When most individuals think of a near-death experience, they envision heavenly gates, bright and shining angels or family and friends waiting for them on the other side. However, for Nicola Hodges, physical reality was quite different. At the age of 32, Nicola Hodges was sent to William Harvey Hospital, Ashford, Kent, when the diagnosis of her epilepsy was altered, making her blood highly acidic. Doctors put her on continuous dialysis, and before long,

Nicola was rapidly declining, and her family were asked to gather at her bedside, as she had a 20 per cent chance of survival. Nicola slipped into a coma. When she finally woke up, she didn’t return with the ethereal visions so often described in books and films.

“It wasn’t like the stories you hear,” she said. “There was no door to heaven. I couldn’t see anything… just a faint warmth and a yellow light.”

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Struggle After Survival

Her ordeal didn’t end when she opened her eyes. The coma left her mind clouded and her memory fractured. Six months later, she suffered a seizure, collapsed, and hit her head, causing four brain haemorrhages.

“It felt like my head was wrapped in cotton wool,” Nicola recalled. “I used to be quick, witty, sharp… but suddenly I couldn’t even remember what day it was.” Her family had been warned that, if she survived, she would be “very different.”

The warm light she remembered during the coma gave her a strange reassurance that “there must be something after death, a life or an energy,” even if it wasn’t the heavenly vision she expected.

Dealing With Loss And Setbacks

Nicola's recovery was slow as her self-esteem plummeted. At family functions, she mostly avoided talking to anyone in fear of making an idiot of herself. Then she had another heartbreaking accident, a fall down the stairs, which left her deaf in one ear.

Regardless of the condition of her broken heart, instead of dwelling in despair, she would promise herself to write a book about her journey before she turned 40. She was equipped only with an old laptop and a very nasty red notebook. “I said to myself I cannot do this. But I said I would try." Completing her first draft felt like "meeting myself again."

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Fast forward to 37, Nicola is able to look through a different lens of her near-death experience. Instead of waiting for her turn in heaven, facing terminality gave her the impetus to fight for recognition of her identity, her purpose, and her future.

“It wasn’t the afterlife I imagined. And I know there's something out there but at least I believe I still have something to do here."