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30 Doctors And Nurses Reveal The Creepiest Last Words Uttered By Their Patients Right Before Passing Away
We people have a strange fascination with our last words. Whether we think those who are called to the afterlife, in turn for their departure, receive all the answers or we are simply interested in how a person summarizes their days on Earth, when someone's whispering their final phrase, we're listening.
To learn more about these moments, Reddit user ProcaineForTheSoul made a post on the platform, asking doctors and nurses to share the creepiest things their patients uttered before passing away. And many did. From spiders to WWII captors and the devil himself, here are some of the most memorable stories.
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#1
I don't care that I'm not a nurse, but this was said by my dad to the nurse, so close enough. Backstory: Dad had MS. He'd had it since he was 18. Diagnosed at 20, married my mom at 24, had me at 29, [passed away] 15 days short of 45. Six months before that, he was put on hospice. He and Mom were discussing funeral arrangements, and my mom jokingly said, "You know Tim, the best thing you could do would be to [pass away] on a Wednesday. That way we can have the body prepared on Thursday, the viewing on Friday, and the memorial on Saturday, so more people could come.
The morning we got the call that it was time, my mom, two sisters, and I were about five minutes too late. After we said our goodbyes, the nurse pulled my mom aside and asked if that day had any significance. It's not even 6 am yet, so Mom doesn't even know what day it IS much less if it's important. The nurse tells her it's May 21st. No... nothing is coming to mind.
The nurse told her that the previous day he kept asking what day it was and they'd tell him it was the 20th. He'd look irritated but accept it. That morning, he asked what day it was, and they said, "It's Wednesday, May 21st." He smiled, squeezed his favorite nurse's hand, and was gone almost immediately.
It was Memorial Day weekend, and we did just as he and Mom had planned. And despite many friends being out of town for the holiday, we had over 250 people show up at the memorial service, overflowing the tiny church more than it had ever been filled. To his dying day, he was trying to make things easier for our family. I miss him.
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#2
Can't write this without sobbing...but three years ago my grandma passed. She was stubborn as she could be and the hospice nurse kept telling us "it won't be long now...anytime, anytime". So there were about twenty of us, her kids and grandkids, her 80 year old sister, standing around the bed. It became quite uncomfortable all of us just standing there holding hands waiting. So finally I went over to her and whispered in her ear that I loved her and it was okay for her to go. She and I were very very close. After I did that my mom did the same thing, then my grandma's sister. After another while my mom said "I remember a long time ago, she told me she figured she would hear I'll Fly Away ( her favorite hymn) as she entered heaven's gates. Everyone kinda chuckled and my 80 year old great aunt a few minutes later softly started singing: One glad morning when this life is oe'r I'll fly away... To a home on God's celestial shore I'll fly away... And without missing a beat all of us joined in as best we could...we were all crying: I'll fly away oh glory! I'll fly away! When I [pass away] hallelujah by and by! I'll fly away...
At the end of the verse of course we were all just sobbing. Not ten seconds later did her heart stop forever. She just needed some help to fly away. Never got to share that before. Thanks.
#4
Last year: my grandfather started desperately pleading for his life with his German captors from WWII.
The doctor present was smart and said in German: "You are free, Herr Caticature. You are free." And then he [passed away].
#5
I worked in a secured Alzheimer's unit and one of my 99-year-old residents rolled up to me in her wheelchair and said, 'can I use your phone honey, I want to call my son before I [pass] today.' I said no granny (what everyone called her) you aren't going to [pass] today. I let her use my phone anyway. After dinner, one of the CNAs asked if I had seen her so they could put her in bed. I said no and helped them look for her. Turns out she just laid down in an unoccupied room and [passed] that evening. I was never more happy that I had let a resident use my phone to call a family member.
#6
Not a nurse, not a doctor, but I'm an apprentice funeral director. We went to a nursing home on a removal and as we were walking down the hall one of the patients got antsy and opened the door to his room and saw us walking with the stretcher.
'I'll see you next week boys.'
And guess who we had to pick up the next week.
#7
My grandma [passed away] in 1989 my grandfather (Bob) [passed away] around 1965. She never remarried, never dated, but she did have a great life.
When she was dying she yelled "Bob Bob here I come.. Oh honey I've missed you so much!"
We always joked that we were glad she didn't yelled "Bob who the hell is that"?
#8
I work in a cardiac ICU. We had a patient who had a pulmonary artery rupture (a rare, but known complication of a Swan-Ganz catheter). One minute he was joking around with us and the next bright red blood was spewing out of his mouth. His last words before he [passed] were, 'Why is this happening to me?' It still haunts me years later.
#9
Not creepy but memorable, old lady few hours before [passing], 'I think I deserve some damn rum.'
#10
Ugh. I was a hospice nurse for many years. Super gratifying job for a nurse, surprisingly. As a 'regular' nurse, you are rarely offered thanks. Hospice nursing is an island unto itself. Mostly peaceful, lots of times sad, often a blessing.
This is sad, but also creepy, and I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it. Had a 20-year-old kid, gang member, who [had] primary liver cancer. Super unusual, aggressive, and terminal. He was angry at the universe. His family was there to comfort him, but he literally [spat] in their faces. Every ounce of energy he had left was angry and mean and ugly. His mom would beg him to lighten up and accept Jesus into his heart. He would swing at her and tell her to eff herself. The family remained beside, in hopes he would chill out at the end.
His last day, hours, moments, he was angry. The family called me into the room, and told me they thought he was going (he wasn't responding, Cheyne-Stokes breaths, eyes glossy, and skin cold - the end was imminent). His lovely mother, in her dearest attempt, whispered to him to go towards the light, to her Jesus. With his [final] breath he opened his eyes, looked at her and said, 'Eff your Jesus!!!' A second or two later, he slowly turned his head to the left, and got the most horrific look on his face as if he was looking at something we couldn't see, and horrified, like in a bad movie, his face contorted, and he screamed with his last breath, eyes wide, 'Oh sh*t, oh sh*t, OH NOOOOOOO!!!!' then made a guttural noise and promptly fell back into the bed and [passed]. Every family member was shaking and too frightened to speak, and I left the room and took two days off. I don't care if I never find out what he saw.
Rosie Hamilton 2 years ago
Used his last moments to mess with you all !! Just kidding - probably hallucinating due to meds.
#11
Not a nurse or doctor, but my beloved Grandpa was in the hospital, ill with pneumonia and sepsis. I thought he would recover. He was asking to see me and my family, so I went with my parents, my husband and my two little boys. Grandpa couldn't talk, but he was lucid and was watching TV in his room. He motioned for a pen and paper. He scribbled something on a scrap of paper and gave it to my oldest boy, who was about 12 at the time. It said, "I love you." When we were leaving the hospital, it hit me that Grandpa was saying goodbye and I started to bawl like a baby. Grandpa had passed before I got home. He held on just to see me and my boys one more time.
I still see him in my dreams, only he isn't the sick old man I had known since my Grandma [passed away] in 1977. He is about 40, in the prime of his life. He is healthy and strong, taking long, energetic strides across the front yard of the house he shared with my Grandma for 45 years. I have never known him to look like that. And yet, there he is, popping in to say hello.
#12
ER physician here, had heard many last words from patients, but the creepiest one has to be of a man who was on his last breaths as he succumbed to renal failure. He said, 'I see a bright light... Horses... No eyes... No... NO... NOOO!' as he loudly yelled, at this point he was crashing when he suddenly woke up, looked up, and with his last breath he said, 'I understand...' and he [passed].
We know in the medical field that these situations are provoked by a cascade of neurotransmitters in disarray due to tissue and organ failure, but I sometimes have my doubts and perhaps we are seeing more than we are lead to believe.
#13
Paramedic:
17 y/o female, car crash: "Please, please, please...don't tell my parents I was drinking."
#14
"You're not gonna believe this..."
Talk about a cliffhanger. Can't wait for season 2 of Old Man With Heart Failure.
#15
My grandfather on his deathbed said "they have no eyes", still give me chills.
#16
Came into an early shift and was handed over a patient who'd been very anxious and had a panic attack overnight. He was anxious all morning, but obs all fine, ecg fine, and so I just asked someone to sit with him to keep an eye on him/reassure him for me. He gets worse, really panicky, heavy breathing, he's on his side in the fetal position. Drs will be in in 10 minutes, so I tell him I'll get them to him as soon as they come in but ask if he'll lie on his back for me to help his breathing. He tells me he won't make it until they get here and that he won't face the other way. Obs still all fine at this point, but he's more agitated so again I suggest he move position for comfort and that's when he says 'I won't make it until the Drs get here. If I turn to face the other way I'll [be gone].' He repeated this a few times to me.
He arrested literally as the Drs walked in and he [passed] on the side he'd been refusing to turn to. I'm convinced he knew.
Alex Bailey 2 years ago
He may well have been aware of additional pain or problems caused to him if he was put on another side (due to other health issues) and how that would have made it harder for him for various reasons. Of course there is a good chance he knew. What is most upsetting is that they didn't listen and put him on the side he refused to turn to. That's not good.
#17
Not a doctor or nurse, but my grandfather was on hospice care at home and for 2 days he told us that he had to go with "the little red-haired girl." We didn't know what he was talking about.
When he [passed away], we cleaned him up and called the hospice nurse on duty, who came right over. I happened to be the one to answer the door and there she stood: 5 foot 2 or so, with gorgeous blue eyes and the most beautiful red hair you've ever seen. I couldn't even manage "hello", but my grandmother looked around me and said very cheerfully "Please come in, he's been waiting for you."
#18
I had an old lady flag me down in the hallway a few days before she [passed] and with her emaciated face and bulging eyes, she said, 'You know where I'm going.' I asked her what she meant and she repeated herself. 'You know where I'm going when I [pass]. And it ain't up.' I was taken aback and asked her if she wanted to talk with the priest we have on staff. She shook her head and said, 'It's too late for that.' A few days later, she was eating her supper and started screaming. She yelled, 'Fire! Fire! There's fire everywhere!' She [passed] a few hours later, quite suddenly. I didn't sleep that night and I really hope her soul found some rest.
#19
Surgeon here. Not sure if this is 'creepy,' but a man on his kept repeating 'the body is in the woods next to the oak tree' over and over until he passed.
The police were notified and they did search some woods behind the man's house, but never found anything.
Alex Bailey 2 years ago
Could have been in any woods, not just the ones nearby. Though people are also often on a lot of medication and hallucinate at the end so could have been that.
#20
I'm a nurse and was previously working at an assisted living community on the dementia/Alzheimer's unit. My very favorite patient had been declining pretty steadily, so I was checking on him very frequently. We would have long chats and joke around with each other, but in the last two weeks of his life, he stopped talking completely and didn't really acknowledge conversation directed at him at all. I finished my medication rounds for the evening and went to see him before I left. I told him I was leaving for the night and that I'd see him the following day, and he looked me in the eyes and smiled SO genuinely and said, 'You look like an angel.' I thought it was so sweet because he had not seemed lucid in weeks.
He [passed] the next morning. It really messed with me.
#21
"But I don't know how to get there..." Grandpa in hospice. Hadn't spoken in days. [Passed] about 2 hours later.
#22
Nurse here - had a patient come into the ER with shortness of breath. He started deteriorating in the ER, and then quite rapidly on the transport up the ICU.
We got him wheeled into his room, replaced the ER lines and tubes with our own, and transferred him from the transport stretcher to his ICU bed.
He actually did most of the transfer himself. He didn’t say anything, but just before he [passed] he pleasantly adjusted his own pillow, laid his head down, and then his eyes went blank. This man just made himself comfortable before laying down to [pass away].
#23
I may have told this one before - this is how I remember it.
It was years ago, I was a junior resident. I didn't know the patient all that well, but got called up to get her paperwork ready for discharge. (She was an otherwise healthy 96 or so, had a palliative colon resection for cancer, something, something).
I went to her room to do a last wound check and DC a JP drain and she kept talking about how she was "going home to Bill*"
Her son pointed out that she's usually mentally very sharp, but Bill was her husband who had [passed away] years ago. He reassured her, "No, mom, dad is gone. We're just going back to the house."
She insisted. "No, I'm going to him. He came to see me this morning and said he's taking me home."
Whatever, I guess? Son said she was otherwise at baseline - it was the first and only weird thing she said - vitals and labs looked good, so we progressed along the DC pathway.
Not even a few minutes later the Code Blue got called to her room. She was Don't Code, so we didn't do anything, but it was like, "WTAF, I guess Bill really was coming for her." Her son was surprisingly OK with how this played out.
This one chilled me for awhile.
*Names changed to protect the innocent...and let's face it, it was like 10 years ago and I don't remember anyway.
#24
I'm working on my mother's Eulogy for tomorrow's wake. I'm going to go into detail for anyone that is smoking because I think it's something you should reconsider.
My mom was diagnosed with Terminal Lung and Pancreatic Cancer, mass had developed around her vocal cords and made it hard for her to speak. She smoked all of her life, and it finally caught up with her. It attacked her quick, from time she was diagnosed, to time she passed away, it was less than 2 weeks. First she lost her voice, then she had difficulty breathing, became weak, she couldn't walk too far, then she could only walk a little, then nothing at all, she had trouble eating. The night she [passed away] I let her smoke her cigarette, (dr said it didn't matter anymore) and my sister and I took mom into her bed and I knew as did my sister, it was the last time, we spent a few hours with her, holding her and I got up, lost it a bit, and my mom said "Don't be sad" loudly with all her might.
I was fortunate to be with my mother at that time, she was due to have hospice that Monday but she did not make it, lung cancer kills quickly. I hope none of you have to deal with that, consider it that next cigarette, it's just a matter of time. Well enough preaching.
EJN 2 years ago
I too lost parents (father & mother) to lung cancer directly caused by smoking... it isn't a pleasant thing to experience or watch. My father died in 9 months after being reduced to an emaciated prisoner-of-war appearing person; mother died in 5 weeks after diagnosis with the cancer wrapped around her throat, windpipe, and aorta, but more than likely due to starvation since she couldn't eat any longer.
#25
My Grandfather was fading fast, but he smiled at me and said "Dar Dar, I can't hang around, your grandma needs me to paint the house". He [passed away] a few minutes later. My grandma had been dead a few years.
#27
Had a patient who had a tracheostomy have a full-on panic attack, was setting off her alarms. She could still write as a form of communication. She wrote to me that there were some black figures in her room (floating above her and on the ceiling) and she drew me this devilish, creepy picture of what she saw. Coded about an hour later.
#28
I had a patient in my first week of being on a hospital floor as a CNA. She was really sweet and wanted to know all about my nursing school. Right before she went to bed, I helped her move from the chair in the room. She jokingly danced with me for a few seconds, humming an old tune before sitting on the bed. She thanked me as she drifted off to sleep. "Don't worry. It will be okay." Referring to my trepidation about the new job, I assume.
She was scheduled to go home and [passed away] from a complication of medications about four hours later.
The first song on the radio that morning as I got in my car was Shut Up and Dance. .... yeah that messed with me for a looong time.
#29
'Get home safe, little one.'
It wasn't what he said - he said the same thing to me any time I had him as a patient for the evening. It was how he said it. He gave me this look and pause like he knew. The DNR's in my experience always know when it's time. It's creepy.
Rosie Hamilton 2 years ago
Having lost several elderly relatives I'd say most seemed to know they were at that point. I don't personally find that creepy.
#30
'The devil has been in my room all night, but don't worry, God is with you.' This man had like the worst [end] ever, too. He had a horrendous seizure and [passed] with his eyes wide open and had a horrible grimace on his face. He had also been yelling all night about the 'devil' and saying over and over, 'Get out of here! This building's gonna blow!'
What do you think ?
Beverly Hasegawa 2 years ago
The word is "die." "Die" is not a curse word. Let's not muddle up the English language any further!
Random Panda 2 years ago (edited)
BP: posts a whole article about death. Also BP: proceeds to censor every single mention of the words "die"/"death". WTF is going on, why are we censoring normal words now???!!
Load More Replies...
Leo Domitrix 2 years ago
DEATH (as Sir Terry Pratchett might have typed it). It's death. We die. It's called death. You pass, you move on, you (fill in euphemism). It's okay. We can handle the word.
Angelar 2 years ago
"It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it’s called Life." Last Continent, T.P.
Load More Replies... Libstak 2 years ago
2 days before my brother passed from heart failure I was visiting him at home and sitting by his bed. He waited until our mum left the room and then his eyes just lit up so brightly and he said "don't cry when I die little sister." I was 46 yrs he was 56 but I was always his little sister. I wish I could describe the serenity and peace in him adequately, because of that light in his eyes I really couldn't cry it has calmed and comforted me so much over the years.
Beverly Hasegawa 2 years ago
The word is "die." "Die" is not a curse word. Let's not muddle up the English language any further!
Random Panda 2 years ago (edited)
BP: posts a whole article about death. Also BP: proceeds to censor every single mention of the words "die"/"death". WTF is going on, why are we censoring normal words now???!!
Load More Replies... Leo Domitrix 2 years ago
DEATH (as Sir Terry Pratchett might have typed it). It's death. We die. It's called death. You pass, you move on, you (fill in euphemism). It's okay. We can handle the word.
Angelar 2 years ago
"It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it’s called Life." Last Continent, T.P.
Load More Replies... Libstak 2 years ago
2 days before my brother passed from heart failure I was visiting him at home and sitting by his bed. He waited until our mum left the room and then his eyes just lit up so brightly and he said "don't cry when I die little sister." I was 46 yrs he was 56 but I was always his little sister. I wish I could describe the serenity and peace in him adequately, because of that light in his eyes I really couldn't cry it has calmed and comforted me so much over the years.
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