In the first half, researcher Joshua Black talked about his study of grief dreams. Grief dreams can be referred to by many names: bereavement dreams, dreams after loss, dreams of the deceased, visitation dreams-- they are the dreams that can occur after the death of someone close (human or animal). He has categorized different types of grief dreams, including symbolic references to loss, the mentioning of someone who has passed away, and actual visitations from the deceased loved one.
Black first became interested in the topic after his father died quite suddenly. Subsequently, he had a vivid dream in which he was startled to see his father, and he was able to bid him farewell. Such dream encounters can prove to be cathartic and help people process their grief, as it did for him, he said. In fact, 77% of the grief dreams he studied were reported by the dreamers to be beneficial, as it helped them in their grieving process, he cited.
In cases of suicides, sometimes those left behind are in the dark as to why their family member or close friend took their life. These individuals are sometimes visited in the dream state by the deceased, who explain their actions, and reveal that they're not in pain anymore, which helps provide closure and relief, he detailed. Black has set up a Facebook group for people to share and discuss their grief dreams.
------------------------------------------
Open Lines were featured in the latter half, with a number of callers sharing their dreams, which included visits from the deceased, and/or precognitive/futuristic elements. Alfredo from Yuma, Arizona shared a dream from 2000, in which a high school friend named Mike, whom he'd lost contact with, walked past him with a blank stare and didn't acknowledge his hello. Alfredo was awakened from his dream by his brother who told him he'd just received a phone call that the high school friend, Mike, had died. Randy, a detective from Pennsylvania, said he teamed up with top criminologists to uncover that the Jack the Ripper killings were actually done by three men (related book).
News segment guests: Lauren Weinstein, Robert Zimmerman