At 14, Through the Golden Gates to Meet the Grandfather He Never Knew

Medical Details

In 1981, at age 14, he was given nitrous oxide (laughing gas) for a cavity at the dentist. When the dentist had it turned up, he says he had an allergic reaction to the nitrous oxide that stopped his breathing. He recalls returning to his body through the ceiling of a hospital.

The Experience

In 1981, when he was fourteen, a routine dental visit changed his life. His mother sat nearby as the dentist turned up the laughing gas. About thirty seconds later, he says, he began to float up toward the ceiling. Looking down at the dentist, the assistant and his mother, he called out, "Hello, can you hear me?" but no one answered.

He was pulled through the ceiling and up into the sky, into what he describes as a portal or vortex. It was very dark and winding, and he moved at a speed he cannot describe. Where it slowed, he heard soothing melodies. At the end, a tremendous, beautiful light opened into a sky more perfect than anything here, bright with love. To his right stood enormous golden gates.

He drifted through immense, perfect fields of trees, leaves, roses and flowers, feeling connected to everything, with no negative thought anywhere. He says it felt like home, and he calls it heaven. An angelic being with long blonde hair, crystal blue eyes and no wings came toward him and guided him, not by touch but by vibration, into a garden he describes as second to none. He could feel her thoughts and her love.

She brought him to a park bench where two elderly people sat. They turned, and he saw his grandparents. His grandmother had died earlier that year. His grandfather had died before he was born, yet there he was, glowing and looking as if he were in his sixties. "Hello, Sonny," his grandfather said, and he felt the joy of finally meeting him. But his grandmother was not smiling. She pointed and said, "Go back now."

He was pulled backward into the tunnel, not wanting to leave. Then everything stopped: no melodies, nothing. He describes this as the most frightening part, feeling alone and afraid that he would never be found. Through his thoughts, he pulled himself back toward the light, and then was drawn swiftly back down through the sky and the ceiling of a hospital, slipping into his body like a hand into a glove. He woke breathing heavily.

When he told his mother he had been in heaven, it was hard for anyone to understand; there was no internet and few people talked about such things. He says he didn't believe in it before. He did not see God as a figure, he explains, because the light he was in was God: the creator, the love, the essence of everything.

How It Changed Their Life

Now 54, he calls himself a messenger and shares his experience to comfort grieving families, telling them he believes they will see their loved ones again. He describes people on the other side in their perfect form, without missing limbs, blindness or disease.