What Happens When We Die? Forest Park Author Says There's 'Life Beyond Life'

No one can say definitively what happens to us when we die. But Forest Park resident Bonney Rega finds there’s certainly a form of life after death in her book, Everyday Miracles, which shares the fascinating stories of dying patients and grieving families she’s heard through her work as a hospice chaplain.

Stories of visions, visits and dreams come true from those on the brink of death, or from those close to them.

“None of us knows what’s on the other side,” Rega said. “But these stories convinced me there’s life after life and life before life.”

Rega was ordained in 1987 in the Church of All, an inter-religious church that recognizes all religious traditions. That has positioned her to work with people from all faiths and approach the question of afterlife with a unique perspective.

She now serves as the Lexington Hospice Chaplain in Lombard, ministering to hospice and end-of-life patients. Through her work, which Rega describes as a “spiritual midwife,” she’s listened to stories from patients and their families—the laughter of a deceased child, the scent of a loved one’s perfume after she’s gone, a yet-to-be-born child visiting someone in their dreams.

“We’re all going to die, and that can be hard to deal with,” Rega said. “But these stories comfort people. The stories are very uplifting and afford great promise that death is not the end. It’s just a new beginning.”

At just 108 pages, it’s an easy read that’s broken into sections that describe various forms of spiritual communication, including dreams visitation, materialization of spirit, manipulating matter, people indicating they’re “crossing over” and visits by gods, goddesses and other archetypes.

The stories are short and flow together nicely, making for an enjoyable read. There’s a woman who was visited in her dreams by a small child, only to find out later that her daughter-in-law was pregnant and decided to forego an abortion. The baby looked exactly like the child who visited the woman in her dreams.

In another story, a man whose wife died oddly felt compelled to tell her manicurist. When he got to the shop, the manicurist said she was visited by the wife the previous night and that she said she was OK. Rega believes the husband was facing too much grief to be visited, and that the manicurist’s belief system and culture made her more accessible.

“That’s the key -- being open to the experience,” Rega said. “It allows these disembodied souls to say ‘I’m OK.’”

BUY THE BOOK: Go to Rega's website for more information. It's also available on Kindle through Amazon.com.