A Profusion of Angels

My wife’s Aunt Carol is a registered nurse with many years of experience, so she watched with great professional interest as the resuscitation team worked frantically to revive the patient after her heart suddenly arrested…not just once but three times.

The patient had been in conscious sedation in the cardiac cath-lab while undergoing stent replacement when she suddenly arrested, an event all too common in cath labs. Aunt Carol and others waited and watched silently, while code blue echoed through the halls. Suddenly the room was filled with specialized personnel, and like a choreographed dance team, they swarmed over the patient.

Aunt Carol was aware of what she later described as a profusion of angels, and a feeling of great peace and joy. You see, my Aunt Carol was not just an observer…she was also the patient.

Aunt Carol’s daughter, Carol Sue, also an RN, explained to my wife Carolyn (another RN…the family is very fond of the name Carol and its variations, and is also big on registered nurses) and me that she was in the waiting room and was unaware of her mother’s dire emergency. She learned all about it later, and she learned most of it from her mother, who calmly watched the whole thing with her protective profusion of angels.

Now I’ve heard of near-death experiences before, but this one was related first hand to me by someone who is simply incapable of telling a lie. In fact, she later told the doctor exactly what went on and that she had died three times. He blinked, because she was unconscious and could not have known all those facts. But somehow, she did know, and so he confirmed her account.

We were visiting her in a rehabilitation facility, where she was learning to function again. Aunt Carol is a gorgeous redhead, somewhere in her 80’s, and I have always adored her and Uncle Johnny. They live on the family ranch in south-central Arizona, and we love to visit, eat her great Mexican food and hear Uncle Johnny play the guitar and serenade us.

When her daughter Carol Sue told us in the rehab center that she did not witness the efforts to save her mother’s life, Aunt Carol quietly spoke up and said, “I saw it all.”

Her account of what she saw, the calm, serene peace she felt as she watched the team fight to save her life, and the love radiating from the ‘profusion’ of angels surrounding her, have all had a profound effect on me. Suddenly, the sweet truth of a promised everlasting life after death has been confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt by a very dear aunt whom I would trust with my life.

And with my soul.

By the way, angels don’t have wings. They don’t wear clothes either, yet they are not naked. And they are round. Sort of.

Aunt Carol can explain.