Dreaming of someone who died: grief dreams and how to live with them

How common it is to dream of someone who died

Dreaming of a loved one who died is very common, and research is starting to document it. In 2014 a team at Hospice Buffalo, a hospice and palliative care center in New York State, led by Scott Wright, surveyed 278 bereaved people who had cared for a family member at the end of life. More than half said they dreamed of the person they had lost, and most described those dreams as pleasant or as a mix of pleasant and sad.

The themes that came up most often were happy memories, the person appearing healthy and at peace, and scenes from the illness or the death. About six in ten participants said the dreams had shaped their grief, often by helping them accept the loss or by giving comfort. The study doesn't explain why these dreams happen, but it confirms what many families already know: there's nothing strange about dreaming of someone who's gone.

What grief dreams are usually like

Grief dreams aren't all alike, and knowing their most common forms can keep them from frightening you. In 1992 the psychologist Deirdre Barrett analyzed dreams about people who had died and described several types that are still a useful guide.

One of the most common is the dream in which the person is alive again, as if nothing had happened, and the dreamer feels surprised or confused. It tends to come in the first months, while the mind is still learning the absence. Other dreams bring advice or a short phrase, sometimes long after the death. And in some, the dreamer and the person talk about death itself, about where they are or how they feel.

• Dreams where the person is alive and life goes on as before.
• Dreams where they look healthy, young or calm, different from how you saw them at the end.
• Dreams with a short message: "I'm OK," "don't worry," a hug.
• Dreams that replay the illness, the hospital or the moment of death.
• Goodbye dreams, where you finally say or hear what was left unsaid.

Visitation dreams

Visitation dreams are the ones many people describe as a real meeting with someone who died, unlike an ordinary dream. They're usually very clear, the person looks well, the mood is calm, and sometimes there's a message or a touch. You wake with the feeling that you were together, and that feeling can last for days or for years.

People make sense of them in their own ways. Many religious and spiritual traditions experience them as true contact with the person's soul. Psychology sees them as something the grieving mind creates, bringing back the voice, the gestures and the love you carry. You don't need to choose an explanation for the dream to do you good. What is known is that these experiences are common, and for many people they're among the most important moments of their grief.

Staying connected: continuing bonds

For much of the twentieth century, many experts believed that healthy grief meant letting go and cutting the tie with the person who died. In 1996 the researchers Dennis Klass, Phyllis Silverman and Steven Nickman brought together studies of widows and widowers, bereaved parents, children and siblings in the book Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief, and proposed a different view: many people go on having a relationship with the person who died, and that can be part of healthy grieving.

Seen this way, dreams are one of the places where that bond stays alive. Talking to the person in a dream, feeling their company or asking for their advice isn't a refusal to accept the death. It's continuing to love someone in a new way while life moves on.

When a grief dream hurts

Not every grief dream brings comfort, and the painful ones are normal too. You might dream that you don't get there in time, that the person blames you for something, that they fall ill again or leave without saying goodbye. Waking from a dream like that can feel like losing them all over again.

These dreams often speak to what grief is still sorting out: guilt, anger, unanswered questions, the fear of forgetting. They aren't a message of blame from anywhere. If the death was sudden or traumatic, from an accident, violence or suicide, hard scenes and repeating nightmares are more likely, and talking with a grief counselor or therapist can help a great deal.

When you wake: how to receive and keep a grief dream

A dream about someone who died can be kept the way you'd keep a letter. Details fade fast after waking, so it's worth writing it down before you get up or check your phone. Over time those notes can become a small archive of meetings that stays with you.

• Don't move yet. With your eyes closed, let the scene come back: where you were, how they looked, what they were doing.
• Write down the exact words you heard, even if there were only a few. They're the first thing to go.
• Note how you felt in the dream and when you woke. That feeling is part of the memory.
• Add the date. Dreams sometimes cluster around anniversaries or hard moments, and seeing that helps you understand them.
• If you like, write back: a few lines to the person about what you felt.
• Share it with someone who loved them too. Many families tell each other these dreams, and it does them good.
• If the dream was painful, write it down anyway, then do something that anchors you in the present: a shower, a cup of tea, a walk.

If you don't dream of them

Not dreaming of someone who died is also very common, and it doesn't mean you loved them less or that they're angry or far away. Dream recall depends on many things: how much you sleep, whether you wake abruptly, the stress of the day. In the first weeks, the exhaustion of grief can leave you remembering almost nothing.

If you'd like to dream of them, you might look at a photo before bed, think of a peaceful memory, or keep a dream journal to remember more. But don't turn the dream into a test. The bond doesn't depend on whether they show up at night.

When grief needs support

Grief doesn't keep a fixed schedule, and its intensity usually softens with time even as the love stays. Sometimes, though, it gets stuck and makes life very hard. Diagnostic manuals now recognize prolonged grief disorder: in the DSM-5-TR, it applies when, a year after the death (six months for children and teens), the longing for the person or preoccupation with them is still intense nearly every day and keeps you from getting back to your life. Only a professional can assess it, and it's treatable.

Reach out to a therapist, a grief support group or your doctor if any of these sound familiar.

• Nightmares about the death keep coming back and cost you sleep.
• Months go by and you can barely work, eat or sleep.
• You avoid everything that reminds you of the person, or you can't think about anything else.
• You feel your life has no meaning without them.
• If you're thinking about ending your life or about joining the person who died, reach out now: call or text 988, the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, in the US, or call your local emergency number or crisis line.