Emily Graves spoke with Dr Mary Neal about her experience of death, heaven and how she came back with a new understanding of her purpose on earth

Dr Mary Neal

Dr Mary Neal, an orthopaedic surgeon, was on a kayaking holiday in Chile. Sceptical of near death experiences, she was to have her life transformed when her kayak became wedged in rocks at the bottom of a waterfall and was underwater for so long that her heart stopped. Her book, To Heaven and Back, is a New York Times number one best seller and is her account of her experience of death, heaven and how she came back with a new understanding of her purpose on earth. Emily Graves spoke with her about what happened.

Emily: What happened on the day you had the accident?

Mary: My husband and I were kayaking in South America in Chile on a very remote river. It's well known for its waterfalls and I don't mean crazy waterfalls, I mean drops of 10 to 15 feet, which still might sound crazy if you're not a kayaker, but for a kayaker those are not unreasonable. It was a river with tremendous volume and flow.

I went over one of the waterfalls; I looked at the bottom and I didn't see a clean exit or clean outflow of water. I should have thought I'd hit the bottom and be flipped over and be bounced around a little bit before I was spit out, but when my boat hit the bottom of the waterfall, the front end was pinned in the rock in the underwater features. My boat and I were immediately and completely submerged. I did the usual things to try to free the boat or to free me from the boat; I tried to shake it; I tried to pull my spray skirt off so I could push myself out of the boat. I'm a spine surgeon so I'm very calm in stressful situations and being underwater in your boat is something that's part of the ordinary for a kayaker. It's not as though I panicked or that sort of thing, but nothing I did worked; it didn't work at all.

I am very much a pragmatist. I realised that nothing was working; I realised I was too far from shore to have anyone help me and I decided to make a very conscious decision and choice and I asked only that God's will be done and I really meant it. When I say that, what I mean is that I actually gave up trying to control the outcome and the moment I gave that up I was immediately overwhelmed with this incredibly physical sensation of being held and comforted and reassured that everything was fine. My husband would be fine and my four young children would be fine regardless of whether I lived or died.

At that point we went through a little bit of a life review; not so much like the old time movies and your life flashes before you, but it was really profound because we looked at not events in isolation, but looked at events in my life and looked at the unseen ripple of facts of those events; not in one or two degrees removed, but how that event created or impacted results 20 or 25 times removed. It was really profound because it gave me this incredible understanding of how everything we do actually matters. Every decision, everything we say, every human interaction, really does have an impact on the world and usually it's not the ways we could even understand.

I have to say I'm very much of a cynic and I was thinking wow this is really crazy. I know that I've been under water too long to be alive, but I feel more alive than I've ever felt. I didn't feel panic or fear or anything. I felt great. I could feel the current slowly sucking my body out of the boat over the front deck and I could feel my knees bending back on themselves, and I could feel the bones breaking and the ligaments tearing but I had no pain. I felt great. As it was happening I could feel my spirit keeling away from my body and when my body broke free from the boat my spirit broke free from my body and I rose up and out of the river. I was immediately greeted by a group of people; beings; spirits; angels; I never really was quite sure what to call them because those names mean different things to different people, but they were absolutely overjoyed to see me and welcome me and I knew this on a very absolute level, that they were there and they were sent by God to greet me and welcome me and guide me and protect me and they had physical form. They had heads, arms, and legs and were wearing these sorts of robes and were very brilliant and just exuding love. I didn't take time to look at them carefully and say, "Ok, now who are you?" and, "Are you my grandfather?" I didn't take the time to look at me. Although of course now that I'm here I wish I'd taken note, but at the time and it's a little tough to describe it, it didn't matter to me; it just wasn't important because they were taking me down this exceptionally beautiful path filled with colour and light and love.

They were taking me to this huge domed structure that similarly was exploding with this sense of not only colour and beauty, but this absolute sense of God's love. It was as though I could not only see it, but I could feel it and experience it and taste it and hear it. It was all encompassing. I just wanted to run there as fast as I could, because I was really surprised by a couple of things. I didn't really have any preconceptions before this experience about what death should be; I was a Christian before this experience but I would have to admit that I sort of hoped that there was life after death, but I was never sure, but I was really surprised by a couple of things. First, I had this overwhelming sense of being home and being back where I really belonged; where we all belong. I was also surprised because when I was with these spirits I could simultaneously look back at the river and I could see the guys pull my body to the river bank and I could see them starting CPR. Although I have a great life and I had a great life; I have a husband that I love dearly; I love my four children more than I could ever imagine loving something on earth, yet despite all of that I looked back at my body and I had absolutely no desire to return and that surprised me. It was interesting because all I wanted to do was get down this path. I knew that this dome structure was the entrance to heaven; God's Kingdom; whatever you want to call it. I knew it was basically the point of no return and I could hardly wait to get there.

As we were going down the path, one of the guys who were resuscitating me was a young man who was only 18 who was a very dear friend of mine and he was one of those guys that are very innocent and vulnerable. He was calling to me to please come back and take a breath. He was calling and calling and I would look at him and he looked so sad and I was overcome with compassion for him. I would turn to the people that were guiding me and say, "Ok, just a minute" and I would go back, lie down, take a breath and then leave and that cycle occurred a number of times. It was interesting to me to talk to him later and realise that we were each equally irritated with each other albeit for very different reasons, but I was not coming back and he was irritated because obviously I would take a breath and then I'd stop breathing.

Then I finally did get to this entrance and inside there were many other spirits who were all very busy. I don't know what they were doing, but I knew and again it's that sense of knowing; it isn't knowing that we generally know here on earth, but it's knowing in an absolute pure sense. I knew that they were busy doing God's business. When I arrived they all looked up and they were overcome with joy that I was there. This was another really profound point in this experience for me, because during this time what became clear to me and what I understood without question was how it is that God can actually know each one of us and love each one of us as though we were the only one and have an incredible plan for each one of us. That's something I struggled with.

As I've said, I would claim to be a Christian before this, but I never really could understand that whole concept of how God could love each one of us, because there are billions of us. We can't even love the guy down the street, or the guy that we don't like or we don't agree with or doesn't look like us. It's so hard for us to have a very big love. How can God actually love each one of us? I can't describe it and I haven't figured out a way how to communicate how that can happen, but during this time in my experience I gained this absolute understanding of how that's true and not only is that true, but all of God's promises are true, which is pretty remarkable; it's incredible.

Then it seemed like just as quickly the sense of disappointment descended on everyone and I was told that I had my work to do on earth and it wasn't my time and I had to go back to my body. As my kids would say, I got kicked out. I did what any reasonable person would do, which is, I said, "No, I'm not going back, you can't make me" and so they did give me some information at that time about some of the work that I still had to do and some of the mandates for my life, including the absolute mandate of sharing my experiences with other people and giving of myself in that way; helping people to face challenges with hope and see them as opportunities for spiritual growth and really be inspired to look at their own lives and find the ways that God has worked in their own lives. By doing that, people would really be inspired to develop a new or closer relationship with God and make this transformation from a hope or a faith that the promises of God are true into a complete trust of their truth of those promises.

Then I was taken back to my body and I was reunited and for me both the leaving and the reuniting was a very seamless transition.

You can buy To Heaven and Back from Cross Rhythms Direct for only £8.99 + p&p.