Aaron & Kari Moulton, Distressing NDE From Pontine Stroke

0:00 From the time that they pronounced me deaf was a good 45 minutes. They cut my clothes and then they paddled my heart, my heart had stopped. And I could see people screaming and crying, but I didn't realize that was actually my physical body because I was somewhere else. The only thing that I could feel, if you could imagine, absolute love and peace, there wasn't anything else to be felt. I was greeted by people I'd known in the past. I'm back home again. Incredibly safe and felt at home. Welcome, welcome to Round Trip Death, everybody.

0:42 And usually I say welcome to our special guest, but today it is guests plural as we have the Multans on the line, Aaron and Kari from Phoenix, Arizona. How are you two? Doing well, thanks. We're great. Good. This is going to be fun to have both of you on and I'm going to tell people up front. This is going to be an unusual story. A lot of our NDEs are very happy, happy all the way through and lovey-dovey. This is going to be a little bit of a tougher one than that. And you've heard some before, you can deal with it, but just realize that's the kind of experience that we're going to be hearing from Aaron.

1:24 And there still is a lot to learn and a lot to gain from these experiences. But before I keep rambling on, would you two mind telling me a little bit about you? My name's Kari. Aaron and I have been married for 24 years and we have two kids. They're both adopted and they're both four years old. And the other fun thing about them is they're cousins. So we got Aria at birth and then three years later we adopted her cousin, Tragan. And we just finalized his adoption in November. And I'm a nurse. So do people assume they're twins since they're the same age? They do all the time.

2:05 All right, Aaron, your turn. Let's see, married 24 years. I work as a nurse anesthesiologist and some local hospitals. Kari and I met in Utah, not necessarily at BYU, but we met while we were in school out there and we've lived in Utah, Florida and currently in Phoenix. We love outdoor activities, biking, RC cars, hiking, camping, just anything that's got a little bit of adrenaline to it. Unless it's gardening. I love gardening and that has no adrenaline. Oh, and then we like to do Star Wars costume stuff. Wait, did you say costume stuff, cosplay stuff?

2:45 Yeah, have you heard of the Fible First Legion? No, I'm sorry. They're the stormtroopers in Darth Vader that you might see at Star Wars events. And we have a couple of costumes that are what they call screen accurate. And we go and do charity events around the community. Like Make-A-Wish or different charity runs or things like that. We go to support the causes. One of our favorite ones to here in Arizona is called Ryan's Rally and it's like a mental health awareness, 5K, 10K, different levels of running that they do. We just go and support the events and cheer them on. It's not paid or anything. We do it as a charity just for free to support the different events in our local area.

3:28 Our other favorite event is a National Adoption Day, which our son was adopted on National Adoption Day and so all of our Star Wars friends, Boba Fett, BB8, Kylo Ren, some stormtroopers, they were all in the courtroom to finalize his adoption. And the judge was so excited. He was a big fan. It was hilarious. It was very funny. Do you have pictures? Yeah. Oh yeah. We always take lots of pictures. Yeah. Okay. I can't wait to see some of them. Okay. Back to what we were talking about here. Let's jump into your near-death experience. Just stressing as it may have been. Can you give me an idea of what led up to this?

4:08 I know you had a major medical event, but was it right out of the blue? What happened? It was totally out of the blue. I had no, like prior to this, I had no known health issues. I did, I did have COVID. I had the COVID shot as a requirement for work, but no prior issues. I've been very healthy. I exercise as much as I can, so nothing that like would have been any warning signs except for like remote family history with my parents in their 70s, but nothing, no like warnings or auras or anything that would have been any kind of heads up that something like that was going to happen.

4:49 And when did this happen? This was back on February 21st, right after work, three o'clock in the afternoon. This year? This year. Oh my goodness. Okay. So as of the date that we're recording, it's only been two months. So this is super fresh. Okay. Well, jump into it. Tell me what happened that day. Yeah. So I was working at the hospital and had just finished my shift there and had been excused. Three o'clock in the afternoon, I took a short detour to the doctor's lounge area where they have snacks and drinks, grabbed a drink and headed out to my car and the parking garage out there.

5:33 And as I stepped into my truck, into the driver's seat, I started feeling dizzy. And like dizzy, sometimes you get dizzy if you stand up too fast or maybe I wear hats a lot. Sometimes if they're too high, too tight, you take them off and you get a little bit of a rush. And I wondered if that was the case and no, it wasn't. I was actually getting worse and I started feeling my head kind of get foggy and my vision was depth perception was changing. I had trouble looking at my phone and I had, we had plans that evening. So I was trying to use my phone, but it really, I was just having a hard time operating it, even doing the motions with my finger. I was having trouble with that.

6:14 And as I sat there and thought like, we have to know how to recognize stroke symptoms and we certify every two years so that we can be aware of those. And it was looking like that in some respects. And so a few alarm bells were going off in my head and I'm thinking, I don't think I should drive and I don't think I should stay right here and just wait for this to pass. Cause I know that time is of the essence whenever you have a patient or someone experiencing those symptoms. So I'm like, I'm right here in the hospital. I'm going to walk. I know it's maybe a little dangerous from even at that point, it was starting to feel a little bit dizzy, but I figured the fastest way to get in there was just for me to walk into the ER, which was maybe a one minute walk from the parking lot.

6:59 I didn't exactly know where it was cause I'd normally work in the operating room, but I figured I'd just ask directions. Even from the parking lot to the first door entering the hospital, I was starting to lose fine motor skill where like I swiped my badge on the key card thing to open the door. And my other hand was a little slow grabbing the door. I was kind of like, pull the push door, you know, and finally got inside. And I was thinking a lot of things that I wanted to say for help or whatever I was going through my mind, but the execution just does not happen. And I was insane. What I thought I was going to say. And once I got to the desk, the ER, all I could say was I'm having symptoms.

7:40 And in my head, I was thinking I'm having stroke symptoms, but all I could say was I'm having symptoms. And at what that meant, you know, I was like, don't you know, I'm having a stroke. And I pulled out my emergency information and kind of almost threw it at the receptionist. I had tried to call my wife a couple of times and finally got a hold of her after the third try because she was on the phone with her mom. She instinctively knew just because of the way I was fumbling around with my words that I was having a stroke. Do you want me to tell that part? Yeah. Wow. Let me ask you a question before you do. Sure. You're back into the hospital and it's a reception. It's not a nurse. So when you say symptoms, she doesn't really probably put those two things together like you did.

8:27 Even though your motor skills weren't working, your mouth wasn't quite working with your brain, you were able to self-diagnose. Yeah. Okay. And then, and then how did you call Kari? So that's what I was going to explain. So he got up to the desk. This is what he told me and he couldn't use his thumb properly to get his IDs out that she was asking for. So she said, well, just hand me your wallet or whatever. And she, he tried to hand it to her and that's when he quote through it at her because he couldn't make his body work properly. And then he went and sat down. I don't know if you go to places, but it was not a very full ER, but he sat down next to another person.

9:07 When I go to places, I'm like, I want to be away from other people, especially if I'm not feeling good, but he sat down right next to a person. I just picked a direct line to where the closest care that was next to, happened to be next to somebody. Yeah. You felt like you're kind of losing your balance. I was like, I don't know. I don't want to be on the floor here because it's, that's how quickly it was happening. Yeah. Although you may have gotten attention faster if you were on the floor. Yes. In hindsight, right? In hindsight, yeah. Okay. Keep going. He actually called me three times. The only reason he was able to call me is I was the last person he had spoken to before leaving the hospital.

9:49 We had set up, he was going to drive to where I was and meet me there. So I thought when he called that he was just telling me he was close, kind of a thing. And I was talking to my mom on the line. I said, okay, mom, I need to hang up. Aaron's calling me and find out where he is. And he called again, right? We were saying goodbye. And when I went to switch over to his phone, his call, he had already hung up. But my kid showed up right then at an indoor play place. That's where I was waiting for my husband. And when you have four year olds, it's pretty hard to ever see them at the same time at these big, huge, you know, indoor play places. But they were right there. And I said, dad's here. We need to go get our shoes on and we need to go. And they didn't fight me or anything like that. They just walked right up front to go get their shoes on.

10:32 And while we're walking up front, I get the third call from Aaron and I pick up and I don't even let him say anything. I'm like, all right, where are you? We're ready to go. We're getting their shoes on. And I hear him say, I'm having symptoms. And immediately I said, you're having a stroke. Where are you? And he said, I'm at the ER. And I'm so glad I asked this. I said, are you in the ER? Are you waiting to get into the ER? And he said, two people ahead. And I said, Aaron, you're having a hard time talking. You need to hand the phone to the person at the desk. Let me talk to them and tell them what's happening. You need to be seen immediately. And I assumed he was giving his phone to the lady at the desk.

11:13 I didn't realize he was sitting and couldn't walk. He like points with his finger and just hands his phone to the guy sitting next to him. And the guy figures out what that means and just walks up to the desk and hands the phone to the receptionist. And I'm hearing, shh, shh, shh. Wow. You know, sounds like that. And then I talked to the receptionist, the person that gave you the phone is my husband because I thought that's who did it. And I said, he is in scrubs. He has a badge. He looks healthy. He just got done working in the hospital, but he's having a stroke. He does anesthesia. I'm a nurse. We know the signs. He's really having trouble with his words. You need to get him assessed immediately. She said, OK, I'll have the triage nurse see him right now.

11:55 I'll let him know I'm on my way because I knew where he was. And we hung up and then you can take over. Yeah. So they brought me, I think they brought a wheelchair out. They had me do a quick neuro-assessment. And I could hear the skepticism in the nurse's voice, like, OK, do this. OK. All right. Well, I guess we'll go do the stroke assess or do the stroke call out. But why was she skeptical? Because it wasn't super obvious. There wasn't a really strong laterality to my symptoms. In other words, I wasn't blimp on the right side. It wasn't slurring my speech like a really defined stroke was. But clearly in my head, I was like on the verge of falling over.

12:37 And you're a young guy in good shape, too. Yeah. And she's like, he's in scrubs. What's he doing here? Is he just, is this a prank? You know, but she ended up, you know, calling overhead and the stroke team came. But a gown on me took away my water so I wouldn't drink anything in case I was having trouble swallowing, put an IV and rushed me into the, like, their response was super fast. And it turned out that I picked a good place to go because they actually have like a legit stroke response system there. And they got me into the scanner. The CT scan, right? To the CT scanner to do a brain scan with contrast. I want to just jump ahead for one second because right now is only a couple of months after this happened.

13:20 My impression is, correct me if I'm wrong, because you've got this really quick treatment, you have no long-term effects from this. You seem absolutely fine. Is that where you're at? Yeah. I have to remind myself multiple times per day that it happened because I have zero, literally zero after effects. People ask me that I see during the day, they're like, how are you doing? Are you okay? And they're like, look me in the eyes, like trying to look for any kind of deficits of any kind. And there are, I feel none and nobody's said like, Aaron, you know, you're doing this thing. There's been none of that at all. Okay. But back in, so you're going in for what kind of test at this point?

14:02 So this is called a CT scan or CAT scan, as some people call it. And it's basically, they're going to use a contrast dye so they can get a good image. They're looking for a bleed because they're two types of strokes. There's one where it's like they call hemorrhagic, where there's a bleeding on the brain or they're looking for a thrombotic stroke, which is where there's a blood clot coming from somewhere in the body that is lodged in the blood supply to the brain that's causing a stroke or the symptoms of the stroke. And before they can give anything to take out, if it's a, if it's a thrombotic stroke, they have to make sure that that's the case.

14:45 Because if they give medication to break up the clots from the thrombotic stroke, but there's a bleed, the bleed can get worse or it can end up being fatal. So they're looking for a bleed first and to see what route to take. So they put me in the scanner and shoot the contrast in. And at this point, I start to feel like the sounds of the scanner, I've been in here, I've worked in this area plenty of times. Well, it should be familiar to me, but I'm laying there and feeling kind of limp. The, the team is just kind of moving me in. I'm feeling kind of more like a rag doll at this point, not super in control of my, of my body starting to feel like someone's turning down the signal on my nervous system.

15:31 And it was really scary because like as a anesthesia provider, we understand that we see, we think about the nervous system a lot. And I was like self observing all of this happening. And I didn't feel like people were keeping a close eye on me. So it kind of added to my anxiety as well that I was in the scanner, but nobody was looking at my vital signs. So I'm laying on my back and I'm closing my eyes. I'm just trying to relax. And I see lights flashing. I'm hearing like a worrying sound of the machine. And I have this sensation of being inside an atomic collider. Have you heard they, I think it's in Switzerland or something where they try to do, they study particle physics.

16:15 Yeah. So I felt like I was in this like, CERN Switzerland, I think the hydrant collider. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And so I was like, I'm in an atomic collider and I'm just going around and around and around or like a wormhole. I felt like I was just being sucked into this wormhole. And at the same time, I was like, is my spirit going to, am I going to die? Am I going to be separated from my body at this point? And I was almost like looking out for some sort of tunnel or portal to open up. It was not what I expected at all to happen at that point. I'm just laying there like, this is really super anti-climactic because about 10 minutes ago, I was like thinking about all these other things.

17:03 And then here I am like this huge question in my mind. And after reading several of the books about near death experiences, I feel like your mind melds into just like a telepathic communication, right? So I feel like I was merging into this telepathic communication. Some of my thoughts were my own, but I'm not sure if there were other thoughts coming into my mind from other beings out there, right? So continuing on with the scan. The scan is just, they just have to shoot the contrast. It feels warm in your arm. It feels kind of funny. It goes throughout your body. Sometimes there's a reaction to that like nausea. I did actually have a nausea reaction to it.

17:43 I've read stories of people actually having anaphylactic reactions to the contracts die. And that triggers their NDE. I don't know. I can't rule that out as some sort of reaction going on. They took me into the ER bay, the big ER bay where there's lots of space and then just kind of parked me in there. I felt like, okay, we're done with you for a while. Just hang out here. But they go, do you want to blanket? And I was just like kind of just laying there, just letting. I was being reacted upon basically. And I was like, no, I'm good. I didn't even feel temperature on my body at all. About that moment, I was like, you know, and I'm still having these kind of pending doom feelings.

18:27 And I'm like, if I'm going to die, I really think I should probably tell Kari at least something. And I mean, I was afraid of that, but it was almost incredulous that it was all happening. But my phone was right there and I just typed out, I love you, explanation mark, explanation mark and all caps. Cause she was supposed to be on her way and I was like, you need to get here quick. I was even rattling off her phone number to the nurses, like call my wife so she doesn't have to waste any time looking around for me. Cause I really want her to be here in case I can't speak for myself. I need somebody to speak for me, especially with her nursing background. Yeah. So Kari, at this point, are you freaking out when you get that message?

19:11 Yeah. So let me tell you my side of the story. So when I hung up the phone from talking to the ER secretary, I went into like compartmentalization nursing mode. I couldn't freak out and scare my kids. I had to figure out what to do really quickly. I immediately actually got on Facebook. I felt prompted to get on Facebook and to just do a quick post asking for prayers. And I said, I don't know what's going on. My husband Aaron is in the ER. He's either having a stroke, a heart attack or a pulmonary embolism. Please say a prayer for him right now. And then I immediately, like, well, I'm doing this while we're walking to the cars when I did that text or post.

19:53 And then I called Aaron's cousin, happened to have a cancellation that day and she cleans homes and she said that she would clean our house that day. So she was at our home and I called her and I told her what had happened. She said, bring the kids. So I had someone to immediately take my kids within 10 minutes of finding out about his condition, I dropped the kids off and was on my way to the hospital. This drive normally takes like 15 minutes for my house to get there. It took an hour. All of a sudden this torrential rainstorm hits. And like I'm an avid gardener. So I was looking at the weather because I needed to know if I needed to cover plants for freezes. This is February. And even the newscasters mentioned it that night at five o'clock.

20:36 This was a freak rainstorm. It was not even on anyone's radar. It was going to happen. And we moved to Arizona from Florida. So we know what it's like to drive in like a monsoon kind of crazy rain. And this is what it was. My windshield wipers couldn't keep up with it. And they were going five miles an hour on the freeway. And there were hundreds of cars pulled over to the side of the road with their lights on. They're just flashing just like, I'm just waiting this out. I passed three accidents with three ambulances and police officers just in the 15 minute drive to get there, well, an hour drive, but normally 15 minutes. And I get the text from Aaron, 10 minutes to the hospital. And the whole time I'm like crying and praying, you know, I get that text and I think, oh, I love him so much.

21:22 He must just be terrified. And because of the conditions, I couldn't text him back. I wouldn't dare. Then I got a phone call five minutes later from his nurse letting me know he was in Bay 12 and that he was really worried about me and wanting to know when I would be there. And I said, my GPS says I'm five minutes away. So when I got to the hospital and got in, I saw that he was in a big bay. And when you're in a big bay in the ER, that's not a good sign. They put you in a big bay if there's a possibility for you to crash and they need to have a team there to do, to work on you and to bring carts and machines and things in. So when I saw that, I was like, oh no, this is really serious. And then as I got closer, I saw that he didn't have a blanket on him.

22:05 He was in a gurney with his head at like 45 degrees and his heels were pumping. His right and left heel were scraping along the thin sheet that's on the gurney. And every once in a while, he would reach out and his eyes were closed. And I saw all these nursing students and nurses sitting at the nurses station right across from the room there kind of keeping their eye on him. And I said, has he been like this the whole time? And they said, since his cat scan, this is how he has been. I said, this makes no sense. I go, this man doesn't drink. He doesn't do drugs. He doesn't smoke. He is an avid cycler. This is not normal. Even stroke behavior, like, because he's moving both sides of his body.

22:46 I get close and I touch him and he is ice cold. I've taken care of patients that have passed. He had no blood in his skin level. He was all pale, all light. He has these marks on his face from during the COVID years where he would have to double mask and wear an N95 with a surgical mask over it for hours and hours all day long every day. Everything was just as pale as could be. And then he opened his eyes when I touched him and he had these pinpoint teeny tiny pupils, which is also not a good sign that he wasn't reactive to the bright lights and the darkness. You should dilate with your eyes closed and then they should tighten up when you open.

23:29 They shouldn't just stay tight the whole time. When he saw me, I could tell everything took effort and thought before he could move. And it took him like 15 to 25 seconds to eventually get his arms around me. And then he just cried and it was so loud. It was the type of cry that you hear a toddler make because they can't control their volume. It was so loud it shocked him and I could tell that it scared him. And then quieter, he continues to cry and he says, I feel like they're trying to take me. I feel like I'm dying. Who's going to take care of you and the babies? And all of these things he's saying, he has to think before he can say these words to me.

24:12 It's not like it flows naturally for him. And I just, I felt prompted to say a prayer and I prayed as Aaron has said that my, the words just got more and more intense. And in my prayer, I even asked for all of our ancestors on the other side of the veil to come and to protect him and to heal him and that he would be well. And when I was finished with the prayer, you can take over from here. Yeah. So from the time that I sent the text, I completely lost time. I slipped into some sort of trance or otherworldly existence. The more I learned about these things, I, I wasn't like on a tour of the hospital, but I was definitely not like well connected to my body at all as, as she was explaining.

25:00 My only thought was like, I just can't wait for her to get here because I need her to be here. And, and the way she talked about me moving slow, I don't remember the being slow. To me, it was just like, oh, she's here. I'm going to give her a hug. But that's just how my brain was like in some sort of different time range. Yeah. So let me ask you a question here. So that part is because of the stroke symptoms and things, but this whole thing with your legs pumping and your arms grabbing, that's based on the experience that's going on with you, right? Yeah. So, uh, that was an outward manifestation of what I was feeling and seeing before she arrived.

25:41 I felt like my gurney was actually on the edge of a cliff and I was being pulled down, really strong gravitational force, pulling me down into a vortex, a hole or an abyss. And the only thing keeping me from going into that was me basically holding the, the side rails of the gurney and back peddling with my feet. Like, don't let me go down. And then when she came in, like, I suddenly, I look, I woke up, I opened my eyes and I looked down and I saw what my feet were doing. And I was like, what, I was completely startled because I knew it was, it was not my, it was not something that I would have done like at all.

26:23 I was just like, what's going, what am I reenacting? What's going on in my mind that's causing my body to do this really, um, dissonant, like running away, like I'm afraid or I'm possessed with fear. So at one of the, at some point during this time, it was almost like it was playing out on a screen in front of me, right? And I'm, I'm feeling it happen to me at the same time as I'm watching it happen. And because I've heard of people talking about two perspectives at the same time, right? So I'm seeing myself as well as feel it happening to me. And it was, uh, like a vortex circuit, like a spiral vortex of, uh, gray floorboards swirling around and on the end of the boards was like fingers or like serrated edges.

27:13 And it was just turning around like this. And then I was like thrown into the center of it. And as I went into the center, it was like Neo from the matrix when he touches the mirror and the mirror and the silver part of the mirror just starts covering his finger and it goes up his arm and it covers his whole body. And then it goes up his head, over his head and down into his throat and his entire body is sucked into the matrix. That's what I saw and felt. I might have been screaming at that moment in time, uh, you know, don't let them take me. And, but that was one of many, uh, I can't even, uh, really describe in, in great detail all of the things we can kind of give me an idea of one.

27:56 Um, so I felt like imagine medieval torture devices, like being on a rack, being stretched, you know, or just like being poked and prodded, almost maybe like limbs being torn asunder. And it might have been me that they were doing that to me too, or someone else, like these scenes of just torment. And it was all within this realm of basically shades of blackness. And imagine like I use various scenes from, uh, from movies to kind of help people get an image of, but like, uh, think of like Mordor, where it's the jagged rock, I think of rocky, jagged, rocky landscape where you can't even walk in a straight line and jagged mountainscapes and like erupting volcanoes.

28:45 Like, yeah, if you want to get anywhere, you got to like walk around the rocks or over the rocks. There's no like flat ground at all in the distances, like storms brewing with maybe a sunset or like, uh, orangish hue to the sky and then just dark mist flowing everywhere. And even the figures that I saw, I felt like they were partially made of mist. Like I didn't really see their faces, but they, I could tell that they were people or figures. I don't think I ever focused in on one in particular, but it was just like this horde constantly surrounding. And it happened like there would be like, I would open my eyes to answer a question from a doctor or something, and then I would slip back in and then there would be like a whole new play of some other scene.

29:35 And a lot of it's been taken from my memory and thankful for that. Some of it might actually come, you know, back over time. Don't know what purpose it serves, but. People that I've had on the show in the past that have had distressing type experiences like this, it is very common for it to be a series of experiences. Just like what you're describing. And I don't hear that from people that have these beautiful positive experiences, but the distressing ones are almost like, okay, here's a five minute horrible dream. Now click, here's another five minute horrible dream. Now click, here's another one.

30:16 And in those things, they're often, you know, people have told me, oh, I, you know, it was like I was being tortured or I was being murdered or raped or some horrible thing happening to me. So is that along the lines of what was happening to you then? Yeah, that makes sense. And that was how I described it to myself or to, to God, basically, like I'm praying to God in my mind. And that's how I described it. Like this is not life. This is not being alive, being stuck in this place where it's just like one torture is seen after the other with little glimpses of reality. There'd be like, oh, I see Carrie's face and oh, there's my friend and there's the doctor and, and that would just be like, I wasn't even participating in the real world.

31:04 Yeah. So I don't want to drum up too many negative memories that you don't want to, like you said, you're happy that they're leaving. But I think listeners would love to hear one or two more. And if you don't mind sharing, if you can think of any of the others. I think, I think that what I can, what I can remember at this point in time is to say the confusion that I felt. I, I remember saying to her, like, why, why is this happening in my slurred speech? Like, why is this happening? Because I felt like I had, because of my religion, I have, they teach us like the progression of life after death and these are the stages and the places you're expected, you expect to go.

31:50 And I was like, they didn't talk about this place at all. Nobody's mentioned this thing. And I, and I mean, this looks like hell to me, but I don't think that I should be staying here. I mean, I don't feel like I, I'm not, I'm not a serial killer. I haven't done all these things to people, you know, I don't associate with those kind of people. Why is all of this happening to me? So it was really a big question in my mind, like, okay, I don't, I have no clue why this is going on. After her prayer, or actually during her prayer, it occurred to me and I said, I just want to rule this out as a possibility because I still wasn't even that clear as to what was happening, but I did not like the feeling.

32:32 And so I almost interrupted her prayer and I put my arm, I put my right arm up in the air, what we're taught to do, and I said, in the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to depart. And I didn't feel like, you know, like a screening and a running away of the evil influences, but I had to do that because I felt like I needed to, to put that out there as like, this is my defense. This is what I know to do to get, to pull me out of whatever this place is. And I don't know, from your perspective, Kari, what do you think? Well, after, after I prayed and after you did that, I, I would say that you just kind of like latched on to me and held on to me, but you were still definitely going in and out of consciousness and you were still having, going into that same realm because you were experiencing that for the whole hour while I was driving there.

33:30 And then definitely while I was still there, I had brought with me like kind of like a heavy weight picnic blanket because I'm always cold in hospital, so I brought it for me. But when I saw he didn't have a blanket on him, he was just ice cold to the touch. I covered him with it and since it's a heavier weight, actually, I think helped him feel like he was more in his body. And I'm sure also me being there helped him just to calm, calm down more as well. But no, you were still definitely going to those places. Well, I feel like part of it and one of the things that I said to her was don't let them take me. They're trying to take me and I didn't hear specifically the words, but I did feel like it's almost like you're listening through a door or something.

34:13 Yeah, that's what you said last time. And they were like not intelligible words, but it was like, and you could kind of feel fair tone what was being said back and forth and it was as if they were reveling in the opportunity to torment me or to make me afraid. They were feeding off the fear that I was exhibiting and I could sense that in a way that I didn't know that I... I became aware of an extra sense that I did not know we had, really. People talk about the telepathy, but there's something more to it. There's certainly something that you feel in your body and that was really the message was like that I was a coveted prize.

34:59 By these beings that you keep referring to as they. Yeah. Tell me who they are. I would say just bad spirits and it took me... I've contemplated like, who is this they, right? And they weren't like relatives that had passed on. It could have been a combination of disembodied spirits who had passed on in this life but were refusing like ghosts that you might say that might haunt a house or be in the graveyard at midnight or something. So a combination of that plus in our church we talk about there was a war in heaven, right? The people that followed God and Jesus and there were people who followed Satan and the spirits that never received a body, never took on human form, but they were sent to earth as followers of Satan.

35:52 And they hate the fact that they will never have a body. And this is something that I, probably one of the strongest and most apparent lessons of this experience is that they are right there. They are around us all the time. But like in the next room, they're in the room with you and they can attach to you. They can try to be in you, but they're in there mingling with the rest of the good spirits, but they are right there. And in the hospital, people die in hospitals all the time. Good and bad people come in the hospital all the time. And the spirits that they are attached to those people, they come into the hospitals as well.

36:36 So it's like a cesspool. It's like the, how's the Star Wars thing go? It goes like a more wretched hive of scum and ability you will not find. So it is really a wretched hive of this, these spirits that probably come and go, and they were taken advantage of an opportunity of weakness to just do what they only know what to do. And that is torment someone and try to put doubts. And it was almost like they were trying to convince me like to join them or like you should give up. But at the same time, I was like, it's not my time. And that was, that started in the CT scan.

37:16 I was like, it is not my time. I'm not going, you're going to have to do a lot more to me to get me to go to the other side. Yeah. You mentioned a few minutes ago that you commanded them to leave and that there wasn't a dramatic them screaming and running out of the room, but was there a change? Was there a difference in what you felt at that point? I can't remember. I feel like I was bargaining like time was weird pieces of, you know, when I watched the great movie in the afterlife, I could have all of these pieces completely jumbled up.

37:56 But I felt like I was still sort of in a bargaining state after that happened where I was like, okay, you either send me back to my family so that I can be with them. I didn't make demands about what's the state, my physical state would be or take me all the way to the other side and just, I'll never come back. I'll just die, right? But do not put me in this middle realm because that middle realm felt to me like death. I would describe it as death. So if I'm going to die, put me all the way dead or all the way alive. That's I find that really fascinating.

38:36 Kari, what was going on with you then? One of the things that he did say to me a few different times is two things. One, I'm so glad the lights in here are so bright because I can tell when I'm back in reality, I can tell because of how bright the lights are because it was so dark there. And he also said, is it always going to be like this? Am I always going to feel this way? Like when he said he was bargaining, he was always like, am I going to stay in this nether kind of like space where I'm just in and out of confusion versus with you? Yeah. You were worried about staying in that spot.

39:17 So did you feel like you had actually detached from your body and left or like this was sort of happening where you were? It wasn't the same as like when you're, you know, you're taking a nap and you kind of like, you start to hear sounds and you're like, oh yeah, that's right. I fell asleep and I'm in my recliner and I'm waking up. It was more like, boom, like switching straight into consciousness. And it almost was surprising. Like I would, I would open my eyes and sit up. And then I had done this multiple times. I had an emesis base and like a basically a little bin in case you need a vomit sitting in my lap and I would sit up and I was like, oh, okay, this is, and I would touch it and and be like, okay, this is a tangible ground.

40:03 This is real quote real. And then another time I was sitting and I woke up and she was at the, at the foot of my stretcher and you were talking to our friends and she's like, yeah, I posted on Facebook and I was telling everybody what's happening. And I was like, what's what's happening? What's going on? Wait, you posted on Facebook? This must be really serious. If you posted on what's happening to me, I was that detached from like the chronology of events. Yeah. But you didn't really feel yourself lifting out of your body, but you did feel when you were coming back into consciousness, definitely.

40:45 Okay. Yeah. Well, I felt this pole being drawn into that vortex, but that was a continuous thing. It wasn't just that one moment where I saw the vortex, but there was a gravity pulling me in, in out of like out of my body. It wasn't like a lifting up like people have described, but I'll tell you a friend of mine who was in the hospital with COVID and I saw him one day and I go, did you feel the pole? And he goes, yeah. And I did, that's all I had to say. No other details. And he knew exactly what it's talking about. And he said, as soon as I felt that I prone myself. In other words, he turned himself on his, on his chest so that his lungs would work better and that he could live because he felt himself dying.

41:26 Wow. And I'm like, how close was I? You know? Yeah. So I was, you know, after the prayer and he rebuked Satan or whatever, I was, you know, really concerned. His vital signs were all over the place and I asked to speak with the nurse and then the nurse got the doctor and the doctor came in saying that everything was negative. He wasn't bleeding in his brain. All of his labs were, were showing that, you know, he wasn't positive for any drugs. Everything was negative from other things that could be causing his symptoms. And he said, I said, well, he's obviously having something neurological going on.

42:06 Can he have the clot busting IV medication that you guys can give? And you can only give that medication if it's within the first four hours of you having a stroke and if you're not bleeding. And he was fitting all that criteria, but because he was still able to move like both sides of his body and all of this, I'm like going, is he having a stroke? Like is that really what's happening? And the doctor said that he was having what's called a pontine stroke. You have your pons, which is right above your brainstem. And if you have a stroke there, it's right in the middle and it affects more of like your autonomic nervous system and your, the things that you just, that happen, respiration, heart rate, your capillaries being able to constrict to keep your blood flow here, your pupils being able to be reactive, those kinds of things.

42:51 So he was, the doctor said, he says, all the signs of having a pontine stroke, but we can't see any of those things on the CAT scan. He would need an MRI with contrast, but because he just had a CAT scan with contrast, we don't want to give him an MRI with contrast because that's too much contrast for his kidneys. That's what the ER doctor said. So I said, okay. And then I asked about the clot-busting medication and he said he talked to the neurologist and get back to us and he did come back saying, yes, let's give that to him. And it was interesting with him. He would be out of, out of it, just out of it. But if they came in to do neuro checks or if the doctor came in, he would be back in his body and like back to consciousness and able to be oriented enough to answer appropriately everything they were asking.

43:40 It was always a pause and a thinking of what to say. And then it would come out, but he could do that. And that was very surprising to me with someone having a stroke that they were, he was able to do that. I even, the neurologist put his fingers, he goes, okay, squeeze my fingers on left and right. And I cracked his fingers. That was the next day, baby. He snapped his fingers. Oh, that was the next day. That was the next day. Anyway. Good thing you didn't break him. Right. I remember these neuro checks going on and off and on. And sometimes it would be like a disembodied, it felt like a disembodied voice because I had my eyes closed and they'd be like touching me, you know, and I'm like, I just hear a voice like out there in space.

44:21 And I would really, really try to answer as truthfully as possible. And the thing was strange is like, they would say, okay, how's, you know, what's the difference between, you know, do you feel this more than this or whatever? I go, I feel you on both sides, but it's slightly different on this side. You just felt a little bit less on the right. That was it. That was his only thing. Yeah, it was just, that was just so weird. Okay, Aaron, I've got a couple of hard questions I need to ask. Yeah. How do you know that this wasn't just hallucinations because of either the dye that they pumped into you or some kind of chemical thing going on because of the stroke? I think because of the episodic periods of being like in hell and seeing like this vortex.

45:09 That was, that was one thing that I don't feel like could have been, it could have been, you know, something happening with my inner ear that was making me feel like this, but the visions and the scenes of torture, the scenes of torture, that could potentially happen with people that are, you know, they're having a schizophrenic episode. They hear voices that are very, very distinct actually. These were not distinct necessarily, but they were, I could certainly feel that feeling. The bargaining that I was going through, the bargaining process was very real to me. And the fact that I was like, I didn't feel in control of my own actions at all.

45:50 When, how do you, how does this even happen? In life where they feel themselves doing things that they did not want to do. You're like, I don't know. I didn't feel in control of my, of my, of my body at that time. And the overwhelming, like just the, there was like a mist coming over me. So I really feel like there was, and I thought about this many times, like there is a, there is a blending of the two symptoms because you talk to people who've had strokes. I don't know. I haven't talked to anybody who's had a, a pontine stroke that's even survived. Was there one of the worst kinds? There were the worst kinds.

46:31 So I don't know if there is a hallucinatory element to that, but there was certainly fear on my part. It wasn't like, I know what I'm doing and you're a demon. I need to kill you. It was like, Oh my gosh, there's a demon. I need to defend myself and I'm not, what's going on? Like, why am I, what's this? So I did not see any spiritual entities. I did not have like a life review. I didn't see, you know, beautiful fields of it. There was none of that going on. But I will tell you that based on her assessment of what I looked like and the way I was feeling inside, certainly death was near. Right.

47:12 And if we're talking about near death experiences, it was certainly a near, near death experience. Yes. And I assume so as well. And it obviously was very, very, very real to you or you wouldn't be feeling that kind of fear. Yeah. Yeah. That's a whole lot more than just a dream or something. So I don't know if you've had time to think about this next question yet, but why do you think that a good person like you, you know, you're, you're a family man, you go to church, you don't do drugs and stuff. Why would something evil like this happen to a good person?

47:53 Any thoughts on that? I don't think about that very often except for only every day. Do you have any answers yet? Probably too much time spent thinking about that. And part of the reason that I decided to do this interview was that seeking some answers as far as that goes. That was a question I answered or I asked myself as it was happening when I was talking to her, I'm like, why is this happening? What's going on? I feel like I'm paying for someone else's sins. Right. And the answers have not been super forthcoming. I someday I might get an answer, but I have come up with some answers to help me.

48:36 I deal with that. And I actually spent a lot of time reading a couple of books recently. One came as a result of you telling me about the distressing NDE with IANS. I forgot the title. And then another book, mostly about the spirit world. And I was searching, I was skinning through, just looking through like, what are some of these people that have the distressing experiences? And actually my distressing experience fits, there's like three types of distressing NDE's and mine is the least common of the distressing NDE's. Congratulations. Yay, for me.

49:17 But I saw a friend of mine posted something on Facebook and it was about the devil appears to three monks and he says, if you could stop anything in history from happening, what would it be? And so the first monk says something, you know, I wish I could have stopped this happening. And then the next monk says, I wish I could stop this thing from happening. And then the third monk says, you guys, you shouldn't even be talking to this guy for one thing. He's the enemy. And number two, that is one of his greatest weapons is to make us dwell on things that we have no control over, that things that we cannot change.

49:59 And so I'm almost back. I'm looped back to before I even had this experience and that is, am I okay with God? Is this some sort of judgment, right? Well, the great thing about this experience is that my work is not done. And I have time to do a life review every day. I say a prayer multiple times per day. I do my own life review and say, where do I need to be repenting in this moment and re-evaluating all of my priorities as a result of that experience, right? Because I've been given this gift to be able to come back.

50:41 And even if that had been some sort of judgment in that moment, I believe in the atonement of Jesus Christ. And I believe that whatever it was, if there was some judgment being made it out to me, that I have the opportunity to repent from it. That's what I decided is that those are things in the past that I cannot dwell on too much and move forward. It's a distraction really, I think. I'm going to throw out a couple more just for you to think about. Yeah. Because I certainly don't know the answer for you. But I don't think that these distressing experiences happen as any kind of a test or punishment.

51:21 Okay? Other people that have had them have been very, very good people too. I think that because every single NDE is so very different and so very individualized, that there is definitely something that each individual can learn from whatever their experience is. And they can pass on what they have learned to other people who may need it even more than they do. Yeah. Yeah. There are a couple of things to think about there. Yeah. Now, what I wanted to come back to was how did this end? Because you felt like, how did you say it? You were being pulled down?

52:01 Yeah. Yeah. How did that finally end? Go for it, Kari. My phone rang about 10 minutes after he got the clot-busting medication in his IV. And it was a friend of ours, and he said, I was going to text, but I had a feeling you wouldn't answer a text. I'm two exits away on the freeway. What do you need? I said, really what I need is a blessing for my husband. He said, I've only ever given one blessing. He was a new member of our faith. Can you explain what that is? A quote blessing? Okay. So a blessing, speaking from the inside to the outside, I guess.

52:44 For anybody who hasn't, I mean, a lot of churches have blessings. So this friend of ours is what I guess you'd call a priest. Men in our church have the opportunity to have the priesthood. And one of the things they do, like having the priesthood means that you serve others. And a way to serve others is to bless other people with like a special prayer. We call our kids, we tell our kids it's a special prayer to... Call down the powers of heaven....call down the powers of heaven for healing or strength or comfort. It's almost like a knee jerk reaction for me as having given blessings to people in the hospital or in their homes who are in need or in my own home.

53:28 And it was something that I was not planning to allow the experience to pass without having at least one blessing in some way. So this friend of ours had recently joined the church probably only a year or two before and didn't have a lot of experience giving these blessings, which it can be a sort of daunting task or if you're not used to that kind of thing. And he left his home with our friend with the intention of going to actually worship in the temple, the LDS temple. So he didn't have the oil that we normally use for this blessing. We use consecrated olive oil.

54:09 And Aaron came too right when I was talking to Jerome. He had one of those moments of... Lucidity. ...lucidity. And I had him on speaker and then he interrupts me talking to Jerome and says, I have an envelope of olive oil in my wallet. I had a business card size packet in my wallet for occasion that I might need to give someone else a blessing. But in this case, I was like, I've got some oil. We can do it. And he goes, I've never consecrated oil. I've only given one blessing before and I was able to gather enough cognition to say, I think I can remember how to tell you how to do it.

54:53 All you got to do is repeat after me because I've given enough of them that it's not too hard to remember the details. So within 10 minutes, he's there at our bedside with our friend and is consecrating the oil and gives a blessing. The blessing is very short and simple and powerful and it was that he would be healed completely and wholly and that you had more work to accomplish in this life and that you were loved by your Heavenly Father. And that was it. It was just short and simple and sweet. And over the next four hours, he had less and less and less periods of this dreamlike state.

55:33 Do you want to talk about that? Yeah. Once he gave the blessing, the periods of being drawn, the episodic periods of being drawn into this realm, this dark realm, became shorter and shorter and then the periods of being able to basically maintain a train of thought because I'd be like answering a doctor's question and I was able to stay alert for longer periods, longer and longer periods of time until I finally just didn't go back at all. So I credit it to like, there wasn't like a one plus one equals this. It was more like, and in the church, they say, don't just rely on blessings. You need to seek medical care as well.

56:14 So it was the two coupled together, the timely medical care as well as faith and the priesthood blessing that I credit with making a full recovery. And so quickly, that is awesome. All right. Before we wind up, are there any thoughts that you've had as far as this that could help somebody else out there? Something that you've learned, either of you or both of you that you want to share? Yeah. I would love to. So what this did for me is really take me on a journey. It's basically the start of a journey to reevaluate my devotion to my faith.

56:56 In a positive way. In a positive way and in an absolutely positive way. We talk about in the church, we say whatever the threefold mission of the church and then we say, and endure to the end. And there's a lot of explanation as to what enduring to the end means. I've always thought of it as like, basically you stay righteous, you go to church, you be a good example, you'd be nice to your neighbor, you serve others as you can. And someday you're going to pass away and you'll be welcomed into the pearly gates. That's what I thought that meant. What it really means is that that word endure is a cyclical thing that you are going to go through a trial and you will hopefully make choices that bring you to another level of spiritual progression.

57:50 Because that's what this whole idea of this life, the purpose of this life and the next life is to achieve spiritual progression. So that enduring is being willing to be subjected to what the Lord wants you to be subjected to and seeking him for whatever strength you need to overcome that trial until finally you have received light and knowledge line upon line until he judges that it's time for you to move on into the next to the next world. You pass away, you die, whatever you transition into the next life.

58:31 And I remember, it was so awesome to me. We have our conference with our church twice a year, general conferences we call it, where the church leaders gather and give their talks. I don't care if I said this out loud, but I knew that one of our church leaders, Jeffrey R. Holland, had been sick. And I thought to myself, I bet you he had an NDE and I wonder if he's going to talk about it. He started to talk about how he was in the hospital and that he spent much of the time at the edge of eternity. He talked about that and I really perked up because this is the message of one of our church leaders telling us what he can tell us of what brought him to a higher spiritual plane and what was his mission, what was his work, and what was the admonition from him to us as members of the church.

59:33 And it was like, don't be a nominal member of the church, of your faith, with your name is written on a dusty, wrinkled baptismal record, and that's it. Devote yourself, whatever faith you are, devote yourself to more fully being willing to submit your will to the Father, seeking his light and knowledge, and never stop looking for ways to repent and to grow and be devoted. And one last thing is that people who have near-death experiences say, love is the only thing that matters.

1:00:18 And this is where I really feel strongly about this is that part of the reason I came back was to show greater love to my fellow man, especially my family. That was the only thing that came to mind when the prospect of dying was presented. I was like, no, I've got to come back. I've got to be with my family. Since then, I have been searching for ways that I can fulfill that mission with them, with my children, with my wife. So that is my message to anybody listening is that whatever your faith is, be more devoted to it.

1:01:00 Don't just step inside the threshold and say, I'm saved, or I'm free, or I'm here, I made it. Realize that God wants more for you, and there is no end to what he can do for you. Kari, any thoughts? I just wanted to share one thought. Well, he was going through all of this. I really saw the hand of the Lord in my life lifting us and protecting us. So many, what I would say, many miracles or tender mercies of the Lord through this whole process that I didn't scare my kids when I found out about it, that they were there and ready to go when we were on our way so quickly when we found out the news.

1:01:40 I was able to have someone that could take my kids immediately. And I was so thankful that he had this stroke at the hospital, and not when he was in the OR doing anesthesia on somebody. He could have endangered someone else's life. But when he was done, now that he hadn't left the hospital yet, because the hospital is right off the freeway, he could have been in that storm driving on the freeway, having these symptoms, gotten in an accident, or if he was in an accident, he could have had an injury of some kind that would have precluded him from ever getting that clot-busting medication. Because if he was bleeding in any way, shape, or form, he could not have had that medication. Because once you get that medication, they have to watch you for 24 hours because you could bleed in your brain and you could have another type of stroke again from the medication.

1:02:27 Or they could have said he was in an accident. Did he have all of these symptoms from being in the accident? He probably wouldn't have even thought he had a stroke because it was such a different, untypical type of stroke anyway. And if he had pulled over, realizing something was wrong, would he have figured out how to call 911? And if he called them, I'm having symptoms with a 911 operator know what that even meant. And there were hundreds of cars pulled over to the side of the road with their flashers on. But they even have found him in time. And there were three ambulances with other accidents on my way to the hospital. Would there have been an ambulance available, even close by, to take him? So all of that was a miracle to me that it happened there.

1:03:10 And that he was able to call me and I was able to advocate for him and knew immediately something medical was wrong. And that he was able to get the medical care so quickly that we were able to have a friend come and give the blessing that all of these things happened. And like I said, I was very much in nurse mode and just keeping really what I was feeling and check when I was around him. But you know, that night I went to sleep and I was crying and the next day I had to drop my kids off and go to the ICU to see him. I was letting all of my fears and worries come out. And as I came to the, to lead the subdivision, there was an accident and there were all these cars and I couldn't get out.

1:03:53 So I went back through my subdivision to leave through an exit I never go to. And there was a small space in the line of these cars and I gunned it to get through. Well I misjudged where the curb was and I hit the curb and I popped my front and rear tire on my passenger side and pinch flatted him. And as I pulled over to the side of the road, because I knew you couldn't drive on them, this car pulls right up behind me and I get out and I'm crying and he sees me crying and I'm saying, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. He's like, I will take care of this. Let me change your tire. And then he saw that there were two tires that were popped and I told him what was happening with my husband. He said, you know what, I was praying that I'd be able to take care of somebody today and you are the person I'm supposed to take care of today.

1:04:38 And he changed my tire with my one spare. My friend came and picked me up, took my kids and I went to the hospital to see my husband. And he took that other tire, went to some tire place, changed it for a full tire, came back and put it on there and I didn't have to worry about any of that. And my friends after they dropped me off the hospital came and took my car back to my house. I just really felt like we really had people watching over us. And my friend who lives in New Mexico, she was painting her ceiling in the middle of the day when all of this was going on and the spirit tells her, you need to say a prayer right now and you need to pray. She's like, oh, I'll do it when I'm done with the ceiling. Oh, you'll forget. Okay. So she gets down, puts her paintbrush down, gets on her knees in the middle of this room and begins to pray.

1:05:22 And in the act of praying, she's praying for her friend that has cancer. Then she feels prompted to pray for Aaron and I. She's like, I don't know why I should be praying for them. They're fine. And she starts praying for us and she feels like she needs to pray for healing and for protection for us. And it was right in the middle of everything we were going through. And then later that night, she sees the Facebook post. I really do feel that there's a power in prayer. There's a power in asking for that help and protection. I asked for the protection of those on the other side, our ancestors, our family members on the other side to come and to be with us and to heal you, Aaron. And I do feel that there's more to this world than what we can see.

1:06:06 And there's more light and hope and love and knowledge that we can have access to if we will seek for it and try to understand it and ask for that help. I thought of something else I wanted to say too. And that is we have a wide audience. You know, you have lots of people listening to your podcast and I want to speak to them just for a second and say that there's a scripture that comes to mind as I went through this experience and it says, it's in the, I believe Psalm 23, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for the Lord is my shepherd. And Jesus overcame death.

1:06:48 He is the master of that realm through his atonement and his sacrifice. He canceled out all of those, the reasons to fear. What I saw was horrible and I can imagine, you know, why it was such an amazing, wonderful and miraculous thing that he overcame those things. It really was like, I've said this a couple of times and I really mean it with all my heart. It was death. There was separation from God. It was a lack of existence, lack of purpose, a lack of love, lack of companionship. All there was was misery. It was death, but he overcame that.

1:07:30 When you turn to him, he pulls you out. And for people who feel like today they're living in the valley of the shadow of death, and maybe they don't think that Jesus loves them or cares about them. He knows where they are. He knows where every one of those people are. And all they have to do is look up. Aaron, Thari, thanks a lot. Appreciate you being on. You're welcome. You're welcome. Thanks again for listening and sharing this podcast. Don't forget to hit the follow or subscribe button and sign up for our newsletter at roundtriptest.com. If you want to share your near-death experience or if you have questions or comments about the show, send an email to eric at roundtriptest.com.

1:08:13 Until then, I wish you everything good that you're looking for in this life and the next.