(no subject)

[greghousesgf]

Heard something at the stupid diet class last night that really spooked the shit out of me. I was already in a very depressed and shocked mood because David Bowie was one of my total heroes but I did not want to bring this up in class because it wasn't the right time or place to talk about that sort of thing, especially since the nutritionist's mother had recently died. (She wasn't running the class last week because she had to go to the funeral.) She was talking about her mother's last days and she had gone to her mother's house to take care of her and her mother kept hallucinating people who weren't there. This spooked the fuck out of me. This other woman in my diet class insisted that these hallucinations were angels. I'm a hardcore atheist but I kept my mouth shut to be tactful. Do dying people usually hallucinate people who aren't there? According to Ann (the nutritionist) her mom saw a lot of people and apparently didn't recognize any of them. That sounds really creepy to me but I didn't say anything. I tried to talk to roomie about my feelings about this but he didn't say anything.

Comments

[pyewacket-1975.livejournal.com]

When my Mom had a bad allergic reaction to the anesthesia while having her tubes tied, she saw the light at the end of the tunnel and heard voices of those who'd passed on, telling her that it wasn't her time yet etc. She said it was probably just the nurses in the room coaxing her back but her brain made her think it was family members. I like to believe that your mind tries to relax you and prepare you for death. If you expect to see angels and harps when you die, that's what your mind is going to come up with.
She did come out of the anesthesia fine, but she still remembers what happened.

[frith]

Our brains, like the brains of the rest of the animal kingdom, is very dependent on pattern recognition. It simplifies everything and makes reaction times faster. It's a life saving solution to just about everything. Camouflage, mimicry and colour pattern diversity are survival strategies that trick the pattern dependent brains of hunters and hunted alike. California king snakes come in such a diverse range of patterns to avoid getting eaten. A predator that has learned that a snake with one pattern is safe to eat will not have learned the same for others of the same species having different patterns.

So, your mother, not working on all cylinders at that time, saw a simplified version of reality.

[chocolate-frapp.livejournal.com]

My mother is very much alive, it's my nutritionist's mother who died. This does help though.

[frith]

While my comment about how brains work is directly related to your post, I was referring to Pyewacket's mother's experience. She is probably alive as well. 8^)

[chocolate-frapp.livejournal.com]

I had a weird hallucination when I was coming out of the anesthetic when i had my hysterectomy but I wasn't anywhere near dying. The closest I've ever come to dying was when my appendix ruptured but I didn't hallucinate at all, I just blacked out.
The hallucination after the hysterectomy was actually pretty funny. House came into my hospital room with a bunch of gnomes. One gnome was riding on his shoulder and another one was sliding down his cane like it was a fire pole. He took my temperature and my pulse and gave me a big kiss.

[pyewacket-1975.livejournal.com]

Hahaha nice! I've never been put under but I don't wanna know what warped stuff my brain would come up with. My dreams are weird enough already.

[chocolate-frapp.livejournal.com]

a nice touch was he acted like the gnomes were no big deal. He's House, he can have gnomes if he fucking wants.

[gmdreia.livejournal.com]

It sounds kind of like a waking dream! That's what some hallucinations are like.

(I've had a lot of hypnogogic hallucinations.)

[srsly-yes.livejournal.com]

Back in 2009 I killed off Kenny Wilson in Volga Boatmen, a very similar experience.

[cuddyclothes.livejournal.com]

My mother-in-law hallucinated people who weren't there. She saw a little girl standing across the room.

[nightchild01.livejournal.com]

It's very, very common for people who are dying to hallucinate all sorts of wild things, including people who aren't there (strangers, relatives, friends). They say it's something about brain function that's very technical.

[gmdreia.livejournal.com]

The answer, in completely clinical/scientific terms:

Yes. Very frequently.

The brain is being flooded with chemicals, the brain may be suffering from a lack of oxygen, the body may be swimming in toxins as organs shut down, there may be imbalances of various neurotransmitters. Not just dying people, but often people with dementia, many sick people in crisis (including some common illnesses like diabetes), and people on various medications. Premortem hallucinations are actually discussed in a lot of death and dying literature and by many respected physicians.

Personal anecdote:

One of my patients saw (what she thought were) ghosts while on an anti-Parkinson's drug and was on antipsychotic meds to counteract that side effect. Consider that Parkinson's is, neurochemically speaking, reverse schizophrenia (medications for Parkinson's often cause hallucinations, and medications for schizophrenia often cause Parkinsonoid symptoms).

Whether or not we see angels or spirits... it's a well understood phenomenon with a scientific explanation.

If you're afraid of experiencing this, you can specify how you would like to be treated when your time comes, including administration of medications and comfort measures. You might like to make a living will.