When The Lights Go Out for Good
What happens when you die? And, what happens to you when you die?
Ed. Note: First, welcome to the swarm of new subscribers to Dirt Nap. Get comfortable and make yourselves at home; grief is a long journey and we’re going to pick it all apart like family at Thanksgiving dinner.
Dirt Nap, as you may have seen from older posts, is a blend of interviews, essays and Griever’s Digests. Many of you are here because of the latter and I appreciate that. We run those about once per month due to inventory and how quickly they are written. If you’d like to see more of them, I need your help in finding people willing to speak up. Share Dirt Nap with them and, if they are willing, introduce them to me at jaredpaventi at gmail dot com.
Today’s the day after Thanksgiving, the first holiday of note without my father-in-law. I’m writing this prelude on Monday, so I don’t yet know how things went. I imagine there was a sense of loss; a presence of someone who was not there. We’ll talk about grief at the holidays next week.
Dirt Nap is a passion project, one validated by the number of people who have come along on this journey. Grief is individual and difficult, but the common trait is the need for community to navigate the journey. I hope you are finding common ground with others here, and I’m thankful for you, dear reader, for coming along on this ride.
Now be a good American and go spend more money than you can afford on presents.
— Jared
I stood in the hallway on the second floor of the St. Camillus Rehabilitation and Nursing Center, leaning against the wall. The door to my father-in-law’s room was closed.
My wife came out, knowing that I was on my way, and asked if I would like to go in the room. He had died about 30 minutes prior to my arrival. My answer was simple: “No.”
Not because I don’t belong there or because I would be creeped out. I’ve made it a rule that I’m not going into a room where a person has just died or is about to die. I did it once in 1997 when my mother died. That would be enough for now.
I went to the hospital with my wife when everyone got The Call for her uncle Tom. I stood in the hall while she went in to his room. I was at the nursing home when her grandmother gave everyone a scare and they thought she was ready to check out. Ironically, I stood in the hallway with uncle Tom.
Not all death is the same, but everyone dies eventually. Sometimes it’s peaceful and sometimes you get blown out of the sky because you attempted an armed coup d’etat.
There were about a dozen of us, not counting the dog, in the living room of my parents’ house the night my mother passed. We were standing around and talking quietly when my aunt noticed that my mother’s chest wasn’t moving anymore. No one was sure what was happening because we heard a low-pitched noise that could have been mistaken as breathing; it turned out it was the motor of the morphine pump. My aunt Marietta put her head to her chest and didn’t hear a heartbeat, but also didn’t hear much else because of the pump. So, inspired by my favorite television show, I went to the bathroom and grabbed a hand mirror.
It didn’t fog up. None of us knew how long she had been dead.
It’s a finite line between life and death, though not binary. We know you can be brain dead but the body still performs its involuntary functions. As long as you receive nourishment, hydration and some level of personal care, you can probably exist in that state for a while.
But, what exactly what happens when you die?
Scientifically speaking…
Death is like an electrical outage. The neurons in your brain stop firing and messages sent from your brain stem to your major organs cease. From the BBC, which briefly summarizes things1:
As dying progresses the heart beats less strongly, blood pressure falls, skin cools down and nails become dusky. Internal organs function less as blood pressure drops. There may be periods of restlessness or moments of confusion, or just gradually deepening unconsciousness.
Unconscious people’s breathing follows automatic patterns generated by the respiratory centre in the brain stem. Because they’re unaware of their mouth and throat, dying people may breathe heavily, noisily or through saliva in the back of their throat, yet without apparent distress.
Breathing moves from deep to shallow and from fast to slow in repeating cycles; eventually breathing slows and becomes very shallow; there are pauses; and, finally, breathing ceases. A few minutes later, the heart will stop beating as it runs out of oxygen.
Your muscles relax, your jaw slacks and any openings in your body, uh, open.
As muscles relax, sphincters release and allow urine and feces to pass.
The brain may keep going for a few minutes as blood continues to circulate and feed it fresh oxygen, but that eventually stops. The human form ceases living…for a few minutes at least.
Your body basically runs an efficient ship through its involuntary commands. It keeps you breathing and your heart breathing (among other things) when you’re alive and it carries out a series of commands when you die. While your organs may stop, it doesn’t mean your body isn’t still alive.
Decomposition begins within a few minutes. Once the cells lose access to oxygen, they begin breaking down due to the chemical reactions taking place around them. Now I didn’t do well in chemistry, but even I know chaos happens when you remove oxygen from an equation. Think of it this way: water is two hydrogen atoms bound to one oxygen atom. Now take the oxygen away. Ever see what happens when hydrogen is left uncontrolled?
Anyhow, the cells begin to breakdown under the toxic acidity caused by enzymes that now roam your body like a band of criminals. Blood vessels break and rigor mortis sets in as your body temperature drops. The bacteria in your body begins consuming organs, musculature and other tissue from within.
Ever notice that a body gets bloated after dying? Bacterial consumption of your innards creates gases, which build up inside.
You know what, I’ll spare you the rest of the details, so let’s leave it at bacteria takes over and you begin to rot.
But, what happens when you die?
I was raised Roman Catholic…
…and was indoctrinated with the dogma of “death is new life,” we ascend to heaven like Jesus Christ, etc. etc. Our body goes to the cemetery, crematorium or renewal center, but our soul separates and rises to stand before God in judgment.
Father Charlie2 never mentioned that there was more than one judgment though. From the Holy Family Catholic Church in Lawton, Okla.:
The judgement (sic) right after death is called the particular judgement. At the time of our falling asleep3, we are judged either as worthy of the eternal life of heaven (which may first require a “stop off” in a place of purification from any last remaining imperfections) or are separated from God and consigned to eternal life in hell. This particular judgment awaits all of us at the very moment that we die and it will be clear in an immediate way.
The general judgment is that act of judgment which accompanies the glorious return of Jesus Christ in His second coming, when He comes “to judge the living and the dead” (as we say in professing the Nicene Creed). This general judgment is characterized by the Lord’s own words in Matthew 25:31-46, as Jesus speaks of how He will separate the sheep from the goats, saying to the sheep at his right that they are to inherit the kingdom, as they fed the hungry, gave drink to the thirsty, etc., while sending the goats off to eternal punishment for not having carried out the way of charity.
Now, our friends in Lawton eliminated the “h-e-double hockey sticks” topic that was bandied about in 1980s religious education classes. You see, falling victim to temptation and following our urges and impulses was obviously the result of a supernatural third party. Too much of that and you’ll end up going to Hell. At least that’s what Fr. Charlie and Mrs. Leahy drilled into our heads during our weekly indoctrination4.
It appears that American Catholics have minimized this in the marketing materials for their particular sect. It’s not like the good ol’ days of scaring the shit out of kids for taking an extra piece of candy when no one was looking.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that this general judgment “will reveal even to its furthest consequences the good each person has done or failed to do during his earthly life.” (CCC 1039) Everything that was hidden will be revealed to all, the just and the damned. There will be a revelation of the whole plan of God for the salvation of the human race and what was distorted and disordered by original sin will be restored to what it was meant to be. All things will be restored in Christ (Eph. 1:10). Also, the Father through Christ will resurrect our bodies from the grave and reunite them with our souls, the just to live in the new heavens and the new earth (2 Peter, 3:13). The damned will be separated from God and their loved ones for eternity in hell.5
Often when we die there are imperfections or, to use a modern phrase, “unresolved issues” that we carry into the next life. These are traditionally called “venial sins.” Unlike “mortal sins” which kill the grace of God in our souls and break our relationship with the Lord, venial sins do not stop us from entering into heaven. Mortal sin must be reconciled in the Sacrament of Penance. This intermediate place the Roman Catholic Church calls “purgatory.” Purgatory is a place of waiting, it is a place where our desire to see God burns within us, not as fire but as spiritual longing and yearning. This desire and longing cleanses us and prepares us to see God in his glory. God decides when we enter heaven to see him face to face. The good part about this intermediate place or “purgatory” is that if we go there, we are assured of heaven.
Purgatory. It’s the doctor’s waiting room for death. Sure, you’re going to get in, but who knows when that will be.
So, what happens when you die?
A binary concept?
It’s difficult to say what happens when the lights go out because, presumably, once you die, you die. Except, of course, when you don’t.
Peter Jakubowicz wrote about having a heart attack at a hockey game, actually dying, and being brought back by doctors. He remembers nothing from the experience.
Kevin Willis died after a heart valve operation and was resuscitated. He said, “I wasn’t looking down at my body, but I was separate from my body. It was like I was in the spirit realm. I was conscious of what was going on, but I had so much peace.”
That sort of aligns with results of studies that show the brain still works after heart stops.
The caps continually monitored the electrical signals moving across the surface of each patient’s brain: before and after physicians removed their ventilators, during each patient’s last measurable heartbeat, and up until all brain activity had ceased. Seconds after their ventilators were removed, two of the patients’ brains suddenly lit up with a burst of neuronal activity in high-frequency patterns called gamma waves that continued as the heart stopped beating. Other studies have found the same pattern when a healthy person is actively recalling a memory, learning, or dreaming, and some neuroscientists have linked these oscillations with consciousness.
One of the researchers, Sam Parnia, interviewed for that story believes that they have identified “a marker of human consciousness.” One of his statements stuck out to me:
We have this binary concept of life and death that is ancient and outdated.
So, what happens when you die?
A choice is to be made…
The Mormons belief that souls detach from the body is a lot like the Catholics, reminding us that our choices today dictate where we will live for eternity. Evangelical ministers and media personalities6 Stuart and Jull Briscoe take this concept a step further:
What happens after death depends on a single choice that you make during your life.
Well, shit. What kind of choice are we talking about? Was it a “I lived with my wife before I got married” type of choice or more like “I stole a pack of gum from the grocery store when I was seven?”7
You can make that choice right up to the end, just before your last breath. But once you die, you can’t undo your decision. Reincarnation doesn’t occur. You don’t come back and get to do it over. You don’t get a second chance.
If you choose to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that He died on the cross to save you from the consequences of your sin, you receive eternal life and go to heaven to be with Him forever in fellowship, light, joy and truth. God raised Jesus from the dead—and if you believe in Him, He will raise you too.
Ohhhhhh. So, it’s shit that I’ve already heard from every other corner of Christianity. Or Islam, for that matter.
But if you choose not to believe, you go to hell. You are condemned to loneliness, separation, never-ending regret, and fire.
Heaven or hell. Life or death. Jesus or destruction.
That took a turn. So, if my main man from Lawton is going for the kinder, gentler Jesus to build his flock, the Briscoes are going for shock and awe.8 Either way, I quote from American philosopher Stephen Stills: “Rejoice. Rejoice. You have no choice.”
So, what happens when you die?
Our belief systems make a nice story, but let’s be rational for a moment. When my dog died all those years ago, my father buried her in the backyard and we went about our lives. I have the bouncy-balls that I used to throw to her sitting on a shelf in my office, but she’s dead. I don’t believe she ascended to some higher plain. The lights went out and dad grabbed a shovel.
Nor do I believe my mother or my father-in-law are seated at the right hand of the father, or whatever I was taught to believe about life everlasting. I believe their hearts stopped beating, their brains ceased functioning and that was it. Maybe their brains hung on for a few more minutes, through those flashes of activity mentioned above, but they were and are no longer alive.
When my mother died, I was questioning my faith but I believed that she moved on to that better place they drilled into my head in religious ed class. I’ve evolved in my relationship to religion and I’m comfortable with where I now stand on this.
My mother-in-law? She’s a dedicated Catholic, and that’s okay. Religion, at the end of the day, should provide you comfort. It should fill in the blanks where science and rational thought cannot. There’s nothing wrong with being religious. Fanaticism, on the other hand, is a whole other thing.
So, what happens when we die? I guess that all depends what you want to happen.
What do you think?
What happens when we die? Drop your thoughts in the comments or send me an email. And, if you want to be part of an upcoming Griever’s Digest, let me know.
Final thoughts on finality…
“If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.”
— Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
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How very British and efficient of them.
Ahhh, Father Charlie. Charlie Major, pastor at St. Joseph’s The Worker Church in Liverpool. He cut an imposing figure, like a linebacker, at the front of church. I went to that church for 18 years, rather dutifully, and through religious education, confirmation, CYO basketball, and serving mass he never once got my fucking name right. He always called me Jason.
I hated going to religious education classes. Mrs. Leahy was very nice, but I always felt this was more for the parents than the kids. It was once a week from 7-8 p.m., so I would always miss the beginning of the A-Team or Knight Rider or, worse, a Syracuse basketball game. Plus, the adults who ran it didn’t ever seem to enjoy working with children. It was as if everyone involved was on a work-release program.
Note that they never explain how you become damned. It’s very vague, as if they needed to mention Hell once to meet a quota.
I use that phrase loosely. By the same token, I’m a media personality.
I did both.
Either way, you get one of the Presidents Bush dictating things. War criminals, all of them.