Off The Record

I Was Dead For Six Minutes—Here’s What I Saw

Published on February 13, 2025

A guy has described the eerie sights he says he seen in paradise after he ‘died’ for six minutes as a child.

The anonymous social media user described how they unexpectedly collapsed in the road in 2003 when they were just 15 years old.

The youngster felt “just fine all day,” then suddenly “broke out in a cold sweat,” became short of breath, and developed ventricular fibrillation, which is the most common cause of sudden cardiac death and a deadly irregular heart rhythm.

Only after ‘trying tirelessly to revive me’ in an ambulance did the person’s heart start beating again after six minutes, after paramedics had arrived and determined their heart had stopped.

The individual stated that they are among the few who have had near-death experiences by momentarily “transcending our world” and that they miraculously averted any long-term harm.

These phenomena, which have fascinated both the public and medical professionals for decades, are thought to happen when a person is clinically “dead” and has a very low chance of surviving.

Many people who have experienced such an event say they have seen the afterlife.

But, recalling the experience on a Reddit thread garnering more than 12,000 likes, the user said: “During my visit, I learned things about our universe that I wish I hadn’t.”

“It began with light. Blinding, white, pervasive. It bathed me, calmed me. It was everything they tell you about. Beatific, welcoming, the stuff of spiritual experiences.”

“I had the distinct feeling of ascent, like the light was lifting me skyward. I passed through several sets of gates, which my dizzied consciousness hardly registered.”

“I arrived in a place without dimension, a place beyond reality. It only made sense while I occupied it.”

However, they also asserted that they encountered a number of “cold” and “mocking” creature-like creatures that presented them with “horrifying truths about existence.”

“At first, because of my Christian upbringing, I thought they were angels,” they continued.

“In my incorporeal form, I made the spiritually-equivalent gesture of opening my arms, anticipating their embrace.”

Rather, I felt like a collared dog, bound by their abilities.

“Humiliation and terror came over me. These were not the ethereal beings I’d been led to believe await us.”

Six minutes in “heaven” seemed to last forever.

When the minutes abruptly ended, they went back to being ‘on Earth’.

But they also said that the creatures told them ‘not to divulge their existence to the rest of my species.’.

“I can’t imagine anything worse than what I experienced, subsumed beneath an ineffable grief and torment.”

They added, “For weeks, I tried to explain to anyone who would listen what I experienced.”

“Everyone told me I’d suffered a very serious and traumatic experience for a young man, that the event left scars on my psyche as well as my heart.”

The social media story is based on a single, unconfirmed experience.

However, the man’s viewpoint has captivated Reddit readers, as evidenced by the more than 400 comments left by posters expressing their fear and disbelief.

In the past, Amber Cavanagh told MailOnline that she had two strokes at the age of forty-three and reached the “meeting point” of paradise.

Canadian Mrs. Cavanagh claimed to be able to see her husband “weeping over” her body.

There is some empirical support for reports of seeing and hearing things while clinically dead.

Although the human brain appears to have stopped activity on routine scans, research has demonstrated for years that it continues to work correctly for a very short period of time after the heart stops.

Additionally, studies have shown that during resuscitation, the brain can still occasionally burst into activity even after an hour without oxygen.

Because of these findings, some medical professionals are advocating for a revision to the current procedure that states that a person should be deemed dead after three to five minutes of oxygen deprivation to the brain because it is theoretically still possible to revive such individuals.

In the past, people have reported out-of-body experiences to MailOnline, including seeing departed family members or seeing dazzling lights at the end of a tunnel.

Meanwhile, some people have also reported seeing a celestial afterlife.

The precise reason why so many people have similar experiences is still up for debate among scientists, even though evidence of something occurring in brains after clinical death is still being investigated.

According to some theories, the brain’s ‘brakes’ effectively fall off as a result of these alterations, allowing us to perceive extremely vivid and lucid memories from our past.

Other experts contest this, though, as it is merely a notion.

Brain death is not the same as clinical death.

When a person on artificial life support loses all brain function and is unable to restore consciousness, this is known as brain death.

These patients’ bodies cannot survive without mechanical life support; thus, they have little prospect of recovering.

This indicates that a person who has experienced brain death is legally dead in the UK.

Families of the deceased may find it hard to understand this as they witness their loved one’s chest rising and falling with each breath from the ventilator and their heart beating.

Both disease and trauma that stop the essential organ’s blood and/or oxygen supply can result in brain death.

A vegetative state, in which a patient’s brain function is preserved, is not the same as this condition.