The Myth About Death People Should Stop Believing

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

Although dying is a natural part of life, it's a taboo topic that most people avoid. It can be sad and distressing to think about a loved one no longer being around, after all. Because of that, there are a lot of misconceptions about what dying looks like. One of these myths is that death is a single-stage process. However, except for accidents — such as the agonizing minutes left after being bitten by a blue-ringed octopus (one of the worst ways to die) — dying happens in stages.

New Orleans-based registered hospice nurse Hadley Vlahos talked to Today about the realities of death while promoting her book "The In-Between: Unforgettable Encounters During Life's Final Moments" in 2023. While admitting she doesn't have all the answers, she said, "The vast majority of people will die of a terminal illness, not an accident," and the process is gradual.

In fact, researchers from University College London confirmed with a study on worms in 2013 that a chemical chain reaction creates a pathway of cell death. It spreads throughout the body until all the cells die, which takes time. Despite the researchers delaying induced death by blocking the pathway, they were unable to slow old-age-related death, likely because numerous parallel processes are involved.

The moment of absolute death is still hard to pinpoint, though. During an American Association for the Advancement of Science conference in February 2026, Arizona State University student Anna Fowler explained that consciousness after the declaration of death can last for hours. "Emerging evidence suggests that biological and neural functions do not cease abruptly. Instead they decline from minutes to hours, suggesting that death unfolds as a process rather than an instantaneous event," she said (via The Times).

Determining the exact time of death is just as complex as knowing what it physically feels like to die, which differs depending on the cause. However, it's possible to identify the stages of dying by observing the changes that occur as cell death occurs (which is part of the cell growth and division cycle).

"A couple of months beforehand, we start to see people eating a little bit less or sleeping more ... and just getting a bit more tired from everyday activities, basically," Vlahos explained. As a result of eating less, some people also lose muscle and weight, making them look thinner or more frail than usual. Confusion or delirium that lasts for hours or days can occur, accompanied by agitation and disorientation. Other noticeable changes during the last weeks of life include anxiety and depression, bladder and bowel issues, breathlessness, feeling cold or hot, and nausea and vomiting.

In the last days or hours, people often drink less or not at all, and even when they do, they could have trouble swallowing. Their skin may change color and breathing may become noisy, and loss of consciousness is even possible. Also, Vlahos says that some people may enter a "semi-comatose state" before breathing stops.

During the last moments of life, breathing is likely to slow and become irregular until it stops. "Our bodies naturally know how to (shut down). ... It's like how our bodies know how to go into childbirth; our bodies know how to die and they will naturally do that," Vlahos added.