In the early hours of Tuesday 4th September 2018, I sat up in my ICU hospital bed screaming, raised my arms and crossed them over my chest and then fell back to sleep again.  Soon after that, a soft and re-assuring female voice whispered in my left ear “It’s okay, it’s okay”.

That happened four days after a major surgery to remove two thirds of my cancerous liver.  After such a major operation, I was all wired-up, and connected to various machinery that monitored my breathing, heart rate, blood pressure, plus cannulas to provide pain killers and fluids to keep me hydrated.  One of the many remarkable things about that episode was managing to sit up unaided and enough slack in all the connections to be able to fold my arms over my chest, without disconnecting any of them.  In any case, I had no core or muscular strength to lift my head at the time so, to be able to sit up unaided was unbelievable.

Before sitting up the way I mentioned earlier, I sensed an unwelcome presence of something / somebody at the foot of my bed.  I opened my eyes and saw what I thought was a demon of death, like the ‘Grim Reaper’.  This evil presence reached out and tried to push its hand through my chest to rip something out like my heart or lungs.  This is when I sat up and resisted the way I did.  This evil presence uttered a chilling scream of anger and disappeared.

Later that morning, Claire arrived at the hospital to see me but before she was able to come to my ICU room, a doctor stopped her and explained that I had a bad night, and I was very close to death.  He did not hold much hope for me thereafter.  However, one of the nurses spoke to Claire and re-assured her I was going to be fine.  Finally, Claire walked in, and I seemed better than she was led to believe by the doctor.  I told Claire about my experience in the early hours of the morning, and she said it must have been a vivid dream brought about by the strong pain killers I was on.  Right or wrong, the explanation made sense and I didn’t think about the incident for a few weeks when I decided to blog about it.

Three and a half years on, I came across a medical term for the first time and I wondered why it was given the name ‘Lazarus Reflex’.  I had heard of Lazarus being a biblical character but could not remember what role he played some two thousand years ago.  So, out of idle curiosity, I began to research the matter.  Jesus Christ had performed a few miracles and one of them was to bring a man to life after being dead for a few days.  The resurrected man was Lazarus.  What I hadn’t worked out yet was the reflex named after him so, I carried on with my research.

It transpired that for some time after death, the body of a dead person may experience a ‘Lazarus Reflex’ by suddenly sitting up bolt, crossing his/her arms over the chest and then collapsing again.  As you can imagine this can be quite upsetting and possibly frightening experience to those present at the time.  The explanation to this phenomenon is long and protracted so, I will spare you the agony; just take it from me, the Lazarus Reflex is something that truly happens to some dead people.

You can see where I am going with this little story.  I am absolutely clear in my mind that I never heard the term of Lazarus Reflex.  My experience of sitting up in bed and making the same gesture as those who pass away is weird, to say the least.  The question on my mind now is this: Had I actually died on 4th September 2018 for a short period of time until the medical staff intervened?  If so, did I demonstrate the Lazarus Reflex phenomenon?

I shall never know!