30 Unsettling Deathbed Confessions From Those Who Knew Their Time Was Up

Patient told me they had a dream that they were going to meet me. I was the one to wash their body and prepare them for the morgue once they died.

Working in oncology at the time, had an older gentleman with liver cancer that had spread everywhere including his brain. Having brain mets made him very vague, often nonsensical, he was in and out of consciousness and never really answered questions appropriately in that his answers were very random. This is not unusual for people with brain tumours. He also had a thick Eastern European accent, his kids explained they immigrated from Russia in the late 80s (to Australia).

Our focus was on comfort care for him as he was palliative due to the extensive metastases throughout his body.

Anyways, one day I’m taking his vitals and he grabs my hand, looks me straight in the eyes and just says to me “you know, I have k****d so many people” in his very strong accent. I kind of just froze and didn’t know what to say but he let go and went back to sleep/reduced consciousness.

Often people have a moment of clarity/make sense for a brief episode right before they pass. I didn’t take it as a threat or anything, it just freaked me out. He passed away that evening after my shift was over so I always wondered if this was a deathbed confession of sorts.

I’m a nurse now and honestly have seen much more sudden and traumatic deaths since this one, but this one always is the first I think of. Back when I was a CNA at a nursing home about 6 years ago, our scrub color was either teal, purple or medium blue and that day I happened to wear my new light blue scrubs that were a little brighter than technically allowed. I only add this detail because I think it might have played a role here? There was this one resident who was much younger than most there, only in her mid 60s. She was in really rough physical and mental shape due to severe liver failure and other compounding issues for years. She didn’t have much family visit although I heard she had a husband, and she was there for at least a year. She never spoke more than a moan and couldn’t really maintain eye contact or do much. She would just need to be turned and cleaned up often. The day I was wearing those new scrubs and in there cleaning her like normal, she suddenly looked right at me and in a very soft, clear voice said, “you look like an angel.” I remember being pretty shocked that she spoke out loud and kinda just said, “isn’t this a pretty color??” She went back to being nonverbal the rest of the shift and I remember thinking about it a lot until I went home. When I got back in 2 days later I found out she had died in her sleep that night. I never told anyone she spoke because I started to doubt myself and felt really weird. I also got yelled at for wearing those scrubs since they were technically out of uniform lol. I always will remember that woman even though honestly I don’t think anyone else thinks about her anymore.

That none of her adult kids were her husband’s - and there were 4 of them , and none of them knew.

Wasn’t a confession, but we were called in to transport a patient from the ED to another higher level of care ED. Pt was in a back room, no windows, just kind of sad really. Report was that he had end stage CA, and all the palliative beds were taken & he didn’t have family.
You could tell he didn’t have much time left.

We got him in the back of the ambulance and I could just sense he wanted someone with him when he went. So I held his hand, and I watched him take his last breath at that exact moment.

“I would give all the money I earned to be able to be a present father to my children, and that's what I will do if I survive” he told me this before he was intubated during the COVID pandemic.

Later I learned that he was a very successful businessman but that he never had time for his family. Today, all companies have practically been sold.

I work with dementia clients. I have had so many pre death confessions. Sometimes it's Asif the dementia leaves them just before they pass away.
A mind blowing confession I always think about was a veteran who confessed to all the war crimes he committed and how he felt so terrible for all the things he did. He said this was the reason he had no relationship with his family and to be honest I don't blame his family for not having anything to do with him.

As a community nurse. The local vicar had a heart attack and was resuscitated by his wife and ambulance staff, into hospital for a bypass. Arrested and resuscitated on the table. Back home and I was seeing him for dressing changes etc. He and I were chatting and he said that ‘God obviously wanted him by his side’…we chuckled.. He went out with his wife in the car for the first time since his discharge that lunchtime and was k*lled by a tractor as they pulled out of the driveway. Wife was fine.

I’m in hospice and I’m beyond thinking anything is weird or creepy at this point. I mostly work with pediatric patients but I see adult patients on call for other nurses sometimes.

Most recently, Jim (in his 80’s) told me his grandpa was sitting in the chair in the corner of his room. He said, “I know he’s dead. But he’s there.” I asked if it was scaring him and he said “no, but he’s telling me to not take my medications” I asked him what he thought what would happen if he stopped his meds and he said, “you know.” We stopped his medications and Jim died a week later.

Sylvia was also A&Ox4 but right after being admitted, she started telling me about a tall black figure she was seeing in her apartment. She called him Scratch because he scratched on the doors and walls. He started at the front door, but gradually moved closer and closer to the bed. She wasn’t afraid of him. Eventually he moved past her bed and onto the balcony, and she said he stopped scratching and was refilling her bird feeders and watering her plants.

Benny saw his deceased family peeking into his windows and waving at him from the backyard.

I’ve had a couple of affairs mentioned to me by patients, and one guy who wanted me to find his second family he’d abandoned who wanted nothing to do with him (they declined). Lots of estranged children/estranged parents. Usually people pull it together for the patient. Sometimes it’s a mess.

I work in a nursing home. One of our residents was a well-known local pimp in his younger years. It involved filming videos of young girls for his rental business. Nicest man in the world now. Everyone at the nursing home loves him. Another resident harbored a known serial killer when there was a statewide manhunt for him. She was related by marriage and this was what women did for the men back in the day. She’s in the book about it and everything. A third resident did hard time for having stockpiled explosives in his house. There was enough to have wiped out the houses on either side of him. Now in a nursing home, he steals and hoards things like batteries, wires, etc. and is always building something. We’ve even had the police in to toss his room once.

Those are just a couple of backstories I know. It can make caring for people…complicated. You really have to suspend judgement and deal compassionately with what’s right in front of you.