VR Technology Reuniting a Grieving Mother with Her Child

Is it too much? That's the first thing I ask myself after watching this video and crying right along with this grieving mother of four. I don't know the answer. Is it a good thing or not good to be able to strap a giant pair of goggles to your head, and with the press of a button, bring your child back to life? I just don't know.

Now, from what I've heard from my friends who have games like the Oculus, they're fun and the visuals are very realistic. Like one friend said to me, he hops on his son's Oculus every day when he gets home from work because he says the different calming sceneries like the ocean or the mountains help him destress from a rough day at work. There's something really positive there. I could get on board with that.

This new technology is probably just the beginning, I imagine. I happened to be just watching a podcast to do with parenting teens and then stumbled into this website which then brought me to this incredibly sad video of a Korean mother of four. Before I started the video, I said, "Well how real could this video game experience be?"

According to, VRScout.com,  this week South Korean-based television and radio network Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation released a clip from their special documentary I Met You showing how the company used VR and haptic feedback technology to reunite Jang Ji-sung with her seven-year-old daughter, Nayeon, who passed away as a result of a rare incurable disease back in 2016. And although the interactions are simple and the experience itself is brief, the virtual reunion clearly has a significant emotional impact on the grieving mother of four.

I watched the video again – and then again – and even though it is completely spoken in Korean, you could feel all of it. I could not get over how real this had to have been for this mother. I couldn't help but put myself in her place, her mind and body and for a moment, and then this VR Technology made complete sense. Of course I would want to be reunited, how could I not? But then I thought, when would it end? I'm not sure I could live with this extreme emotion day in and day out.

The death of a child is something I don't think about, I don't let myself. But reading this article and then seeing this video completely took me over today. My heart is crushed for any mother who has ever lost their baby, no matter what age. I know only a few women who've been through this devastating loss and they cross my mind every single day.