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A doctor is analyzing brain scans.

Death remains one of the greatest mysteries of life. It’s impossible to know what happens as a person passes and whether there’s anything afterward because no one has ever been able to report what happens from beyond the grave. Of course, if you ask those with a keen interest in the supernatural, they may say otherwise.

However, in 2021, researcher Dr. Raul Vicente and his colleagues at the University of Tartu, Estonia, became the first people ever to record the brainwaves of someone in the process of dying, and what they’ve come to realize should be very comforting to everyone. “We measured 900 seconds of brain activity around the time of death and set a specific focus to investigate what happened in the 30 seconds before and after the heart stopped beating,” Dr. Ajmal Zemmar, a neurosurgeon at the University of Louisville, US, who organized the study, told Frontiers.


The patient who died while having his brain waves measured was 87 years old and had epilepsy. While researchers were studying his brain to learn more about the condition, they had a heart attack and passed away. “Just before and after the heart stopped working, we saw changes in a specific band of neural oscillations, so-called gamma oscillations, but also in others such as delta, theta, alpha, and beta oscillations,” Zemmar said.

The different types of brain oscillations that occurred in the patient before and after the heart attack were associated with high cognitive functions, including dreaming, concentrating, memory retrieval, and memory flashbacks. Therefore, it’s possible that as the patient was dying, they had their life flash before their eyes. What an amazing and comforting experience right before leaving this mortal coil.

“Through generating oscillations involved in memory retrieval, the brain may be playing a last recall of important life events just before we die, similar to the ones reported in near-death experiences,” Zemmar speculated. “These findings challenge our understanding of when exactly life ends and generate important subsequent questions, such as those related to the timing of organ donation.”


How long are people conscious after they are technically dead?

Science has found that people can remain conscious up to 20 seconds after they are declared dead. Even after the heart and breathing have stopped, the cerebral cortex can hang on for a while without oxygen. So, some people may experience the moment when they hear themselves declared dead, but they aren’t able to move or react to the news. In cases where someone performs CPR on the deceased person, the blood pumped by the compressions can temporarily keep the brain alive as well.

Although the experience of death will probably always remain a mystery, we should take solace in the idea that, in many cases, it may not necessarily be a miserable experience but an ecstatic final burst of consciousness that welcomes us into the great beyond. “Something we may learn from this research is: although our loved ones have their eyes closed and are ready to leave us to rest, their brains may be replaying some of the nicest moments they experienced in their lives,” Zemmar concludes.

This article originally appeared in February

A nurse comforts a dying woman.

In 2011, hospice nurse Bronnie Ware wrote the bestselling book The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing, recalling the lessons she learned as a palliative care nurse. The big takeaway is that when people are in their final days, their regrets are about their relationships and how they failed at being their true selves.

Ware’s Five Regrets of the Dying:

1. "I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me."

2. "I wish I hadn’t worked so hard."

3. "I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings."

4. "I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends."

5. "I wish I had let myself be happier."


a man passing away, older man passing, death bed, hospice, hospital grief, relativesAn older man in his final moments.via Canva/Photos

It’s worth noting that when people are in their final days, they never wish they had worked more or complain that they spent too much time with their families. It seems that when we take a full assessment of life, what really matters are their relationships and experiences, not the car they drove or the number of digits in their bank accounts.

A group of hospital workers on Reddit shared their experiences with the final regrets of the dying, and they were similar to Ware's. However, their experiences are more dramatic because they worked with people who may have just had a catastrophic diagnosis or were in an accident, and their reaction to their final days came as more of a surprise.

Here are 13 of the most common regrets hospital workers have heard from their dying patients.

1. Some people are ready to go

"Some people just want you to let them go. I had a man with terminal cancer break down crying after his daughters left the room because they wanted him to 'keep fighting' and he just wanted to rest and pass peacefully. Learn when to let go."

"So often I see people who are ready to die but feel more tethered to their relationships with others rather than their relationship to themselves in pain. It creates a sort of stagnancy in their transition that I think prolongs their suffering."

2. Some have no one

"He was one of my first patients as a nursing student, named Frank. He was 92. After knowing him a few days, he disclosed to me his regret was outliving everyone he loved.. that he and his wife hadn’t had kids, and he was 'all that was left' and that he wanted to see his wife again. I wasn’t sure how to respond , so I just listened... and it made me realize how living so long isn’t great if everyone you love is gone. He passed away later that week, and while I distinctly recall some of my classmates being upset, I felt relief for him. I knew he was where he wanted to be. I’ve had many patients since, but you tend to remember your first ones."


final days, death, dying hospital, last rights, patients, regretsA doctor checking on a man receving oxygen.via Canva/Photos

3. They regret how they treated their children

"He wished he had been a better father to his daughter. He wished they had reconnected. His dementia prevented him from remembering they had reconnected years before and that she visited often. I wish I could have made him aware that he had accomplished his last wish. But he died not really understanding that."

4. True love to the end

"I worked in long-term care for 12 years. I remember a married couple that shared a room. She had cancer and kidney failure. I was helping her eat lunch one day, with her husband sitting there with us. She looked like death, but her husband looked at her, then at me, and said Have you ever seen a more beautiful woman? I had to leave and go to the bathroom and cry. I cried for days every time I thought of what he said."

5. They regret not having the chance to live

"I worked as an oncology nurse right out of nursing school. I was barely 21 years old. Had a patient about my age who was dying of lung cancer. A few hours before he died, I sat with him and he was telling me how much he wished that he had had more time, maybe fall in love, marry, have kids. He was so young. He asked me to call his parents, and he died shortly after they arrived. It was awful. His regrets were more about the life not lived."

6. ER patients don't want to be alone

"In the ER, it's not something most people see coming when they arrive, but it's usually the same regret when they are coherent. They all wish their family was there. Or they cry out for their SO in a panic. It's gotten to the point recently where we tell them 'SO is right here with you.'The look of relief on people's faces just hearing that gets me every time. People just want to not be alone at the end."

"In a confession subreddit, a dude confessed how he was with a man, during his last moments ( he crashed his truck in the roadside, op was behind him, called the urgencies). As op was waiting the ambulance, even hearing it, the man asked after his wife, where she was, that he wanted to see her. Op tried to comfort it the best he could, saying she was on her way. The man died when the ambulance arrived. Sometimes after, op looked after this man, on social networks. He found out that this man's wife was already passed. And that he said to the man that his late wife was on her way."


car wreck,  cra crash, deadly crash, firemen, jaws of life, broken windshieldFiremen help a motorist in a car crash.via Canva/Photos

7. People regret what they didn't do

"It's very likely that no one ever said, 'I wish I let my life pass by,' or I wish I had been a passive observer in my life.'"

"I second this, worked in hospice for about 5 years."

"More specifically people regret not spending more time with family, spending too much time with the wrong people, and not having children. There are plenty of regrets about not going skiing, not learning a different language, not going dancing more etc...but the majority of regrets are related to relationships with other people."

8. Eat the cake

"AEMT here most patients that I see in my ambulance are too sick to talk in these cases but one sticks with me. A mid-40s male called us for chest pain, put a 12-lead on, and he was in the middle of a massive heart attack( for those that know the term, he was throwing tombstones). The sad part was that he had medical training, so he knew that it wasn’t good. We were screaming to the hospital he looked me dead in the eye and goes, 'I should have ate that f****** cake'when I asked what he meant he told me 'F what others think if it makes you happy do it, eat the cake, pet a squirrel, take a nap. F anyone else it doesn’t matter.' He crashed shortly after we got to er, didn’t come back."

9. I still have growing to do

"'Not yet! I can't die yet. I still have so much growing to do. I want to see my children and grandchildren grow up...' I am a physician trainee who has done a decent amount of palliative care. I have been privileged to hear many stories and be part of many deaths, but I still can't explain why it is that certain lines remain with me and hit me so much harder. The gentleman who told me the line above was in his late 60s to early 70s. It made me reflect on how I view patients in this age group - yes, much older than myself, but still with growing and living to do."


dying woman, final days, woman passing, hospice care, pallative care, hospitalA woman in her final moments.via Canva/Photos

10. They miss their pets

"I had a patient who I was in the room with when her doctor explained she only had a few weeks to live. I knew her well, spent quite a bit of time talking to her up to the news. The days that followed, she seemed to have accepted she was dying. She lived this beautiful, independent, and successful life, maybe not money successful, but just plain happy. Anyways, when I was helping her to the tub on day 10 since receiving the news, she just broke down crying and couldn't stop crying about how much she wished she hadn't put her dog down b/c they could have died together. Come to find out her dog was on his deathbed too. I guess she put her dog down a few days before going into the hospital, she knew her life was over so she put him down first. She hated herself for it and for the fact she blew the opportunity for them to spend their last moments together. Really heartbreaking to watch, to hear that unfold."

11. Should have been more positive

"I shouldn't have spent so much energy on negative emotions / hatred as the things that made me angry now seems completely trivial and I wish I spent my time being more happy and positive in life."

12. The dying reveal their true selves

"You'll find out who they really are when they are dying. Kind, mean, chill, blaming. Just keep asking them to tell stories. They love that."

"I spent a fair amount of time with this man during his last weeks. It’s pretty amazing how different of a person he was just a few months later. Before, he was arrogant, obnoxious, prideful, skeptical, and pretty self-absorbed. He was not a fun patient. But in those last weeks - his whole ego had dissolved. All that was left was just... him. The real him. Or at least it seemed that way to me. The man spent his life working as a writer/reporter for a large political website. He was a very liberal man, and he told me that his biggest regret was absorbing himself in politics."

13. The dying want closure

"I’m a chaplain in hospitals and hospices. Doing everything we can to reconcile people before they die is a large portion of my work. I have a lot of stories. Regrets naturally are expressed at the end of life because people want to close their narratives and they are reflecting on everything they’ve lived. This isn’t scary or heartbreaking, it’s natural and a way to end things with beauty. The important lesson isn’t to focus on the regrets, it’s to live a life now of love, acceptance, and mending bridges because you don’t know when it’ll be your time to tie loose ends."


afterlife, heaven, staircase, god, judgement, religion, final moments, reincarnationThe stairway to heaven. via Canva/Photos

Doctor reveals patients' often overlooked deathbed regret.

Thinking about death is kind of a bummer. Nobody excitedly tells a friend that they're dying or throws a will-writing party, though come to think of it, what a great way to organize your final wishes while blasting early 2000s club music and sipping on sangrias. Note to self: Plan will-writing brunch.

But seriously, thinking about death is uncomfortable and a little scary, so it's understandable that it's not on everyone's "things to do today" list. Sadly, it's part of life and, unsurprisingly, many people die with regrets. The regrets can range from not making the move to Colorado at 25 to turning down the sweet kid from math class that asked you to prom. Hospice and palliative care doctor Kathy Zhang cares for people at the end of their lives on a daily basis and she reveals the biggest regret that haunts patients on their deathbeds.

According to Dr. Zhang, this regret isn't just felt by the dying patient, but also those close to them. She writes in her caption, "I didn’t think I would hear this end of life regret as often as I do: people wish they had taken more photos of themselves. People realize at the end of life that photos are snapshots of memories frozen in time, and that each one carries stories and emotions."

end of life, deathbed, regrets, thoughts, lifeSick Season 11 GIF by One ChicagoGiphy

As technology developed into people owning a supercomputer that fits in their pockets and the palms of their hands, society's views around picture taking has also shifted. On one hand you have people insisting that people simply "enjoy the moment" when they're out with loved ones and stop photographing or recording everything. On the other, you get the instantaneous nature of photographs now.

When the only way to take photos was on film, you had to wait for the photos to be developed and hope that one of them looked kind of okay. Now that photos are instantly visible, people can see themselves essentially in real time so there's plenty opportunities to scrutinize every possible angle of one's face. These photos are also usually promptly uploaded to social media, which isn't known for it's benevolently kind nature. Gone are the days when someone would have to physically come to your home to rummage through photo albums and bins to see you in a bathing suit on your family vacation to the beach.

beach, photos, photo opps, real time, real life, Beach Day Summer GIFGiphy

But the things that are lost along with the slow process of developing film are the memories captured with the people no longer walking the earth. Upworthy shared a photo of a woman who asked to be photoshopped to cover her arms and change the color of her shirt due to her own critiques of her body. Dr. Zhang read some of the comments highlighted by Upworthy from the post, and paused one that stood out to her the most.

"I have barely any pictures of me, for this exact reason. At 41, diagnosed with terminal cancer. Now I'm taking all the pictures, but the girls will really only have pictures of their dying mom, not their healthy one. I have few regrets but, not taking or sharing pictures because I was unhappy with my looks, is absolutely one," the mom writes.

The regret around not having enough photos isn't one that stays only with the dying person. It's a regret that ripples out onto your loved ones who would give everything they could to have more pictures of the person they're now missing.

Dr. Zhang then relays a story of a former patient, saying, "I had a patient once who was in her forties dying and her husband was showing me pictures. The[re] were a few pictures that he had of her a year prior on their vacation in the Caribbean. And she was on a catamaran and her hair was flying everywhere and she was gorgeous. She was stunning. And he said, 'I always thought she was so beautiful and she never wanted to take pictures. What am I supposed to look at now that she's gone?' So please, take the pictures. The people who truly love you just want more of you, no matter what you look like."

The sentiment Dr. Zhang expresses in the video is felt by those in the comments with one person writing, "I felt this. I hate my body and taking pictures. But when my dad died, I had no recent pictures of the two of us. Now, whenever someone asks for a picture of me or with me, I do it. If they love me as is, I can too."

Another says, "Thank you for this. My wonderful Mom died of Alzheimer’s in 2013. I post tributes to her on her birthday, Mother’s Day & the anniversary of her passing each year. I include pictures of her especially so her grandkids who were babies when she was sick can get to see what a vibrant, joyful person she was. But… I have only a precious few pictures of her save for a few formal group shots. Because of this I now make a point to be in photos."

One grieving daughter writes, "My Mom was beautiful. Dad took a portrait photography class & needed to take pictures. She hated having her picture taken, but let him. About 3 years after that - at 44 she died. I've always been grateful for those pictures. I always offer to let the photographer get in the picture & take pictures of them with their family & friends."

loss, family, mourning, photos, memory, loved onesmourning GIFGiphy

Someone else chimes in with gratitude, saying, "Thank you. I have never been a picture person, even as a child. I will do better. The pictures are not for.me but for my children and their children. Thank you."

It may be uncomfortable at first to jump into taking more pictures, but the more you do it, the easier it will become. With selfie sticks, affordable tripods, and built-in photo timers, people can easily set up photos of themselves. So, if you're worried about being on the other end of the camera, remember Dr. Zhang's advice–take the pictures.

Joy

Man with terminal cancer throws himself a 'going away party' in lieu of a memorial service

He wanted to attend his own "celebration of life," so he just…did.

Photo credit: Canva

Gathering with loved ones to say good-bye can be empowering.

When you know your life will be coming to an end soon, what do you do? How do you spend your final weeks? Do you get your affairs in order? Spend time with your family as you await the inevitable?

If you're someone like Bibi Brzozka's father, you throw yourself a goodbye party as if you're only getting ready to leave town. Brzozka shared a video about her father, who is dying of terminal cancer, organizing a "Goodbye Party" for 50 of his friends and family so they could celebrate his life while he was still alive and able to enjoy it.

"My dad is a legend," Brzozka wrote in an Instagram post. "I’m not sure how it is in your country, ⁣but in Poland, admitting you are dying is often seen as giving up—a big no-go because it's believed to bring bad luck. ⁣It makes people deeply uncomfortable.⁣ Here, we have a tradition of honoring people after their funeral. ⁣It’s called STYPA. ⁣But my dad? ⁣He wasn’t interested in a gathering where he wouldn’t be present—so he decided to have ⁣a PRE-STYPA instead.⁣

"This was completely new for people here—bold, unconventional, and courageous. ⁣But that’s just who my dad is. ⁣
And that’s exactly what I’ve inherited ⁣from him.⁣ We're not "normal"…We do things differently.

"What truly amazed me was how many people left inspired, saying they’d love to celebrate their life while they’re still here.⁣"

"While it was shocking for some, it was also deeply inspiring for others," Brzozka shared. The idea of saying goodbye properly, at a dedicated event with that specific focus, is a beautiful way to embrace the end of life and to celebrate the person who will be passing on, even if it's not what we normally see.

Others in the comments shared stories of their loved ones throwing similar parties and how much it meant to everyone who came.

"My great aunt did this back in the 1990s. She paid for all her siblings and their kids to join her in Florida when she was diagnosed with terminal breast cancer. I accompanied my grandma, the oldest sibling, and one other from my generation was invited. I was always close to Aunt Florence. It made sense to me when she said, why would I want you all to throw a party after I’m gone? Let’s do it now."

"I got to perform for a similar goodbye party for someone passing away from cancer, last year. Very small and intimate gathering with family and friends, got to sing their special requests, everyone was singing along crying, and dancing. It was so hard holding back tears watching everyone emotional and embracing each other 🥺🥹 this is indeed a lovely idea more ppl should do, celebrate each other in life while we have the chance."

family celebrating, family, gathering, celebration, life, deathCelebrations of life don't have to wait until death.Photo credit: Canva

"My friend did this about 25 years ago she had breast cancer - We sang and danced and a young man came to sing for her he bought her a birthday present-she said oh no darling it's not my birthday it's my going away party 💔❤️🩹she was so brave❤️I still talk about it with friends."

"One of my close friends did this before she passed of breast cancer. It's was an amazing event and when I miss her, I watch the video of her farewell party."

"I went to a celebration of life party for a friend who was terminally ill. At first I found the concept odd but he enjoyed it very much and we all laughed and cried tears of joy together. Our culture needs to change its views on dying It is not something to hide but rather to celebrate a life well lived."

dinner party, gathering, loved ones, life, celebration, partyGood food and good company make a goodbye party a celebration.Photo credit: Canva

Many people said that they loved the idea and appreciate how it celebrates life while life is still happening.

"What a blessing to be able to do that, many of us don’t have the privilege of knowing when our time will come. And while it doesn’t necessarily make it easier, I think this is a beautiful way to honor life and walk along side him on his journey home. ❤️ much love to your sweet dad and the family/community he created."

"I love this!! I’m all about why do we only rest in peace, let’s live in peace too! I think this is a perfect example of that perspective. Don’t come and honor me once I’ve passed, come celebrate my life while I’m alive! Thank you, for sharing! This is a beautiful idea and a way I’d love to say goodbye to the most important people in my life."

"What a beautiful idea. I would definitely do that. And I might one day."

Looking death in the eye and saying, "Hey, let's have a big final bash and celebrate this life of mine!" is an incredibly empowering way to not only accept death, which eventually comes to us all, but to embrace life with radiant joy.