A researcher who experienced a medical crisis and was clinically dead for six minutes has shared her encounter with the ‘waiting room’ of the afterlife.
Despite numerous accounts of near-death experiences, curiosity persists about what truly occurs after death.
In 2016, Anna Stone was declared ‘dead’ for six minutes following a severe medical incident, which resulted in an out-of-body experience.
Stone recounted observing medical staff as they stopped resuscitation efforts on her in the emergency room, and she also recalled visiting her daughters before returning to her body.
“That’s what my life has been, all about serving, service to others, and service to myself and being a better mother,” Stone shared on the Next Level Soul podcast.
Before her 2016 experience, Stone was grappling with personal challenges, resorting to alcohol and drugs to cope.
“I was married to somebody that I barely knew, and it was a nightmare, and I just wasn’t doing well,” she elaborated in a YouTube video. “I couldn’t keep a career on track. It was all just falling apart and I was really bitter and angry and very selfish, self centered, all about me and my problems.”
Stone had also been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and faced menstrual issues before her near-death event.
“I kind of made a joke and I said, ‘I think I’m bleeding to death’, and that’s the last thing I remember saying before I woke up in an ambulance,” she recalled.
“The next thing I’m in a hospital bed. I had this feeling come over me that I can only describe, is that I knew I was dying. It felt like I was going to explode. It’s too much. I couldn’t handle it. Then suddenly I popped out of my body.”
She described finding herself in what she referred to as a ‘waiting room’: “I was standing to the right of me, in the room… and then I noticed if I looked over to the left, I wasn’t in the hospital anymore… I knew it was somewhere I was supposed to be waiting for something to happen.”
In this ‘waiting room’, there were no tunnels, apparitions, or spirits of deceased loved ones—only an empty space.
Upon realizing she was without a body, Stone witnessed the medical team’s attempts to revive her, with one doctor finally succeeding in saving her.
Stone described re-entering her body through her belly button, which she noted was extremely painful.
After this ordeal, Stone began sharing her story and offering support to those enduring difficult times.
She remarked: “I’ve been helping other people with trauma backgrounds, I can help other people. I had previously been an alcoholic, I would get home and drink 12 beers: now I can’t touch alcohol at all.”