The Healing Magic of Grief Dreams

By Alan Siegel

Remembering and exploring grief dreams can help us discover meaning and hope during a time of despair. When someone close to us dies, we begin a process of grieving that may last for months or years. Although grief nightmares can be painful, exploring our dreams can help us recover from the devastation of loss and lead to a deeper resolution of our relationship with the person who has died.

If we pay attention to our dreams we can observe vivid appearances by the dead person. They may be calling out to us in pain or sadness or appearing serene in otherworldly surroundings, suggesting they've made it to a heavenly place of repose.

In some cultures, events during dreaming are considered to be a crucial part of the process of grieving. Bereaved members of the Negrito tribe of the Philippines do not hold a funeral feast until the dead person appears in several dreams of their close relatives.

In contemporary urban Thailand, after a death, family members discuss their dreams together to hold on to their connection with the deceased. This informal ritual of dream sharing promotes emotional sharing and facilitates the resolution of grief.

For those people whose religious beliefs include an after-life and possibility of true contact with dead spirits, these dream encounters offer a possibility of working out their unresolved issues with the dead person before their spirit fades.

We don't have to wait for the deceased person to make an appearance in our dreams to benefit from the wisdom of our dreams. Deeper exploration of almost any of our dreams during the period of acute grief can be beneficial.

Early in the grieving process, the appearance of the deceased person in a dream is disturbing. When we awaken, the contrast between the dream and the fact of the person's death is jarring. The person seems so real in our dreams, more alive than ever.

Common dream themes in the middle stages of mourning include struggling to communicate with the dead person and expressing unresolved feelings of grief, anger, or guilt. Memories of past losses, such as earlier deaths of important people, may surface.

When a resolution is reached in the process of letting go of our attachment to a loved one, dreams can help us to confirm a sense of resolution. Dreams that herald this breakthrough may include some of the following themes.

1. Peaceful images of the dead person from an earlier era, usually prior to illness or aging;
2. Appearances of the dead person as an angel, benevolent ghost, or spiritual being from a realm apart from the living;
3. Words of comfort from the dead person or a sense of reassurance from the circumstances that the dead person appears in;
4. A focus on some positive quality of the dreamer's relationship with the dead person;
5. Forgiveness emanating from the deceased person or from the dreamer;
6. Receiving a gift or specific reassuring message from the dead person.

The death of a child has been called one of the most unbearable stresses that can face a person. After months or even years, when a parent has traversed the stages of grieving they begin to have dreams which suggest that a resolution is taking root. Renowned dream researcher, Dr. Rosalind Cartwright, experienced the tragic loss of her 28 year-old daughter, Christine, who had only recently received her PhD. In the middle of the night, she received a horrific call from the police informing her that her daughter had been killed by a speeding driver.

At first, she was unable to dream of her daughter. The images were blocked due to the overwhelming magnitude of loss. Gradually, she began to dream about Christine and an amazing evolutionary process occurred. She witnessed her daughter growing up in a long series of dreams. Her initial dreams portrayed Christine as a toddler in trouble that needed to be rescued by her mother. She pulled Christine out of the toilet, saved her from a car accident and protected and comforted her in other ways. As time passed, Christine appeared older and older. After a number of months, she had a vivid dream which helped her break out of her grief and realize that she could not save her daughter and the death was not her fault. Here is her dream:

Cartwright found the dream extremely comforting. The words and presence of her daughter were not only reassuring but mirrored her daughter's personality and way of speaking. This breakthrough dream was the last in her series of grief dreams. "The threat and rescue dreams turned to acceptance and appreciation" and this transformation of her dreams about her daughter heralded the resolution of her grief.

In the midst of our sadness and desolation, dreams help us find meaning and see the spiritual side of our grief.