because he told us the same thing. that there were so many similarities in the stories that people tell him. for example, the most common person that people who are dying are visited by are their mother and tend to be in the corner of the room. he hears that from so many different people and written about that in his book. even though he heard so many stories, he remained a skeptic for a while until one particular incident that touched his personal life. here he is describing it. now you ve got extensive experience with this because you re the director of a hospice, you watch so many people pass on and you have personal experience with it, as well. because of the situation your father was in. tell us about that. i have to admit i was a skeptic early on and my teacher and coauthor for years talked to me about this and i would hear about it from patients. but it wasn t until i saw my father who was at the end of his life dying somewhat hopelessly and lonely and missing all of
those he had loved and all of a sudden something changed. and i said to him one morning, what happened? he said, your mother, who died years ago, came to visit me last night. she said, we re going to be together again. all of us are going to be together. and i realized, he was now not dieing into an emptiness but into a fullness. and his hopelessness went to hopefulness and made me realize what if everything we know about dying isn t true? what if everyone we ve ever loved, ever cared for, ever lost we ll see again? that would be a true heaven. hmm. yes, it would. what about the medical theories that, you know, the critics coming forward saying it s the medication playing with your head? it s not a real vision. it s you re just in this state of euphoria. yeah. well, people have prost lated that maybe as you die, there s a lack of ox yen to the brain and that s why people have the
they re real celebrities here an the reason is they re seen as taking on the government, doing something that s vital to a struggling democracy here and the country facing so many problems so all the iraqis we spoke with, not just the people with the exhibit but the fans there and the next generation of caricature artists there to learn say it s an important art form and hope it continues and these artists are doing something heroic. kyra? incredibly intelligent art form, as well. mohammed, thanks. the question as old as life itself. what happens when we die? we found a man who found the dying have something in common. he should know. he spent his life with them. if you have ever lost a loved one, you have to hear his story. [ male announcer ] gout s root cause is high uric acid.
then miraculously survived. th the accounts were so strikingly similar, it couldn t just be ko coincidence. a man that doesn t think it s a coincidence, david kessler wrote visions, trips and crowded waiting rooms: who and what you see before you die and he has an article up on cnn.com. check it out. do the dead greet the dying? it s been hugely popular. john roberts actually talked to him this morning. now john, kessler worked in hospice care and spent time with doctors and nurses and caregivers. people around the dying. he found that so many of the death bed stories had something in common. we should point out, too, he said respectfully i didn t talk to mediums and stuck with those in hospice like doctors and nurses. yeah. he was dealing with traditional science. he could have been the character in that movie the here after
vice president. it was. wasn t my idea to send her back. as long as the wife doesn t care about it. yeah. thanks so much for being with us today. we ll be back here friday morning bright and early. cnn newsroom begins this morning with kyra phillips. good morning. good morning. crunch time for the candidates and for celebrities they re using star power to influence voters. you ll see who s stumping for what issue. a dedicated father stripped of his cub scouts uniform. the price of being an openly gay father. and a new view of the afterlife from a man that spent much of his life with the dying. if you have ever lost a loved one, you have to hear this story. i m kyra phillips. thanks for joining us. you re live in the cnn newsroom. we begin with 12 days until the midterm elections. democrats struggling and the president stumping out west lending the clout to embattled