allow us to be a little bit closer to you.

My father died on Christmas as well, back in 1995. He wasn’t at all afraid to die, because in the last years of his life he was struck by a series of seizures where he would very nearly die on several occasions, and be brought back by the paramedics and by my mother’s hysterical pleas not to die. He told me how peaceful and free he felt on the other side, and how disappointed he was to be returned to the land of the living, and from that point on, felt totally at ease with the thought of dying. According to my brother, after a huge Christmas feast, and learning of the news that Dean Martin had passed away on that day, he fell asleep in his chair, and that was that.

I wasn’t living at home, but flew into town to spend some time and attend the funeral.

I returned home three years later to be with my mother, as she was given only a week to live by the doctors who had done all they could to keep her organs from failing. I don’t want to go into too many details as this was the best of times and the worst of times, there with her and my family, but it was truly a spiritual event.

Witnessing a loved one’s passing is much like attending the birth of a child. One foot on this side of life and one foot on the other, straddling the great divide between worlds, an entirely different space. That is what I sensed, and wish to report on.

One other thing, please if I may, after she had passed on and I had gone back home, every night I would send her thoughts of love, and feel her fill me with love in return, more than I had ever felt before. Could have been the best relationship we’d ever had. That went on for over a year after her death. It didn’t happen with my dad, or friends I have known and she no longer connects with me today, but wow, if only I could describe how deeply I could feel her love then.

Don’t be gone too long Ahab. I really do enjoy and appreciate your contributions to this forum.

Our thoughts are with you,
terry
~

[LilyPatToo]

I really appreciate your sharing of that experience, Ahab. Reading and rereading it has given me some comfort, since I seem doomed to just miss being present with each of my own lost loved ones at the moment of their death. I want (need) to experience what you did, so that I can believe that some part of them lives on. Tomorrow would have been my son's 39th birthday, had he not died in Children's Hospital in Pittsburgh 26 years ago last month. Last week I was in PA and visited his grave and my parents' too and stood and longed for something--anything--to believe about their survival beyond Death's door. So much unfinished business between us and so many regrets and questions in the case of my mother....

Thank the rest of you too for posting about your own experiences. They've intrigued me and made me think deeply about Life and Death and about my much-mourned-loss of most of my spiritual beliefs. Like Mulder, I WANT to believe, but keep running into so much evidence of human manipulation/evil/deception that it serially robs me of my ability to keep believing in the great cosmic unknowns like survival of the soul.

Your stories will stay with me and I'm very grateful to you for your willingness to share them. Ahab, Uncle $cam's description of waves of grief is what I've experienced too. Ride them if you can bear to, since, if you refuse, they simply wait for you and recur unexpectedly (and devastatingly) in your future, ambushing you when you least expect it. I wish you comfort and eventual healing.

LilyPat