Rena P's NDE

Experience description: 

In spring 1975, I was attending my Junior high-school year in Greece at a public school. At that time High-School education was not co-ed in my country, so this was a high-school for females only. That sunny day we were taken for a walk to the parks surrounding the sea promenade of our city. Thessaloniki is built around the horseshoe of Thermaikos Gulf and that's the most favorite place to spend time on a sunny day. My best friend and school mate had got secretly married that summer (she'd be expelled if teachers were to find out) so we considered ourselves a couple of "sophisticated" teenagers, too sophisticated to spend time in the park by the sea. She called her young husband to pick us up with his car and drive us to a cafeteria till the end of the school excursion, but things didn't work out that well for both of us! 

Five minutes after he picked us up, less than a mile down the Bay Boulevard we were caught in a severe accident. A taxi coming out one of the side exits lost control and hit us with high speed right in the middle of our car side. I was sitting at the back, right behind the driver.  Last thing I recall was shouting out "Watch Out!" while the taxi was coming right on us and then..

I found myself speeding fast up in the air inside a tunnel, light as a feather. A tunnel full of holes all around that bright light beams were coming through. I could hear the sweet sound of hundreds of chimes in the wind and I've never felt happier or more ecstatic in my whole life while swirling around and around. I was listening to the chimes and enjoying the gorgeous feeling not being able to get enough of it. This place was so gorgeous that I couldn't get enough of it and I just had to see it all! I looked up and I saw the end of the tunnel far away..a very bright, beautiful light that was not hurting my eyes at all. A destination I felt eager to reach.

Yet something inside me forced me to look downwards too. I'm not certain if it was a voice or curiosity - yet I knew that I had to return.

I realized I was hundreds of meters above the air as what caught my eye was the roof of the highest and most expensive hotel in that area, built by the sea. I recall watching the summer bar stationed up there and the tables with yellow-white striped sun umbrellas all around. That hotel was at our starting point where we had got into the car! Immediately I came to realization that I had no body but only eyes. The tunnel disappeared, the swirling stopped and now I was floating in slow motion loosing slowly but steadily height, drifted down the Boulevard area by the wind, closing more and more the accident point.

The incredible happiness feeling was faded out..now I was just a curious and cool observer of what I was seeing in this unexpected trip on the air.  Reaching the accident I was only a couple of meters above in the air. I saw our car almost twisted around an electricity pole at the side of the street.  A white Mercedes was parked next to it and my best friend, safe and sound outside the car -yet in panic- was asking the men who came out of it to help her get the rest of us out. The driver's seat wouldn't open, yet they knew her husband was alive as he was moaning of pain - his ribs were broken.

One of them was tall with a white shirt while the other stockier with a green sweatshirt and a small bald at the back of his head. I could tell as my view of them was straight from above and I couldn't see their faces.  They debated over the fact that he'd be safer with the ambulance that was on its way so they opened the back door to help the other passenger. There was my body, lying on the back seat unconscious. I was completely aware of that body belonging to me yet..no feelings, no emotion, no compassion at all..just a cool spectator hovering at the time at one meter above the scene, slightly sideways.

The men grabbed my body by one feet each and slowly pulled me out of the back seat. I heard my best friend asking if I was alive - the man in the white shirt reassured her I was still breathing and that they would take me to the closest hospital. She helped them to put me in the back seat of the Mercedes and all that time I was getting lower and lower myself.. By the time the Mercedes took off I felt I'm passing through its roof towards the interior, closer to my body..

Next thing I recall is myself waking up on a wheelchair with a nurse by my side, pushing me down the hospital corridor towards the emergency room.

Was the kind of experience difficult to express in words? Uncertain,     The only part of my experience that I could never express accurately with words was the feeling of complete indifference towards my body although I was aware of the fact that it belonged to me. All emotional ties were completely cut off - something impossible to experience at a normal condition. That feeling was so odd afterwards although at the time I was not at all puzzled by it..we see a stranger hurt and we feel pity for him, watching your own body hurt and yet feeling absolutely nothing as this being the most normal thing in the world..well, it's not at all easy to describe!

At the time of this experience, was there an associated life threatening event?          Yes

t what time during the experience were you at your highest level of consciousness and alertness?     At all time but mostly when I looked downwards in the tunnel..that's when I realized what was happening to me.

How did your highest level of consciousness and alertness during the experience compare to your normal every day consciousness and alertness?    Normal consciousness and alertness

Did your vision differ in any way from your normal, everyday vision (in any aspect, such as clarity, field of vision, colors, brightness, depth perception degree of solidness/transparency of objects, etc.)?  Yes     My eyes were not at all hurt by the extreme brightness of the light inside the tunnel and when I went through the roof of the Mercedes I felt it like Jell-O instead of metal

Did your hearing differ in any way from your normal, everyday hearing (in any aspect, such as clarity, ability to recognize source of sound, pitch, loudness, etc.)?
            Uncertain      The clarity of those chimes I can still recall after all those years. It was the most soothing sound I've ever heard and despite the distance I had on the air when I reached the accident area, I could hear the voices underneath loud and clear!

Did you experience a separation of your consciousness from your body?     Yes

What emotions did you feel during the experience?            Incredible happiness, ecstasy, peace..a unique feeling that can't be described with words. Other than that no other emotion at all.

Did you pass into or through a tunnel or enclosure?          Yes     See at #3

Did you see a light?           Yes     See at #3

Did you meet or see any other beings?           Uncertain      Up to this day I can't recall if after looking downwards the decision to return was completely mine or forced to me by an inside voice that didn't belong to myself

Did you experience a review of past events in your life?    No       I learnt with certainty that we DO have a soul. A soul that's capable to exist outside our body in a world much better than our own. This realization has marked my life ever since. I'm not afraid to die, but most important.. my entire attitude and behavor towards life and other human beings has changed to the better.

Did you observe or hear anything regarding people or events during your experience that could be verified later?          Yes     A month later when I came out of the hospital I visited the hotel roof I had observed from above. It was exactly as I had seen it during my experience, summer bar and tables with  white-yellow striped umbrellas all around. I had never set foot not even to the lobby of that hotel ever before.

My best friend - in deep puzzlement I admit - verified that my description of the people and car who brought me to the hospital was accurate.

Have you shared this experience with others?         Yes     I told my father about my experience the very next day in the hospital. We were very close and I knew he was always a man of open mind. He heard me skeptically but I could sense he believed me. It was him who took me to the hotel roof a month later to verify that what I had seen was real. We talked about it lots & lots of times in the years after, last time a few months before he passed away - seven years ago. He was eager to visit that unlimited happiness I had described and get free of his illness. My own experience had comforted his own departure and helped me to accept his loss with calmness although we were always very close.

I've shared my experience years later with a few of my friends and relatives too but their reactions varied. Others wanted to believe me, others laughed, a couple asked me again to tell them my story over and over again.

Did you have any knowledge of near death experience (NDE) prior to your experience?    No       I was too young at the time.