April 28, 2026 • 20 mins
George Noory and death educator Gail Rubin explore her efforts to give people insight into living and dying, the importance of having a will and funeral arrangements before death, and how movies like The Sixth Sense and Ghost can give us a better understanding about the dying process.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast am on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
And welcome back to Coast to Coast George Nori with you.
Death educator Gail Rubin is known as the day End
of Death. She is a death educator who brings a fresh,
sometimes humorous perspective to one of life's greatest mysteries, the
question of what happens at the end. She is a
certified thetatologist and author of multiple books on funeral planning
(00:26):
and end of life issues. Her most recent work is
called ninety eight point six Mortality Movies to See Before
you Die. Gail, I'm looking forward to this. Welcome to
the program.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Thank you, George. Great to be with you.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
How did you get involved in studying after death experiences
and the afterlife, what happens after you die?
Speaker 3 (00:49):
Well, it sort of came along with the death educator
path I took, which actually started because I got married
in two thousand and had a very creative Jewish Western
wedding and everybody had such a good time. I wanted
to write a book about creative life cycle events and
(01:12):
call it matchings, hatchings and dispatchings, and I got to
write a monthly feature in our local newspaper about weddings
and births and deaths, and it was the stories about
death and funerals that got the most reader response. So
you know, there's already plenty on creative wedding planning. We
(01:33):
didn't need more on that topic. But sixteen years ago
there wasn't much about creative funeral planning. So I focused
on funerals and became a certified phanatologist. Fanatology is the
study of death, dying, and bereavement, and actually that comes
(01:54):
from the Greek demi god Thanatose, who was the personification
of a good death. His twin brother is Hypnose, which
is sleep, which none of us are doing right now
in the middle of the night, right But so sleep
and a good death are very closely related. And in
(02:15):
the process I just started bumping into psychics and having
a few ghostly encounters through my loved ones, and it's
been very interesting.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Now you're called the Diana of death. What does that mean?
Speaker 3 (02:34):
A doyenne doien is a French term. It means a
woman who knows a lot about a particular subject, So
that would be me when it comes to funerals and
death and all these topics that a lot of people
don't want to talk about because they think it will
happen sooner rather than later. But you know, despite great
(02:57):
advances in medical care, we all still have a one
hundred percent mortality rate.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Was looking at your website and you're giving us an
option of picking the cover of your book between two choices.
Why'd you do that?
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Well, so ninety eight point six mortality movies to See
before you Die. My original cover has the Grim Reaper
eating popcorn. I love that cover, and I was talking
with a funeral homeowner about holding a mortality movie night
at one of his funeral homes, and he said, we
(03:36):
do not associate our brand with the Grim Reaper. So
I was like, okay, well, we can do a movie
Marquee kind of cover instead, so people can choose which
one they prefer. I find the people who I know
through my death education work they like the Grim Reaper cover,
(03:57):
but the Marquee one is pretty popular too.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
My first radio job, when I was twenty one years
old and Detroit, Gale was working at a radio station
that was in a converted funeral home. Oh boy, and
working late shifts and working nights sometimes and stuff like that.
You would hear the elevator where they put the bodies
in there in the old days.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
Uh huh.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Take you downstairs where they embalmed you and did all
this other stuff. It was creepy, oh, creepy dime. So
I can understand how the old funeral man doesn't want
the grim reaper.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
I actually had the opportunity to be in a funeral
home at night by myself. I was keeping a body company.
That's part of the Jewish tradition when somebody's died that
you don't leave the body alone. It's called sitting. Well,
(04:58):
you're being a showmer watcher. That originally comes from ancient
days when you had wild animals and so you'd be
protecting the body from being desecrated. But it came to
evolve to be more of a spiritual keeping of company
(05:20):
for the deceased.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Interesting take. Now you have got involved in a big
way with mortality movies. Tell me about that. How'd that happen?
Speaker 3 (05:31):
Well, my college degree is actually in radio and television
and film, and out of college, I actually worked for
c Span for five years.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Well where'd you go to school?
Speaker 3 (05:47):
The University of Maryland in College Park. Good school and
so I've always loved films, and once I got into
this death education, I recognized that movies and film clips
can really memorably teach so much better than just anything
(06:11):
I would tell somebody, and so I did get a
license to use film clips in my talks, and as
time went on, I was one of the first people
to hold the Death Cafe in the United States. That's
an opportunity for people to come together and talk about
(06:31):
what's on their minds about mortality issues. Well, that was
mostly women who would come to those events, and I thought,
what if I showed movies in my house and then
people would come and watch the movie that would be
related to mortality in some way, and then we'd talk
about it. And a lot more men would come to
(06:55):
the movie nights and stick around and have conversation about
mortality issues. And after about three of these movies, it
got too crowded in my living room and I asked
my funeral director friends with French funerals and cremations here
in Albuquerque, New Mexico, if we could go watch movies
(07:18):
in one of their chapels, and they said yes, and
it was a wonderful community building activity for the funeral home.
So we've been doing that and it's just a wonderful
way to get people to even think about talking about
their own mortality. And so the book is a compilation
(07:44):
of one hundred and forty two movies and TV shows
with discussion guides and what mortality themes they embody. And
I'm just very excited about this whole idea of helping
people plan ahead for their mortality by watching a movie
(08:06):
and then talking about it.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Would the movie What Dreams May Come with Robin Williams
be part of that?
Speaker 3 (08:14):
It is. It's in the chapter about after life fantasy
and visions. I've got different chapters about funerals and funeral directors,
medical treatment and end of life issues, grief and growth,
mortality and living fully, but the afterlife death fantasy chapter
(08:37):
has got What Dreams May Come. And that was actually
one of the films I was planning on, mentioning.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
I still can't get over the fact that he's killed himself.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Oh I know, but just the visual it did win
an Oscar for the visual effects dramatic, so that the
story and his wife and their two kids, their two
kids are killed in a tragic auto accident and then
(09:13):
like a year or so later, he's tragically killed in
another auto accident and his wife is left bereft and suicidal.
And when he dies, he winds up in this it
looks like one of his wife's paintings, and there's a
(09:35):
guide there who helps him adjust to the afterworld. And
unfortunately she dies by suicide, but she doesn't go to
the wonderful magical paintings that he's living, and she is
in her own basically personal hell, and he sets out
to find her in the afterlife and rescue her from
(09:59):
that person.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Help alos You remember in that scene where he steps
on these heads that are like in the ground and
he's mushing them.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
Yes, yeah, Actually I really liked they were like on
a boat and it looked like the boat was going
through a library. That was a really interesting scene.
Speaker 5 (10:23):
But I know you're going to want some them after
hearing this. This is an amazing story.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
We've got Stephen and Malachi Gregory in Nelson, New Zealand.
Speaker 5 (10:31):
Now I understand that Malachi, who's eight almost nine years
old now, was suffering with not just one or two warts,
but I mean a significant outbreak of warts all over
his body, so significant it impacted his ability to really function.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Yeah, yeah, he was having trouble even holding a pencil
to right Epi's book.
Speaker 6 (10:49):
Actually, they got me thinking about it. I'm not surprised.
It is an amazing immuno modulator, and so I can
see that it would work.
Speaker 5 (10:56):
And so at what point did you see that there
was actually improvement, is really going to work?
Speaker 4 (11:01):
Well, look, we really started to notice it around twelve weeks.
You can see these things actually getting smaller and smaller
and then going down to with just little red marks.
The whole things are gone and we're talking about what's
you know one the size for Warner. I thought, no way,
that's gonna Wow. That's just been miraculous to see them
get into a pair of shoes.
Speaker 5 (11:21):
Yes, how wonderful.
Speaker 6 (11:23):
It's great to see. I'm so happy and yeah.
Speaker 5 (11:25):
Confident, absolutely wonderful.
Speaker 6 (11:27):
Friends that have seen it, that is blown away.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
TI, this is awesome.
Speaker 6 (11:30):
Yeah, this is awesome.
Speaker 7 (11:31):
Another amazing story. Why we're talking about Carnivora. Call them
to awaken your immune system and protect yourself now called
one eight sixty six eight three six eighty seven thirty five.
That's one eight six six eight three six eighty seven
thirty five, or visit Carnivora dot com c A r
niv o r A Carnivora dot com.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Do the movies that you recommend the mortality movies? Are
they scary or do they just send me messages? What
are they doing primarily?
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Well, actually a number of them are comedies. There are comedies,
there are dramas, There are animated films as well as
the TV shows, and then like some really hard to
categorize films, like my favorite for the afterlife visions is
(12:25):
Defending Your Life? Do you remember that one?
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Who started that one?
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Albert Brooks and Meryl Streep And Albert Brooks plays a
Daniel Miller, a guy who is killed in an auto accident,
hit by a bus and he goes to Judgment City,
which looks like a southern California city and there he
(12:57):
is to be in a courtroom like setting to look
at his life. And really, the themes in this movie
is it's more about how brave you are, Courage not
perfection is what matters, and living your life fully personal growth.
(13:23):
But it's got comedy in that you know you're imagining
this afterlife. There are people you can eat as much
as you want, and the food is all delicious and
you won't gain a pound. Well, it's just a really
interesting film that can get you thinking about, well, what
(13:45):
does actually happen after we die? And there's other like
afterlife fantasy films like ghost ghost Town, and The Sixth Sense.
Those are all featuring spirits that still have business they
(14:06):
want to resolve in the world of the living and
uh so, but the Sixth Sense is more of a
you know, a thriller drama, and Ghost Town is a
comedy with Ricky Gervais as a dentist who goes and
(14:26):
has a colonoscopy and is has a near death experience
and when he comes out of it he can see
ghosts and interact with him and so, but it's a
funnier approach to that. And then of course Ghost with.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Uh oh, Patrick Swayze.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore, whoopee Goldberg. Right, So he is
kill in a shooting in New York City, but he
hangs around his wife because he realizes there was more
nefarious things going on and he wants to set the
(15:14):
record straight. And of course that whole scene with a
potter's wheel and clay and unchained melody ooh.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Classic and it's a tragedy. He's gone for good.
Speaker 3 (15:30):
But he sets the record straight before he goes off
into the light.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
But I mean, now he's really gone.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Well, yes, he is really gone.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
Now.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
So many actors are gone now, actors, actresses.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Yeah, pancreatic cancer got him.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Oh yep.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
What is it about Hollywood immortality movies?
Speaker 3 (16:01):
What is it about Hollywood and mortality movies? You know,
it's all about storytelling, and mortality is a very powerful
part of storytelling because I mean, we are all going
to get to our final credits and the end, and
(16:25):
it really makes life so much better when we do
plan for that end. And I have bad news for you.
Less than thirty percent of adults do any end of
life planning, So that would be wills and trusts, advance
medical directives before you're hospitalized, doing advanced funeral arrangements, which
(16:52):
you can do, and that really makes it us so
much easier for your loved ones. And you know, I
speak from experience because you know, earlier on I told
you I got into this because I got married. Well,
my husband died three years ago, in fact, on April
(17:12):
twenty eighth, this very day.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
Oh my gosh, Yeah, how old was how old was he?
Speaker 3 (17:19):
He was seventy one. He had gone in for a
low risk surgery and had medical complications afterwards, heart attack, sepsis,
kidney failure, and he coded in the hospital and was revived.
That was that was very challenging because I get a
(17:40):
call from the hospital and they say, your husband's in
critical condition, come right away back. But they didn't tell
me he had coded, which means your heart stops, and
they restarted it. And so he's in the intensive care
unit and the doctor is saying, what are our goals
of care here? And I'm like, what does that mean?
(18:03):
And he is like, how aggressive do you want us
to be if his heart stops again? And the choice
was basically put him on something called an ecmo machine
where they pump the blood out of your body and
clean it and put it back in to give your
heart and your lungs arrest. And I was just like,
(18:27):
and it doesn't fix anything, And I said, no, if
his heart stops again, he is DNR. But those are
the kind of tough conversations that you need to have
before something like this happens. And we had had those conversations,
so that's why I felt confident in saying DNR, do
(18:50):
not resuscitate and you know it. We thought maybe he
might recover, but it was basically the surge that happens
often before people crash and then die. He wound up
in a hospice inpatient hospice unit for a week. This
(19:14):
was a whole a three week process. And I had
left the room to make a phone call to call
a girlfriend of mine and within fifteen minutes he died
while I was out of the room. He didn't want
to want me to be there when he died.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
And now you know, a believer in the afterlife. You
always were, weren't you.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
Yes, I always have. And I'm friends with a psychic,
a wonderful woman named Tammy Holmes, and she did two
readings for me where she basically channeled my deceased loved ones,
including my husband, and she basically let me know that
(20:02):
he did not want me to be there when he died.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at
one am Eastern and go to Coast to coastam dot
com for more
Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast am on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
And welcome back to Coast to Coast George Nori with you.
Death educator Gail Rubin is known as the day End
of Death. She is a death educator who brings a fresh,
sometimes humorous perspective to one of life's greatest mysteries, the
question of what happens at the end. She is a
certified thetatologist and author of multiple books on funeral planning
(00:26):
and end of life issues. Her most recent work is
called ninety eight point six Mortality Movies to See Before
you Die. Gail, I'm looking forward to this. Welcome to
the program.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Thank you, George. Great to be with you.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
How did you get involved in studying after death experiences
and the afterlife, what happens after you die?
Speaker 3 (00:49):
Well, it sort of came along with the death educator
path I took, which actually started because I got married
in two thousand and had a very creative Jewish Western
wedding and everybody had such a good time. I wanted
to write a book about creative life cycle events and
(01:12):
call it matchings, hatchings and dispatchings, and I got to
write a monthly feature in our local newspaper about weddings
and births and deaths, and it was the stories about
death and funerals that got the most reader response. So
you know, there's already plenty on creative wedding planning. We
(01:33):
didn't need more on that topic. But sixteen years ago
there wasn't much about creative funeral planning. So I focused
on funerals and became a certified phanatologist. Fanatology is the
study of death, dying, and bereavement, and actually that comes
(01:54):
from the Greek demi god Thanatose, who was the personification
of a good death. His twin brother is Hypnose, which
is sleep, which none of us are doing right now
in the middle of the night, right But so sleep
and a good death are very closely related. And in
(02:15):
the process I just started bumping into psychics and having
a few ghostly encounters through my loved ones, and it's
been very interesting.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Now you're called the Diana of death. What does that mean?
Speaker 3 (02:34):
A doyenne doien is a French term. It means a
woman who knows a lot about a particular subject, So
that would be me when it comes to funerals and
death and all these topics that a lot of people
don't want to talk about because they think it will
happen sooner rather than later. But you know, despite great
(02:57):
advances in medical care, we all still have a one
hundred percent mortality rate.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Was looking at your website and you're giving us an
option of picking the cover of your book between two choices.
Why'd you do that?
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Well, so ninety eight point six mortality movies to See
before you Die. My original cover has the Grim Reaper
eating popcorn. I love that cover, and I was talking
with a funeral homeowner about holding a mortality movie night
at one of his funeral homes, and he said, we
(03:36):
do not associate our brand with the Grim Reaper. So
I was like, okay, well, we can do a movie
Marquee kind of cover instead, so people can choose which
one they prefer. I find the people who I know
through my death education work they like the Grim Reaper cover,
(03:57):
but the Marquee one is pretty popular too.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
My first radio job, when I was twenty one years
old and Detroit, Gale was working at a radio station
that was in a converted funeral home. Oh boy, and
working late shifts and working nights sometimes and stuff like that.
You would hear the elevator where they put the bodies
in there in the old days.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
Uh huh.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Take you downstairs where they embalmed you and did all
this other stuff. It was creepy, oh, creepy dime. So
I can understand how the old funeral man doesn't want
the grim reaper.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
I actually had the opportunity to be in a funeral
home at night by myself. I was keeping a body company.
That's part of the Jewish tradition when somebody's died that
you don't leave the body alone. It's called sitting. Well,
(04:58):
you're being a showmer watcher. That originally comes from ancient
days when you had wild animals and so you'd be
protecting the body from being desecrated. But it came to
evolve to be more of a spiritual keeping of company
(05:20):
for the deceased.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Interesting take. Now you have got involved in a big
way with mortality movies. Tell me about that. How'd that happen?
Speaker 3 (05:31):
Well, my college degree is actually in radio and television
and film, and out of college, I actually worked for
c Span for five years.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Well where'd you go to school?
Speaker 3 (05:47):
The University of Maryland in College Park. Good school and
so I've always loved films, and once I got into
this death education, I recognized that movies and film clips
can really memorably teach so much better than just anything
(06:11):
I would tell somebody, and so I did get a
license to use film clips in my talks, and as
time went on, I was one of the first people
to hold the Death Cafe in the United States. That's
an opportunity for people to come together and talk about
(06:31):
what's on their minds about mortality issues. Well, that was
mostly women who would come to those events, and I thought,
what if I showed movies in my house and then
people would come and watch the movie that would be
related to mortality in some way, and then we'd talk
about it. And a lot more men would come to
(06:55):
the movie nights and stick around and have conversation about
mortality issues. And after about three of these movies, it
got too crowded in my living room and I asked
my funeral director friends with French funerals and cremations here
in Albuquerque, New Mexico, if we could go watch movies
(07:18):
in one of their chapels, and they said yes, and
it was a wonderful community building activity for the funeral home.
So we've been doing that and it's just a wonderful
way to get people to even think about talking about
their own mortality. And so the book is a compilation
(07:44):
of one hundred and forty two movies and TV shows
with discussion guides and what mortality themes they embody. And
I'm just very excited about this whole idea of helping
people plan ahead for their mortality by watching a movie
(08:06):
and then talking about it.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Would the movie What Dreams May Come with Robin Williams
be part of that?
Speaker 3 (08:14):
It is. It's in the chapter about after life fantasy
and visions. I've got different chapters about funerals and funeral directors,
medical treatment and end of life issues, grief and growth,
mortality and living fully, but the afterlife death fantasy chapter
(08:37):
has got What Dreams May Come. And that was actually
one of the films I was planning on, mentioning.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
I still can't get over the fact that he's killed himself.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Oh I know, but just the visual it did win
an Oscar for the visual effects dramatic, so that the
story and his wife and their two kids, their two
kids are killed in a tragic auto accident and then
(09:13):
like a year or so later, he's tragically killed in
another auto accident and his wife is left bereft and suicidal.
And when he dies, he winds up in this it
looks like one of his wife's paintings, and there's a
(09:35):
guide there who helps him adjust to the afterworld. And
unfortunately she dies by suicide, but she doesn't go to
the wonderful magical paintings that he's living, and she is
in her own basically personal hell, and he sets out
to find her in the afterlife and rescue her from
(09:59):
that person.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Help alos You remember in that scene where he steps
on these heads that are like in the ground and
he's mushing them.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
Yes, yeah, Actually I really liked they were like on
a boat and it looked like the boat was going
through a library. That was a really interesting scene.
Speaker 5 (10:23):
But I know you're going to want some them after
hearing this. This is an amazing story.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
We've got Stephen and Malachi Gregory in Nelson, New Zealand.
Speaker 5 (10:31):
Now I understand that Malachi, who's eight almost nine years
old now, was suffering with not just one or two warts,
but I mean a significant outbreak of warts all over
his body, so significant it impacted his ability to really function.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Yeah, yeah, he was having trouble even holding a pencil
to right Epi's book.
Speaker 6 (10:49):
Actually, they got me thinking about it. I'm not surprised.
It is an amazing immuno modulator, and so I can
see that it would work.
Speaker 5 (10:56):
And so at what point did you see that there
was actually improvement, is really going to work?
Speaker 4 (11:01):
Well, look, we really started to notice it around twelve weeks.
You can see these things actually getting smaller and smaller
and then going down to with just little red marks.
The whole things are gone and we're talking about what's
you know one the size for Warner. I thought, no way,
that's gonna Wow. That's just been miraculous to see them
get into a pair of shoes.
Speaker 5 (11:21):
Yes, how wonderful.
Speaker 6 (11:23):
It's great to see. I'm so happy and yeah.
Speaker 5 (11:25):
Confident, absolutely wonderful.
Speaker 6 (11:27):
Friends that have seen it, that is blown away.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
TI, this is awesome.
Speaker 6 (11:30):
Yeah, this is awesome.
Speaker 7 (11:31):
Another amazing story. Why we're talking about Carnivora. Call them
to awaken your immune system and protect yourself now called
one eight sixty six eight three six eighty seven thirty five.
That's one eight six six eight three six eighty seven
thirty five, or visit Carnivora dot com c A r
niv o r A Carnivora dot com.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Do the movies that you recommend the mortality movies? Are
they scary or do they just send me messages? What
are they doing primarily?
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Well, actually a number of them are comedies. There are comedies,
there are dramas, There are animated films as well as
the TV shows, and then like some really hard to
categorize films, like my favorite for the afterlife visions is
(12:25):
Defending Your Life? Do you remember that one?
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Who started that one?
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Albert Brooks and Meryl Streep And Albert Brooks plays a
Daniel Miller, a guy who is killed in an auto accident,
hit by a bus and he goes to Judgment City,
which looks like a southern California city and there he
(12:57):
is to be in a courtroom like setting to look
at his life. And really, the themes in this movie
is it's more about how brave you are, Courage not
perfection is what matters, and living your life fully personal growth.
(13:23):
But it's got comedy in that you know you're imagining
this afterlife. There are people you can eat as much
as you want, and the food is all delicious and
you won't gain a pound. Well, it's just a really
interesting film that can get you thinking about, well, what
(13:45):
does actually happen after we die? And there's other like
afterlife fantasy films like ghost ghost Town, and The Sixth Sense.
Those are all featuring spirits that still have business they
(14:06):
want to resolve in the world of the living and
uh so, but the Sixth Sense is more of a
you know, a thriller drama, and Ghost Town is a
comedy with Ricky Gervais as a dentist who goes and
(14:26):
has a colonoscopy and is has a near death experience
and when he comes out of it he can see
ghosts and interact with him and so, but it's a
funnier approach to that. And then of course Ghost with.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Uh oh, Patrick Swayze.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore, whoopee Goldberg. Right, So he is
kill in a shooting in New York City, but he
hangs around his wife because he realizes there was more
nefarious things going on and he wants to set the
(15:14):
record straight. And of course that whole scene with a
potter's wheel and clay and unchained melody ooh.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Classic and it's a tragedy. He's gone for good.
Speaker 3 (15:30):
But he sets the record straight before he goes off
into the light.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
But I mean, now he's really gone.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Well, yes, he is really gone.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
Now.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
So many actors are gone now, actors, actresses.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Yeah, pancreatic cancer got him.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Oh yep.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
What is it about Hollywood immortality movies?
Speaker 3 (16:01):
What is it about Hollywood and mortality movies? You know,
it's all about storytelling, and mortality is a very powerful
part of storytelling because I mean, we are all going
to get to our final credits and the end, and
(16:25):
it really makes life so much better when we do
plan for that end. And I have bad news for you.
Less than thirty percent of adults do any end of
life planning, So that would be wills and trusts, advance
medical directives before you're hospitalized, doing advanced funeral arrangements, which
(16:52):
you can do, and that really makes it us so
much easier for your loved ones. And you know, I
speak from experience because you know, earlier on I told
you I got into this because I got married. Well,
my husband died three years ago, in fact, on April
(17:12):
twenty eighth, this very day.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
Oh my gosh, Yeah, how old was how old was he?
Speaker 3 (17:19):
He was seventy one. He had gone in for a
low risk surgery and had medical complications afterwards, heart attack, sepsis,
kidney failure, and he coded in the hospital and was revived.
That was that was very challenging because I get a
(17:40):
call from the hospital and they say, your husband's in
critical condition, come right away back. But they didn't tell
me he had coded, which means your heart stops, and
they restarted it. And so he's in the intensive care
unit and the doctor is saying, what are our goals
of care here? And I'm like, what does that mean?
(18:03):
And he is like, how aggressive do you want us
to be if his heart stops again? And the choice
was basically put him on something called an ecmo machine
where they pump the blood out of your body and
clean it and put it back in to give your
heart and your lungs arrest. And I was just like,
(18:27):
and it doesn't fix anything, And I said, no, if
his heart stops again, he is DNR. But those are
the kind of tough conversations that you need to have
before something like this happens. And we had had those conversations,
so that's why I felt confident in saying DNR, do
(18:50):
not resuscitate and you know it. We thought maybe he
might recover, but it was basically the surge that happens
often before people crash and then die. He wound up
in a hospice inpatient hospice unit for a week. This
(19:14):
was a whole a three week process. And I had
left the room to make a phone call to call
a girlfriend of mine and within fifteen minutes he died
while I was out of the room. He didn't want
to want me to be there when he died.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
And now you know, a believer in the afterlife. You
always were, weren't you.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
Yes, I always have. And I'm friends with a psychic,
a wonderful woman named Tammy Holmes, and she did two
readings for me where she basically channeled my deceased loved ones,
including my husband, and she basically let me know that
(20:02):
he did not want me to be there when he died.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at
one am Eastern and go to Coast to coastam dot
com for more
The Best of Coast to Coast AM News
Host
George Noory
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