My father died with a lot of unfinished business with his children and wife.  He was consumed with wanting to live and really never went through the stages of grieving.  Up to a few days before his death, he was still bargaining with God for more time.  My entire family was hurt by this man that we loved.  He neglected his family in favor of his friends until the day he died.  He said hurtful things to me and all the others, including my own children, until right before he died.  This was just the way he was. 

My daughter and I had a mutual experience the night he died, which I will write about separately.   

My father had a death bed vision before he died which I will also write about separately. 

After dad died, he came to my mother in a dream and slow-danced with her.  She described it as a split-second of him looking at her with unconditional love radiating from his eyes that enveloped her.  She said it was very real and she had never experienced or felt anything like that before. Anyone who knows my mother knows that this is about the last thing you would ever expect to hear from her.  Dad also came to my sister in a dream shortly after that I do not recall the content of. I do recall that it left her feeling loved and happy. I was feeling neglected and a bit jealous, so I asked dad to also visit me.  The very night I asked, he appeared in my dream.  He did not speak to me, he just patiently taught me how to change the oil in my car.  It was his patience that struck me, because he completely lacked that quality in life.  I felt loved by him and I felt his compassion toward me. 

The content of this dream was very significant to me because one of the cruelest things my father did to me involved this very issue (an oil change or lack thereof).  It was like he was trying to handle the event like he wished he would have in life.  What had happened in life is that I was a single mother of 4 kids who had come out of a physically and mentally abusive marriage.  I was flat broke, working 50-60 hours a week, in college full time and my kids were 12, 10, 8 and 7 years old. I was struggling with all my might to overcome the divorce and give my kids a good role model and a decent life. I was considering buying my aunt's car, but before I did, I asked my dad to look it over to make sure it was okay. My aunt was a widow and probably even more naive than me when it came to cars. My father did look at the car, but as usual, he let me know how much I had put him out by the request.  He also didn't really look it over very closely, and told me to buy it.  It turned out that the oil was drained from the car (we don't know why), and within a day of driving it the engine exploded.  It was freezing cold out when it happened, and I had made Christmas cookies for people and was delivering them out in the countryside in Minnesota.  I called him to come and pick the kids and me up.  My father screamed at me and blamed me and basically told me what a loser I was for not checking the oil.  He did this in front of my kids.  So, that is why the oil change thing is significant.  It was one of the most hurtful things he had done to me in my life when I was my most vulnerable.

Was this experience difficult to express in words?  Yes

The intensity of the feelings that occurred during the experience

Did you hear the deceased or hear something associated with the deceased?          No

Did you feel a touch or experience any physical contact from the deceased?            No

Did you see the deceased?         Yes

He looked like he did before he was ill, and when he was at his healthiest.  He also looked younger than when he died by a good 15 years.

            How clearly did the deceased appear?            Solid and similar to any other dream I had ever had.

            How much of the deceased did you see?       From about the waist up.

            Did the deceased appear or not appear to be the age at which they died?       He appeared about 15 years younger.

            How healthy did the deceased appear to be?            He was quite obese before he became ill and then became very thin and ill looking as his disease progressed.  In my dream he looked like he did at his healthiest.

            Is there any possibility what you saw was from any other source present in the surroundings at the time of your experience?           No

Did you smell a distinct smell, scent, fragrance or odor associated with the deceased?      No

How long did the experience last?        A few minutes, I would guess.

Was the beginning and end of the experience gradual or more sudden?         It seemed more sudden.

Could you sense the emotions or mood of the deceased?           Yes  He felt compassion toward me.

Did the deceased give you information you did not previously know?  No

How do you currently view the reality of your experience?           Experience was probably real

            Please explain why you view the reality of your experience as real or not real:           I know I was dreaming.  The qualities and characteristics of the dream were not any different from any other dream I have had.  It was the emotional component that was more real and more vivid that any other aspect.  I felt his compassion toward me, felt it deeply, and I had never experienced that in life. To me in most dreams, the emotions are somewhat muted.  In this dream, they were intensified.

            Was the experience dream like in any way?   Yes  It was a dream             

Describe in detail your feelings/emotions during the experience:           I was cautious at first.  I did not want to approach the vehicle when I saw it was him.  He had to somewhat coax me over.  Then I understood, without him saying a word, that he was being nice.  I relaxed a bit and let him show me what he wanted to show me and then I could slowly begin to feel his compassion toward me.

Was there any emotional healing in any way following the experience?           Yes  I understood that he loved me.

What was the best and worst part of your experience?      The best part was the feeling of love, compassion, understanding coming from my father.  There really wasn't a bad part to the experience.

Has your life changed specifically as a result of your experience?         Uncertain                  Describe:            It gave me a sense of personal peace in regard to my father. 

Did you have any changes of attitudes or beliefs following the experience?   Yes     It added to my belief that there is life after death.  It gave me peace about this separation from loved ones being temporary.

Did the experience give you any spiritual understandings such as life, death, afterlife, God, etc.?            Yes     This has been an evolution for me because of a handful of such experiences I have had.  Each time something happens, and in 45 years I have had 4 or 5 experiences, my belief that there is another dimension or reality of existence increases.  It reminds me that all the little things that upset me or worry me on an ongoing basis are a waste of time and that I need to focus on what is important.

Death Compacts are when two or more living people promise among themselves that whoever dies first will try to contact the other(s).  Have you ever made such a compact?        Yes

I made that compact with my father's mother.  The deceased in this case, was not included in the compact.

Did you observe or hear anything regarding people or events during your experience that could be verified later?          No
What emotions did you feel during the experience?            I felt like my father wanted me to know how much he really loved me.  I felt happy that he took the time and that I meant enough to him for him to make this happen.

Was the experience witnessed or experienced by others?           No

Did you have any sense of altered space or time?   Uncertain

I think in a dreaming state I always have the feeling that time doesn't exist.  It just doesn't play into the experience in any significant way.

Did you have a sense of knowing, special knowledge, universal order and/or purpose?    No

Did you become aware of future events?       No

Did you have any psychic, paranormal or other special gifts following the experience that you did not have prior to the experience?         No

Did you experience a separation of your consciousness from your body?     No

Did you meet or see any other beings other than the deceased?            No

Did you see a light?           No

Did any part of your experience seem to occur in a place other than the location described above?            No

Have you shared this experience with others?         Yes     I told my mother.  She didn't react in any particular way and was not influenced by my experience in any way I could determine.

Have you shared this experience formally or informally with any other researcher or web site?   No

 Is there anything else you would like to add regarding your experience?       No

Were there any associated medications or substances with the potential to affect the experience?            No

Following the experience, have you had any other events in your life, medications or substances which reproduced any part of the experience?         No 

Did you ever in your life have a near-death experience, out of body experience or other spiritual event?           Yes 

I have had other spiritual events. At particularly painful or stressful periods of my life when I had lost hope and when I felt I had no one to turn to, I have had spiritual experiences.  It happened once when I was a teenager, once when I was in my 20s and when I found out my father was terminally ill and 3 months after his death, as described here. 

1. When I was a teenager I was being really tormented and tortured at school.  It included having foul words and pictures drawn on my locker with permanent marker that stayed up for months, being tripped in the hallway and being called names constantly.  The names were attacking a physical characteristic I had (big lips) and were very humiliating. Going to school each day was torture and it lasted for weeks.  No adult ever came to my aid.  My English teacher tried but my parents did not follow through with meeting her and she let the issue go. I was in 9th grade and in religion class we had been given a Bible.  In the front of the Bible it had lists of struggles you might be going through, like "feeling hopeless" or "feeling unloved" and then it listed places in the Bible to read that would help with what you were going through.  One day I was doing so, in my room alone, feeling so horrible.  I was crying very hard and could not stop.  All of the sudden I felt arms embrace me and this warmth enveloped me and spread through me to the tips of my fingers and toes and to the top of my head.  It was a very physical feeling that started in the center of me and moved outward.  I became calm and peaceful and felt unconditionally loved.  Several hours later I became very ill.  Just like the love I felt physically spread through me, I felt a fever take me over suddenly and my lungs became heavy.  I ended up in the hospital with a pneumonia.  Everyone at school ended up feeling sorry for me and sent get well cards, etc.  By the time I went back to school (I missed a total of a month) they had cleaned my locker and everyone was nice to me again. 

2.  When I was pregnant with my 3rd child, I was going through a particularly rough patch with my husband.  I married when I was 19 and this event took place when I was 25, about 16 years after the previous event.  I was under a tremendous amount of stress due to working mandatory overtime, caring for my two other young children, and being in a very abusive relationship.  My husband worked night shift and I worked from 6:00 a.m. to 2:30 pm. and overtime on the weekends and sometimes after work.  He routinely woke me up when he got home from work, which was around 1 am because he would want to talk to me about work.  I was 8 months pregnant, chronically sleep-deprived, and recently the police had been called to our home because my husband got so violent that the neighbors called the cops.  When the cops arrived I had locked myself in the bathroom and was too embarrassed to come out.  I finally did and was handed information about spousal abuse.  My world was falling in around me and I had taken 3 children along for the ride.  I was so stressed and sleep deprived that I was having these episodes of driving and becoming lost and kind of waking up not knowing how I got where I was.  It was partially attributable to the fact that we had just moved as well, and I was going to another town to get home.  One time I was daydreaming and worrying on the way home and I turned on to the interstate which was the old way home.  I just started crying because I thought I was losing my mind and I was so stressed that I felt like I just couldn't handle things anymore.  Suddenly I smelled lilacs.  It was January in Minnesota and the scent was so strong that I looked everywhere to try to figure out where it was coming from.  I believe this was my maternal grandmother letting me know I was loved and she was looking over me.  She loved lilacs and the second I smelled them I knew it was her. It sounds like an insignificant event, but for me the feelings of peace, love and protection that are so strong during the event are what makes it special, real and significant.  These thing don't happen everyday, and therefore and I am left with what I would call a knowledge that I have been helped, loved or protected by something outside of this world.  Subsequent to this, I was placed on bed rest because my blood pressure was dangerously high.  My daughter was born healthy, but I was very worried about how the stress had affected her prenatally.