As an associate professor at the Vanderbilt School of Nursing, Dr. Bette Moore performs research in the importance of mother-infant skin to skin contact after birth and its relationship to mother-infant bonding and breastfeeding. But after the suicide of her daughter, she began an emotional journey around mother and child bonding that she describes in her new book, The Dreaming Road.

Beginning with a diary, Moore wrote to cope with her grief at the advice of a friend. She originally planned to turn the diaries into her memoirs, but a strange experience changed her plans.

“At that time, my daughter [began to] visit me in very vivid dreams and this is the thing that changed my perspective on death and the afterlife because they were like something I had never experienced,” Moore said. “Whether they can communicate with us in some way I had begun to feel that my daughter was communicating with me and that I was only writing half the story.”

Afterwards, it eventually evolved into a story about a mother who lost her daughter and the experiences the daughter had in heaven.

“[The story] would go from my journey of healing to my daughter’s journey and what she was doing on the other side and how she came to terms with what she had done, how it affected everyone here, and how she moved on,” said Moore.  

The book is the culmination of multiple drafts and experiences Moore had over a ten year period.

“It took me about a year to write the first rough, rough draft. It took me about four years and multiple drafts to get it edited to where the editors I was working with and I felt that it was at the level were it could be publishable and then it took me another five years to figure out how to publish it,” Moore  said.

But despite the level of work and commitment she had placed into writing of the book, it was almost not published.

“The School of Nursing is very traditional and I was concerned because I was known as a researcher. I was really worried about the impact on my professional reputation by publishing something like this. So it took a long time to get up the nerve to do it,” Moore said.

You just have to get quiet and believe that it is possible to still stay in touch with them and ask questions and just listen

While no official sales have been reported, according to Moore, she sees that people seem to enjoy the book, despite the different beliefs they may have about life after death.

“People who have a more new-age, not necessarily traditional religion but spiritual view of their existence here on Earth, seem to have received it really well and they have told me that it confirms things that they have thought about death and the afterlife and after-death communication,” Moore said. “Other people who are of a more traditional or come from a more traditional religious background seem to really relate to the memoir part of it, the mother story about her grief and loss of her daughter to suicide. But they say they are confused about the spiritual aspects of it or whether we can communicate with people who have pass on or whether people who have passed on can visit you in your dreams and if it is real or just really wishful thinking.”

With this book, Moore hopes to spread a message to those who have experienced a loss.

“They are not lost. You just have to get quiet and believe that it is possible to still stay in touch with them and ask questions and just listen.”

As for those going through grieving the loss of a loved one to suicide, Moore also offers some advice it ease the process.

“I think it is really important for them to find trusted people and get those emotions out and try to get to the point where they can forgive themselves and find some way that is meaningful to move on,” Moore said.