Death, the final frontier – to change a quote from an old TV series, if you’re a Trekkie, then you will know it. But is death the final frontier, the end of us? Or is it just the end of our physical body, the vehicle that we currently use? Like with the victims of Spontaneous Human Combustion in our last episode? Death. The word itself seems so final. Dictionary.com gives this definition of death, it says; “Death is the permanent cessation of all biological functions that sustain a living organism”

Many, many different religions or belief systems throughout the world, teach that we’re not merely this physical body that we currently inhabit, that we are much, much more than that. That this physical body we currently inhabit is merely a vessel we use for whatever reason, much like we use a car to get from point A to point B. They see our bodies as no different than that. Of course you have to take good care of your car, maintain it, get it regularly tuned, give it fuel so it functions at its optimum. We, in that respect are no different. If you want to look at it from that perspective. But, this episode is not about going into religious or spiritual beliefs on the continuation, or not, of life after the physical body ceases functioning. It’s about life after death. Does it actually exist? And if so, can our loved ones let us know they are still around?

It is however, about the different ways that our loved ones can let us know that they are still around us. And, speaking for myself, I have no doubt that life exists after this one and to me that death is merely a transition from one vibrational state to another. But, I do know that many of you listening to this episode don’t hold the same beliefs, even some of the experiencers who shared their experiences themselves, didn’t initially believe either. But their experiences have brought them comfort, given them warnings of future events to come, or simply to reassure their grieving loved ones.

In this episode I’m not trying to push my beliefs, I am merely sharing experiences, including my own. It is up to you all to decide for yourself what you chose to accept or not and that’s how it should always be. Having said that, are you ready to walk with me into this part of the shadowlands and see what awaits us there? Then let’s begin.

Signs From the Other Side

There’s probably one question that I get asked the most as a medium, and one I was specifically asked to write a document about, by group members of the ‘Walking the Shadowlands’, my Facebook group ­– from which this podcast gets its name. Most of us have at least one person we know, a loved family member or a friend who’s passed on from this stage of life. It’s not at all uncommon for us to wonder do they still exist and if they do, are they ok?  Are they able to do what they perhaps could not do here in this life – due to perhaps ill health, or whatever reason? Do they still love me? Are they thinking of me from time to time? Can they hear me if I talk to them? Will they let me know if they are around? How can I tell if they are around me? So many questions most of us have, around people we have loved who are no longer present with us. One of the biggest and saddest I hear so often is; do they know how much I love them? There is a saying that really resonates with me. Enough that I created a poster with it written on for my group members:

“Grief is just love without a home”.

I don’t know who said it, but it rings very true for me, in my personal life. When that person, or people who we loved absolutely, are no longer physically present, where do we put that love we have for them? Those feelings of love don’t cease when that person is no longer with us and so we grieve, we hurt, we cry and try to adapt to a life without that loved one here with us.

We all need to know that our loved ones be they family, or friends, or pets, are still living even if not they’re not here with us physically. That they can still feel the love we have for them, hear us talking to them or about them. That they know how much pain we feel at their passing, and the void they’ve left in our lives. We need to know that this vibrant person who gave so much colour to our life, no matter how short a space of time they were with us, or how they passed over, that they are ok. That they are safe and loved where-ever they are.

Because they loved us also, they do try and reach out and let surviving friends, partners or loved ones know that they continue to exist and that they are ok, and they still love you. I know it sounds trite, but love is all you really carry with you from one existence to another.  Our loved ones can come back and visit us for many reasons, not the least of which is to reassure you that they still exist and still feel your love. It’s actually very, very common for people to experience loved ones letting them know that they’re still around. So in this episode I am going to go over some of the more common ways that our loved ones, pets included, can let us know that they’re around. I’ll provide examples that people have been kind enough to share of most of the ways.

Dreams

Possibly the most common way, that our loved ones will let us know they are still around is via our dream state. As we sleep our energetic vibrations rise to a higher level than when we are awake, closer to the vibrational plane that spirit exists on. Also, while we are sleeping our conscious mind does not interfere with spirit communication as it can when we are awake. So many, many people get visits from loved ones in their dreams.

Often they are given messages that reassure them, or information that they may need to know – like where that will or important paper is kept. Sometimes they don’t talk, but their mere presence is reassuring enough for the dreamer, and they feel the love and reassurance coming from off their loved one. Also, often in the ‘dream’ the deceased loved one is surrounded by some sort of bright light. For a lot of people, this type of dream stands out and is very different to their regular dreams. More vivid. More realistic, and you often hear them say, it was just like they were standing there – as indeed they were.

My dream visitation

When I was in my late teens, I had a very, very dear friend. His name was Wade, he was at University, in Hamilton where I used to live. He was an incredibly intelligent kid, who was originally from Canada and his mum, brother and sisters came to New Zealand to live. We were very good friends, and truth be told, I had a big crush on him, but he never saw me as anything other than a friend and I was actually ok with that.

I had a small flat or apartment, that I lived in and I remember often Wade would turn up at my flat in the late evening hours, because, he just lived around the corner from me. Asking if he could use my bath, as they only had a shower and he was having tremendous back pain. Soaking in the bath seemed to help a wee bit. Of course, I was happy to let him do that, but, the nurse in me immediately would kick in and I kept telling him he needed to go to the Doctor’s and get checked out.Eventually he did, when the pain got so bad that he was unable to tolerate it and had difficulty walking, initially the Docs told him pretty much it was all in his mind. I kept pushing him to go to another, because, my gut was telling me something was terribly wrong with him. So he did and was diagnosed with a very aggressive cancer, in his spine that within weeks of diagnosis had left him paraplegic and within months he was dead.

In his last weeks he was in the hospice ward at the hospital I worked at. In fact, I had to go past his floor to go on duty, ‘cause, I was maybe two floors above him. So every day on my way on duty and my way off duty, I would go in and visit him for a little while, as much as he was able to deal with. One morning as I was going of night shift at 7am, I was absolutely exhausted. It had been a really, really rough shift and I thought I’d see Wade later on in the day, rather than on my way home. Even though my gut instinct was telling me I needed to go and see him on the way home. I walked down the stairs and as I got to the landing where his ward was, I was just so pulled to go in and see him. And I thought…. I was really torn, because, I was so tired and I didn’t want my tiredness and my heavy energy to affect him. And, I was just so tired. So I thought, oh it’s alright. I’ll go and see him later in the day when I wake up. He died a few hours later, that morning. I was absolutely gutted and guilt-ridden that I had missed saying goodbye to him, and telling him how much I loved him and valued him as my friend and having him in my life. How much richer and more colourful he had made my life. All I wanted was the chance to let him know how much he meant to me. It really hurt. And, recounting it now, to you all, it brings those feelings back up again.

One night, some weeks after his passing. I went to bed early in the evening to try and get a few hours sleep before I had to go back into night shift. Immediately when I shut my eyes, I found myself in this huge room. It was like an auditorium. There were people dressed in white, busily moving back and forth. Talking in groups doing things I couldn’t see. The room was full of them all looking very busy. And a lot of conversations were going on as well. The light in this room was incredibly bright, brighter than any light I’ve seen here in this reality, but it didn’t hurt my eyes at all.

To my left and behind me I heard a woman say; “There here is. Tell him what you need to say to him!” I never saw her and for a minute I had no idea what she was talking about, or indeed, where I was. I turned to look at her, and felt hands on my shoulders turning me around in the opposite direction. As I turned the crowd of people that previously had been moving in front of me, sort of parted and I no longer saw them. Instead, there standing in front of me, was Wade.

But, it wasn’t Wade as I remembered him, thin, emaciated, with no hair. In front of me, not three feet away was a beautiful young man. In the prime of his life, full head of hair with the biggest, most loving, compassionate smile on his face. In fact, as I’m recalling this, I’m…. I can see his face vividly, in my mind, how he looked.  I was stunned. I had not expected to see Wade. He said nothing, but just stood there looking at me with these waves of love and compassion washing over me, from him.

The woman behind me again repeated; “Now is your chance, tell him what you need to say.” It was at that moment that I realized this was not a dream, that I was actually in some other reality, out of my body in some way or another. So telepathically, I told Wade, that I loved him, over and over.  That I had always loved him and that I was so sorry I never saw him the morning he died. That I didn’t get the chance to tell him how much he meant to me, or to say good bye.

He stood there for a minute and simply nodded his head in acknowledgement.  And wham! I was jolted awake instantly in my bed. But my body felt sooo heavy. It was like, a struggle for me to move my arm, my finger, or any of my limbs. A feeling that lasted me hours, as I biked to work that evening and for most of my shift that night. It felt like I was struggling to walk through treacle. My body felt so heavy. I realized pretty quickly that I had gone into this other realm and I had seen Wade.  I’ve never seen him since, there has been no need. But I think of him from time to time and I know he’s ok wherever he is.

Wade was the first loved one I saw after their death, but certainly not the last. Since Wade’s death I have had four other people I love pass over, both my parents, my grandmother and most recently, my ex-husband just a couple of years ago. Up until his death, we remained very good friends and in fact, he came to tell me, that he was passing over shortly, days before I heard from his brother in North Carolina, that he’d been admitted to hospice care. But, that’s another story and I was back home in New Zealand at that stage, while he was back living in North Carolina.  My experience certainly is not unusual; many people see loved ones in their dream state as previously mentioned for a number of reasons.

Tongyasorb, a contact on Reddit from a previous episode, messaged me with her experience of seeing her father not once, but three times in a dream after his death. She was kind enough to allow me to share her experiences with you all today, but was a bit shy about sharing them personally. So these are her words.

Her first dream.

I tried and tried but could not think of a way to describe the three incidents involving my Dad that would not be VERY wordy and long. So I am going to just tell you about one at a time. First one; a year after Dad died. I came home to visit on my vacation. Got in late and sat up at the kitchen table talking with Mom till 3 in the morning, then went to bed in my brother’s room because he was staying at a friend’s house. Woke to someone knocking at the front door. No one answered. They knocked again. Someone had closed the door to my bedroom so I got up and opened the door.  And went through the house to the front door.

 It was my father. He was wearing a zip up golf jacket, like a windbreaker, and he had a huge green vase in his hand. He walked in, nodding to me, and I turned and followed him as he walked out to the kitchen where he set the vase on the kitchen table. “Dad!” I finally said. “You’re DEAD!” “I know, I know,” he replied, with this kind of irritated way he had of speaking when he was dealing with his kids. (My oldest brother told me once that until he was twelve years old he thought his name was ForChristSakeMike). Then he said “ I just stopped by to see how everyone is doing?”

I stood there stunned, searching for how to reply to my dead father who just asked about the family’s progress since he died. Then, I haltingly tossed out some tidbits of info as they came to me: “Well, so and so graduated from college, and so and so graduated from high school and well, so and so had a baby boy and is pregnant again…”

And he was heading back toward the front door. I hurried barefoot after him saying “Dad! Don’t go until someone else comes to see you! They’ll never believe me if they don’t see you too!” But, he said he had to go and sure enough there was a taxi cab idling in the road out in front of the house. As he walked down the steps from the porch and out toward the cab, I noticed the pants he was wearing with the jacket were the pants of the suit we buried him in, and the seat of the pants was ominously baggy. He got in the cab and it drove him away. I woke up.

The door of the bedroom had been closed, so I got up, still freaked out about the dream that felt SO REAL, and opened the door and walked out into the living room. No one was home. I went to the kitchen to see if Mom left me a note, and there on the kitchen table was the green vase. The very one, to the last detail. I don’t know how long I stood there staring at the vase or what my face looked like, but the back door opened then and my brother entered the kitchen. He said What’s the matter with you? I couldn’t think what to say so I just pointed at the vase. He said, “Yeah, I found it in a box going through some things in the garage, so I brought it in. What’s the big deal?”

 I told this experience to a friend and said so I thought my Dad had visited me. He said either that or you psychically picked up on what your brother was doing. You could have been dreaming about your Dad because it was the first time you were home since he died, and picked up psychically on your brother’s activities and folded it into the dream you were having.

Second dream

Ten years after the first dream of my father, I was asleep in my apartment on a Saturday night. I woke (not realizing yet that I was dreaming) because I heard someone washing dishes out in my kitchen, so I rose and walked to the kitchen to investigate. The apartment was part of a one-hundred-year old house and the kitchen was huge, and as I entered I saw my father across the room from me standing at my sink with his back to me, a dish towel draped over one shoulder, washing dishes.

This made no sense because — besides the whole death issue — I had washed all my dishes and put them away, so what would he be washing? He glanced over his shoulder as though to acknowledge my presence. As it happened I had seen two different TV shows in the previous month where the female characters woke to find their deceased fathers in the kitchens. So I had a lucid moment and reflected to myself: this is only a dream. I’m just dreaming of a father in the kitchen, like I saw on TV.

Dad rinsed the last glass and stacked it in the draining tray. He drained and rinsed the sink, turned off the water, and turned to face me. he leaned back and propped his rump against the sink front and crossed his legs at the ankles, pulled the towel down off his shoulder and started drying the suds off his hands. I was standing around fifteen feet away from him barefoot in my nightgown, and just enjoying the dream, and he was looking into my eyes with an unprecedentedly peaceful, almost serene quality about him. And I got the overwhelming sense that it was actually him and I was actually looking into my father’s eyes.

At this point he stood and walked over and hung the dish towel on the oven door handle of the stove standing in the corner of the room. He turned and walked toward me and past me into the living room. I knew he was heading through the living room and down the hallway to the front door, so I ran after him and cried out “Dad! Don’t DO this! You keep showing up in my dreams and there are no witnesses and then you just leave and I have to wonder if I am crazy for believing it is really you! Please, please don’t do this!”

Now he looked testy and more like his easily annoyed self from life and he said “So what do you want me to do?” “Tell me something!” I replied. “Tell me something that is going to happen. Then, if it does not happen, I’ll know these are just dreams and I’ll be at peace. If it DOES happen, I’ll know you are actually coming to see me.” He pursed his lips and stood there almost rocking on the balls of his feet as though coming to a decision, then, he strode back past me and across the kitchen floor to the stove.

He raised his arms and slapped his palms against the wall behind the stove and turned his head over his shoulder toward me and said “Fire worm. You’re going to have an infestation right here.” And then he turned and strode back past me in a fairly pissy hurry as though to say “There! Happy now?” I followed him to the front door and he opened the door. There was a taxi cab again, idling in the alley next to my porch, and he went out to it and got in. He was wearing a short sleeved pullover golf shirt this time, by the way. Not sure if that casual wear he wore in the first two dreams matters but you can decide for yourself eventually.

This dream must have come in the middle of the night unlike the previous one that woke me to the morning sun. I believe I slept for several more hours and then awoke recollecting the dream in great detail. I had gotten my answer. I asked him to predict a future event and he responded with gibberish. Fire worm?! What on God’s green earth kind of sense did THAT make? So it was only a dream. I was peaceful if a little disappointed. Ten days later, I looked down and saw a circle of pink bites around my ankle I had a flea infestation in my apartment. So I went out and bought flea bombs and giant ziploc baggies. Came home and bagged up the toothbrush and all the open foods and silverware etc. How they say to do. Then I put the cats out in the fenced-in back yard, and set out the flea bombs, and before setting them off and running out of the house, I picked up one to read the instructions on the box.

The first instruction said to shut off the gas line to the house! No clue. I had never turned gas lines on or off. Didn’t even know what a gas line LOOKED like, nor where it would be located on the premises. So I called the gas company. The woman who answered was a customer service angel, and I believe she would have stayed on the phone with me all day long if it would have helped. She told me to pull the stove out from the wall it stood against, so I did. Then she told me to look behind it (which I had never done since I had rented the place) and I would see something coming out of the wall that looked like a snake. It was a hose, she said, covered with chain mail that looked like scales to keep it from being damaged. She said it connected with a pipe coming out of the floor and there was a knob on the pipe and I was to look for that. There was the snake, and there was the knob.

She instructed me carefully on how to SAFELY turn off the gas supply and then how to SAFELY turn the gas back on after the bombs were set off. BUT…. she said, there was a very important thing I had to do after I turned off the gas and BEFORE I set off the flea bombs. She said sometimes residual gas remained in the lines in the stove and kept the pilot light lit for awhile after the gas was turned off. She said it was essential that I made sure the pilot light was out before setting off the bombs because the flame of the pilot light could ignite the fumes of the flea bomb and cause an explosion.

So following her instructions, I turned off the gas supply. Then I squatted down and peered in through the hole in the stove top that accommodated one of the four burners. Deep back in there, sure enough, I could see the blue and orange flame. So I followed her instructions. Put my mouth down to the opening and BLEW as hard as I could. Took two tries, but I got the pilot light put out. Then I set off all the bombs and locked the house and went to sit in my car with the book I had ready to help me pass the time. But instead of reading the book, I just sat thinking about what had just happened. I had just unexpectedly gotten back behind the stove against the wall Dad had indicated, and I had seen — if not a fire or a worm — yet, a flame and a snake……and all because of an infestation I could not have foreseen almost two weeks earlier when he informed me of it.

So I recognized an obligation was upon me, to choose a position. I piled up all the pieces on a scale: dream, asking for a favor, getting gibberish, two weeks later finding a kind of fulfillment of the gibberish had implausibly arrived. And I did choose my position on this event and am committed to it. I respect wholeheartedly any rational person’s choice to see these events as synchronous silliness — the ludicrous reaching of a woman desperate to find some evidence of the paranormal. But Marianne, I am not such a woman. I have walked such a miracle strewn path since childhood it would be laughable to picture me desperately trying to establish evidence of what I have been deeply well aware of for as long as I can remember. But still, the idea that someone from the other side would take a request from me here in the land of the living and actually fulfill it is breathtaking to me. it is beyond miracle. It is palpable PROOF that death shall have no dominion. And I would be far more devastatingly ashamed to encounter a miracle and ignore it than I would be to believe in a thousand silly coincidences in error. The final dream of my father is much briefer but very meaningful to me.

Final Dream.

The last time I dreamed of my father was more than twenty years ago. As the dream began, it was darkest night out somewhere isolated. I was standing on the black asphalt of a gigantic empty parking lot, in the middle of nowhere. Almost as though someone laid an asphalt four-acre parking lot in the middle of a desert. I could see by starlight, and saw a long black limousine pull up near to where I was standing, like seven feet away. The back door opened and my father got out. He was wearing a nice, long black winter coat. As my father approached to stand facing me, everywhere there was an overwhelming feeling of tenderness. All of the elements of the dream that might have been forbidding: the darkness; the isolation; the starkness of the landscape – were filled to overflowing with a wonderful feeling of tenderness. Love, gentle and sincere.

Before I could begin pestering him with questions, he broke the silence to announce “I have got to leave, now. I won’t be able to come back for a long time.” And as I took that in, snow began to fall all around us. Drifting flakes settling down through the silence and the sweetness. Then he said he had something to give me before he left, and went back to the limo and opened the back door and leaned in.

Just then, my sister in law was there with us, just standing. He came up out of the car with two bouquets of flowers: one purple and one yellow and white. My dad stepped toward me holding out the bouquet of yellow and white flowers, and suddenly my sister-in-law LUNGED for them. But he anticipated her move and straight-armed her in the sternum with the hand that held the purple bouquet. Having stopped her, he then again held the yellow and white flowers in his other hand out to me and I accepted them. Then he turned to her with a stern look on his face and extended the purple bouquet towards her. With a sulky, resentful expression and her eyes downcast, my sister in law accepted the purple bouquet and vanished.

 My father and I stood there in the dark under the stars looking at each other between the snowflakes and his eyes seemed very kind and sincerely fond. It was like he was memorizing what I looked like. Then he turned and climbed into the back of the limousine and it pulled away, leaving me standing on the dark plain under the stars, with the snowflakes spiraling around me and the yellow and white flowers in my hand. When I woke, I thought of the snow and his loving manner. I decided maybe he was telling me he was going to be born again so he won’t be free to drop in for visits anymore. He’ll not be my Dad anymore. I have never dreamed of him again.

Two years after Dad became unable to stop by with messages, my sister in law accidentally taped herself on the answering machine arranging for my brother (her husband) to be shot while she was out of town on business. The marriage exploded and they were divorced. I had assumed for years my father dropped by my dreams to communicate love to me before he left my life. Looking back now, I wonder if he maybe gave me that final dream as all the warning he could supply that my sister in law was aggressive and not to be trusted. Those are the three dreams Marianne, and I suppose they are not compellingly convincing with regard to spirit communication. But I still urge you to keep a little file of such and see how they add up.

Smells

Often times loved ones will let you know they are around through your sense of smell. There’s a specific name for this. It is called Clairgustance. Generally, you will smell a scent that you associate with them, like cigarette smoke, or perfume, or even the smell of a roast cooking. So if you smell a familiar fragrance like that, that you would generally associate with that person then the likelihood is, it is them visiting you and letting you know they are there. Such as an experience Frank Jones had, which I’ll talk about a little later on in a few minutes. Such as the experience Frank Jones had, which I’ll talk on in a few minutes and Jon’s partner had. Which, I’ll talk about towards the end of this episode.

Being Touched

You might feel someone playing with your hair, like they used to when they were alive. A hug, someone holding your hand, a gentle hand on your shoulder. Feeling your loved one’s touch is probably the one of the most common experiences people may have. This particularly happens in the early days following the persons passing. People have even felt their spouse in bed beside them and hugging them to sleep.

Hearing Their Voice

Some people will hear the voice of their loved one, (this is called Clairaudience), as though they were there in the room with them. Still others will hear the voice in their mind, but it is the persons voice they will hear. This is more common than audible hearing, as spirit no longer has a physical voice box and it takes far more energy for them to audibly create the sound, rather than through thought. But sometimes people do hear them audibly as well and this is called a disembodied voice. Cleo Brockman has kindly shared her experience of hearing her Mum’s voice.

Mum’s China Set

– from Cleo Brockman

When I was a little girl, my mother had a beautiful 12-piece China set. It was our “fancy” dishes. They were white with platinum rings and details. When we got our first microwave in 1980, my brother put one of the soup bowls in, and it sparked and caused a permanent scorch mark.

In the mid 80s my mom had to pawn her China because we were poor and living in Vancouver, and she used the money for bus tickets for us to move in with my grandparents. My mother loved that set and it broke her heart to pawn it. She passed away in 1986. As I grew up, I thought about that China set. My whole adult life I looked for something similar, just for nostalgia I guess.

In 2015, I was out Christmas shopping with my daughter, and we decided to duck into a thrift/consignment store to browse around. We didn’t see anything, so I headed to the front door. I distinctly heard my mothers voice say “turn around”. I hadn’t heard her voice in almost 30 years. I turned around and I saw at the back of the store, very well lit, an old china cabinet full of China. I walked over to it crying like a little bitch, because, it was my mothers China. Memories flooded my head with the platter having a turkey on it, and the bowl full of stuffing. It was all there!

So, the sales lady was all concerned with my tears and I said to her “this is my mothers China”. She said “no, the lady who has it on consignment never had daughters. She has no one to leave it to.” I said; “One of the soup bowls will have a scorch mark on it from my brother putting it in the microwave when we were kids!” She knew. The bottom bowl had the scorch mark that turned into a crack.  I asked her to ask the woman where she got it because the odds of it being in a thrift store in my small town thousands of km away is astronomical.

So, the lady bought this China set in a pawn shop in Vancouver BC in the mid 80s, the moved to Germany and around Europe before moving back to Canada to retire in Alberta. She had 4 sons who remember fancy dinners with the China, but none of them wanted it.

I was put in contact with this lady who told me that she wanted this set the moment she saw it. She said she had dreams of someone telling her to give it to her daughter, but she never had any. So she eventually decided to put it on consignment. This wonderful woman gave it to me – and thought it was crazy I knew about the defect in the bowl, and how it ended up in a pawn shop. This right here, is the #1 reason why I believe in the paranormal.

Unexplained Electrical Activity

We are all energetic beings and are composed of energy. People who have passed over can very quickly learn how to manipulate electrical devices. So this is quite often why loved ones will use electrical devices to get your attention. TV & lights turning on or off, or dimming / brightening. Changing TV channels. Sometimes even making electrical or battery operated toys move. If you’ve ruled out all physical cause as to why this might be happening, then you can look at it as a sign that a loved one or spirit is around.

Anon.

When my Mom was in hospice dying from cancer I asked her to give me a sign that she was in a better place. She has like what come back as a ghost? I said oh heck no that would freak me out. I told her to do something electronically. She loved to watch and buy stuff off QVC and I always used to give her trouble about it. Well like, years later my TV would randomly switch to QVC. it did it maybe four or five times in the span of six months. It took me awhile to realize it was her and when I did I told my son about it. he thought his mom was losing it until he came running out of his room one day telling me that his TV just turned to QVC after we just had a conversation about his grandma. Once he realized it wasn’t me pranking him I think it shook him up a bit to realize reality wasn’t confined to just this plane or existence.

Phone Calls / Text Messages

It’s not difficult for spirit to be able to manipulate cell phones, or regular landlines, or even send text messages. Often times if you answer a call you get from spirit, the voice can sound like it is very distant, or have quite a bit of static, or it can sound very mechanical and electronic.

Phone Buried with Wife

In 2003 Frank Jones suffered suffered a double tragedy – the death of his son Steven, 32, from a brain tumour and wife Sadie, 69, three months later from a heart attack. Jones explained:

“Just after Sadie died I came home and I felt like I didn’t want to go in the house. I got a missed call on my mobile, but it didn’t ring. The call was from my own home number, but there was nobody in the house. Then when I went inside there was a smell like cigarettes, which Sadie used to smoke and the smell of her perfume.”

Jones says his family has since received strange SMS messages which they believe to be from Sadie. He said:

“She always had a mobile with her. We buried her with her phone. There have been messages with words Sadie would say but there’s no number.”

Charles Peck

On 12 September 2008 at 4:22 p.m. in California’s San Fernando Valley, a commuter train carrying 225 riders collided at a combined speed of 83 mph with a freight train run by a crew of three. In what came to be known as the Chatsworth crash, 135 people were injured (of which 87 were taken to hospitals, 46 in critical condition), and 25 died.

One of the deceased was 49-year-old Charles E. Peck, a customer service agent for Delta Air Lines at Salt Lake City International Airport. He’d come to Los Angeles for a job interview at Van Nuys Airport because gaining work in the Golden State would have allowed him to wed his fiancée, Andrea Katz of Westlake Village. (The pair had put off getting hitched until they were living in the same state.) This would have been his second marriage; Peck had three grown children from a previous relationship.

His fiancée heard about the crash from a news report on the radio as she was driving to the train station to pick up him up. Peck’s parents and siblings (who live in the Los Angeles area) joined her.

His body was recovered from the wreckage 12 hours after the accident. Yet, for the first eleven of those hours, his cell phone placed call after call to his loved ones, calling his son, his brother, his stepsister, his sister, and his fiancée. In all, his various family members received 35 calls from his cell phone through that long night. When they answered, all they heard was static; when they called back, their calls went straight to voice mail. But the calls gave them hope that the man they loved was still alive, just trapped somewhere in the wreckage.

The barrage of calls prompted search crews to trace the whereabouts of the phone through its signal and to once again look through what was left of the first train, the location the calls were coming from. Tracing the calls searchers finally found Peck’s body about an hour after the calls from his cell phone stopped.

Charles Peck had died on impact. Yet long past his death, his cell phone had continued to reach out too many of those he cared most about, and ultimately led rescuers to his mortal remains. (As far as investigators revealed, they never found Peck’s cell phone.)

Not all stories about cell phone communication are serious, or sad. Some like this one from Gina, are really funny.

“The night my grandfather passed he came to me in a dream to say goodbye. A week later at his funeral the pastor was talking about what kind of man he was when my Aunt’s phone started ringing. It was turned off. It started playing the song “Bad to the bone.”

Song Timing

A sign that is not uncommon, particularly with spouses or lovers, is hearing a song that is significant to you both or was significant to the person who passed over. On the radio, in the mall, driving in the car, as background music at a takeaway place. You might hear the song over and over repeatedly over a number of days, or weeks. Not just once as a random occurrence, but repeatedly.

Caycay Sou 

shares this experience.

Last year a friend passed away car accident. Later that day I was sitting in my car listening to a song he liked on my phone and as I got up to walk back to my work that same song started playing on someone else’s phone.

I took it as a sign and started driving around asking him to show me where he passed. When I drove to a bridge the static went really loud on my radio. When I asked if it was him static stopped immediately and a song about death came on. It was about meeting again in a new life. I cried and asked if it was him to show me one more song as proof not a coincidence. Then my favourite song in the world started playing.

Few days later I meet his mom at the funeral and find out his accident happened on the bridge.

TJ’s

kind enough to share her experience in her own words

My name is TJ. I’m in Colorado in the USA, born and raised. And, I’ve had a couple of experiences that – you know, they don’t happen to me everyday, but I’ve had a couple of things happen to me that people never, even believe. That you wouldn’t even think are things that would happen. The big one that got Marianne talking with me today, is this friend that I had all through elementary school and high school. We grew up together.

And he was best friends with my first husband. There was a song we played at his funeral. And now, every and then – anytime I think of him, anytime he just pops in my head for unknown reasons…. I start thinking about him and I’m listening to my head phones. I’ve got my head phones in right now. If I think about him, his song that we played at his memorial service starts playing: ‘Pennywise – Bro Hymn’. That’s the song.

And for the next several …. Many songs, it’s like I lose total control of my playlist, at all! And it’s all the stuff he liked. But it always starts with the song that played at his funeral. And, I don’t know where it comes from? But, we’d hang out, me and him. Like you know, best friends. Girlfriend and whatever. I’d go smoke a cigarette with him or something. It was always music, always. And he’s slid into my Spotify now. And he’s just staying there.

Marianne: And you didn’t put the songs there on your play list?

No! They’re not on my playlist. I very specifically left them off my playlist, because it makes me so sad to hear those songs. If I wanna hear them, I’ll go look them up but it’s not on my playlist. I put my playlist on, my start songs. Do that and I’m happy and I work. And, I bust all my stuff out and it’s fine. 

But he just kind of slides in there sometimes, it feels like. I didn’t put it there. I made sure I did not put it there, ‘cause, I did not want it on there, only when I’m ready for it.

Signs / Symbols / Synchronicity / or Coincidences

Sometimes our loved ones are so eager to let us know that they’re around us that they will try and let you know in as many ways as possible. They like to place things in our paths that were significant to them or are significant to us. I remember reading a story of a woman whose father worked for a hotdog making company in the states. She was a teacher. When her father died, she saw the logo for the then out of business, company everywhere in the weeks following his death. One of her students at school drew her a picture of that company’s hotdog icon, and someone else found a little plastic hotdog ornament and gave it to her. All these were signs to her, that her dad was still living and letting her know he was around. This sign could be as simple as a bird’s feather floating down in front of your eyes, or on your doorstep in the morning – or your mum’s favourite rose blooming out of season. Yes, I’ve heard of that happening before.

Animals

Sometimes spirit will use animals to send you let you know they are around, especially if that animal or insect does something unusual, like it lands in front of you, on you, or stares at you through a window, or sits looking at you in your path. Generally, these animals stand out in some way from normal. Could be more colourful than most animals, or a wild, normally timid animal that will approach you.

Objects Moving

Another thing loved ones will sometimes to, is that they will move objects to get your attention. Does that ornament keep shifting position? Does that picture keep tilting to one side? Does a picture of your deceased relative or friend keep falling over or off the wall? Are you always misplacing a particular object, like your car keys, even though you know you left them in a specific spot? Sometimes they will combine moving things with noise to make sure they get your attention.

Seeing Their Ghost – Either fully Or Partially

Finally and actually is not as common as one might think, despite what all the movies and TV shows might have you believe. It is quite rare actually, which is why I made it last on my list. Don’t think that if you haven’t seen your loved one appear to you, that they have not tried to contact you or let you know they are around. But, sometimes when they do appear, it is not always full body, it might just be their head or hands. They might appear flat, like a black and white photo – and not necessarily in living colour (so to speak). OR they can appear as solid and life-like as you and I. This last experience really touched me and I’m grateful for Mortismalum for allowing me to use it in this episode.

From mortismalum

This is the first time I’m actually writing about this. So when I was 13, my older brother (18) and I were on our way to a movie when we were hit by a drunk driver. I woke up in hospital 4 days later, having lost my right leg and other leg in cast along with other injuries. That night I woke up to my my brother sitting by my bed telling me everything will be okay and to go back to sleep.

Next day parents came to visit and see how I was doing. I asked why my brother wasn’t with them and they looked at each other but didn’t say anything. That night I again woke up to brother sitting by my bed.  Again telling me he knows I can get through this and I need to be strong and overcome this and not let my injuries stop me from living life. We talked a bit, him not answering specific questions but answering more general questions. Remember asking him why he was still wearing clothes from yesterday. Because, that was very unlike him to wear anything similar to what he wore the day before. He didn’t answer that but when asked how he was he said better than he thought he would be given the circumstances. He reminded me to be strong and keep living and not let anything stop me and how much he loved me, before telling me I should get some more sleep.

That next day parents again came to visit me in hospital and I again asked why brother wasn’t with them and they again looked at each other and it was only after I said that I would like family visit together and not at different times.  And would like brother to visit during day when we can talk more, instead of at night that my dad asked what I meant and I told him Andy had been coming at night to visit. My mom broke down and left the room. My dad then told me that was impossible because Andy died in the accident instantly.

 I didn’t believe it and argued it and ended up having to be sedated. That night I had no visit and next day the parents brought newspaper article about the accident.

Years later my fiancée had an experience. My fiancée never met my brother. Never seen photos of him before this. My fiancée is bipolar, extreme highs and extreme lows. We had been dating for 4 months at the time and just moved in together. I didn’t know at the time but she had gone off her meds. This all happened while I was at work and she told me about it later.

She went out for a walk to get some air because she was feeling really claustrophobic, the start of a manic/depressive episode. It got to the point she thought dying would be the best option and standing at the corner, she thought the best idea would be to just walk into traffic. As she took a step off the curb, someone grabbed her and pulled her back and turned her around into a hug. Arms wrapped around her telling her she doesn’t truly want to do this, that everything will be okay, that she is stronger than she realizes and it isn’t her time. Told her to just breathe nice, slow, deep breathes. She looked up at him and said thanks. Turned around to wiped her eyes and when she turned back the person was gone.

She told me about this when I got off work and she wanted to put up a post online to see if she could find the guy to say a proper thank you for his help and saving her. It was when she started saying what he told her and describing him that my heart started beating fast. I knew who helped her. She described him as being 17-18, athletic, slightly taller than her, dark brown shaggy hair, big freckle/birth mark under his eye with a blue shirt that said J.S. Jenks in yellow letters. It brought me back to the visits I got in the hospital. The shirt my brother wore on the day of the accident and when I saw him by my hospital bed.

I told her, I know who helped her and I can’t explain it. I told her it was my brother and she said it was impossible. It was a real person. She got mad at me for suggesting it because she never believed in ghosts or spirits or anything like that. Very sceptical. I asked her to please trust me and that night we drove to my parent’s house and I went into the basement and found a picture of my brother and asked if that was who helped her and her face went pale and kept asking how?How it was possible? I had no idea what to say because I didn’t know either but told her how he came to me in my time of need and looks like he came to her in her time of need. Still crazy to think about and definitely can’t explain it.

Usually in the first days, weeks, or months following the death of a loved one, many people will find that they have visits or signs from them, to let the people left behind here know that they are still living and aware of them. Generally, these taper off after a while, once your loved one realises that you are ok and you have mostly finished your heaviest grieving process. Although sometimes these visits and reminders can last for years, or in the case of partners, until the remaining partner also passes over. I feel that this is such an awesome display of love from those in spirit, and love is something that transcends all of time and is the real treasure we take with us when we pass into the next realm of existence.

For anyone listening who had just lost a loved one recently and is in the midst of the grieving process, I am so very sorry for your loss and the pain you feel at this point in time. I hope that this episode today, will at the least give you a measure of comfort that life continues on and our loved ones are still around us. That their feelings of love for us continued into their next phase of existence. And that they feel and are aware of the love that we have for them.

Our musical bumper today is called ‘Bittersweet by Poddington Bear, Licensed under Creative Commons. For more information, check out our website www.walkingtheshadowlands.com

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* “Bittersweet” By Poddington Bear, http://www.soundofpicture.com/