Dearly Departed (10 page)
Latoya butted in then, telling me that just after her mum made the request, she ‘lost’ her beautiful crystal necklace that she had worn for her graduation. It was expensive and sentimental to her.
She looked everywhere in the home and just couldn’t understand where it had gone to. It literally had vanished into thin air. Then there was the scary experience of seeing a very dark-skinned spirit-woman in the reflection of her lounge room mirror—she thought someone had died. This happening prompted her to have the courage to ring home and speak with her mother. Wasn’t that exactly what her mother had wanted?
It was as though the Spirits were appeased with the open line of communication now existing between Latoya and Mary. Latoya’s necklace mysteriously returned! It was found sitting on the sink in the bathroom. Both she and Brendan were stunned. Where did it come from? I remember this event clearly as Brendan had rung me, highly agitated, wondering how this could happen. Mary explained, ‘Everything about our family is “signs”. If our family doesn’t listen to us, the other side will bring them back to us because of the signs they will send.’
There was so much to learn and understand right there in my own country—I sense it is another book in the making. It would now appear my guides were broadening my knowledge and understanding of the ancient ways and beliefs about life, death and the afterlife that make up the Sacred Journey of the soul.
It is true that as a psychic medium I am privileged to communicate with the other side, passing on messages to their earthly loved ones, but now there was much more to consider. What did the souls yearn for prior to their separation from the physical body to heavenly realms? What did they really need from their loved ones here and those already passed over? Could we build a bridge from this world to the next that would allow this phase to be beneficial for all concerned, the departed and the ones left behind?
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The soul’s journey The soul’s journey
Dying is not void of the painful emotion we experience in living. At the same time, dying, like living, presents opportunity for personal growth and development. Dying involves choice. And for some people, the moment of realising that death is inevitable, that their time is limited, marks the beginning of a new way of being.
David Kuhl, MD
I
t was one of those September mornings, somewhat cool, so I treated myself to the luxury of grabbing a few extra minutes under the doona. It had been a restless night’s sleep, and I was concerned about my mother. When I visited her the day before, she sounded rather chesty and was coughing. She was getting over a bad bout of the flu, so her doctor had said. As I left her house and was walking up her steep driveway, I kept hearing ‘heart, heart’ in my head. She was a robust woman for her 80 years— she had beaten breast cancer five years earlier, and had bounced back brilliantly.
The doctor had given her antibiotics, having diagnosed a chest infection, so I dismissed the ‘message’. Rolling over and checking the bedside clock, I realised I’d fallen into a deep sleep—and there was work to be done. My apartment has bedrooms downstairs and the lounge and kitchen upstairs, and that night I’d left my mobile phone in the kitchen. It must have been several hours later when I walked past my mobile phone and I noticed there had been a message left. It had come through at 4.30 a.m.— obviously I hadn’t heard the phone ring. It was from the emergency department at our local hospital saying that my mother had been taken there in an ambulance. She was very ill and I was needed immediately.
The Intensive Care Unit
By the time I arrived at the emergency department, five hours after her admission, my mother had been transferred to the intensive care unit. They’d diagnosed pneumonia, which had subsequently weakened her heart. She was not responding to orthodox treatment.
For ten days she went in and out of consciousness. Twice I was told: ‘We don’t know if she’ll pull through. You need to be prepared, due to her age and health, if she goes into cardiac arrest, we won’t resuscitate her. Do you understand this? Is there someone we can call to be with you?’
I sat by her bed from early morning until late at night, then after making the twenty-minute trip from the hospital to my home, I would fall exhausted into my bed for a quick nap before returning to her beside. This time my mobile phone lay within easy reach of my hand, should the hospital call.
And sure enough I did receive that ill-fated call: ‘You need to come immediately; she has had a huge haemorrhage. We don’t know the source and we don’t anticipate she will recover.’
But she did. Five weeks later she was out of ICU and into a general ward. She was considered ‘a miracle’. Granted she had to go to rehabilitation, and it was a slow process, but nevertheless Mum was grateful for her second, or should we say third, chance of staying alive. Reflecting on her time spent in the ICU, she distinctly remembers experiencing one phenomenon—as she lay unconscious, staff moved around her bed discussing her condition, but she was vividly aware of their conversations. She recalls feeling frustrated, wanting to respond to them, to ask questions, but unable to make any movement or facial expression to draw their attention to her alertness and indicate she was aware of her surroundings and aspects of her health being discussed.
It was during the many hours I spent in ICU that I was able to witness firsthand a number of transitions of the soul from this world to the next. It was an emotional roller-coaster as you walked into the unit. One day there was hope, with families huddled together, rallying when they heard their loved one was making progress, then swinging into a decline by evening as the tide changed and the patient was back in ‘critical care’. Obviously, the mood would become sombre and sadness filled the room. The downside of being a psychic, a sensitive, is that you feel and sense more than most people, and at times I could sense and feel that death was in the air.
Some patients had a solo relative or friend sitting by their bed; other cubicles or rooms had a congregation of many people— perhaps friends and family members—all held together by one common thread, their loved one was struggling to sustain life. The suffering for some was in silence, and the expression on their faces said it all; others cried, seemingly in a state of confusion and bewilderment; for others it seemed to be heightened activity, or a sense of peacefulness and serenity. I was perplexed as to why there were such extremes.
On one occasion I noticed a family group standing in front of the swinging doors that led to the ICU—they were trying to convince an anguished woman, perhaps a relative or friend, pleading, begging her, to go inside to visit the very ill person. It was as though that individual had frozen in one spot. It seemed she just couldn’t bring herself to take the few extra steps that were needed to push through the double doors that would take her into the ICU and bring her face to face with her beloved.
Sitting with Mum by her bedside was not an option—it was where I was meant to be, yet I couldn’t stop thinking of the person on the other side of the doors. For me it was a natural inclination to be with someone I loved and I wondered about the excuses of others, the reasons that justified their non-participation.
‘I just can’t—I don’t want to see him look that way—anyway, what can I do to help?’ ‘He won’t remember me. He’s on life support, so why bother putting myself through this stress?’ ‘I can’t help him anymore.’ ‘It’s too late. What’s the point?’ ‘We haven’t spoken for ten years. Best I leave it that way and walk away now, before I change my mind.’ ‘What if he doesn’t remember me, I don’t think I could live with that, knowing he doesn’t know who I am.’
It was most obvious to me that they too were suffering their own pain; a pain that was different from their loved one’s, but very real to them. Maybe the process of losing someone so close was tugging away at their own beliefs, their own immortality. Who would be there for them when their time came? Perhaps denial was an easy option—if I don’t have to witness this firsthand, it can’t be happening and therefore won’t happen to them, or me. I wanted to learn ‘why’; I wanted to understand the reasoning behind the actions I witnessed.
With so much time on my hands in the unit, I became friendly with the clinical nurse consultants and associate medical staff. It was a rapid time of learning and understanding, not just about my mother’s condition and needs, but about the support requirements of the patients and the caregivers. It was felt by the majority of staff that the caregivers who had a faith, be it in God, Spirit or a philosophy, although distressed and sad, would appear to have more resilience, greater coping skills and acceptance that when their loved one died they were on a journey; that there was something beyond this world that was waiting for them—a better place, a place
of tranquillity and healing. It gave them a sense of hope that life was infinite.
What saddened the staff the most were the individuals and families who were fractured, divided about how their loved one was to be cared for while they were alive and when they passed over. They placed barriers and conditions on who was informed of the impending death or who could visit their relative—at times denying the dying person’s requests to speak with those who mattered most to their heart.
It became evident that for some families the dying person provided a reason to continue to hold onto resentment and bitterness, and to blame, prolonging years of disharmony. Some families could not put away their prejudices, and they allowed their individual emotional states to override the wishes of the person dying.
Raised voices could be heard in the patient’s room as brothers and sisters couldn’t reach a consensus over matters from who would sleep there that night, to who would be informed first or, in the event of death, how the person would be buried.
Sacred moments turned into feuding battlefields. My heart went out especially to those who couldn’t move beyond their own position of fear to bid a farewell to their loved one, held in bondage, living in the past, unable to forgive or accept that nothing could be done to undo the past. An opportunity was now present to be able to heal both souls in a time of reconciliation, a time of restoration, yet ‘pride’ became the number-one killer.
Unfortunately, when this opportunity is missed, later, upon reflection, these people sometimes return to the ICU to seek understanding, counselling and a listening ear. Unfortunately, the staff can’t turn back the clock—all they can do is gently refer them to a bereavement counsellor. The opportunity for reconciliation was lost in the moment of yesterday’s actions.
What the dying person really needs is to feel unconditional love in an environment that fosters tranquillity and peace, where there exists opportunities to talk about their thoughts, fears and emotions around dying. They need people who will listen, sit with them and be at ease. It’s okay to give the suffering person permission to die, reassuring them that their loved ones will be waiting for them on the other side.
The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
T
here were wonderful endings and new beginnings which I also witnessed in the ICU. Let me tell you the story of one man and his sacred journey to the other side. I never knew his name. He was a large-framed gentleman, and he reminded me of a wise warrior, so for this story I will call him Solomon.
Solomon came from Samoa. He had a mop of salt and pepper curly hair. He was a gentle giant—I imagine he’d have been a fine-looking man in his youth. The nurse told me he was 57 and had suffered a massive heart attack and was not expected to pull through. He was one of nine children, some living close by, all with large families. This did present a dilemma for the ward, because at times there could be up to twenty people wanting to visit Solomon, so they did it in shifts. Often I would catch up with some of the family members in the television room as we ate our meals together.
They were an animated lot, full of conversation and stories— a family bound together by tradition, faith and belief in God. They were Seventh Day Adventists. They told me that Solomon had been placed on life support until his aged mother arrived in Australia from New Zealand to say her final goodbyes to her son. They believed Solomon should be experiencing life as though he was still at home with them. It was nothing to see them talking to him, singing hymns or native songs, joking, laughing and sometimes eating a snack or two as he lay there peacefully in his bed. His wife would brush his hair and talk to him as though his eyes were open and he understood each word.
One morning I came in and there was a delicious smell of coconut oil filling the ICU. I then saw Solomon’s wife massaging his limbs with this fragrant oil, no doubt a familiar smell from their tropical home. She seemed to coo words of love and comfort as she tenderly stroked his arm and massaged his large biceps. He was being pampered, he was being loved. Nothing was held back.
They even snuck in his grandchildren—although not allowed—to kiss him and have little conversations with their grandfather. They all knew it was a waiting game, until his mother arrived and the support system would be switched off.
He was adored to the final moments. It has been scientifically proven that our hearing is the first sense in our mother’s womb to be developed and it is also our last sense to leave us, and quite fitting that Solomon would be sung to and talked to as the soul would hear and acknowledge the vibrations, the messages and the intent.
There was such reverence and respect as they tended to his needs.
His body and his soul were feeling the power of love through touch. It became a dialogue between the patient and the carer.
Finally, after a number of days, his aged mother arrived. As she sat next to his bed holding his hand, she too talked to him, and for me, the onlooker, it appeared she believed he heard every word. I was not privileged to be there when Solomon’s soul left and moved on, but my mother, who had the adjoining room, said there was a special service around his bed that night, where family gathered, prayers were said and songs sung. She overheard a gentleman telling Solomon he was now free to go on his journey over the water. We presumed this was when the life support was turned off. Solomon, I sense, would have felt blessed, adored, comforted and reassured that his exit from this world and entry to his heavenly realms were indeed a sense of celebration, his sacred journey to his Lord had commenced with his loving family by his side.