I am 68, I am sure as shit it is not ol’ St. Nick knocking at the door. I seem ambivalent actually. All I know is I really, really, really, really do not wish to feel any sort of pain if possible.

Fuck no. I’m terrified.

In my life I had 3 near-death experiences. All three were close calls, with one being so so so damn close that I felt my body shutting down and it was the most dreading sensation ever.

If anything, those experiences led me to realize that I still have lots to do before even thinking I’m ready to go.

I’ve had one foot in the grave (doctor literally said that 50% die the first three days. after three days you have a good chance)

I remember the time the thought shot through my head: “If I’m dead I don’t feel the pain anymore” I immediately realized i’m not afraid to die, i’m just not ready to do that. So yes, I am prepared, just don’t wanna (yet). I also know it’s not hard on me (i’m dead then) but for those who love me and have to sit powerless and watch it happen and go on living.

Why would I need to be? I’m not going to have to live with the aftermath.

My loved ones dying, now there’s a problem.

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Yep. I don’t want to but there’s nothing particularly distressing about the idea. I’ve never felt “existential angst” or anything like that.

At this point I’m not sure I’m emotionally prepared to live.

My wife (39) died in October. Her breast cancer moved to her brain and over 20 days she went from perfect function to not being able to speak or move and being in excruciating pain. Sometime over those three weeks I made peace with my eventual death.

I dont believe in an afterlife but I hope there is one just so I can see her again. But either way life is to hard to wish to live forever. Immortality is a young persons wish. When you get older and you see what life takes from you piece by piece you come to realize that the end is not to be feared but welcomed just so the pain stops.

I had a serious motorcycle accident in my early 40s. It was the kind that usually results in death, but I got off easy with a shattered collarbone, two broken ribs, and some road rash. I remember the initial impact and then lying on my back looking up at the sky, but nothing else. That nothing made me realize what death would be like, and it freaks me out. Thinking about how someday I’ll just stop existing fills me with immense dread. I understand why some people are religious, it gives them an alternative to that dread.

Perhaps I won’t always feel this way.

Motherfucker, I’m not emotionally prepared to do the dishes

For death ? Yes, it will be the same as before I was.born.

The dieing might be horredous though,.so thats of some concern.

I’m just passively living life until that happens; so yes…

Couple months ago, I woke up to chest pain. Pain that I couldn’t get rid of. I’m going through my morning routine trying not to think about it, but it just keeps getting worse. Then it starts radiating out towards my left arm and I am feeling really nervous. I was going to text a friend, but then decided that it was stupid and just drove myself to the nearest emergency room (because of course I wouldn’t waste money on an ambulance, I’m an american, we live in hell). I came in feeling faint and dizzy and emotional and that blasted pain just kept getting worse. I remember the receptionist taking her fucking time.

Finally get a nurse to see me and she does a 12 lead EKG and has me hold up my sweatshirt while she’s applying them, and while she’s doing it, I end up fainting. I wake up almost immediately, but now I’m terrified. I told her I smoked a little weed to try to calm myself down, and now that’s all she cares about, wheels me back out into the waiting area so I can piss in a cup for her. At this point, I feel like they don’t care, my symptoms aren’t being taken seriously, and if I faint again, I’m gonna die in this shitty rural hospital.

So I piss in the fucking cup, fire off a few texts to people I care about, and I lay down on the hospital bed when just… a feeling of complete calm and relief descended upon me. Wherein I was like “well, shit happens, and not everybody can achieve all their goals. You were kind, and that’s all that really matters.” and there I was, just, completely accepting of what I assumed would be a swift death.

Then the doc came in and said “your EKG is fine, your troponin levels (when you have a heart attack your heart releases “help me” signals via this molecule, troponin) are normal, you just have a bad case of COVID.” I was floored. I mean, being sick is better than dying, but I was also just… ready to die? They disconnected my IV and shit and sent me on my way. Walked out into the night back to my car in such a daze.

But hey, I know when I die I’ll feel a sense of peace and relief that one can only dream of. Imagine winning the lottery and knowing you’ll be OK for the rest of your life. I imagine that it carries around the same level of peace I felt on that bed waiting for death.

Yes. Please strike me down where I stand.

This is an impossible question to answer with certainty for pretty much everyone. Maybe the extremely suicidal or the terminally ill, but likely not anyone else.

Death (and our perceived relationship to it) changes with our proximity to it. So, being existentially and emotionally prepared for death when you’re young is very different from when you’re old, and from when death is pretty much imminent. I would wager even people who report a high degree of confidence that they are prepared for their eventual death are less so (and likely much less so) when they are facing imminent death. I imagine the number of people who don’t experience fear when their death is imminent is actually quite low.

I have considered myself prepared for death for much of my adult life, but since sometime in my 30’s I have also accepted that I can’t predict my preparedness in the months-to-moments before I die. The existential threat of your existence ending is simply too dependent on its immediacy to be predicted with certainty ahead of time.