I've Had 2 Near-Death Experiences. Here's What I Saw When I Died.

<div><img src="https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/6468e5042100003c00891e7e.jpg?ops=scalefit_630_noupscale" alt="The author and her husband, Bruce, in Hanover, New Hampshire, in 1984, just a few months before their son was born and she experienced her first near-death experience." data-caption="The author and her husband, Bruce, in Hanover, New Hampshire, in 1984, just a few months before their son was born and she experienced her first near-death experience." data-credit-link-back="" data-credit="Courtesy of Deborah Prum" />The author and her husband, Bruce, in Hanover, New Hampshire, in 1984, just a few months before their son was born and she experienced her first near-death experience.</div><div class="content-list-component text"><p>As I stared at a Halloween-like picture of my own skull, including gaping eye and nose sockets, I shivered, shocked by the no-nonsense view of what lay beneath my skin.</p><p>A dental technician convinced me to get a panoramic X-ray that included my whole head. She took the X-ray, then kept the image displayed above me when she left the room. The panoramic aspect of the shot had distorted my mouth into a wide, toothy grin. I felt as if this future iteration of me carried a message: “Hello dearie, this is where you are headed.”</p><p>Squirming in the dentist’s chair, I thought about the other times I’d come face to face with my own mortality. I’ve had two near-death experiences (NDEs), although I wouldn’t have known to categorize them that way when each happened. The occurrences had distinctly different features, but years later, when I read books that summarized information on thousands of NDEs, I noticed they described events like those I’d gone through.</p><p>My first NDE happened just after I went into early labor with my oldest child. I wound up at the hospital with stroke-level blood pressure, low plate