My answer ... Well, I am not sure but after losing my daughter in a car crash, some things happened that it is difficult to explain.
She died late on a Friday night. On Saturday morning, my parents telephoned close friends who live in Switzerland to tell them the sad news. These friends had lost a grown up son to suicide two years earlier. The father said ' I had a dream last night (Friday) and in my dream a girl with long hair came to me and put her hand on my arm and said' Simon's okay.'
My daughter had long hair. This in itself just seemed a little bit coincidental to me, but very soon after I heard another account that I tied in with the first.
I had rung my daughter's Godmother on the Saturday morning - at about 8:30 - and her daughter had answered the phone. All I said to her was 'Hi, it's Janice - can I speak to mum please...' When my friend took the phone from her she went into another room, but when she emerged she was weeping. Her daughter said straight away 'It's Evelyn isn't it - she's dead isn't she?' Her mum said 'How did you know?' She replied 'When the phone rang I was having a dream and in my dream /I was standing next to a girl with long hair. We were in a dark place, but with a light at one end and there were lots of people walking towards us from the light. The girl said' I'm scared' and I said 'Don't be, they all love you.' She squeezed my arm and at that point the telephone rang and woke me up.
Coincidence maybe, but I feel there was a striking similarity between the two 'dreams' .
Soon after my daughter died, my mother suffered a heart attack and developed an aneurysm. She refused to be operated on - she was literally heartbroken that we had lost my daughter, they had been very close. Mum lived on borrowed time for another 13 months, but then was taken ill suddenly and admitted to hospital for tests. I visited her that evening and left expecting to see her the next day, but she died early in the morning. I went for a beach walk that day and ss I was kicking up the pebbles a noise broke in on my thoughts. It was a shout of greeting - just one word: 'Nanny!' I looked u at the skies and smiled and I said out loud ' You've met.' It was such an affirmation.
No doubt someone, somewhere will think this was all rejection and delusion, but it felt very real and very life affirming for me.