BLEU-BERRY

I posted this in the behaviors in bereavement section also so I am sorry for the repeat. I was wondering if any of you believe in our dreams, that our loved ones make contact with us through them? Do any of you have experiences? I have dreams about my dad pretty regularly, and I can easily pick out the ones that are simply just dreams. I can even figure out for myself why I would have the dream and what it meant to me. All of my dreams about my dad consist of him dying. He has cancer and looks very ill in every single one. In one dream, I was at his house taking some of his things to keep and he appeared to me and told me not to give up on him yet, that he wasn’t ready to stop fighting. I knew this was a dream, it was very fragmented, and I knew it represented the internal guilt I feel about not believing he would beat his cancer, or not having enough faith in God and miracles. However, twice I have had a very different kind of dream. After each, I wake up feeling a sense of peace that I never imagined I could feel after the death of my father. A huge part of my really believes it was him talking to me. In both, he was happy and healthy, just as he had always been. The first dream happened about a month after he died. I remember standing on his grave, standing where I was when he was lowered into the grave. He was there with me, just talking and bullshitting like we always did. I knew he was dead but I wasn’t afraid, I was just to happy to be with him. Towards the end of the dream, he leaned over his headstone and went on and on about how much he liked it. He told me it was so big, it was “like 40 inches long!” I didn’t think much about the dream. I woke up feeling so peaceful though. My boyfriend and I laughed at the idea of a headstone being 40 inches long. He didn’t have a headstone yet, but I knew the plan was to get a double headed one to include his wife. My boyfriend and I went to his grave later that day, and when we did, we decided to measure the double headstone next to his. Of course, it was 40 inches long! I also researched more online about those types of stones, and it turns out, one of two standard sizes for those stones is 40 inches. Unbelievable. I know it sounds like useless information, but I am an engineer and my father and I were both numbers people, so it makes sense to me that he would prove that it is real with a number. The second dream just happened two nights ago. I was out to dinner with two friends I haven’t seen in years. Out of literally nowhere, my dad was there. We gave each other the HUGEST hug and I said, “I miss you so much.” He said, “I miss you too.” He then told me that it was really important that I try to move on with my life now. I told him I would try, and he was gone. Any opinions? Any similar experiences?

Good Morning everyone, I was wondering if any of you believe in our dreams, that our loved ones make contact with us through them? Do any of you have experiences? I have dreams about my dad pretty regularly, and I can easily pick out the ones that are simply just dreams. I can even figure out for myself why I would have the dream and what it meant to me. All of my dreams about my dad consist of him dying. He has cancer and looks very ill in every single one. In one dream, I was at his house taking some of his things to keep and he appeared to me and told me not to give up on him yet, that he wasn’t ready to stop fighting. I knew this was a dream, it was very fragmented, and I knew it represented the internal guilt I feel about not believing he would beat his cancer, or not having enough faith in God and miracles. However, twice I have had a very different kind of dream. After each, I wake up feeling a sense of peace that I never imagined I could feel after the death of my father. A huge part of my really believes it was him talking to me. In both, he was happy and healthy, just as he had always been. The first dream happened about a month after he died. I remember standing on his grave, standing where I was when he was lowered into the grave. He was there with me, just talking and bullshitting like we always did. I knew he was dead but I wasn’t afraid, I was just to happy to be with him. Towards the end of the dream, he leaned over his headstone and went on and on about how much he liked it. He told me it was so big, it was “like 40 inches long!” I didn’t think much about the dream. I woke up feeling so peaceful though. My boyfriend and I laughed at the idea of a headstone being 40 inches long. He didn’t have a headstone yet, but I knew the plan was to get a double headed one to include his wife. My boyfriend and I went to his grave later that day, and when we did, we decided to measure the double headstone next to his. Of course, it was 40 inches long! I also researched more online about those types of stones, and it turns out, one of two standard sizes for those stones is 40 inches. Unbelievable. I know it sounds like useless information, but I am an engineer and my father and I were both numbers people, so it makes sense to me that he would prove that it is real with a number. The second dream just happened two nights ago. I was out to dinner with two friends I haven’t seen in years. Out of literally nowhere, my dad was there. We gave each other the HUGEST hug and I said, “I miss you so much.” He said, “I miss you too.” He then told me that it was really important that I try to move on with my life now. I told him I would try, and he was gone. Any opinions? Any similar experiences?

Thank you for your words of encouragement, they are very helpful. You are proof to me that things will never really get “better,” they just change and over time, you learn to cope. I think what a lot of people may not understand about death is that it is much more than just grieving the loss of someone you love. It is grieving the loss of your old life. It affects every fiber of your being. You are forever changed overnight, and its nothing anyone can understand until they’ve gone through it. I am having a hard time adjusting to this new life because it is so completely different than the life I enjoyed for 23 years. I graduated college, started my career, moved out on my own, and lost my dad all within 3 months. I literally lost every bit of my childhood in 3 months. Yes I know that everyone has to grow up sometime, but it was (is) too much to adjust to all at once. I literally feel like I went to sleep one night and woke up in the middle of someone else’s life. I miss my old life, I miss the way things used to be, I miss my dad. If losing one’s parent is a “natural” part of life, why does it feel so wrong to me? Things I have always taken for granted are hitting my hard. The thought of getting married and having children now without my father here hurts me and make me not want to do it at all. Things are just different now, and I don’t know how to accept losing so much. Ironically, my dad would be the person I would call and talk to about this. I don’t understand why he got cancer, but I have to stop asking and try to find my way in this new, unfamiliar world.

Hey friends, I am struggling today, so I thought I would come here and let it out. In a few days it will be three months since my dad died. It’s really odd because it feels like it’s been forever since he was alive, and yet at the same time I still have to convince myself it even happened at all. Sometimes I try to believe he’s just temporarily somewhere else, just waiting for me. But what if that’s not true? What if I never see him again after this life. Its tormenting. If you asked me today to describe a random person in my life, I could imagine them exactly as they are in my head with no trouble. But when my dad died, I had the hardest time just imagining his face. I couldn’t hear his voice, I couldn’t remember what we would talk about, his mannerisms, I couldn’t remember anything, no matter how hard I tried. My mom told me that she went through the same thing when her dad died, and its just us in a panic trying to hold onto whatever we have left of them. Now that time has gone by, if I really relax myself, I can imagine him just the way he was. I think its even harder now that I can because it makes the realization that he’s gone even more hard to bear. In my dreams, he is just as he was. It makes me miss him so much more. I spoke to my doctor about how angry I have been over my dad’s death and she gave me a great piece of advice. She said that it’s important for me to stop asking why this happened. She said that I will never find the answer and I will only become more bitter by trying, and she was right. I have been trying to keep that in mind lately, and it has helped. I know now that nothing I could have done would have saved him. Now, I’m just left to miss him. Things have become so much harder since he died. His possessions and estate have brought the worst out in everyone. His wife decided not to give my brother a car that he wanted, and my mother (they were divorced) took it out on me and we are no longer speaking. Its hard because I need all the support I can get from people and yet I’m starting to realize how untrustworthy a majority of people are, even if they are your family. It’s hard to lose someone you love to death as well as lose your faith in all the people you trusted ALL at the same time. Sometimes I just repeat to myself, “it will get better,” and even though I can’t see it now, I just have to continue praying that it will. Thanks guys.

Yes, after my dad died I became pretty obsessed with reading documented accounts of near death experiences. It was amazing to me because so many of these accounts occurred long before there was internet, so their striking similarities really struck a cord with me. It seemed that even though everyone's account was different, there were always shocking similiarites. One of these is the all-encompassing, non-judging, and unconditional love felt. Another is the fact that when they left their bodies, they no longer felt any more attachment to it. Although they dearly care for their loved ones, they didn't want to go back. They were also greeted by their loved ones. In each account, the description of God was the same, and it was unlike any God I have ever learned about from religion. Reading these accounts helped me greatly, and I would definitely recommend that all of you do the same!

I have just started taking prozac a week ago and already I have noticed a slight difference. Ill let you know how it goes

Hello friends, I have recently been referred to this board from a friend on a dailystrength bereavement forum. I wanted to say hello to you all and give you a short recap of what has happened to me and where I am in the grieving process. My father, who was 48 at the time, was always an extremely healthy man. I honestly only ever remember him having a cold or stomach virus a handful of times in my life. After the winter this past year, he was having a great deal of back pain that would not let up, and he thought he had hurt himself shoveling snow after one of our big storms. We all thought the same, and I repeatedly told him he probably had a dislocated disk. However, the pain continued and got worse, and he went to the doctors in April. After a month or so of testing, my father was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer that had spread to his pelvis, hips, ribs, spine, and brain. My father’s battle was not long, but was extremely painful for him and all of us. He was always a very laid back, happy person, but was a very different person once he got sick. It was so easy to see the pain in his eyes and the fear of leaving his family behind with so much left to see. He deteriorated very quickly, and a week before he died we were told that the cancer had spread virtually all throughout his body. This 3 months after diagnosis. He died of a brain hemorrhage about 5 days later. I feel guilty about the night he died because I repeatedly asked his wife and doctor why he was acting so funny. He was very joyful and was joking around and eating, which he never did ever since he was sick. He was exhibiting strange behavior and I asked the nurse to please watch him carefully after I left. He was on so many pain medications though that I never thought too much about it. The phone call I got a few hours later burns in my mind. As I’m sure some of you have experienced, being there to watch someone in their final hours adds a whole new aspect to the grieving process. I never left his side, but the visions of those 6 hours haunt me every day. I will never forget it for as long as I live, and watching him die has changed my life. Sometimes, it’s literally impossible for me to get the visions out of my head and they submerge me. It’s been three months since my father died. While I have gotten better in some areas, I remain stagnant in others. I have isolated a lot of people in my life out of bitterness towards their happiness, and I am very fearful. His death has changed me so quickly, and I never thought my world could change so fast. I do not look forward to the future anymore and I lack the drive and inspiration that I once had. I live in fear that all my beliefs in God and the afterlife have been a mistake, and it’s hard for me to know that Ill never know for sure whether or not I will be with my father again. At this point in life, I just feel like I’m in a lost state. I’ve had signs, I’ve gone to a medium, and these have helped, so I am just trying to take it one day at a time and hopefully find some answers for myself. Well, that’s my story, and I hope I can find more people to relate to in this forum. It has helped me tremendously to know that I’m not the only person who feels these feelings!

I contacted a medium after my father died and it helped me tremendously. I was very skeptical and nervous about it, not because I do not believe in it, but because its hard to find an authentic medium. I know there is a huge stigma about mediums, that it is going against God’s will and it is fake, but in my situation, I looked at it the following way. I had always been very interested in mediums growing up and I always wanted a reading eventually. I figured, what better time than now? Either I will spend the money and she will be fake, and I’ll know once and for all that I can let that hope go, or she will be real and it will bring me great comfort. I admire all of the people that never let go of their faith in God and the afterlife when faced with the challenge of losing their parent, but I was not one of those people. I was (am) devastated and I was very angry. My father’s death was horrible and I was angry that my young father had to deal with such a horrible sickness. I was angry at God, whether or not he was there to know it, and most importantly, I was so afraid. I was terrified that I would never get the chance to see my father again. I have learned that there is nothing scarier in life than living with no faith or living your life in question. This is why I went to the medium. This was MY way of figuring it all out. I went to Denise Lescano in Florida, who is even more expensive than the medium you are researching. Although there are things she said that I cannot figure out, a majority of the reading was right on the money and brought me a great deal of healing. No, it is NOT a quick fix to the grief process… I don’t miss my dad any less. I also fear that I was researched, because I am paranoid like that and who knows what you can find on the internet. In my heart, I don’t think I was researched, because I feel that some more “obvious” facts would have been brought into the reading, and there were things she said that only my dad would have known. Not to mention she brought 3 other people through who weren’t even always related to me, but I knew exactly who they were and it was great to hear from them. I personally do not feel that it is against my religious faith to do these readings, but everyone is entitled to their own opinions. This was the boost I needed to restore my faith during a very, very dark time in my life. I am getting another reading done in march with someone else. I am also planning on using a fake name and everything just to prove it to myself once and for all that it is real. I suggest you do the same, and good mediums even encourage you to do that. Overall, I couldn’t be happier that I did the reading and plan to continue doing them. Good luck with whatever you decide.