Animals and the Afterlife (17 page)
Buster
Renee Pastman, Homemaker Florida
I
RESCUED
B
USTER
at only four weeks old from a lady who was sick. Her dog was the mother. She couldn’t afford the puppies and was sending them to the pound in three days. I immediately bonded with him and took him home. I had only been married for one week and we already had a stray dog named Molly that we had gotten two years before.
Buster was so smart and trained very easily in anything we tried. When I became pregnant, Buster even knew before I did. Molly tried to jump in my lap, which she had done so many times, but Buster pulled her back and wouldn’t let her near me. I had always heard that dogs sometimes had a keen sense about these things, so I took a test, and sure enough, I was pregnant. Things were going great; we had a nice house with a huge yard, and I gave birth to a beautiful daughter.
Then we had a job opportunity come up, which meant we had to move a thousand miles away. On the day we were moving, everything changed. Normally the dogs were in the house, especially at night, but we had everything out and were packing, so they were outside. I had gotten a “tie out” [long leash that attaches to a stake in the ground] for each of the dogs because we didn’t have any trees for a run. Molly had broken her “tie out” so she had to go into the basement, but I left Buster outside on his.
We had been gone for about four hours to take some things to my mother’s house, and when I pulled up in the yard, I saw my Buster just lying there not moving. I knew right away he was dead, but I rushed to his side and tried to get him loose. He was still warm, so I thought maybe I could still save him. It was too late; my Buster was gone. I couldn’t bury him myself, so I had to call animal control to come and get him. I have never been so sick with grief.
We still had to finish packing and leave that night as we had planned to. I was so glad to leave that house and the terrible memory.
When we got to our new place, I was in bed trying to relax and go to sleep. Then I heard a bark—not Molly’s bark, but Buster’s bark—and then I felt a huge indentation in the bed behind my legs. Buster slept that way with me every night. I didn’t think anything of it and went on to sleep. It was only when I woke up the next morning that I realized Buster was gone and it couldn’t have been him. Molly always sleeps under the bed and weighs about fifty pounds less than Buster did.
Since then, I have still been dealing with the grief, but each day it gets better. I know that just by telling this story I feel like I can find closure.
Pooh
Melissa French, Student Colorado
W
HEN
I
WAS AROUND SEVEN
, my parents got me my first dog, a cute little white cockapoo named Pooh with a tail that reminded me of a pig’s. When I think about him, I can remember dressing him up in doll clothing and walking him down the street. I think it might have hurt his pride a little, but he put up with everything I did.
When he was three, he got out of the house and vanished. We looked for him for hours; we went from house to house to no avail. We decided to give up our search until the next day. When we got home, we had a message from a vet. They had Pooh and it didn’t look too good for him. Some boys thought it would be fun to run him over with their car. Luckily, a lady saw what happened and rushed him to the vet, to no avail. He died an hour later from a bruised heart and a punctured lung. It hurt to know that I didn’t even get to say good-bye.
The next morning, God gave him a chance to tell me good-bye. I woke up with him on my feet. I didn’t see him, but I felt his weight on me (and no, it wasn’t a dream; I was awake) for a good thirty minutes until he decided to get off the bed.
Later on that day, my mom was cleaning house when he scratched on the door to be let out. When my mom heard this, she opened the door. She didn’t see him, but she heard him and felt his presence. Not five minutes later, he scratched again to be let in the house.
That evening when we were all watching TV, he walked in front of the television. My mom, dad, and I all saw him, not like he would look when he was alive, but more of a white blur walking in front of the TV. God gave him a day to say his good-byes.
Kim’s note:
A compelling aspect of this story is that it involves several different types of contact, including not only feeling Pooh’s presence and his touch, but also hearing and seeing him. The latter two phenomena will be explored in later chapters.
Willy
Audrey Cornelius, Retired California
I
GOT MY CAT
, W
ILLY
, when he was just six weeks old. Eventually, he got sick and I had to take him into the emergency animal hospital. He was there two weeks, after having two surgeries, then died two days before his third birthday. Needless to say, I was heartbroken.
One week later, I had my first “experience.” I was lying in bed and felt a movement and the bed vibrated, then pressure against my legs, which is where Willy used to lie all the time. I did not know what to think of this and wondered if I had imagined it, but two nights later I was lying on my stomach when I felt footprints up my back, then suddenly a loud purring and a face rubbing against mine. I was scared, elated, and excited. I was on a high for the rest of the day.
Several nights later, same thing. He came up and put his face against mine and this time I was not scared and put out my arm and felt
fur!
I talked to him and said, “I love you, Willy.” Then he was gone. My bedroom is quite dark, but I did make out a large dark blob, which must have been his head.
I have also heard him meowing in the night beside my bed a couple of times. I did not believe in animals’ afterlife, but as you can imagine, now I do!
You think dogs will not be in Heaven? I tell you, they will be there long before any of us.
—R
OBERT
L
OUIS
S
TEVENSON
W
HEN
T
HOMAS
G
OHEEN
of Fullerton, California, distinctly felt Dooie the cat rubbing against his leg even after Dooie had died, this wasn’t his only indication that his beloved cat was still very much around.
When Dooie was alive, each night he had slept in a chair in the kitchen until around 4
A.M
., when he wanted to be let out. So, he would walk down the long hallway from the kitchen to the bedroom. Thomas explains:
He would look in my bedroom and “meow,” which meant he wanted to be let out, so I would get up—and then he would zip down the hall to the door. If I didn’t get up quickly enough, he would “meow” again, and a minute or so after that he would “meow” a third time, more forcefully…. Well, a couple of nights ago, it was around four in the morning and I heard this “meow” from the hallway. I looked down the hall and, of course, there was nothing there, but that’s just what he used to do and when he used to do it.
As time went on, I gathered more and more stories very similar to this one. People also reported hearing such things as the familiar bark of a recently departed dog or the sound of scratching at the door just as a beloved animal had done when still alive. There was even the case of a dog who, when alive, loved to drink out of the toilet and could still be heard periodically scratching on the bathroom door, which would then slowly, mysteriously open—seemingly all by itself—just wide enough for the dog to get in, at which point the scratching was heard on the toilet seat.
Another rather unique case involved a man who always rang the doorbell to let his beloved dog know he was home. Several days after the dog died, the doorbell mysteriously began ringing all by itself. The doorbell had never done this before.
Yet another case involved a dog named Ty. After Ty passed, her devoted human, Carol Everson of Washington, continued to hear her bark and whine and actually saw impressions left by her in the carpet and bed. Carol continued to feel Ty’s presence and to hear her even after she and her husband, George, got a new puppy named Lily Mae.
As it turned out, Carol wasn’t the only one who would literally
hear
evidence of Ty’s continued presence even after she passed. One day, the Eversons’ grown daughter, Kim Louie, went to her parents’ house but found that no one was home. The garage door was closed, and she heard a dog barking and crying inside. So, assuming it was the new puppy, she stooped down at the garage door to tell the pup that her parents would be right back and not to cry. She thought it was strange since they never left the puppy alone at home. In her words:
I started past the garage door; that’s when I heard the crying, so I stayed there for a few minutes talking to her, to try and let her know that Mom and Dad would be home soon. I’m sure I looked strange to the neighbor, talking to a garage door. Anyway, I stayed for about ten minutes, then decided she wasn’t calming down with me on the other side of the door. So, home I drove, twenty-two miles with time to think how
mad
I was at my parents for leaving the “poor li’l pup” in the cold garage alone—how mean! Once home, I told my husband how surprised I was by their actions. Within ten to fifteen minutes, in the driveway came my dad’s truck; Mom got out and came to the door. As I started to tell her that I was at their house trying to calm the “baby,” she looked at me and said, “What are you talking about? Lily Mae’s in the truck with your dad. We just went grocery shopping and he stayed in the truck with her while I had to do the shopping by myself, because he wouldn’t leave her alone.”Sure enough, in the truck sat my father with his new baby [the puppy] all content on his lap. We have talked of this often, and the neighbor did tell my mom that their daughter was up while they were away and that I was standing at the garage door for a few minutes, like I was talking to someone. Well, I was … I know what I heard! Weird, huh?
Well, perhaps there was a time in my life when I would have thought it
was
weird. However, an experience of my own showed me that such things
do
happen….
Jameth and I have a minivan. One of the reasons we chose this type of vehicle is because our giant “travel cage” fits just perfectly, so we can take our beloved “rat children” with us when we travel. That way, we don’t miss them or worry about them when we’re gone, and they always seem to enjoy going with us and visiting new places. During long car trips to conferences or to visit relatives, it is common to hear the familiar rattling sound of their water bottle, and occasionally, the distinct high-pitched sneeze of one of our little travel companions in the back of the van.
One night, shortly after several of our beloved rats had died of old age, Jameth and I were driving home from a local errand. The rats were not with us, and the back of the van was empty. Suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, I heard the familiar, distinct, high-pitched sneeze of one of our little travel companions. At first, it seemed like quite a natural sound to be coming from the back of the van, until I realized that the rats weren’t with us. I wondered if Jameth had heard it, too.
“Did you hear that?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I replied.
“It sounded like a rat sneeze,” he said.
“Yes, it sure did,” I responded, looking back into the emptiness of the van. “Well, there aren’t any rats back there.” We looked at each other.
“Do you think it’s the spirit of one of the rats?” he asked.
“Well, I’m not quite sure what else it
could’ve
been,” I reasoned, and we discussed the possibility that one of our little travel companions was still with us.
G
LADYS
H
YPES OF
W
EST
V
IRGINIA
shared the following about her departed dog, Cindy:
Cindy had very long toenails and did not hesitate to try to bite you if you cut them. As she aged, I didn’t bother her with cutting them anymore. She slept in a bedroom with a tile floor and you could always hear when she was ready to get up, as her toenails would make noises on the tile. Several times after her passing, my husband and I heard her walking around in that room. For four to five nights we did not say anything to each other about this, for we both thought the other would think we were crazy (we knew nothing of after-death communications at that time). Finally, I had to ask my husband if he heard that and he said
yes.
We have not heard her since.
Then there was the case of a woman who originally contacted me about my research, wanting to know if my book was out yet because she had recently lost her beloved dog and needed some support. She was absolutely beside herself with grief, and although I didn’t yet have a book to offer her, I did my best to console her. Having been there myself many times, I felt a kinship with her during this sensitive time. We kept in touch thereafter, as I wanted to know how she was doing. Then one day, she contacted me with the following:
I wanted to share something with you—don’t know if I’m going crazy or it’s wishful thinking—but last week I had to take a drive into the city—it’s about sixty miles, and a good portion of the way I kept hearing my dog whining like he always did when he wanted out. That was the only time I heard it. I don’t know what to think about it, do you? I want so much to hear from him or see him that it’s making me crazy. Do you think I’m really losing it, or have you heard of things like this before?
Her question was not uncommon. We have been so conditioned to believe that we live in a very physical world that works in a certain way, that whenever we experience the extraordinary, we assume we must be going crazy. Now, granted, there are cases of people with genuine psychological conditions causing them to “hear things.” However, my background in psychology, coupled with my years of research into afterlife communications, has helped me to discern the difference.
Studies have shown that we can talk ourselves out of the reality of just about anything, if the general consensus is that it did not really happen, regardless of how real the experience is. For example, I recall one experiment from college psychology in which a person who absolutely
knew
what day of the week it was became the unwitting subject of this phenomenon.
The people who were “in” on the experiment repeatedly referred to the date as being a
different
day of the week. At first, the subject of the experiment argued that he knew for certain what day of the week it was, and that they were wrong. However, they didn’t back down, insisting that
he
was the one who was wrong about the date. After a while, he began to question his own perception of reality; and eventually, he came to believe that he had been wrong and that, indeed, everyone else was right about the date. And such is often the case with so-called paranormal phenomena. If enough people tell us that such things are not possible, we tend to believe them, regardless of what we have actually experienced.
Although the woman who heard the sound of her dog whining chose to remain anonymous for fear of being ridiculed, she did agree to allow me to tell her story, which didn’t end there….
It has happened three times now, and it’s only when I’m alone in the car and going on longer trips. And in my home I have a room that is my computer room; and when my dog started to get sick, I moved his cage (which I kept him in when I was not at home) in there. After his passing, I just left it the way it was with his water bowl and food bowl and two toys in there. Then the door was closed and has not been reopened since the night he died. But I have on two occasions heard his toy bones being moved around in the cage like when he used to play with them. And something else I noticed is that sometimes it feels like something brushes against me when I’m just sitting at the computer desk or standing at the kitchen sink preparing the other dogs’ food. It feels like a light brush either across my back or the back of my legs.
I did contact an animal communicator and she says my dog is near me all the time and he’s worried about how I’m handling this situation. I still cry all the time and I want so much to see him again or touch him. Also, I have some medical problems myself, and one night very recently I had gotten sick and was on the floor not able to get up. It was around 2
A.M
. and while lying there, it felt like something was licking my face just like my dog always did when I was sick.
No matter how vivid these experiences are, people do sometimes question themselves or their sanity when such things happen. Of course, skeptics may argue that these experiences are the results of wishful thinking. However, it’s not so easy to dismiss these events when witnesses are involved, especially when those witnesses happen to be other animals. Her story continues….
I wanted you to know about a few things that have been going on around my home. That whining I told you about that happens on the road, well, it has happened several times at home the last ten days or so, and when it occurs, one of my dogs will go into the living room and just growl at nothing, at least nothing I see.
This, too, is not uncommon. Often, it’s other animals—who experience reality fully and without preconceived notions or fear of being ridiculed—that ultimately confirm the validity of these experiences. As it turned out, this woman had other experiences, both before and after the above, but she never shared them with anyone. Her further experiences will be covered in a later chapter. Meanwhile, following are more stories of people who have heard what, for them, was “music to their ears.”
