Not long ago, someone asked me a question that I suspect has quietly passed through the minds of far more grieving people than any of us realize. She had listened to friends describe beautiful dreams of husbands, wives, parents, and children who had died. Each story seemed to bring comfort to the person telling it, yet every time she heard another one, she felt herself becoming a little more discouraged. Finally, she looked at me and asked, "Why hasn't that happened to me? I've asked him to visit me so many times, but I've never had a dream that felt any different from an ordinary dream."
As she spoke, I realized she wasn't really asking me about dreams. She was asking whether her husband was somehow farther away than everyone else's loved ones seemed to be. There was a quiet sadness behind her words because she had slowly begun wondering if she had been overlooked. The longer she went without having the kind of experience other people described, the more she questioned whether she was missing something that everyone else seemed to receive so naturally.
I think grief does that to us sometimes. It has a way of convincing us that our own journey should resemble someone else's. We hear another person's story and, before we even realize we're doing it, we begin measuring our own experience against theirs. If they received a dream and we didn't, we wonder why. If they felt a sign and we haven't, we begin searching for reasons. Before long, we're no longer paying attention to our own relationship because we're trying to fit it into someone else's experience.
The longer I've worked with grieving people, the more I've come to appreciate that love has never expressed itself in only one way. While someone may find enormous comfort through a dream they remember for the rest of their life, another person may feel that same comfort while cooking a family recipe that suddenly reminds them of home. Someone else may find it while laughing at a memory that once would have brought only tears. Another may simply notice that they're becoming more patient, more compassionate, or more resilient because of everything the person they loved taught them while they were here. None of those experiences is greater than another because none of them measures the depth of the relationship.
I remember asking her to stop thinking about dreams for a few minutes and simply tell me about her husband. Almost immediately her entire expression softened. She talked about his dry sense of humor, the way he always whistled while working in the garage, and how he insisted on making Sunday morning pancakes even though the kitchen usually looked like a small disaster by the time he finished. She laughed as she told me those stories, and for a few beautiful moments it felt as though grief had stepped quietly into the background while love took its place at the front of the conversation.
When she finished, I asked her whether moments like those still came into her mind very often. She smiled and admitted they happened almost every day. Sometimes something would remind her of him without any warning at all. She'd hear a familiar expression, pass a restaurant they loved, or find herself smiling at one of his old habits that used to make her shake her head. Those moments arrived so naturally that she had almost stopped noticing them because she had become so focused on waiting for a dream.
That conversation has stayed with me because it reminded me how easy it is to decide in advance what comfort should look like. Once we've done that, we sometimes overlook the quiet ways healing is already finding us. We become so busy waiting for one particular experience that we fail to recognize the many others gently unfolding all around us. Love has never limited itself to one expression, and I don't believe it begins limiting itself after someone dies.
I've often thought that if every relationship is unique while two people are living, it makes perfect sense that every continuing relationship will also be unique. Some people will always treasure a dream that remains vivid for decades. Others may never experience a dream they would describe that way, yet they'll continue feeling deeply connected through memories, familiar routines, or the quiet realization that the person they love still influences the way they live each day. I don't think either journey is more meaningful than the other. They're simply different because the relationships themselves were different.
If you've been hoping for a dream that hasn't yet come, I hope you'll be gentle with yourself. Please don't allow the absence of one particular experience to convince you that your loved one is somehow absent from your life. Love has never measured itself by dreams, signs, or extraordinary moments. It has always been measured by the life two people shared together and by the lasting imprint that relationship continues to leave upon the heart.
Perhaps one day you'll have a dream that stays with you forever. Perhaps your greatest moments of comfort will arrive in completely different ways. Either possibility is perfectly enough. I don't believe we honor the people we love by comparing our journey with anyone else's. We honor them by allowing our own relationship to continue unfolding naturally, trusting that love has always known exactly how to find its way to us.
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