Does anyone have experiences that have made them believe in life after death?

[Magicpaintbrush]

My DH died in April. He had bowel cancer and was only 46 years old and not ready to die. I made the mistake today of picking up the photo album I made full of photos of him and I am having a really tough morning, my heart is absolutely broken. The only thing that gets me through the days is talking aloud to him and hoping that he is somewhere 'else' and can hear me or see me, but then I have moments where I think I am kidding myself and I am just a sad, grieving woman talking to thin air. I don't know what to believe, I hover between the two. But today I absolutely cannot and do not want to believe that there is nothing after death, I can't cope with the thought that he exists nowhere at all anywhere. He was so strong and had so much personality, it makes no sense. Does anybody have any personal experiences or know of any true stories that have led them to believe there is 'something' after we die? I would find it really comforting to hear from people that believe and have a reason why they believe. To those who believe we are just dust after death, you may be right, but today I can't hear that, and I don't need to be told that as I already know that is possible - which is why I haven't posted this in AIBU as I know the first 30 replies would be people rushing to tell me I'm deluding myself by hoping there is something more than darkness after we die. If anybody has anything to share that would bring some comfort today I am very ready to listen x

My boys (12&9) always talk about seeing Nana .. my mum who passed about 4 years ago. I always felt my younger one did it to help me, but my eldest has a severe learning disability and zero concept of telling a white lie to help someone! He will always tell me he saw her at big events like family holidays abroad, which she would have loved to be part of. Her animal was always a robin, and when she was alive & we spoke about her coming back (terminal illness) it was always as a robin. The ones I have been absolutely broken & doing my washing up, lo look out the window & see a robin looking back. Definitely my mum right there!

I have another. DSIS and BIL live in his Granny’s old house. The granny had just passed away around the time they met. About 5 years later they had kids. When my nephew was about 2 and a half he was playing in the garden and seemed like he was talking away to someone. DSIS investigated and he said he was talking to ‘the lady that used to live in our house.’ The thing is, he said her exact name, which was an unusual enough name and he wouldn’t have known it or overheard it anywhere.

Dear OP, Im 45 and I have stage 4 bowel cancer and it’s terminal. I truly, truly believe that there is life after death. If there wasn’t, what is the point in life itself? I get through it by knowing that I’ll see my beloved family again. I know that it will happen. I’m so very, very sorry that this has happened to you. But if you believe there is life after death, then there is xxx

My daughter was born sleeping in January 2025. It was such an awful time and I really struggled to accept that she was just gone, especially as I blamed myself as I got really ill around the time she passed. Over the year there have been a few signs that I have taken comfort in. The first being during a half term I took my kids to see some donkeys. All the donkeys were happily grazing apart from one who wandered over to the gate where we were stood. We were petting the donkey when I happened to look at her name tag.. she had the same name as our daughter. That was the only donkey that came up to us during our whole trip so I truly believe that it was a sign that our daughter is okay. That other is at the park the oldest were playing and my baby was sleeping in his pram. I saw something move out of the corner of my eye and look up to see a robin sat on the hood of the pram. The robin quite often comes over to us when we are at the park and hops around the pram or our feet. It truly makes me smile.

I'm so very sorry for your loss. I do believe the spirit still lives on after death. My mum died very unexpectedly a few years ago. It was a big shock and took all of us a while to really process it.
About a week later I was doing some housework and was thinking about her while I was vacuuming the hallway. When I'd finished I switched off the vacuum cleaner and turned around to find a big feather on the floor. It most definitely wasn't there before and there were no doors or windows open that it could've blown through. I believe it was a sign from my mum to let me know she was okay.

OP thoughts are with you and your DD. Grief is the most difficult emotion. It’s incredible we all play the lottery now and then but I bet given the choice between any amount of money or to have him back, with a body that works, you’d opt for latter.

He was far too young, it wasn’t fair on any of you. It’s not something you ever get over. Some days even years later hit like it’s just happened but every day often first and last thought.

The loss, includes loss of meaning, love, shared memories, having your person. How do you carry on? Answer is with great difficulty but you are never the same.

It’s important to believe there’s more to this life than we know. Makes it all seem that smidgeon less brutal. Until it’s our turn talk about him often and talk to him as much as you need. I can understand how sad you feel. Bug hugs x

OP, their energy and love is still with you, all around you.
When my best friend was in labour, and the baby went into distress, her father stepped out from behind her screen and comforted her until the staff had stabilised things. That was the second time he had appeared to her. He had died when she was 11.
Please do get some grief counselling; it will help you to cope. 💐

@Clocksgobackautumngirl sorry for your diagnosis. Hoping you get more good days than bad still.

There is a lovely scene in Rev, which is a comedy, in which the title character talks about life after death, likening it to a dragonfly which crawls out of the pond, stretches its wings and sets flight on a new and wonderful existence that was unimaginable to the being he was at the bottom of the water. He only wishes he could communicate this to those he left behind.
Grief, I think, is having nowhere to direct all the love you feel. You are doing the right thing by talking to your partner. It is simply a way of acknowledging all your love for him and sending it in his direction.

I am so very sorry for your loss.
I don’t have direct experience but will share what my mum told me. She was very close to death in hospital when I was about 3.

Whilst unconscious she described very clearly seeing friends and family members who had already died waving to her and smiling, seemingly waiting for her. One being her close friend and neighbour who had died very suddenly only months earlier.

Mum said she felt calm, warm and content and was happily moving towards them, something stopped her, and she felt as if she was moving away again.

She didn’t tell anyone at the time and only told me many years later having watched a programme about near death experiences, where people described similar episodes.

It gave her enormous comfort to have a degree of assurance that there was something else to come, and I truly hope that your husband had a similar welcome.

So much love to you and your daughter 💐

I lost a very close friend a few years ago. The night he died I woke up to feel his arms round me. It was the most incredible peaceful, warm feeling, like a light was shining on me.

It’s his birthday today, and here’s this thread..!

Sorry for your loss 💐

I can't say 'Yes' to your question but I can say I've experienced 'moments' when I've thought someone was 'close by'.

I sleep with the radio on and I don't need lot of sleep. I always used to wake up when one specific song played on the radio. My Dad loved this song. Years later, when my Dad passed away in tragic circumstances, just at the moment I realised there was nothing that could be done, the same song started playing on the radio.

My Dad had chosen a 'direct cremation' years prior but I couldn't bare the thought of him going to the crematorium on his own. I drove there even after after the funeral director said I wouldn't be allowed inside. Fortunately one of the crematorium staff, said I could have a final moment with my Dad and stand by his coffin. I said what I needed to, got back into my car, turned on the radio - the same song was playing. ♥️

So very sorry for your loss. I always thought I didnt believe in life after death but when my Dad died 36 years ago when I was 18 I just couldnt accept that his whole being and energy had gone. That just couldnt happen. I also asked, when I went to bed the night he died that he didnt visit me as it would scare me. He never has given me any sign but still, 36 years later I can feel that he's somewhere near, hear his voice, smell his hands (not sure if thats weird but I can!) I am not sure what is after but I know its not nothing 🥰

I’ve had a couple of moments. When I was pregnant the first time I dreamt I was going for a scan, only they didn’t scan my belly. There was a baby girl with dark curly hair, then the midwife said it’s time to say goodbye now and I gave her a kiss and then woke up crying. I miscarried not long after. When my stepdads mother was poorly in hospital not long after my daughter was born I woke up in the night and smelt cigarette smoke. I checked to see if any windows had been left open and none had. Everybody was asleep. I checked the time on my phone and messaged my mum for an update on her. She’d passed away a few minutes before. She was a heavy smoker. I believe both had said their goodbyes to me before they left. I’m so sorry for your loss xxx

I dreamt that I saw my neighbour walking down our road I asked her how she was as I know she had been unwell she said I’m fine now. I remember feeling really surprised to be seeing her in the street in my dream. We were not that close just neighbourly. The next day I found out she had died. I never told her family

The morning my mother died, we were gathered around her bed when she started smiling and reaching her arms up and then said ‘ok, wait for me’. When I asked who she was talking to, she said my dad had come for her. She died a few hours later.

I really really hope they are together again.

OP this came up on my FB timeline and thought of you 🫶🏻

A very close family friend died, she was 94, religious and had a wicked sense of humour. As her ashes were being lowered into the ground and the vicar was giving his speech his phone went off with the mission impossible theme tune. He was mortified and showed us his phone was on silent and he had no idea how it happened. We all giggled through the rest of the service. Then as we were walking away through the cemetery two dogs stopped in front of us and one was staring at us until its owner said ‘Come on Daisy, time to go’ and it trotted off. Our friend was called Daisy and loved dogs, it was 100% her having one last laugh and then saying goodbye.

I can't answer your question but found this comforting
""You want a physicist to speak at your funeral. You want the physicist to talk to your grieving family about the conservation of energy, so they will understand that your energy has not died. You want the physicist to remind your sobbing mother about the first law of thermodynamics; that no energy gets created in the universe, and none is destroyed. You want your mother to know that all your energy, every vibration, every Btu of heat, every wave of every particle that was her beloved child remains with her in this world. You want the physicist to tell your weeping father that amid energies of the cosmos, you gave as good as you got.
And at one point you'd hope that the physicist would step down from the pulpit and walk to your brokenhearted spouse there in the pew and tell him/her that all the photons that ever bounced off your face, all the particles whose paths were interrupted by your smile, by the touch of your hair, hundreds of trillions of particles, have raced off like children, their ways forever changed by you. And as your widow rocks in the arms of a loving family, may the physicist let him/her know that all the photons that bounced from you were gathered in the particle detectors that are her/his eyes, that those photons created within her/him constellations of electromagnetically charged neurons whose energy will go on forever.
And the physicist will remind the congregation of how much of all our energy is given off as heat. There may be a few fanning themselves with their programs as he says it. And he will tell them that the warmth that flowed through you in life is still here, still part of all that we are, even as we who mourn continue the heat of our own lives.
And you'll want the physicist to explain to those who loved you that they need not have faith. Let them know that scientists have measured precisely the conservation of energy and found it accurate, verifiable and consistent across space and time. You can hope your family will examine the evidence and satisfy themselves that the science is sound and that they'll be comforted to know your energy's still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you're just less orderly.
Aaron Freeman"

People have believed in life after death since time immemorial, you will be reunited with him one day xxx

I do Angelic reiki, I think that's what opened up the ability to allow me to see energy. I started as an open skeptic and after all of the spiritual things I have seen and experienced I am now a firm believer in the after life.

I used angel cards for a while after my Mum died and without fail I would get the hello from heaven card every time. I would shuffle them with my eyes closed until one fell out, because I wanted to be sure that I wasn't influencing it. It went beyond the possibility of chance.

So sorry for your loss, I haven’t posted on here before, but will add my experiences here in the hope that they bring you some comfort. Dad had Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia for about 8 years, but in the end he had a heart attack. He stayed with us for a couple of days after so we had time as a family, although he didn’t really recognise us by that point as the dementia was quite advanced. The afternoon before he passed he sat up in bed, and was smiling and waving at the foot of the bed, really quite animated. My sister asked what he could see and he said well it’s mum and dad, and my brother, and seemed amazed that she couldn’t see them. Mum passed last year, and we had a few weeks of odd happenings; a light which was on a sensor in another room would come on in the middle of the night (I thought it was the cat, but he was on the bed), a tissue with a red lipstick mark appeared in my handbag - my mums colour, I don’t wear lipstick, and I was desperately searching the house for a book of stamps. Turned my bag out, all the drawers, I said in frustration come on mum, help me out you always had stamps! Gave up looking, opened my bag to get my car keys, and you can guess what was on the top… thanks mum! What I didn’t realise at the time was that I had to do something to get the probate moving along, I do think she was trying to get my attention. Once that was sorted, it all calmed down so I like to think she went to be with dad.

I’m sorry for your loss.

At my grandparents’, there was an oil painting. It’s hung in the same place forever (a corner of the room, above the TV), and was my grandfather’s favourite. My grandfather died at night. When my grandmother got home after, she heard a bang and that picture had fallen off the wall. The string was intact, there was nobody in the room, and nothing else that could have caused it to fall off after all these years.

I am so sorry for your loss, your husband sounds like he was an amazing person. I don’t have any direct experience although I interpret some signs. I also don’t want to believe that there is no life after death. I have not had much time with my grandma, she died 25 years ago and I just think that I have to and must see her again.

I nervously decided to visit a medium. He asked me if I had heard any sounds coming from my wardrobe (I kid you not!). I was taken aback. I had been hearing coat hangers clanging together once or twice every night for months. I hadn’t understood it. He told me it was my grandad trying to get my attention!

I read a brilliant book called Autobiography of a Yogi. I remember a chapter where the young author was trying to save an ill goat (I think) by feeding it and tending to it. He had a dream whereby the goat asked him to stop trying to save him as it was preventing him from passing on. The goat said he had important work to do in his next life! (it may not have been a goat but you get the idea).

A relative passed away suddenly a few years ago. The shock was awful. I decided to meditate to try to calm down. This was 3 days after he passed away. I became the most calm I had ever felt. So serene. I saw that I was in Canada in the mountains looking down at a lake. Then my relative joined me, gave me a big smile and said he was ok. He started to fade from the scene. I asked him where he was going. He laughed and said he wasn’t going anywhere…then he faded some more just as my dh burst through the door. Some hours later I realised why I had sat in “Canada”. My relative had a dual passport for UK where he had always lived, but also for Canada where his dad had been born. He had never had the chance to visit. OP I hope this account and others give you some comfort that you can chat to your dh whenever you like. Xx