Three times. That's the estimate the Ministry frontman gives when asked how many times he's died. He says he knows, unequivocally, that he has been clinically dead three different times. This isn't hyperbole, either. There are hospital records to back up Jourgensen's claim. The one that really got to him, though, was when one of his many, many bleeding ulcers burst in his stomach, taking a good bit of his main artery with it. He lost nearly half of his blood and was seizing out of control. When the paramedics arrived to find him in a pool of his own blood, they said there was nothing they could do. They just hoped to get him to the hospital in time for a miraculous save. Somehow, even though his heart rate was 30 over 20 (which, we've been told, is not so good) and had been "flatlined" for a good chunk of time, managed to bring him back.
"There was one theory put forth by a journalist recently. I have a lot of friends that have died prematurely, and a lot of friends that have died of natural causes. I've lost a lot of people over the years. This journalist basically recommended to me that God keeps me around because I amuse him. He keeps giving me cat lives. I'm on three, I've got six to go. I don't want to hit nine. Trust me, I don't want to be a cat. I'll settle at three and I'll leave it at that."
So what about those other two times he died? Says Jourgensen: "I think I was just too f*cked up to know I was dead."
