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When my father died, he had a waking dream of this. Saw a river with all his dead family across the water. Smiling and waving. Coming to the banks. Waiting for

When my father died, he had a waking dream of this. Saw a river with all his dead family across the water. Smiling and waving. Coming to the banks. Waiting for him to cross. His last words were “Cover me in a blanket of sunshine.” He died two hours later. What’s a little remarkable to me is that he had these visions in this detail despite being lifelong blind. As I was reading the article, I kept wondering which came first. Humans having visions of loved ones? Or the religions and stories that posit a posthumous reunion? I was theorizing that the visions were shaped by the individuals’ religious beliefs. The article offered one piece of evidence that my theory was wrong. The doctor claimed that almost no one saw Jesus or any other divine entity in their near death dreams. If this is universally true, then the religious beliefs about death & heaven are shaped in part by the dreams and not vice versa.

daniel-cussen 4y ago
[dead]
budgi4 4y ago
Similar thought about religion being established around these experiences rather than these experiences being a result of religion as the direction of cause and effect. The symbolic significance of boats in ancient Egyptian religion mirrors the river theme in a lot of the accounts with the sun god Ra travelling through the underworld at night.
Centigonal 4y ago
re: sibling: Almost like an end-of-life vision, I thought for a moment that Terry Davis was with us again.
virtualwhys 4y ago
> Cover me in a blanket of sunshine That's a truly wonderful, life affirming expression in the face of mortality.
rmason 4y ago
My late father had a dream where he said his brother had appeared before him beckoning him to come with him. He said I told him that I needed more time and he nodded. A few days later with all his relatives around him who flew in from all over the country we had an amazing day and he was in really good spirits. The nurses finally told us that evening we had to leave for the day so he could sleep. I was the last to leave the room and I heard him softly call out to his brother to say that he was now ready to go. He passed away sometime later that night.
- MrLeap 4y ago
  This is a beautiful recount. Thank you for sharing it.
- jgilias 4y ago
  My late grandmother used to see dreams of passed away relatives long before she died, as in decades. She told that she enjoyed having a good chat with them, and that the important part is to politely decline if they want you to follow them for whatever reason, as that would mean passing away. To her all of this was just common sense. Crazy to see it validated in actual research! Thanks for sharing your beautiful story!
  - andrepd 4y ago
    > Crazy to see it validated in actual research! Well a handful of anecdotes aren't "actual research". Not knocking it off per se, but yes, further research is needed. Also, I couldn't find a link to the empirical work alluded in the piece.
    - jaystraw 4y ago
      That would've been nice. If Kerr, as described, has had trouble presenting even his quantifiable metrics, polling his hospice patients and using statistics on the responses, to other professionals, I doubt there's a way to get published. Maybe an observation without a question?
  - 4y ago
LT_SPA 4y ago
> If this is universally true, then the religious beliefs about death & heaven are shaped in part by the dreams and not vice versa. However, it seems not explained why we will have this kind of dream.
- simion314 4y ago
  So people that dream a lot or remember their dreams will often dream about dead loved ones, This can explain why we would have a believe or hope that there might be something after death. Also some people can feel they are not well and they will die soon, it is normal to then have visions or dreams about something your mind is obsessing. We do not have a number here , so I expect the percentage of people that have such visions or dreams not too be to big. Some people tell about life flashing before their eyes, but for me when I had an accident and I thought I will die in that moment I just thought "fuck, what a stupid way to die", there was no flashes, but I was not injured too much so maybe those come after some chemicals are released in your blood.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
andyjohnson0 4y ago
Eden Rock By Charles Causley They are waiting for me somewhere beyond Eden Rock: My father, twenty-five, in the same suit Of Genuine Irish Tweed, his terrier Jack Still two years old and trembling at his feet. My mother, twenty-three, in a sprigged dress Drawn at the waist, ribbon in her straw hat, Has spread the stiff white cloth over the grass. Her hair, the colour of wheat, takes on the light. She pours tea from a Thermos, the milk straight From an old H.P. Sauce bottle, a screw Of paper for a cork; slowly sets out The same three plates, the tin cups painted blue. The sky whitens as if lit by three suns. My mother shades her eyes and looks my way Over the drifted stream. My father spins A stone along the water. Leisurely, They beckon to me from the other bank. I hear them call, “See where the stream-path is! Crossing is not as hard as you might think." I had not thought that it would be like this. The article gave me a new perspective on this poem. I had thought of the final line as the narrator's surprise at the way that grief affected them. But it could equally well be describing the narrator's experience of their own approaching death.
lynx23 4y ago
My eyesight started to deteriorate around the age of 7, and went completely away roughly 5 years later. I was always a rather visual person, but still kept my ability to visualize complex scenery roughly only for about 5 years. At the age of 20, every face I might have remembered was totally gone, nor was I able to crisply imagine things I used to know how they looked. I don't really want to muddy your memory of your father, but I highly doubt he really saw the vision he described in the detail that you imagine. More likely is that he found a way to translate his inner state in such a way that a sighted person like you could understand it. There are always exceptions of course, and I dont know what "lifelong blind" really mean. But if it means what I think, I doubt that the ability to visualize complex scenery suddenly reformed itself just for that occasion.
tpoacher 4y ago
I don't know if an update of N=1 will alter your posterior or not, but I have an uncle (not a particularly religious man himself) who had a 'dream' while undergoing risky surgery, that he had 'left', but saw his grandchildren praying to the Virgin Mary and the Virgin Mary interceded and sent him back. This is already weird, since, technically people don't dream while under the knife, unless the anesthetic has worn off. In any case, at recovery he was told there was a moment during the operation where he briefly 'died' on the table (whatever that means) but then spontaneously awoke and the surgery was smooth sailing after that. And it was indeed true that the grandchildren were praying to the Virgin Mary specifically at the time of the operation. I'm a bit fuzzy with the details because my information is second hand (my uncle's wife related the story to my mom, rather than me directly), but it is true that he had a terminal condition (I visited him in the hospital back when we thought he was close to going), the operation was not meant to be curative, only palliative, and yet somehow he's now completely cured and a changed man since that event. In any case, not claiming this proves anything, of course; obviously there could be lots of explanations; but I remembered it because it does disprove the "people don't see religious figures in these visions" claim (albeit with an N=1). That's not to say I haven't heard of many similar accounts, but those had all been 3rd party accounts; this is the first time it came from a family member.

daniel-cussen 4y ago

[dead]

budgi4 4y ago

Similar thought about religion being established around these experiences rather than these experiences being a result of religion as the direction of cause and effect. The symbolic significance of boats in ancient Egyptian religion mirrors the river theme in a lot of the accounts with the sun god Ra travelling through the underworld at night.

Centigonal 4y ago

re: sibling: Almost like an end-of-life vision, I thought for a moment that Terry Davis was with us again.

virtualwhys 4y ago

> Cover me in a blanket of sunshine That's a truly wonderful, life affirming expression in the face of mortality.

rmason 4y ago

My late father had a dream where he said his brother had appeared before him beckoning him to come with him. He said I told him that I needed more time and he nodded. A few days later with all his relatives around him who flew in from all over the country we had an amazing day and he was in really good spirits. The nurses finally told us that evening we had to leave for the day so he could sleep. I was the last to leave the room and I heard him softly call out to his brother to say that he was now ready to go. He passed away sometime later that night.

MrLeap 4y ago
This is a beautiful recount. Thank you for sharing it.
jgilias 4y ago
My late grandmother used to see dreams of passed away relatives long before she died, as in decades. She told that she enjoyed having a good chat with them, and that the important part is to politely decline if they want you to follow them for whatever reason, as that would mean passing away. To her all of this was just common sense. Crazy to see it validated in actual research! Thanks for sharing your beautiful story!
- andrepd 4y ago
  > Crazy to see it validated in actual research! Well a handful of anecdotes aren't "actual research". Not knocking it off per se, but yes, further research is needed. Also, I couldn't find a link to the empirical work alluded in the piece.
  - jaystraw 4y ago
    That would've been nice. If Kerr, as described, has had trouble presenting even his quantifiable metrics, polling his hospice patients and using statistics on the responses, to other professionals, I doubt there's a way to get published. Maybe an observation without a question?
- 4y ago

LT_SPA 4y ago

> If this is universally true, then the religious beliefs about death & heaven are shaped in part by the dreams and not vice versa. However, it seems not explained why we will have this kind of dream.

simion314 4y ago
So people that dream a lot or remember their dreams will often dream about dead loved ones, This can explain why we would have a believe or hope that there might be something after death. Also some people can feel they are not well and they will die soon, it is normal to then have visions or dreams about something your mind is obsessing. We do not have a number here , so I expect the percentage of people that have such visions or dreams not too be to big. Some people tell about life flashing before their eyes, but for me when I had an accident and I thought I will die in that moment I just thought "fuck, what a stupid way to die", there was no flashes, but I was not injured too much so maybe those come after some chemicals are released in your blood.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

andyjohnson0 4y ago

Eden Rock By Charles Causley They are waiting for me somewhere beyond Eden Rock: My father, twenty-five, in the same suit Of Genuine Irish Tweed, his terrier Jack Still two years old and trembling at his feet. My mother, twenty-three, in a sprigged dress Drawn at the waist, ribbon in her straw hat, Has spread the stiff white cloth over the grass. Her hair, the colour of wheat, takes on the light. She pours tea from a Thermos, the milk straight From an old H.P. Sauce bottle, a screw Of paper for a cork; slowly sets out The same three plates, the tin cups painted blue. The sky whitens as if lit by three suns. My mother shades her eyes and looks my way Over the drifted stream. My father spins A stone along the water. Leisurely, They beckon to me from the other bank. I hear them call, “See where the stream-path is! Crossing is not as hard as you might think." I had not thought that it would be like this. The article gave me a new perspective on this poem. I had thought of the final line as the narrator's surprise at the way that grief affected them. But it could equally well be describing the narrator's experience of their own approaching death.

lynx23 4y ago

My eyesight started to deteriorate around the age of 7, and went completely away roughly 5 years later. I was always a rather visual person, but still kept my ability to visualize complex scenery roughly only for about 5 years. At the age of 20, every face I might have remembered was totally gone, nor was I able to crisply imagine things I used to know how they looked. I don't really want to muddy your memory of your father, but I highly doubt he really saw the vision he described in the detail that you imagine. More likely is that he found a way to translate his inner state in such a way that a sighted person like you could understand it. There are always exceptions of course, and I dont know what "lifelong blind" really mean. But if it means what I think, I doubt that the ability to visualize complex scenery suddenly reformed itself just for that occasion.

tpoacher 4y ago

I don't know if an update of N=1 will alter your posterior or not, but I have an uncle (not a particularly religious man himself) who had a 'dream' while undergoing risky surgery, that he had 'left', but saw his grandchildren praying to the Virgin Mary and the Virgin Mary interceded and sent him back. This is already weird, since, technically people don't dream while under the knife, unless the anesthetic has worn off. In any case, at recovery he was told there was a moment during the operation where he briefly 'died' on the table (whatever that means) but then spontaneously awoke and the surgery was smooth sailing after that. And it was indeed true that the grandchildren were praying to the Virgin Mary specifically at the time of the operation. I'm a bit fuzzy with the details because my information is second hand (my uncle's wife related the story to my mom, rather than me directly), but it is true that he had a terminal condition (I visited him in the hospital back when we thought he was close to going), the operation was not meant to be curative, only palliative, and yet somehow he's now completely cured and a changed man since that event. In any case, not claiming this proves anything, of course; obviously there could be lots of explanations; but I remembered it because it does disprove the "people don't see religious figures in these visions" claim (albeit with an N=1). That's not to say I haven't heard of many similar accounts, but those had all been 3rd party accounts; this is the first time it came from a family member.