One of the most common occurrences involving contact with the deceased is known as an after-death communication (ADC). An ADC has been defined as “a spiritual experience that occurs when someone is contacted directly and spontaneously by a deceased family member or friend.” ADCs also go by the term afterlife encounters (AEs).
In a popular 1995 book titled Hello From Heaven Bill and Judy Guggenheim published the results of a seven-year investigation of ADC’s involving interviews with 2000 people. Based upon their research the Guggenheim’s estimated that at least 50 million Americans or 20% of the population have had one or more after-death communications. Among bereaved parents and children, widows and widowers, and all others who have grieved the death of someone they love, the percentages increase dramatically
Following are a few examples.
A widow in Oklahoma whose husband had died a week earlier felt him lie down on the bed beside her and put his arms around her. It seemed like they were reading each other’s thoughts. He let her know he was fine, that he would go on being himself, learning and building his life, and yet he would be waiting for her when she comes. .
A substance abuse counselor in Florida, while lying down and crying, saw her deceased sister standing at the foot of the bed. She was very solid and very real and looked better than she had ever looked. Just as it seemed she was about to lean over and say something comforting, with a whooshing sound she was gone.
A homemaker in Washington, who had had no contact with a friend for over ten years, woke up out of a sound sleep to see him standing at the bottom of her bed in a Navy uniform. She thought he had become a Catholic priest. He told her goodbye, that he was leaving, and disappeared. Three days later she got a letter from her mother saying he had just been killed in action. She found out then that he had been a chaplain in the Navy..
A receptionist in Washington had a moving experience with her father 18 years after he died of cancer. She and her husband had a music box given to them as a wedding gift because it was very pretty, but it was broken and never played. On their first wedding anniversary all of a sudden it began playing the song “Lara’s Theme” from the movie Doctor Zhivago. Then she saw her dad just as plain as day standing right beside her. He looked about 35 or 40 and had a huge smile on his face. He was only there for an instant and then he was gone..
A homemaker had an experience with her mother who had died of a heart attack at age 64. A week after the death her father told her that her mother had $5,000 worth of savings bonds hidden somewhere in the bedroom. They started searching in every conceivable place in the bedroom where they might have been but with no success. Finally, the woman concluded the bonds simply weren’t in the bedroom. Immediately she heard her mother chuckle and very distinctly say, “Oh, you dummies! They’re in the false bottom of the garment bag.” Upon looking, that’s where the bonds were. The woman’s father looked at her and said, “I’m telling you, your mother’s here!”
A clothing designer in Florida related that her mother who had died of cancer appeared in her bedroom. When she died she weighed only 57 pounds, but she now looked beautiful and appeared healthy and happy. She had on a blue velvet dress the woman had never seen before. Sometime later when she and her aunt were going through her mother’s hope chest, she came across a blue velvet dress and immediately started crying. Her aunt told her that this was the dress her mother had been married in. She had made it herself .
A nurse in the Southwest reported that she was given detailed information by her 2-year-old son six weeks after he died from a gunshot wound. He came to her in a dream appearing happy and healthy. However, he seemed older than his age and talked to her almost as an adult. The boy said that his tombstone had been mistakenly placed on a little girl’s grave who had died two weeks before he did and also that his name on the stone was backwards. The next day the woman went out to the cemetery and discovered there was no tombstone where her son was buried. She contacted the monument company who told her a tombstone had been placed on his grave. She then went to the caretaker of the cemetery who took her to a grave where, in fact, her son’s stone was. The caretaker determined from his chart that the grave belonged to a little girl who had died two weeks before her son. All the other tombstones were facing in one direction except this one that was turned around facing the other way. The woman said that to her son it must have looked like his name was backwards. The monument company then placed her son’s tombstone correctly on his grave
A telephone repairman in Florida had the following lifesaving encounter with his friend who had died in a car-crash two years before. On his way home late at night, after working all day, the man fell asleep while driving through some S curves. Suddenly he heard a scream to wake up. Upon opening his eyes he saw his friend sitting in the passenger seat. The friend was smiling and had light radiating from his body. The man looked forward just in time to see he was heading straight toward a house. Fortunately, he was able to navigate through the turn and avoid the house. His friend had saved him from the having the same thing happen that killed him (p. 260).
Almost all of the Guggenheim’s ADCs involved only one person at a time as the recipient, but in a few cases two or more people together in the same place at the same time perceived their deceased loved one simultaneously. These shared ADCs, they believe, provide credible evidence that after-death communications are genuine experiences with deceased loved ones and not products of overactive imaginations.
A business executive in Florida, feeling very much alone, was sitting in her hotel room praying for her deceased father the night before his funeral. Her friend and her five- year-old son were in the room. As she was praying the lights in the room seemed to grow dim, and suddenly her father appeared. He looked “very, very solid” and 20 years younger. Bluish white, rose, and gold colors radiated from and surrounded him. He told her to be strong, to take care of her mother, and that he loved her. After a few seconds the figure vanished. Her little boy, who she thought had been sleeping, ran to her saying, “My granddaddy! My granddaddy!” Your granddaddy is gone she told him, but the boy insisted, “No! My granddaddy was right here!” She realized he had seen him too
The Guggenheim’s commented that their research indicated that young children are far more open and receptive than adults to having ADCs. Therefore, it’s best not to argue with a child who insists he has seen, heard from, or perhaps even spoken with a deceased loved one because to do so might cause him to doubt all his future intuitive experiences.