Everyone loses a loved one at some point; it’s an unpleasant fact of life.

But the loss of a particular loved one can have a greater impact on us than we could have predicted.Have you ever, for instance, had a deceased person materialize in your dreams?

The significance of their appearance in your dreams might not have occurred to you.

Bereaving a loved one is incredibly difficult, and each person handles sorrow differently. While some people cry a lot, others stop talking and withdraw within themselves.

Some attempt to sidestep the topic or act in a detached manner. One typical behavior, though, is that many of them dream about their deceased loved ones. Our subconscious controls our nighttime dreams, and if you’ve ever had a dream about a departed person, it might have significance.

Can deceased loved ones still communicate with us through dreams?

Patrick McNamara, an associate professor of neurology and psychiatry at Boston University School, says that dreams involving deceased individuals are known as visitation dreams. As McNamara puts it, “dreams of the bereaved where the dead appear to the bereaved in dreams and look to be very much alive” indicates that the departed is paying you a visit in your dream.

The 67-year-old neuroscientist, who blogs at Psychology Today under the pen name Dream Catcher, is quite active. McNamara has frequently discussed his ideas and research on dreams and their significance over the years. Furthermore, he says that visitation dreams typically have a rational reason.

They support you in overcoming loss, sadness, and sorrow.

He writes about a dream he experienced after his parents died in one of his blog entries. Following the incident, which was referred to as a “visitation dream,” McNamara started arguing that these dreams were an indication of life beyond death.

“Now, how much stronger must be the conviction of someone with a less skeptical approach to dreams than me if I, an individual who studied dreams with a skeptical scientific cast of mind, could not shake the conviction that I had just communicated with my dead parents?” asks McNamara.

Numerous research have been conducted to delve deeper into this phenomenon, and Patrick McNamara is not the only one who finds these dreams intriguing.

A 2014 study that looked at the effects of mourning dreams was published in the American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care. “Dreams of the deceased occur frequently, can be highly meaningful, and further heal from a loss,” according to the study.

“Previous memories or experiences, the deceased free of illness, memories of the deceased’s illness or time of death, the deceased in the afterlife appearing healthy, comfortable and at peace as well as the deceased communicating a message” were among the themes found in the dreams.

A group of Canadian academics analyzed 76 middle-aged bereaved people’s dreams in 2016. The study found that 67.1% of the bereaved group believed more strongly in a hereafter as a result of their dreams about the deceased. Seventy percent of respondents described their dreams of the deceased as “visitations,” and 71 percent said that having dreams about the deceased increased their sense of connection to the dead.