P.M.H. Atwater

P.M.H. Atwater (born Phyllis Marie, September 19, 1937) is an American researcher of the near-death experience who is also a three-time experiencer, having reported three NDEs during a period of serious illness in 1977.

Beginning systematic fieldwork in the late 1970s, she interviewed thousands of adult and child experiencers and became one of the field’s early independent investigators, writing for a popular audience in books such as Coming Back to Life (1988), Beyond the Light (1994), and later works on children’s NDEs.

Atwater is best known for shifting attention toward the aftereffects of near-death states — the physiological, psychological, and lifestyle changes experiencers describe afterward — and for documenting less-discussed varieties, including distressing or “hellish” NDEs and the experiences of children.

FLAG: her stance is that of an experiencer-researcher rather than a clinical scientist, and several of her broader claims (such as NDE-induced brain changes and generational “new children” theories) are speculative and not established within mainstream science.

Treated as a sincere, firsthand-informed investigation, her aftereffect typologies have been influential in the experiencer community, while their evidential status remains contested.