How to Connect With Someone Who Passed Away

Many search for ways to connect with someone who has passed away, and it’s easy to see why. The bond often feels as if it continues even after death. For many, the connection shows up as a vivid dream, a meaningful song, or a quiet sense of presence while doing something as simple as folding an old sweater. Most people who have lost someone say they still feel connected in some way.

What many don’t realize is that researchers have spent the past thirty years studying these experiences closely. Their findings have changed how we understand grief, memory, and the ongoing connection between the living and those who have died.

Can You Connect With Someone Who Passed Away?

The truth, based on current evidence, is that something real and measurable does happen, even if science doesn’t yet fully understand how it works.

For much of the 20th century, psychologists saw any ongoing connection to someone who had died as a problem, believing it meant a person hadn’t “let go.” The idea came mostly from Sigmund Freud’s view that healthy grieving meant emotionally detaching from the person who died. But in 1996, researchers Dennis Klass, Phyllis Silverman, and Steven Nickman published Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief, which challenged this belief.

By studying bereaved parents, widows, and children, they found that keeping an ongoing inner relationship with someone who has died is normal, common, and often helps people cope with grief. It’s not a sign that something is wrong.

Since then, researchers have focused on what they call after-death communication experiences, or ADCs. These are moments when someone who is grieving feels the presence, voice, touch, or image of a person who has died, without any outside trigger. Unlike just thinking about or missing someone, people describe ADCs as something that happens to them, not something they make up.

Key findings from the research include:

• A 2012 systematic review of 35 quantitative studies estimated that 30–35% of people report at least one ADC experience at some point in their life, and 70–80% of recently bereaved people report one or more ADC experiences within months of a loved one’s death.
• A more recent review found reported ADC prevalence ranging from 30% to 85% across different studies, with rates highest among people whose loss is recent.
• These experiences occur across religious and non-religious populations, including people who identify as atheists or were previously skeptical of the idea.
• The large majority of people who have these experiences describe them as comforting, meaningful, or life-changing rather than distressing.

Separately, a 2025 study published in the journal Dreaming found that 73.5% of people grieving a romantic partner and 59.3% of those grieving a pet reported dreaming about the deceased within the past month, and that people who dreamed about the deceased were a lot more likely also to report sensing their presence while awake — suggesting the sleeping and waking experiences may be connected aspects of the same grief process.

None of these findings proves that there is a metaphysical connection to the afterlife, since science can’t test that right now. But the data clearly shows these experiences are very common, are not a sign of mental illness for most people, and usually bring comfort instead of harm. More and more, clinicians see them as a normal, and sometimes even helpful, part of grieving—not something to hide or avoid.

What Is the “40 Day Rule” After Death?

The “40-day rule” refers to a period of about 40 days following a death that many cultures and religious traditions treat as spiritually and emotionally significant for both the deceased’s soul and the grieving family.

It isn’t a single, universal rule. Instead, it’s a pattern that shows up, with many differences in the details, across several mostly unrelated traditions:

• Eastern Orthodox Christianity: Church teaching has that the soul remains near the earth for a period after death, is shown scenes of both paradise and torment, and reaches its determined resting place on the 40th day, marked by a memorial service called Parastas, which includes prayers, cemetery visits, and the blessing of food.
• Some Latin American and Filipino Catholic communities: In parts of Mexico and Latin America, prayers may begin on the fourth day after death and continue daily through the 40th. In Filipino tradition, a nine-day prayer period called pasiyam is followed by a 40th-day rosary and gathering.
• Islam: There is no basis for a mandatory 40-day ritual in the Quran or authentic hadith; Islamic teaching has that a soul’s fate is determined immediately after death, and mourning is not bound to a fixed number of days. In practice, some Muslim-majority cultures still hold a 40th-day gathering as a cultural (not religious) custom, alongside continuous encouraged practices like charity and prayer for the deceased.
• Hinduism: The 40-day period is not a fixed doctrinal marker in the way it is in Orthodox Christianity, but Shraddha ceremonies — rites intended to help the soul toward liberation (moksha) — are performed on specific days after death, including around the 13th and 40th days in some regional traditions.
• Tibetan Buddhism: The relevant period is traditionally 49 days, not 40. This is the bardo, an intermediate state the consciousness is believed to pass through between death and rebirth, during which prayers and rituals are performed to support a favorable rebirth.
• Judaism: Jewish mourning does not center on day 40 specifically. Instead, it follows its own structure: shiva (seven days of intensive mourning), sheloshim (a 30-day period, inclusive of shiva), and — for the loss of a parent — an 11-month mourning period, followed by ongoing yearly remembrance (yahrzeit).

When the 40-day tradition is followed, it usually serves two purposes at the same time: a spiritual one, marking the soul’s transition, and a psychological one, giving the family a set period for the hardest part of grief.

After this time, families are gently encouraged to start returning to daily life. Grief researchers say the dual purpose is common in mourning rituals around the world. The set timeframe doesn’t end grief, but it helps give it structure.

It’s important to remember that grief doesn’t follow a 40-day or any set timeline. The ritual period marks a transition in social and spiritual customs, but it isn’t the end of the emotional process. Grief moves at its own pace for everyone.

Dreams of Passed Loved Ones: What the Research Shows

Dreaming about someone who has died is one of the most common and well-studied ways people feel connected after a loss. Research shows these dreams happen much more often to people who are grieving than to those who are not.

Studies of people who aren’t grieving show that dreaming about someone who has died is actually rare. Only about 1% of dreams reported by women, less than 1% by men, and about 2% by college students include a deceased person, according to classic dream research.

Compared to that baseline, studies show that most people who are recently bereaved dream about the person who died within a month. This significant increase suggests to researchers that these dreams play a special role in the grieving process, rather than occurring by chance.

A survey of hospice caregivers found that 60% felt their dreams about the person who died directly affected their grieving. For most, these dreams helped them accept the loss, brought comfort, or deepened their sense of spirituality. For some, the dreams also brought renewed sadness.

Common themes in these dreams include happy memories, seeing them healthy again, seeing them at peace in the afterlife, or receiving a specific message from them. A larger review found that 67.1% of people who had these dreams said they were more likely to believe in an afterlife, and about 70% said the dreams had a positive emotional effect.

A related but separate body of research, led by hospice physician Christopher Kerr at Hospice & Palliative Care Buffalo, examined dreams and visions experienced by people who are actively dying rather than by the bereaved.

Drawing on interviews with more than 1,400 hospice patients, the research found that the majority of dying patients experience vivid dreams or visions, most commonly involving deceased loved ones, and that these experiences tend to increase in frequency as death approaches.

About 60% of patients said these end-of-life dreams or visions were comforting. Family members who understood what their loved one was experiencing often found comfort in it too, even after the person had died.

While this is different from dreaming about someone after they’ve died, both types of experiences are common and serve a real psychological purpose. They are not unusual or strange.

Ways People Experience a Felt Connection to the Deceased

Besides dreams, researchers in parapsychology and grief have spent decades studying how people experience connections with the deceased. The largest dataset comes from Icelandic psychologist Erlendur Haraldsson, who spent more than 40 years collecting stories of encounters with the dead.

In a national survey in Iceland, 31% of people said they had felt the presence of someone who had died. Haraldsson later interviewed more than 450 of these people in detail. Other surveys, like those by Gallup and the European Values Survey, found that about 25% of people in Western Europe and 31% in the United States reported feeling in contact with someone who had passed away.

In Haraldsson’s Icelandic research, 14% of people reported having seen an apparition of the deceased. Another 17% reported other types of sensory contact, like hearing, touch, or simply feeling a presence without seeing anything.

The frequent forms these encounters take, according to this and related research, include:

Visual apparitions involve seeing a lifelike image of the deceased. Sometimes these images look completely real, while other times they are brief or see-through. Haraldsson’s interviews found that people from many backgrounds, who were otherwise healthy and functioning, reported these experiences—not just those in clinical groups.

Auditory experiences include hearing the voice of the person who died, hearing a message, or hearing your own name called. These can happen either when you are falling asleep or waking up, or even when you are fully awake.

Tactile sensations are feelings of touch, such as a hand on your shoulder or a hug, that have no clear cause. A survey of older adults who lost a spouse found that people sometimes also noticed smells linked to the person, along with the more common visual and auditory experiences.

The most common experience in grief surveys is simply feeling that the person is there, even without seeing, hearing, or touching anything. People describe it as a strong sense that their loved one is in the room.

Some people notice meaningful signs or coincidences, such as seeing a particular animal, hearing a special song at just the right time, or finding an object in an unexpected place. Those who are grieving often see these as messages from their loved one.

Some people report hearing unexplained voices on audio recordings or noticing strange things with electronic devices around the time of a death.

This is called Instrumental Transcommunication (ITC) or electronic voice phenomena (EVP). There is less strong evidence for these experiences, and even parapsychology researchers are cautious. Mainstream science often explains them as the mind’s tendency to find patterns in random noise.

Some people seek contact with the deceased through mediums. Researchers, like psychologist Julie Beischel at the Windbridge Institute, have tested mediums in controlled settings where they have no information about the person seeking the reading or the deceased.

Some studies have found that media provide more accurate information than would be expected by chance, but the methods and results remain debated among scientists. Mainstream science does not accept this as proof that consciousness survives after death.

Demographic patterns show up consistently across the research. In Welsh studies of bereaved spouses, researcher W. Dewi Rees found that 50% of widowers and 46% of widows reported some form of contact experience with their deceased spouse.

Other surveys found that older widowed adults and people who had a close relationship with the deceased reported these contact experiences more often. In one U.S. study, Black and Mexican-American respondents reported these experiences more frequently (55% and 54%) than the general population. This suggests that culture affects both the experience itself and people’s willingness to talk about it.

Researchers talk about two types of bonds: internalized bonds, such as memories or feeling the person as a source of comfort or guidance, and externalized bonds, in which someone feels the deceased is an active, separate presence, such as seeing apparitions or hearing voices.

Both types of bonds are seen as normal in grief research. There isn’t clear evidence yet about which type is better for long-term healing. Current advice is to look at how these experiences affect a person’s daily life and well-being, not just their form.

When a Felt Connection Becomes a Concern

Because these experiences are so common, it’s important to know what separates a comforting, ongoing bond—such as apparitions or a feeling of presence—from something that might need professional help. In the past, clinicians often saw these experiences as problems, but new research shows they shouldn’t automatically be treated as hallucinations that need intervention.

Population baseline context. Because roughly a quarter to a third of the general population reports some kind of after-death contact experience, and belief in the broader paranormal is itself common — a 2025 Gallup survey found that a majority of Americans believes no single paranormal phenomenon, but 89% of people who are open to paranormal belief endorse ghosts specifically, and separately, roughly a third of the general population report some openness to paranormal ideas — a single vivid experience of a deceased loved one is, statistically, an ordinary event rather than an anomaly requiring explanation.

The background is important for clinicians. Research with hospice caregivers and grief experts shows that people who are grieving often worry that sensing or dreaming about a loved one means they have a mental health problem. But surveys show the opposite—these experiences are actually normal for most people who are grieving.

Researchers and clinicians generally raise concern, not when a connection experience occurs, but when:

• The experience is consistently distressing, frightening, or accompanied by intense guilt rather than comfort.
• It is tied to a persistent refusal to accept that the death happened, rather than existing alongside acceptance — for instance, continuing to set a place at the table or expect the person’s return in a way that resists, rather than coexists with, the reality of the loss.
• It greatly interferes with daily functioning, relationships, sleep, work, or physical safety.
• It occurs alongside the broader symptom pattern of prolonged grief disorder, a diagnosis formally recognized in both the World Health Organization’s ICD-11 (2018) and the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM-5-TR (2022). The two systems differ slightly in their criteria: DSM-5-TR requires persistent, pervasive yearning or preoccupation with the deceased plus at least three of eight additional symptoms (including intense emotional pain, marked disbelief about the death, avoidance of reminders, identity disruption, and difficulty engaging with life) causing significant impairment, present most days for at least a month, and only diagnosable after 12 months have passed since the death for adults. ICD-11 uses a similar core symptom set but allows diagnosis after 6 months. Population studies using these criteria estimate that prolonged grief disorder affects roughly 4.7% to 6.8% of bereaved adults, depending on which criteria set and diagnostic threshold is applied — meaning the large majority of people who have connection experiences, even vivid or frequent ones, fall outside the clinical category entirely.

The main clinical question isn’t whether someone sees, hears, or feels a loved one who has died—by itself, that doesn’t mean much. What matters is whether grief is causing long-lasting problems in daily life.

If any of the concerning signs above are present, a grief counselor, therapist, or doctor can help. This is a well-understood and treatable area of mental health, and getting help doesn’t mean your relationship or earlier experiences weren’t real or meaningful.

Practical Ways to Open Space for Connection

Experts in grief and parapsychology, as well as clinicians who study ongoing bonds, suggest some practices that don’t force an experience but help create the right conditions for people to feel connected:

Set aside some quiet, unstructured time. Many report feeling a presence or seeing apparitions during the moments between waking and sleep, when the mind is relaxed. Researchers have found that these experiences often happen during these times, or during quiet activities like driving, bathing, or resting. Spending a few minutes in stillness before sleep, without distractions, is when many people feel their strongest sense of connection.

Talk to them directly, out loud if it feels right. Continuing bonds research consistently finds that people who speak to the deceased — aloud or internally, about ordinary things as much as big ones — report this as a genuine source of comfort and ongoing relationship, not a sign of distress. Some ADC researchers additionally note that people who report the deceased “answering” — through a felt sense, a thought that doesn’t feel self-generated, or a sign shortly afterward — often describe the exchange as reciprocal rather than one-directional.

Ask for a specific sign, then stay attentive without forcing it. Some bereavement and mediumship researchers describe a documented pattern in which people request a specific, unusual symbol from a deceased loved one — a particular animal, color, song, or number — and later report that symbol appearing at a meaningful moment. This practice doesn’t have controlled experimental validation (it’s inherently difficult to test, since confirmation relies on subjective, after-the-fact interpretation). Still, it is one of the most frequently described practices in qualitative interviews with the bereaved. Researchers note that it may work in part by increasing attentiveness to coincidences that would otherwise go unnoticed.

Engage with objects and rituals that hold their memory. Revisiting belongings, cooking a recipe they loved, visiting a grave or a meaningful location, or marking anniversaries are documented in continuing bonds research as ways in which bereaved people actively sustain the bond rather than passively remember it. Ritual behavior tied to a fixed calendar — such as the 40-day, sheloshim, or yahrzeit observances discussed above — appears across unrelated cultures precisely because structured repetition seems to support the process.

Pay attention to, but don’t chase, dreams. Since dreaming of the deceased appears to be a natural feature of bereavement rather than something to be manufactured, keeping a simple written or voice-recorded note of dreams as they occur — without pressure to have one — allows people to notice and reflect on them. Hospice-caregiver research found that dreams featuring the deceased as at peace, free of illness, or communicating a specific message were the most commonly reported themes, and that reflecting on these details after waking was linked to greater feelings of comfort.

Consider a professional mediumship reading with appropriate skepticism. For people specifically drawn to this route, it’s worth knowing that the mediumship research is genuinely divided: some laboratory studies using blinded protocols have reported readings containing specific, accurate information at rates researchers describe as above chance, while the broader scientific community remains unconvinced the effect (where found) proves communication with the dead rather than statistical artifacts, cold-reading technique, or researcher bias. Separately, even skeptical grief researchers acknowledge that the emotional experience of a reading — regardless of its metaphysical source — can measurably support the same continuing-bonds process seen in spontaneous ADCs, which is why some grief-focused researchers have proposed studying assisted readings as a potential clinical tool rather than dismissing them outright.

Consider guided or clinical approaches if grief is seriously impairing your life. Induced After-Death Communication (IADC) therapy is an emerging clinical approach, based on bilateral eye-movement techniques adapted from EMDR, designed to help bereaved individuals access a comforting sense of connection to the deceased within a structured, therapist-led setting. A controlled trial comparing IADC therapy to traditional grief counseling found significantly greater symptom improvement in the IADC group, and researchers describe the continuing presence reported by clients afterward as consistently associated with love, gratitude, peace, and acceptance rather than sadness. As with any relatively new therapy, the evidence base is still growing, and it should be sought out only through a trained, licensed practitioner.

The Bigger Picture

Over the past thirty years, grief research has shown that healthy mourning does not mean cutting off the relationship with the person who died.

The evidence shows the opposite: most people who are grieving still feel connected to their loved ones, and most find the connection comforting rather than harmful. The experience is common across different cultures, religions, and beliefs—from centuries-old 40-day rituals to dreams people have today. The relationship changes, but for most people, it doesn’t just end.

Sources

• Klass, Dennis, et al., editors. Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief. Taylor & Francis, 1996.
• Steffen, Edith & Klass, Dennis. (2017). Continuing Bonds in Bereavement: New Directions for Research and Practice.
• Kerr, Christopher, and Carine Mardorossian. Death Is But a Dream: Finding Hope and Meaning at Life’s End. Penguin, 2020.
• Osis, Karlis, and Erlendur Haraldsson. At the Hour of Death. Hastings House, 1977.
• Haraldsson, Erlendur. (2012). Departed Among the Living. An Investigative Study of Afterlife Encounters.
• Haraldsson, Erlendur. (1988). Survey of Claimed Encounters with the Dead. Omega-journal of Death and Dying – OMEGA-J DEATH DYING. 19. 103-113. 10.2190/NUYD-AX5D-LP2C-NUX5.
• Beischel, Julie. Investigating Mediums: A Windbridge Institute Collection. Windbridge Institute, n.d.
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