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 The Art of Dying – Drs Peter and Elizabeth Fenwick

Martin Howard’s son Matthew died in 1998.  He drowned in a neighbour’s garden pond when he was two years old.  This is what happened three days after his death:

In the early hours of Tuesday morning I woke up. We have a window above our bedroom window. I could see a shadow of a baby's face looking through the window. I couldn't make out any features but I knew it was Matthew. I think I dozed off.

Later I heard a rustling noise (like the noise of a baby walking and his nappy rustling). The noise started near the door and moved across the foot of the bed and up towards my wife. I was reluctant to open my eyes (I was scared,, to be honest) but when I did there was nobody there. When I got up in the morning the house alarm had reset itself during the night.

I didn't mention, this to my wife at first as I didn't want to upset her: I told her a couple of days later. She said, she had heard exactly the same thing as me, which freaked us both out a bit. Both of us heard the same thing but did not want to mention it in case it upset the other.

Now, Matthew had been doing this for quite a while before he died. He would wake up in the early hours, come into our room past the foot of the bed, and up Janette's side, and we would hear his nappy rustling. She would, then either take him back to his room or pick him, up and put him in between us for a while. One of us would take him back to his own bed, later and tuck him in.

I was always a bit sceptical of these stories . . . It's only my own experiences that have made me question what happens when we pass on. I don't know if these experiences happen, to other people, it can be a bit daunting mentioning it for fear that they will think you're crackers.