#55 — What Do You Believe About Death Once No One’s Telling You What to Believe?

Content note: This episode includes a brief mention of suicidal thoughts in childhood.

This caller pictures death as floating in a dark bathroom lit only by a nightlight, so comfortable you forget where your skin starts and stops. You arrive with a cannonball, whether you jumped or got shoved. Then you settle into what they call a soup. The people and pets you loved aren’t floating next to you. They’re more like a cold spot brushing past your feet in a lake, there for a second and then gone.

Nobody handed them that picture. They grew up Mormon and homeschooled, two hours from the nearest Walmart. At seven or eight, they got a Kindle Fire with open internet. For the first time, they had something that answered their questions without talking down to them. They held off on baptism until ten and finally agreed just in case they were wrong. They also used their last question for the missionaries to ask what the church planned to do about Slender Man.

The soup took shape years later in a float tank. Part of the reason they went was a lifelong fear of the dark. If they were wrong about everything and ended up in a coffin underground, it was going to be dark down there, so they made themselves lie in it. They came out deciding this is what death is. If they’re wrong, that’s fine with them.

These days they work nights as an EMT. The first time losing a patient didn’t hit them, being not sad made them sad. A therapist suggested putting those calls away in a mental filing cabinet and coming back to them when they’re ready. They still haven’t figured out how to use it, so the papers are still sitting in a box somewhere in their head.

What they still want from this life is to be known. It doesn’t need to ripple the pond. They just want it so that if someone searched for them, they could find them.

Topics covered

• 07:59 Growing up isolated, then building a life

• 12:53 Death as a soup, a dark room, and a nightlight

• 19:30 Questioning the church with a Kindle Fire

• 23:31 Asking the missionaries about Slender Man

• 32:47 The float tank and facing a fear of the dark

• 39:26 Working nights as an EMT

Related episodes

• Anonymous #26 — Are We Making Death Harder by Refusing to Accept It?

• Anonymous #31 — What Happens If There's No 'You' Left to Be Afraid of Death?

• Anonymous #45 — How Would You Know If a Message From the Dead Was Real?

Book recommendation: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. See the full list of Anonymous Book Recommendations here.

Video Episode: If you’d like to watch this conversation instead of just listening, you can find the video version on YouTube.

Giveaway: When We Die Talks turns three in November, and to celebrate, there’s a book giveaway. From October 21 to 30, answer the question every caller gets at the end of their call, “What’s one thing you still want to experience in this lifetime?”, for a chance to win one of four book packages. Enter at whenwedietalks.com/giveaway

If you're not sure where to start, the Episode Guide can help you find a place to start based on where you are.

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