I underwent open heart surgery to have the aortic valve replaced, and when the surgery was over, they had difficulty restarting my heart. I was hooked to a pacer for 4 days until my heart took over. Not sure how long it took them, and I didn't know It was an NDE because I was still unconscious, but the second time I was asystole, I started from a conscious state and was flatlined for 10 seconds, and that was so similar to the first one, I knew that both were caused by the same type of event, complete cardiac inactivity. 

The first event happened Feb 24th and the second happened March 2^nd. Today is March 7, 2025, and I am at home recovering and wanted to get this recorded somewhere in case I don't recover. 

In the second flatline, I had a cardiac event whereby both nodes were not present so they stopped my heart chemically in the ICU to get the rhythm back, and that is when the second NDE took place. They did a third cardioversion electrically on March 3^rd, but my heart didn't stop and I had no experience with that one.

I was hyper-aware and had a sense that I had transitioned to another environment, some unfamiliar and strange place. I saw an intense, vivid light that flashed, with about a two-second reassurance, and a voice saying we need to go back. The voice was repeating the phrase, “Have to go back,” with desperation, over and over. I came to a definite conscious decision to return to life.

I was surprised that no one seemed to be interested in hearing what I experienced, so I told one of my sons about it, so at least someone else would know. I talked one of the nurses into letting me take a picture of the waveforms on the monitor at the exact time of the flatline of March 2^nd, so that is on my phone for reference. Fortunately, my son Googled my experience and found IANDS, so I am learning more about NDEs now.