My Dead Mother Was the First Person to Wish Me a Happy Birthday
I’ll see you in my sleep: a 5-step roadmap to help you have a dream visit from your passed-on loved one.
They told me 1,133 days ago (approximately) that my mother had died, yet she was the first one to wish me a happy birthday on January 21, 2021.
In a dream.
This time around, she didn’t come in person as usual but instead left a letter for me on the dining table in my childhood home. Even as I write, I can still feel the softness of the paper in my hands and the love from her words permeating my being.
She wrote in red ink, with her beautiful chubby b’s and a’s. She told me she had been trying to reach me for a while but since I had not left her a forwarding address, she had not been able to contact me to send me little snacks as she had done when alive.
Since my mother’s death in 2018, I have met with her many times through visitation dreams, and this is not shocking because I had dedicated the previous five years learning how to lucid dream as though I had known that having this lifeline was the only thing that would tether me to life after she died.
You might not believe in the afterlife and that is fine.
In this article, I am not asking you to believe anything because visitation dreams go beyond religion or belief systems.
I am inviting you to investigate.
If you miss your loved one and yearn for their embrace, have words left unsaid, or just want affirmation that they are not completely gone, I am inviting you to become soft, flexible, open — and from this place — explore the possibility of reconnecting with them through the healing power of a visitation dream by trying out the steps in this roadmap.
How to make the most of this article
- Read the intro. Get additional context around dream visitations.
- Become very clear on your intention. Why do you want to have a dream visit with your loved one?
- Follow the roadmap. It’s a very simple 5 step process that shows you how to have a dream visit from your loved one. Nothing is set in stone, so please modify as you see fit. Take what resonates and leave the rest.
- Save the article and come back to it. You might have beginners’ luck and have a dream visit on your first night, if not, come back to this as many times as you need to.
- Don’t give up. Focus on the process.
Is death really the end?
There is something so final about death. One minute a person is here, the next minute they are gone.
Just like that.
The body becomes a shadow, a deflated balloon, a bag of bones and flesh that will decay. Given enough time, the elements will get to work with what is just now organic matter and decompose the body that housed — in my case — my mother.
Where is she? Is this really the end of her?
Just gone, disappeared into nothingness?
How do you begin to cope with the words “your mama is dead”?
In that moment language ceases to make sense. It is like a thick wall has suddenly barricaded your cognitive functions to prevent you from the destruction that is inherent in the words.
I woke up at 4:00 am on June 25th, 2018 to a barrage of 20 missed calls and that one singular text message that turned me into a zombie for the next six months.
I ate, I slept and I laughed but I was not there.
How could I be here partaking of this event we call life when my mother’s body lay 5,693 miles away (in Cameroon) buried under the weight of ~ 2500 pounds of red soil in an unmarked grave?
Visitation dreams: maybe dead is not really “dead”
“Six weeks after his death, my father appeared to me in a dream. Suddenly he stood before me and said that he was coming back from his holiday. He had made a good recovery and was now coming home. I thought he would be annoyed with me for having moved into his room. But not a bit of it!…It was an unforgettable experience, and it forced me for the first time to think about life after death.”
— Carl Jung
I met my mother for the first time in a dream two weeks after she died. This meeting happened during the wee hours of the morning in those precious few moments that allowed me respite from the elephant that had taken up residence on my chest.
She was different, yet the same. There was a solidness about her that had been missing in those last months of life populated by unending physical pain, terror-filled nights, and childlike innocence that had broken my heart.
We walked down a gravel road while her body lay a thousand miles away in a morgue in Silver Spring, Maryland.
As we walked, we talked.
When I asked her why she had died, with the composure of a philosophy professor, she said “it was part of the plan”.
I was furious and might have cussed her out. In either case, I abruptly ended the visit. We did not meet again for many months.
An underworld of darkness and unbearable anguish
In those days, darkness was my friend and faith was on a vacation. The terror of panic attacks became my new norm and life was full of landmines. A green pepper had ceased to be just a green pepper, and the color lavender was my ticket to the waterfall of tears.
In those months, the only dreams I had of my mom were nightmares.
How many ways can she die?
How many ways can you bury your mother?
It seemed like my psyche was playing a cruel joke because I had recurring nightmares in which I would see her alive and think her death had been a dream and then she would die in my arms in myriad gruesome ways.
Each time I would have to bury her all over again.
A new relationship with my mother
It was not until maybe a year or so later before I would see her again in a visitation dream and not the psychological projections of her in nightmares.
Then it became a constant: my mother, the sneaky woman that she was, was keeping tabs on my life.
When I met a new guy in 2020, she visited me in a dream, and I introduced him to her. she asked me where he was from and I told her. At that point, I had not told my dad and she told me not to tell him yet because he was from a tribe in Cameroon that was unacceptable.
Six months later, I was thrown into another dark night when the relationship ended. This time, she stole into my dreams during a quick nap. When I noticed her, I said “mummy, what are you doing here?”.
In the dream, I was aware that she was ‘dead.’
She acted like a child caught with her hand in the cookie jar and just shrugged as she said, “I came to wipe your tears away and let you know that your sadness will soon pass away”.
So, you see, it is not very strange to me that my mama wished me a happy birthday in 2021. I feel grateful and privileged to be able to continue my relationship with her through dreams and I hope through the steps in this article, you can also experience the extreme joy of a visitation dream that can nurture you for years, if not the rest of your life.
What is a visitation dream anyway?
A visitation dream is a dream in which your deceased loved one visits you. These dreams are very vivid and you cannot confuse them with regular grief dreams which include psychological processing.
Are They Even Real?
Naturally, no one can prove that there is an afterlife. However, there is enough evidence through research and anecdotes to support the belief that our passed-on loved ones can communicate with us through our dreams.
Belief in the afterlife is not a prerequisite to having a visitation dream which can provide you with emotional closure and peace.
There is nothing like a vivid dream visit to turn your ideas and beliefs about life and death upside down.
The good thing about these visitation dreams is that even if you don’t believe in them, no one will have to convince you once you have one. Here are anecdotes from The Dream Detective podcast Episode 9 on after-death visitation dreams as well as the words of McNara, a bonafide atheist, who had a visitation dream with each of his parents 6 months after they passed.
You can also investigate Jennifer Shorter’s doctoral project “Visitation Dreams in Grieving Individuals”, grief researcher, Joshua Black, Ph.D. who is one of the world’s leading academic experts in the field of grief dreams.
Roadmap: how to have an after-death visitation dream
Since 2013, I have spent hundreds of hours learning how to lucidly navigate the dream world through Jungian dreamwork, Tibetan yoga of dreams, workshops, books, and personal experimentation. This has ultimately allowed me to reconnect and form a new relationship with my mother and other loved ones who have passed on.
The tips below are essentially nine years in the making and it is my hope that by learning a few simple skills, you can also reconnect with your passed-on loved one and form a new relationship with them.
What you will need: A journal to write down your dreams and a whole lot of desire to reconnect with your loved one.
Step 1: The Invitation
Invite your loved one to visit you in a dream.
It is as simple as that.
Just ask them to come and visit you while you sleep.
You can ask them in the privacy of your thoughts, or in an elaborate ritual like creating sacred space for them in your bedroom and writing a formal invitation letter.
Step 2: The Mantra / Intention
This step uses what is called prospective memory: the concept of reminding yourself to do something in the future. When you repeat this throughout the day, you are priming yourself to remember your dream visit.
Many people say they don’t dream at night. The thing is, we all dream but we don’t remember. My mama is pretty sleek because, after each visit, she makes sure I wake up, so I don’t forget. You can also ask your loved one to do this when you invite them for a meeting.
Really, it is a simple yet profound practice:
- Throughout the day repeat your intention/mantra about 10 times (try to do it consciously). You can also set a timer or repeat it each time you do an activity like go to the restroom or put anything into your mouth.
- Before going to sleep, set the intention clearly in your mind to recall your dream visit when you wake up.
- Say to yourself as you lie in bed ‘the very first thing I’ll do when I wake up will be to lie still and remember my dream visit.’
It sounds simple, and really it is. However, it may take a little practice to engage the exact mental mechanisms required before you find it effective.
Sample mantra /Intention: I intend to reconnect with my mother tonight through a dream visit so that I can hug her and tell her how much I miss her.
Step 3: Remembrance
To amp things up, spend the day connecting with your loved one in some meaningful way. For example, you can;
- Cook their favorite meal
- Wear something that belonged to them
- Create a playlist of their favorite songs and listen to it
- Look at pictures of them
- Write a letter to them
- Visit their grave and leave flowers
Step 4: Winddown Routine
How you go to bed is important when it comes to dreaming and dream visits, because you take whatever is on your mind into your dreams.
Here is a simple winddown routine you can use, but feel free to modify it.
Bedtime: 10:00pm
- 8:30 pm — turn off screens
- 8:30 pm — 9:00 pm — last conversations with the people in your home
- 9:00 pm — 9:15 pm: sip a cup of soothing tea (mugwort increases awareness in dreams), while listening to relaxing music
- 9:15 pm-9:25 pm: complete any before bed personal hygiene activities
- 9:25 pm — 9:35 pm: journal about your day
- 9:35 pm — 9:50 pm: meditate and practice rhythmic breathing
- 9:50 pm — 10:00 pm: get into bed and go to sleep
Repeat your intention before you sleep and let the last thing on your mind be your mantra.
Additional Sleep Considerations
- Create a cozy sacred space to prep for sleep e.g., dim your lights, light a candle, light some incense, and put on some light soothing music.
- Journal for about 10 minutes about your day. The goal is to empty your mind of the day so that you don’t spend most of your REM sleep (dream time) processing your day.
- Ground and center yourself in any way you like. You can imagine roots going down from your feet to the center of the earth or you can imagine yourself wearing red boots (from my teacher Ron Young).
- Do a short breathwork exercise like the one below (breathe of love from Hilda Charlton). The goal of this breath is to soften and open your heart.
1. Imagine a nose at the center of your chest.
2. Take two quick breathes in and out through your heart nose and for the third breathe make it a long inhale and exhale.
3. Repeat for two cycles.
- Do a short 5 to 10-minute meditation like this one.
- Just as you’re falling asleep, quietly affirm to yourself in your thoughts that you intend to remember your dreams with your loved one when you first wake up.
Step 5: Morning Routine
To retain your dreams as completely as possible, you must first understand that dream memories can be as fleeting as your next breath of air. Therefore, whenever you start to wake up, be it in the middle of the night or first thing in the morning, do not open your eyes or even move. Instead, stop and focus entirely on remembering your dreams.
The ideal scenario is to wake up as naturally as possible, preferably without an alarm, but follow the points below if this is unavoidable.
Tips to help you remember your dreams
- The most important thing is to minimize all distractions. Lie still, allow your eyes to remain closed, and put aside any thoughts or worries about the day ahead.
- Under ideal circumstances, you will find yourself having woken directly from a dream, with a vivid clear memory of the events.
- If this is the case, remain still and mentally rehearse the dream, taking the time to go over the events and details, making sure they are firmly committed to memory.
- Once you feel comfortable that you have successfully memorized the dream, quickly get up, making sure your first activity is to physically record your dream in a journal. You can also use the voice memo on your phone.
- Work with whatever memories you have, focus on them, and extrapolate likely scenarios and connections.
- The trick here is to be persistent — keep going until you feel you’ve managed to retrieve as many of your dream memories as possible.
You just might get lucky and have your loved one visit you the first night you try this, but if it doesn’t happen, don’t sweat it. Having dream visitations will dramatically improve with practice so don’t be discouraged. Dreaming is a skill you can learn.
Visitation dream roadmap recap
The dream visitations that I’ve had, and have heard being shared were similar in that they were always profound and brought healing and comfort to the grieving dreamer.
See a recap of the roadmap below.
- Step 1: Invite your loved one to visit you
- Step 2: Repeat your intention/mantra to remember your dream visit
- Step 3: Connect with your loved one throughout the day
- Step 4: Perform your winddown routine
- Step 5: Allow yourself time as often as possible to remember and reflect on your dreams before opening your eyes or moving
My hope is that through this roadmap, you will learn the skills you need to have visitation dreams from your loved one and use them to gain nourishment for the grieving process and balance out the emptiness of the finality of death.
If you would like to dive deeper into this practice with a community, join me over at After Death Dream Visitations — a space to explore dreams as a means of reconnecting and evolving the relationship we share with our deceased loved ones.
