Terminal lucidity is a phenomenon in which some very sick person believed to be very close to death or with a very damaged brain or demented mind suddenly shows a brief period of intellectual clarity before dying from his disease. This often can occur after a long period of stupor or mental incapacity.
In a previous post I included an image of a 1936 article mentioning cases of terminal lucidity. I should quote the entire text, particularly for any readers reading this blog in a non-English version (as you can do using the Translate widget at the top right of this blog). Here is the text of that article, found on page 603 of the September 17, 1936 edition of the journal Light, which you can read here.
"In one of his lectures last year to the L.S.A., the Rev.
Cruwys Sharland related how a one-time pupil of his,
after suffering for many years from disintegration of
the brain, when approaching his death, suddenly
recovered complete mental control and gave those
present a long circumstantial account of a walking tour
he had undertaken when quite a boy, in company with
Mr. Sharland, then his tutor. Every detail was correct,
every fact rightly placed, as Mr. Sharland himself
testified.
Psychica quotes several analogous cases from the
German Wahres Leben. A young girl, imbecile for
eight years, one morning informed the doctor of the
asylum in which she lived that she would die the
following night—which she did—and discussed various
points with him with full mental awareness.
M. Martensen Larsen has recorded the case of an
Army doctor confined for homicidal mania, who, just
prior to his passing, recovered his sanity and wrote
several letters asking the forgiveness of those he had
attempted to injure.
M. G. W. Surya writes of a friend of his who was
summoned to the asylum in which his brother had for
years been confined with complete softening of the
brain. He found his brother perfectly normal and
anxious to make certain suggestions to him. He died
the same day, and autopsy revealed that the brain had
entirely disintegrated.
How can we account for his complete lucidity before
death ?
Similarly, the well-known Berlin anatomist, Benecke,
assured his students that Schinkel, the architect, died
in possession of all his faculties, in spite of the fact
that his cranium was subsequently proved to have been, ' so to speak, empty.' ”
We have here not just one but three different cases in which it is stated that someone with the most severe brain damage seemed to gain or have normal mental function shortly before dying. In two cases it is reported that the person acting normally or with normal cognition just before death had the most extreme disintegration or wasting of the brain, leaving basically no brain left.
At the bottom of page 79 of the book you can read using the link here, we have an account by a person who says this about her grandmother: "An hour before she passed, this old lady suddenly woke up from the stupor that she had been in for six long years." We then hear an account of the grandmother speaking well, and acting as if she saw apparitions of the dead (a common occurrence for the dying, even those without any brain problems).
On page 410 of the book Irreducible Mind we read this:
"Myers (1892b) had referred to the 'sudden revivals of memory or faculty in dying persons' (p.316)...The eminent physician Benjamin Rush...observed that 'most of mad people discover a greater or less degree of reason in the last days or hours of their lives' (p. 257). Similarly, in his classic study of hallucinations, Brierre de Boismont (1859) noted that 'at the approach of death we observed that ... the intellect, which may have been obscured or extinguished during many years, is again restored in all its integrity' (p. 236). Flournoy (1903, p. 48) mentioned that French psychiatrists had recently published cases of mentally ill persons who showed sudden improvements in their condition shortly before death. In more recent years, Osis (1961) reported two cases, 'one of severe schizophrenia and one of senility, [in which] the patients regained normal mentality shortly before death' (p. 24)."
The paper "End-of-Life Experiences and the Dying Process in a Gloucestershire Nursing Home as Reported by Nurses and Care Assistants" is one that reported dreams that seemed to foretell a death, and many other hard-to-explain phenomena. What is remarkable is the amount of hard-to-explain phenomena reported in such a small facility. Questions were asked of workers in Kingsley House, a small facility handling no more than 31 persons at a time, and reporting only about 13 deaths per year. We read of these results, coming from the ten who responded:
- "7 reported unconscious or confused residents who unexpectedly became lucid enough just before they died to interact with relatives and carers," a phenomena sometimes called "terminal lucidity."
- "6 reported dreams that help to prepare for death, and 2 reported dreams or visions that held significant meaning for the dying to help with unfinished business." The "Dreams" section of the paper on page 200 gives several examples, some involving dreams that seemed to foretell a death.
- "5 reported the dying seeing dead relatives visiting just before death, and 4 reported the dying seeing dead relatives sitting on or near the bed." This is the well-documented phenomenon called deathbed apparitions or deathbed visions, described in my eight posts here.
- "4 reported the synchronistic appearance of birds or animals around or just before the time of death."
- "4 reported a change of room temperature around the time of death," with one saying, "sometimes the room is freezing," and that "at other times it is really, really hot."
- "3 reported synchronistic events at the time of death, such as clocks stopping and bells ringing in rooms of those who had recently died." Read here for examples of the clock stopping at death phenomenon.
The year 2021 scientific paper "Spontaneous Remission of Dementia Before Death: Results From a Study on Paradoxical Lucidity" discusses many cases of terminal lucidity. We read this:
" Detailed case reports of 124 dementia patients who experienced an episode of paradoxical lucidity were received. In more than 80% of these cases, complete remission with return of memory, orientation, and responsive verbal ability was reported by observers
of the lucid episode. The majority of patients died within hours to days after the episode..... More than 80% of the patients in this
study appeared to have experienced a full, albeit
brief, reversal of often profound cognitive impairment in advanced and end-stage dementia."
In the paper we read this: "Macleod (2009) observed 100 consecutive
deaths in a hospice in New Zealand and found
six cases of unexpected, spontaneous return of
cognitive functions and verbal ability within 48
hr before the death of the patient."
Recently there was published the paper "Terminal Lucidity in a Pediatric Oncology Clinic," which reported some similar cases of terminal lucidity. You can read the full paper here. One or more of the authors interviewed the physicians involved in the cases. Before discussing its fascinating account of terminal lucidity in a patient identified as Patient One, I should mention that the term "encephalopathic" typically refers to a severe brain pathology, most often involving a brain infection or a failure of the immune system to protect the brain from infection. In the paper we read this:
"The patient was a three-year-old Hispanic female with prolonged medical
treatment history for her diagnosis of hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH), a complex and
often life-threatening medical condition resulting from an uncontrolled and ineffective immune
response, leading to extreme inflammation in many organs/tissues. After over a year of intense
treatments, she underwent an umbilical cord blood transplant, which is the only known cure for this
condition. Unfortunately, the transplant was rejected, and while attempts were made to find
another option for a second transplant, she had a re-emergence of her HLH and was admitted to the
hospital for chemotherapy and immunotherapy. Despite some initial improvements, she developed
progressive organ damage and deterioration over the next several weeks, prompting transfer to the
Intensive Care Unit (ICU), with worsening liver and pulmonary failure. She became severely jaundiced and encephalopathic, and was no longer speaking, eating, or responding to
parents/providers. The ICU physicians were worried that she was an aspiration risk, prompting intensification of Do Not Resuscitate/Do Not Intubate (DNR/DNI) conversations with her parents. As
all the known treatments available were exhausted and her condition worsened, the focus shifted to
providing palliative care. Although initially resistant, after nearly two weeks of intense conversations
with parents (including family members and a Catholic priest) and further deterioration in their
daughter’s condition, a DNI and modified DNR status change was agreed. That evening, the patient
awoke and asked for her usual comfort items (i.e., Lion King movie, parents, toys) and food. She
showed no indication of mental impairment and regained the ability to sit up in bed and participate
in coloring and other simple age-appropriate tasks. She spoke using logical, organized full sentences,
and had multiple conversations with her parents that evening, which they and the bedside nurse
described as 'like a miracle.' During the conversations with her parents, she reviewed all the
important people in her life and prayed for them. She indicated awareness of transitioning to death
and reassured loved ones of the need not to be concerned about her. She also seemed to be
communicating with people who were not visible to others. After several hours, she asked to 'go to
bed' and returned to her comatose state. During the next 24-48 hours, she never awoke again, and
she ultimately died peacefully of cardiac arrest in her parents’ arms."
We also read in the new paper of a Patient Three:
"The patient was a 19-month-old boy who underwent a bone marrow transplant
at 16 months of age for ill-defined immune deficiency. He was recovering with typical transplant
complications until he developed fevers and progressive neurologic symptoms with loss of ability to
communicate, loss of motor function, and loss of cognition.... Prior to the lucid event, he was not responding to
healthcare providers and was giving parents only minimal response/eye contact. Three days prior to
his death, he became much more alert and interactive, in stark contrast to his steady decline of the
prior three months, which was preceded by his parents having decided they would not proceed with
further life-saving medical interventions (i.e., surgeries, intubation, etc.). He was noted to be able to
move, talk, eat, and communicate for 24-48 hours prior to a rapid decline and death. On the night
before his death, he communicated with his parents that he 'was ready to go home' and that 'he
and parents would be OK' using verbal and sign language. He talked about joining his brother who
was a still-birth, and he told his parents he was going to be fine. Subsequently, he returned to severe
mental impairment and died within 24 hours."
No such thing as terminal lucidity should occur if your brain was producing your mind. Once a mind-producing brain had deteriorated, such a deterioration would be irreversible. A brain producing a mind would no more suddenly restore itself than a book missing many of its pages would suddenly restore such pages.
Cases such as these are hints that the brain is not the source of the human mind. They are part of a very large body of evidence that minds can operate normally when brains have undergone the most severe damage. Countless other cases are discussed in my posts you can read here and here. Such cases are only some of the innumerable reasons for rejecting the dogma that the brain is the source of the human mind. When studying such cases and reasons (discussed in the most voluminous detail in the posts of this blog), we should remember: nature never told us that brains make minds. It was merely professors who told us that, jumping to conclusions that were never warranted by observations.
Postscript: In the paper here, we have an account of terminal lucidity. We read this:
"We provide biographical background information about the two principal witnesses who reported this case. It concerns the death of Anna Katharina Ehmer, a 26-year-old woman with severe mental disabilities who lived in an institution for people with mental disorders, and who had allegedly never spoken a single word during her life. Yet, she was reported to have sung dying songs for a half hour before she died."
