The gentle truth behind the 'scary' facts of death

The way we talk about death matters. We fear the unknown, and if you’ve read my previous post, you’ll know I’ve already talked about how, as society, we’ve lost our recognition of the normal dying process. It’s not anyone’s fault, but it means we don’t tend to know what dying looks like. And as I said, we fear the unknown.

I came across a social media post this morning entitled ‘6 Scary Facts About Death’. Each one was blown out of proportion, to make death seem sinister and evil. But death is neither of those things; it simply ‘is’.

So I wanted to take this opportunity to go through these 6 scary facts, to debunk and reframe them, so that they’re more realistic. Because dying is scary enough, without media over-sensationalisation of it.

Now I must add as a caveat that my experience has been in relation to 'expected' deaths; I don’t have any experience in traumatic deaths, so I won’t pretend to know what I’m talking about with that. But I would highly advise you search for articles, blog posts, videos etc of professionals who are experienced in that, if you want further information. Don’t rely on social media to tell you right from wrong.

‘Fact’ #1: ‘Your brain knows you’re dying. For a few haunting seconds after death, your brain stays aware, trapped in silence, knowing it’s over’

Generally speaking, when we’re in our final moments, we tend not to be conscious. That means that we’re still alive, but not responsive. The first thing, generally, that stops is our breathing. Our final breath isn’t dramatic; we just breathe out, then don’t breathe in again. It’s generally very peaceful, barely noticeable to those who are expecting the Hollywood final moments.

Up to a few minutes after our breathing stops, our heart stops. It pumps the last of its oxygen stores into blood around our body, then it just stops. Our brain is still working at this point, however, because there’s still blood in it giving it oxygen. When that last pump of blood finally leaves our brain and returns to our heart, that’s when the brain stops working.

They say hearing is the last sense to go, because sounds travel from our ear to our brain stem before being sent deeper into our brains to be interpreted. Our brain stem is the last part of our brain for blood to leave, meaning it is normally the last part to function. So hearing is, in a way, the final sense to go.

However, as for whether your brain is aware, ‘trapped in silence’ for a few seconds after death, this isn’t true. Our brain is generally still active after we take our last breath, but we are unconscious so we aren’t generally aware that we’re dying, and we’re certainly not ‘trapped in silence’. We aren’t officially dead until our brain activity ceases.

‘Fact’ #2: ‘The body doesn’t die all at once. Even as the heart stops, cells keep working, tiny parts of you refusing to accept death’

The first sentence is true, as we’ve just discussed. Our brain is generally still active after our heart stops. However, cells are not sentient; they aren’t ‘refusing to accept death’. They’re just doing what they’ve always done, until they stop. That generally happens once the last of our blood returns to our hearts. Some cells stop working long before we enter our final moments. This isn’t something to fear – it’s simply biology winding down at its own pace, as a worker would lay down their tools.

‘Fact’ #3: ‘The dead can move. As muscles stiffen and release, bodies twitch, like something inside is still trying to wake up’

This is what I mean by ‘sensationalisation’. It’s true that dead bodies can have small spasms or twitches, and although there are reports from people around the world of dead bodies sitting up, this is incredibly rare. Generally, we’re talking maybe a slight twitch of a finger or a cheek muscle. This isn’t a certainty, and happens before rigor mortis sets in. This is because our muscles tend to store energy, which doesn’t just disappear when we die. It’s not because ‘something inside is still trying to wake up’. It can be jarring to see, but if you find yourself at a person’s side as they die and see a twitch, it’s just that energy escaping.

‘Fact’ #4: ‘The “death smell” starts fast. Within minutes, your body begins to release gases, nature’s first whisper that life has left’

Again, the first sentence can be true, but isn’t a certainty. It’s also a bit crude to put it like this. When our brains stop being active, they no longer control our bodily functions. That means the body releases what needs to be released from our digestive and urinary systems, if there is anything still in them. This can mean that gases may escape, but these are gases we create when we’re alive (i.e. flatulence). The gases that this ‘fact’ is talking about generally start to escape much later on, when enough of our cells, muscle fibers, organs etc have broken down. These gases are waste products of bacteria.

‘Fact’ #5: ‘The heart can beat again. Sometimes, a dead heart jerks back to life for a moment, a cruel echo of what used to be’

This is essentially the same thing as ‘Fact’ #3. The heart, as with other organs and muscles, stores energy in it, and if there’s any left after it has stopped beating, it may move. It’s not a ‘beat’, per se; it’s just the last of the heart’s energy leaving the body. If this were to happen, it’d be pretty soon after death, before rigor mortis sets in. It’s just a release of stored-up energy, it’s not the heart ‘jerking back to life’, and it’s certainly not ‘a cruel echo of what used to be’; it’s a very natural part of death.

‘Fact’ #6: ‘Your body makes one last sound. When air escapes your lungs, it can sound like a sigh, or a moan. The last voice of the dead’

Actually, in our final weeks-days-moments, our breathing can vibrate our voice box in a way that makes it sound like a sigh or moan. We’re not actually doing either, it’s just how the air moving into and out of our lungs glides across our vocal cords.

Because of this, it is possible that our final breath can sound like a moan or a sigh, but it’s neither. It’s not a sign of pain or despair; it’s simply the physics of the last breath.

I hope that this post has cleared up some of the misconceptions of death and dying. Whilst this is centred on one post, some of the claims the post made are widespread across social media, in order to make death seem more scary and to tap into morbid curiosity to boost follower counts and engagement. But sadly, a consequence of that is that the normality of death can sometimes seem remote. Dying is a very natural process, just like being born.

If you’d like to know more about the normal dying process, I’d highly recommend this video by Theos in collaboration with Dr Kathryn Mannix, who set up the UK’s first CBT clinic specifically for palliative patients, and who has authored two books on her experiences of working in palliative medicine: ‘With the End in Mind’, and ‘Listen’.

Link to video: https://youtu.be/ayMhA1pRLeY?si=X8PIRFm5A0krRsDd

Behind all the gloss and the paint that social media adds onto aspects of our lives, including death, is something very human. Something tranquil.

It’s a body doing what it is meant to do, until it no longer can. It’s a meadow of flowers closing their petals at dusk until the last one is shut. It’s a rippling brook that just, simply, stops flowing. It’s the last drop of rain in an April shower. It’s death – and that’s all there is to it.