One of life's greatest questions is what happens to us after we die?
Is death the end or a new beginning?
Welcome to the Round Trip Death podcast.
In this show, we listen to firsthand accounts of people who have gone beyond the veil and
return to talk about it.
Okay, everybody, welcome to Round Trip Death and I'd like to welcome our special guest
today, Jay Martin from Columbus, Ohio.
Jay, good morning.
Good morning.
Thank you for having me.
I'm very, very happy.
I appreciate this.
You are very welcome and to our listeners, I should say good afternoon, good evening,
whatever time of day it happens to be that they're listening.
We're so glad everybody is tuning in and we're glad to have you here, Jay.
Thank you.
Thank you again.
Hey, Jay, tell us a little bit about you.
Well, I am 46 years young.
I just turned 46 on the 16th of February.
I have five children.
Four of my children are adults and I have a three year old, so that was kind of a shock
to us.
You know, it's 19 years later, you know.
That's an awesome shock though.
That's okay.
Yes, it is.
She's beautiful.
I have a border raised on the South Side of Chicago in Inglewood.
My parents are very loving, very loving.
You know, grew up in like, I want to say mixed emotions type environment, you know, where
there's a lot of love in the home, but on the outside of the home, there's a lot of
like, we'll say, crime, violence, you know, somewhat, you know, but with this border family
made it through it, you know.
My dad was, I grew up in the 80s, of course, so more than 77, grew up in the 80s.
My dad was a drug dealer, a band that was pretty common for people around that time
on the South Side.
I was privy to a lot of shootouts, fights, drug deals, police raids, hall raids.
When you say privy to, is that sort of a sarcastic way of dealing with really tough things like
that?
Yeah.
Yeah, you know, it was, you know, when I was young, it didn't really, I mean, it didn't
really bother me because I was a kid, you know, you know, playing around with my siblings
and everything.
Even the police raids, when they raided the home, it didn't bother me.
As a kid, you're scared for a certain period of time, but after a while, you just kind
of get used to it.
Some people are like, well, do you get used to that?
It just is what it is, you know.
We were pretty much, you know, lived a life of, even though that was going on, we were
still able to get some of the things that we wanted as a kid.
And I was pretty spoiled, you know, I didn't go without.
But my mom, she wanted different from us, so she was about to move us to the projects.
If you heard the projects in Chicago, they are pretty bad.
They pretty much tore them down now, but they were pretty bad.
And my grandmother, my mom's mom, she didn't want us to move to the projects, so she purchased
a home about several blocks from where we were.
So we moved there, had different environment, a little bit different.
I had to adjust to my mom's side of the family now at that time, you know, which was, they
were religious fun, not like my other family, it was fun too.
But I got to see both worlds in that, you know, in that switch.
I attended John P. Allgaard Elementary School, South Side of Chicago, went to Harper High,
had my friends, two of my friends to this day, we started dancing.
We were, I want to say professional dancers.
We did what you consider hip hop in house, dancing.
We did many, you know, concerts, opening up for rap artists, a couple of R&B artists,
one of them was Usher, and we opened up for him when we first started.
We were contestants on the Apollo Theater at Arlington York twice.
We didn't win, but it was one experience.
Yeah, it's a big accomplishment just to get there.
Do you ever get back to that old neighborhood in the South Side of Chicago?
Oh yeah, often.
Home is where the heart is, you know, so even though I've been here in Columbus since, I
think it was in 2021, I mean 2001, I always go back home pretty often to see my family
and my friends.
They're still there, you know, they didn't break.
Is the neighborhood in better shape now?
Safer?
No, that really is.
It almost became like a ghost town.
Because you know, unfortunately a lot of people passed away, moved away, violence is, I don't
want to say it's crazy, but for some reason, blessed reason, we haven't had to have any
problems with it, you know, but my mom said, you know, my grandmother said, she won't leave
anyway.
She's one of those people where she's like, I've been here 30, 40 something years, not
going anywhere, no matter what you tell her, you know, and my mom, she doesn't want to
move too far from my grandmother.
Yeah, I understand.
So you had a heart attack at a young age.
How old were you and what was going on in your life then?
I was 39 years young, 39.
Prior to when I first, well, when I moved in 2001, I had three children and two years
later I had another on the way.
I started having issues with the mother of my children separated, still having paternal
issues.
So I started with the last stress and depression.
And then the following year, what I'm going with this is that it all built up to my medical
condition progress to be having that heart attack.
More from all the stress of all those things going on.
Because you look like a healthy guy.
Oh, well, it was, yeah, it was a combination.
You know, I always say to people that it's best to talk to someone if you're going through
something or find a way to vent or let it out because it will catch up with you.
And I did, I had, let's say maybe 2001, 2002, my grandmother passed away.
And then in 2003, the good part was we had our last son, but I lost my cousin to murder
on my grandmother's lawn.
And I didn't get degrees from my grandmother before, my grandmother who passed the year
before.
So I was still in that process of dealing with relationship issues.
And then trying to work and then living in a different state, you know, from what I'm
used to in different environments.
Started working for Coca-Cola.
And then I found out at a routine checkup that I had lupus since 2005.
I didn't know much about it.
Found out the hard way.
It's one of the things that come with it.
And then I didn't deal with it, you know, that news and all the trauma that was still
going on and then more issues.
Then we had like, it seemed like a death every year in the family.
There was a death, you know, if it wasn't from a natural cause, it was cancer, murder
or unexpected.
It was always a death, you know, in the family.
And then I want to say 2011, I got 2010 severe depression.
Then to the following year, severe anxiety.
I did 2013, I was diagnosed with pulmonary embolism.
I had a blood clot.
So again, while all this was going on, there was no time for mourning, you know, no time
for mourning because it was, you know, take care of your family, take care of things,
take care of that.
Health is there, but you still got to work, take care of this.
And I just was moving like a workhorse, you know.
And then I want to say 2015, I had to bury my uncle.
You know, he passed away.
He was actually killed in my grandmother's home by my little brother.
He was now incarcerated, they don't call liquor spirits for nothing.
I think, you know, and he was intoxicated and those spirits got to a man, killing my
uncle.
So we had to bury him in 2015.
That same year I found out that once was one pulmonary embolism, blood clot, but when it
turned to two, it turned to three blood clots in my lung.
Didn't know how they get that gap there.
I started adding more issues, more health issues.
I decided to, a couple years prior, I started meditating because it was like too much, you
know, too much going on.
So up until my incident, I was just meditating hard, you know, praying hard, meditating.
And that's what kept me at least grounded why everything was going on around me, you
know.
I said it wasn't, it always seemed like there was no time for mourning.
But I was working for Coca Cola and on an evening of August 17th, I came in our house
to work in the Eden share.
I mean, afternoons shift, I came home that evening, I called my buddy, my mom, and then
I was in the kitchen when I was talking to her.
And the next thing you know, I find myself waking up in the hospital about a week later,
you know.
I had no idea what happened.
The last thing I remember was standing in that kitchen, you know.
As I'm sitting there in his bed, the hospital bed with tubes and everything hooked up to
me, I look over.
And it's my family and the doctor there.
With my family, it was like this, it was almost like a glow around them, you know, but I recognized
that glow because of where I was just what I was just experiencing.
But the doctors was like, Jay, Jay, do you know where you are?
Do you know where you are?
How you got here?
He said you had an heart attack.
He said you died.
You left us.
You left us for a whole more day.
And I'm still thought of it, so I'm not paying attention to anything that's going on.
You know, I'm just, I'm just being, you know, but it was, it was, I want to say it's a real
moment and the fact was I didn't even know that.
I did not know I had passed away.
I thought I was sleeping.
Okay.
I got, I hate to interrupt, but you just mentioned you were gone for a whole day.
Please explain.
What does that mean?
Well, what had happened was when I had the heart attack, my, I guess, cause I went in
like the, apparently I drove my, what they say it was I drove myself to the hospital.
I parked my car perfectly.
As soon as I walked through the murder scene, I immediately collapsed and went into cardiac
arrest.
Some cold blue was called, they came about, they had to resuscitate me.
They got me back and then get me stabilized and then I coded again.
They put a stent in my heart.
Then I was coding again and they stabilized me.
They flew me to the nearest hospital, trauma hospital, which is called Riverside.
So when I got there, I was coding again and it was still working on me.
All my mom, my family is Chicago and said, someone needs to get up here because he's
not looking.
We don't know.
We, we've been working on for about 45 minutes and my mom responded like, you've been working
on my baby for 45 minutes and just calling me.
You do tell.
Well, they've been busy.
Come on.
Exactly.
They said, they said, you're sorry, but we've been working with, we've been working on it
and what he's fighting.
You see him trying to open his eyes over fighting with them.
So they said, hurry up and get up here because we don't know because he's not looking good.
So while he was working on me, I called it the last time and they called my mom about
hours, about an hour later or something like that while they was on their way up to up
here.
And they say, we're sorry, he's gone.
And my mom didn't believe it, you know, so they still proceeded to make their way up
here.
My children was already here because they can came up prior and they were at their mom
and they got the call from the doctor instead.
I had passed away.
So they came up to the hospital, everybody's at the hospital and they were waiting on my
mom to get there so they can say the final goodbyes, you know, before they, you know,
start wrapping up everything.
So my mom got there.
They don't need me.
I was there once early and she got off the elevator and she said, okay, where's my baby?
And the mother of my children was like, he's been gone all day.
He's been gone the entire day.
Gone.
And she was like, no, where she responded and she think she responded, you know, she
hit the floor, you know.
So they went in a room, I still had machines around me and everything and my daughter was
18.
She had to make the choice so they can officially call it, you know, start the paperwork and
everything.
My job was already notified of my passing.
They sent the condolences letter to my family saying, we're notified about the passing of
your loved one.
I still have that condolences letter and my daughter, they said, okay, you see, you know,
now it's time.
My daughter said, no, he's still in there.
And the doctors and my mom was like, no, he's gone.
I'm sorry, he's been deceased the entire day.
She said, no, no, he's still in there.
Just wait.
So they waited even though my vitals and everything's gone, my brain, my organs shut down.
Were you on life support machines at this time or they had just given up and unplugged
everything?
The life support machine that they had was basically a machine that was, it wasn't supporting
my life because my life and their organs and everything was gone.
But I guess before, you know, I don't know if you've seen it like in the hospital sometimes,
it's like when somebody's gone already after somebody said they advised me to officially
disconnect.
But I think that's what that was what they were waiting.
They went home, my family went to my house, started cleaning out the house and everything,
making a worry plans and everything that evening.
The next morning, the hospital called him and said, believe this, we found a faint pulse.
You know, so they're like, wait, what?
Wait, what?
That's almost like a bad joke.
Right, exactly.
You don't so and then I get there with, you know, social media posts.
I still have that post from everybody.
Everyone that I knew saying that I had passed away, my cousin let everybody pass away the
day before and everything.
So it was everyone, like I said, my job and everything.
So when they got rushed back up there, the doctors was like, yeah, even though we found
the same pulse, you only have like a 20 something chance, percent chance of survival.
And they said, if we do, we don't know what his chance of life, his quality of life is
with everything was even dead.
You know, his brain, all that shit now.
So they said, it doesn't matter, keep it morning, keep working.
So they put me on a machine called an ECMO machine to pump blood through my body since
my heart, even though it got that faint pulse back, it still wasn't strong enough to pump
blood.
So the ECMO machine pumped the blood.
My body was swelling.
I still have cracks all over my body, you know, from, you know, the trauma and everything.
So they put me in a medically induced coma while in that medically induced coma, I had
26 strokes and it was, it, they were everywhere in my brain, you know, to this day, I still
have some lasting damage from it.
So but they yet they still waited, they waited.
I came back.
I had to do countless therapies, you know, to remember how to walk, talk and everything.
But I was in a good place.
It was the best I ever felt in my life.
This may sound morbid, but I say it was the best sleep I ever had in my life.
Pretty deep sleep, it sounds like.
Pretty deep sleep.
And you know, like I said, I didn't know that I was deceased, you know, because I thought
that maybe I was sleeping because when I was gone, I remember going, I was going down this
tunnel.
It's like an amber tunnel that was surrounding me and it was people.
It looked like people reaching out for me, but there was no malicious intent, but it
was just reaching.
I wasn't afraid or anything or emotion.
I was just going down that tunnel.
Once I got to the end of the tunnel, I found myself like it was like almost like floating
down the highway and it was like gloomy outside.
Mighty was out there and I witnessed it was like it's like a landmark here in Columbus.
I think they call it the Brewery District and I remember seeing that, you know, same
thing.
And after that, it was just like immediately straight up to space, you know, and again,
no fear, no concern, no doubt, no worry.
I just existed, you know, I just was.
So while I'm up there, like at the footstool, like in front of me, but below me, I saw the
earth and it was like energy protruding from the earth, like going in as it's going up
and circling in and out of the earth.
It was a pretty cool sight, you know.
I'll bet.
Then I looked to my left and I saw what looked like a galaxy or like a swirling of stars,
you know.
At first I described it as a wormhole, but as the years go by and started to look and
research and everything, I noticed it on Google when I was looking at images.
And I was like, that's what I saw.
And it looked like the Andromeda Galaxy.
You know, I was like, that's what I saw, you know.
And while I was there, then I heard to my right, it was like I heard someone call my
name.
I didn't know who it was from, who it was.
I just heard my name called.
So I looked to my right, didn't see anything.
Looked at the earth again, then I looked at the stars again and looked towards my name
again.
And then after that, everything went black again.
And then that's when I eventually don't know the timeframe, but I eventually awoke to like
seeing my like friends, my buddy came from Chicago, him and his wife and their kids to
come up and see me.
I just need to interject for our listeners.
If you hear any little giggling and things, that is little Hallie that's on Jay's lap.
How old is Hallie?
She is three years young.
She just heard Burry.
Happy birthday, Hallie.
Sick.
And busy.
Well, she's beautiful and she's happy to be sitting on daddy's lap this morning.
Thank you, my she wanted to be anywhere I am.
Good, okay, keep going.
She was holding my hand and I was still hooked up to the tunes and everything.
And I can just look, but she was holding my hand.
I saw my kids her tears and she said, if you can hear me, squeeze my fingers.
So I scrolls her fingers and then let's see, no, I'm out again.
So I was in and out of consciousness the whole time while I was there.
But again, I felt amazing.
I had no fear, no doubt, no anger.
I was just in a great place.
Then it kind of hit me out to what some of the things that happened when I was lying
in my bed and the therapist came in and said, okay, it's time to start the therapy.
What?
So I proceeded to try to get up out the bed and move my legs around and almost felt like
I could try it.
I almost stood up and almost fell.
So I didn't get too far from the bed.
So I fell back on the bed.
It was like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
And I come to find out that I couldn't walk.
How many days after going into the hospital is this now?
This, my therapy, I started my therapy probably like, I want to say a month after the hospital.
So you're dead for a day and then you're in and out of consciousness while you're in a
medically induced coma, then in and out of consciousness for a while.
Finally, okay, month has gone by time to get up.
Sounds easy, right?
Right.
Yeah, it sounds easy.
After all those strokes, did you have some paralysis?
Yeah, at least like one of them was my legs.
I couldn't speak.
So I had to learn how to speak again.
I had to learn how to write again because it was like I couldn't even hold a pen.
They tried different ways for me to try to communicate with, I remember one time they
brought in like this alphabet magnetic board with alphabets to see if I could try to spell
it out.
I couldn't even move those things, right?
It was frustrating because it was like I knew what I wanted to say but couldn't say it.
Yeah, yeah, I got it.
Let's go back to this near death experience for a minute.
You saw the earth, you saw galaxies, swirling stars.
Anything else that you saw or felt or can recall?
Any other detail?
I don't recall seeing anything else.
I can say I do.
Only thing that I know for certain is that I knew I existed.
I didn't notice to have any form, anybody.
I was like one with the universe, so I was one with everything.
It was almost like hard to explain, I just knew I was.
If something's in the Bible, we're saving God to a good count.
When Abraham asked what his name is, he said, I am.
I am what I will to be.
That's what I was.
Yeah, that's what that reminded me of.
You just realized that you were, you are.
Yes, yes.
And I took that amazing feeling with me because when I told you that I saw this aura, this
light over my family, I recognized that to be love.
And that's how I knew that love wasn't a word, it was an actual entity.
Each of you is actually me.
Because even after some of the first words that I said, it was someone actually being
with love, you know, this is as if that was the prominent force that was working for me,
just tell people about love, the importance of love, that love exists not as a word, but
as an entity in this.
You know, so it was sometimes I wonder, man, if I can get that feeling back.
I didn't know that relaxing, calm feeling, it wasn't until I started getting more interested
to this world, you know, in the acclimatization, television and all this stuff, when I started
feeling literally everything, the emotions, the hurt, the pain that people feel, it's
like an amplicite, you know, and I felt it literally hurt.
You know, it was very sad, you know, I was literally reborn after that moment, literally,
so much as when I first left the hospital, when I looked outside, it's like I had, I
was looking at everything like I had never seen before, you know, the bus, the clouds,
the trees, I was like, shocked and awed looking at it like, wow, what is this, you know, I
had to get readjusted.
I did, I literally had to get readjusted.
Yeah.
So emotionally, was that a really difficult thing?
Or was that, yay, I'm back, so I'm so happy about it?
Or what were the emotions like?
The emotions was just, it was, I want to say it was pure calm, you know, I was at pure
bliss, you know, at calm, even though everything looked strange to me, I was at pure calm,
I was relaxed.
Like you said, the only thing, it wasn't until I started being around people more and seeing
television when I started feeling, started to feel, it's like their energies and their
emotions radiated either through television or through them physically, and I felt it,
and that's what it started to feel like uncomfortable, you know, it felt very scary.
It was like an extreme empathy.
Yeah, yeah.
And I see a therapist now and I started seeing a therapist, I had to, after all of that,
you know, and one of the things she said to me was, you can't carry everybody's emotions
or burdens and everything that you feel.
And I'm like, it's kind of hard to not do, you know, because it's like, it's a natural
thing that I feel, you know, I try to.
Balance it, but I feel you'll feel it nonetheless.
You know, you can't, someone like you can't shake it.
How is your health now and what do you do for work?
Right now my health is, it's a roller coaster because of the damage that was done to my
brain from the strokes.
I have traumatic brain injury.
A lot of the strokes was in my cerebellum.
So that control was like, like direction, balance and everything.
So I have vertigo every day, all day.
Try medication, no medication, the neurologist was like, we tried there, but he said, but
I can't promise you anything because of the extensive damage that was done to your cerebellum.
And that was true.
So the best thing I could do is learn to live with it.
I have nerve damage to where I have to take medicine for my nerves because I, it, they
like jumps, you know, my nerves like, it's more like neuropathy.
I have damage in my leg to where I had to walk with a cane.
I can't move my foot, my left foot.
So it's like a lot of damage was done to my left side.
I balance the, I balance the dizziness and so time to nausea and everything with raising
a three year old.
You know, that's a lot.
I just learned to get back, start sleeping again because for, it's been 87 years in August.
So up until a year ago, I had what they call them, can't sleep.
Insomnia, insomnia, I had insomnia where I couldn't sleep for up until a year ago.
It was, I just couldn't do it.
It's almost like my clock was just like reset and I just didn't, I couldn't do it.
And PTSD would creep in sometimes too, because if I did fall asleep or feel like I was about
to fall asleep, I would wake right back up because I was afraid that I would be afraid
that I had died yet because I died the first time I thought I was asleep.
So I wouldn't, so I was like, I don't know if I'm dying again, if I go to sleep, I don't
know if I'm dead again.
As you know, so it's like trying to figure out how to, how to do that.
And because I couldn't sleep, sometime I was nauseous every morning, you know, because
I was stayed up because I, you know, I couldn't sleep.
And I'm just starting to get back to sleep now, but there's still the other thing, like
I said, things that I mentioned about the neuropathy and then the lupus likes to kick
in, you know, where sometimes lethargic and tired, you know, then I have my headaches,
you know, but I still keep placing through that short term memory.
And even with all these things, I still stay optimistic.
You know, I don't let it keep me down.
I can tell.
I think you're doing great.
Your speech is really good.
I haven't seen any memory issues yet.
It made, I tried to, it's a thing called I have disabilities.
I tried to program to see if I could at least try to go back to work.
And I went the thing I couldn't because of my reliability.
I can't look at like words, read anything.
Like if I'm reading a book after the first, after the second sentence and I get to the
third sentence, I don't forget what I read, you know, and then the computer sometimes
looking at that screen going back and forth.
If I get dizzy, you know, because of the vertigo, sometimes I can't drive because the vertigo
is so bad.
So I choose to sit it out.
So I've just been trying to find a way to, I want to say goodbye.
You know, my wife is a big help.
My family is a big help, but I've had a job since I was 15, you know, and I'm used to
being that provider.
So it's like, I've been constantly trying to find a way where I can do more providing
to my wife when I have to work as much, you know, it's, I guess that's the main part of
me, you know, it's like, I understand you work getting, you know, you help me because
I, you know, I still have, I have social security helps me, but it's like, I wanted more, you
know, you know, like the man is like, I should be doing more.
I understand.
Has your family found a change in you personality wise?
Yes.
I noticed it as well, you know, they say that I'm not as, I want to say, too much humor
as I usually get, you know, they say I'm more laid back or I've always been a laid back
guy, but more laid back to where I'm almost like point of seclusion.
I don't see things the same way to everybody else.
When they say like my wife instance, I got to add this is that me and my wife, we had
just started dating.
I was like, my answer's been bad.
So I was like, what a way to start dating somebody and go once just to have them die
in the middle of a date bill, you know, and she spayed me, you know, she's at the hospital
every day.
He was at the hospital every day.
In fact, when I, my kids got the news, she was just coming in for work, which is the
same hospital where I'm saying she was just coming in and working.
My youngest son called her and said, dad, die.
So she rushed right back out up there and she was at my hospital bed every day by my
side.
You know, she never left.
She made sure since she worked at the hospital, she made sure that all my meds was okay, that
they wasn't putting up some bad blood, but I had to try a fusion as well.
You know, she was on it, you know, and one day she was by my bed, still hooked up to
the tubes and everything.
I got the trachea and couldn't talk and she was holding my hand and I looked over at her,
looked up at her looking at, and I looked back and my eyes started welling up.
And I looked back at her and I looked up at her and I bowed with my bowels.
I said, would you marry me?
Yeah.
And she started tearing up.
Now does that count?
You may have been under the influence of something there in the hospital.
Oh, I was, I was saying, you know, it's funny is that my kid's mom and her mother, my kid's
mom mother, they were all wondering, it was like, did you do that out of obligation because
she was there and you think he was obligated?
I said, no, I was where I was.
I was the, had the clearest mind ever.
I wasn't thinking about anything or anyone.
Every problem that I had for then, I didn't think about it.
Only thing that I was thinking about was now at that moment.
And I had a divine energy being with me that was guiding everything, even those words.
So when I said that, I said, that was real.
That was true.
That was definite.
And she noticed she, even though she said yes, she decided to take care of me.
So I came and stayed with her in her apartment, her step dad, and she took care of me.
You know, she got me to my doctor's appointments, my therapies.
And she, at some point in time, she noticed a difference in me because she said that I
wasn't as outgoing, so to speak, as I was, I was different.
Even to a point where she asked me if I was in love with her years ago, you know, she
asked me, she said, are you still in love, are you going to love with me?
And I had to explain to her, I said, baby, the way I see things now, people's interpretation
of being in love is not a real thing.
I said people sometimes are fact-explained, but somebody, some people love to the point
where they love you just for who you are.
They can love you romantically.
They can love you in all aspects.
Actually, I love you in all aspects, including romantically.
So I can't say that I'm in love with you, that makes you, hopefully that clears it up
for you.
It's not an in love with you thing.
I love all of you.
So even though she probably accepted that, she still noticed that there was still a difference.
And I noticed it well too, because I've had a hard time trying to figure out who I was,
because everybody would say, you used to be this, you was that, you was this.
And I'm like, who is this person that you guys talking about?
Because I felt different.
I felt like I was walking in between two worlds, one foot in the spiritual world, one foot
in the physical world.
And I was new.
And for years, I was combating myself literally to the point to where I would come in tears,
because it's like, how come I can't remember who this person is they could talk about?
How come I can't remember it?
And it hurt me for a while.
One day I got in the shower and I just started bawling, just crying profusely.
She came in there to see what's going on.
You know, I told her that I just, it just hit me what happened to me.
I think that the ramifications, just the idea of everything that happened to me and how
you all felt about what happened to me and what's happening to me, it hit me all at the
same time to where I just couldn't control it.
And to this day, I'm doing better with it.
I must honestly say I'm doing better with it, but there is still acknowledgement that
I walk with one foot in the spiritual world, one foot in the physical world.
And I can still feel everything and everyone around me.
I just have better habit on it than I did when it first happened.
That makes sense.
Yes.
Let's finish up.
I would like you to give our listeners a message of hope.
You've learned a lot.
You have come a long ways.
Some people are still struggling with a lot of really difficult things.
What do you have to say to them?
Well, one thing I learned from not just growing up on the South side of Chicago, the environment
I did and everything that I've been through here is that even though times are hard and
it may seem like there's no way out and it may seem heavy and sometimes it may groove
spiritually as well, those things that you're going through are preparing to give you strength
to have the next thing that's coming your way.
And best believe there's going to always be something that comes your way.
And how you handle what you're going through now is going to determine how well you handle
the next thing that comes your way.
And you can make it through.
You can make it.
Anything is possible.
If I, the doctors and all couldn't believe it, even one of the doctors had to say he
wanted to take a picture with me because he couldn't believe it, you know, if the doctors
can see something that the medical license and expertise couldn't explain and yet now
they believe something, that should show you that there is a higher power out there that
will protect that guide you and that will help you make it through all these difficult
times that are going through.
And you can make it.
And just because it seems like you're not making it because you may get a little weary
or you may get crazy sick, you can still pull through.
This is only temporary.
And know that regardless of what happened, that there is no death.
There is no such thing as death.
You only get that energy, that spirit that is within you.
It just transmits to another level.
I do have one more question about that.
You mentioned that you've had insomnia because of fear of dying at night.
But in all reality, since you've seen the other side, are you afraid of death?
In other words, what's on the other side?
No, I'm not.
I think what it was for me was that I felt like, and it's the same with a lot of people,
a lot of people fear death not because someone says someone don't admit it, not because they
don't know what to expect on the other side.
It's because of what they have here.
They don't want to let go.
Either it's a family member or somewhere that they had to go or do and they feel like they
have to accomplish something.
So that was my thing, that I didn't want to go back to sleep, so to speak, because I felt
like I'm bad for a reason and I have something to do.
I don't know what it is and I have some things here to do and I have a family so much.
I'm just not ready to go back just yet.
I'm not afraid.
I just feel like there's still something that I have to do.
Now when elders and people get to that age and they live like 100 years and stuff like
that and they say they're tired, they're actually tired and they're not afraid because they
live their life and they let go of everything and it's okay to do that now because they
experienced all the love of all the emotions, all the good times, the bad times, trials,
triumphs, they experienced all that.
So now, yeah, they want to rest.
They want that body to rest and they want to move on to that other place where they
still exist, but they won't die, but they still exist.
It still feels good to know that you still exist.
So whatever you do, know that you make it through and that regardless of what happens,
you still, but since there's nothing to be afraid of whatsoever.
Good summary.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate having you on the show today.
I appreciate you having me.
I'm very humble, very grateful.
I start to believe one of the things that I have left me to do is to share my story
and to share this message of hope and inspiration to inspire people to love, to find love, to
let love in their life and experience it and to help those who are about to meet their
trans and should know that there's nothing to be afraid of and that they won't die.
The real being won't die.
I think that is part of why I'm still here.
Beautifully said.
Thank you.
If you have had a round trip death experience, we would love to hear about it.
Send an email to eric at roundtripdeath.com.
And lastly, if you have found this program uplifting, if it's given you just a little
more hope in the future, share it with a friend, hit that follow button and take a few seconds
to write us a review.
Until next time, I wish you everything good that you're looking for in this life and
the next.