Visitation dreams

[meathead]

I just wanted to share this. Perhaps some of you have had this happen as well. Bare with my first few paragraphs, the dream is coming up.

 

My mother and I were very close. Dad died when I was 19 months old and mom never re-married. She couldn't accept that anyone else was as good as my Dad. She was the epitome of a mother. Even into my adult years, she would try and "mother me". Dropping everything if I was sick or needed help. As an only child, we has each other, despite a very large extended family. In 2008, she was diagnosed with stage IV cancer and given 6 months to live. It was, of course, shocking, terrifying and confusing. Long story short, I fired her doctors and got more opinions, she lived 5-1/2 years. A gift. She got to know her only grand child, and was so proud of being a grandmother, or "Memere" to those of the French-Canadian heritage. 

I became the parent. She asked me to make all of her medical decisions and I did just that to keep her protected from all the bad news, prognosis and terrible things coming her way. The last 7 months of her life were spent in a nursing home. I could not physically care for any more, which I did for so long. Cancer spread to her brain and she still wanted to fight, enduring whole brain radiation 5 days per week for 3 weeks. Her first day back in the chemo chair, she decided she had enough and half way through the 6 hour infusion, we left the cancer center for the last time. I cried like a baby on the ride back to the nursing home, holding her hand and finally breaking down after 5 long years of not showing how scared I was. I had always reassured her the entire time that she would be okay. I would be strong with her, then go home and cry. We held hands on that ride home and I was finally able to tell her how much she meant to me and how fortunate I was to have been blessed with her as my mother. Even though I had been with her the entire time and put my life on hold, it was only then that I decided we could have that conversation. She knew her time was coming to an end. 

I quit my job and was at the nursing every day multiple times. As she declined, again, I was more of a parent than a child. First, bringing her delicious food form the outside world, to feeding her pudding and thickened water. With all the pain meds and the brain cancer itself, we werent able to communicate for the last 3 or 4 weeks of her life. But I would sit and talk with her, announce the RedSox game out loud as it was happening (she was a big fan) and just hold her hand, on so many lonely, quiet days and nights of her sleeping 24x7.

Years ago my mother would use a cassette tape recorder to document family visits and events like birthdays, anniversaries etc. This was before camcorders even. The last few nights before her passing, I would play tapes of my grandmother playing the piano and singing with other family members. One night, we were alone in her room and I got up to get something off a table in the corner. I heard my mother moaning and quickly turned around, completely scared she was in pain... asking "mom are you okay? whats wrong?". She has no reply, but as I leaned in close to her face, I realized that she was trying to sing along with her mother on the tape. Tears overwhelmed as I knew she could still hear, which means that maybe she could hear the things I would say to her.

I held me mothers hand the morning she passed. She fought it for a while, gasping for air. She would stop breathing for a few minutes, which seemed like forever, then she would start breathing again. As I whispered over and over in her ear how much I loved her... I realized she was staying for me. She was always fearful to leave me behind, asking everyone else what would happen to me when she is gone. Once i told her it was okay to go, I would be okay and we would see each other again soon, she took two more breaths and rose up to her Heavenly father.

 

Two nights after she died, I had a dream that was so vivid and I remember every detail, 5 years later. I was in what seemed like a hospital. The Looking around, there were 3 or 4 floors, like catwalks around the sides with rooms. The ceiling was 40 or 50 ft high and most everything was white. Walls, floors, etc. My mother was sitting up in a hospital bed with white sheets and blankets neatly folded over her waist. She had a white gown on and hair! Yes, hair. Mom was bald when she died. In the dream, she had a full head of perfectly permed hair. Nothing was out of place. She also had the biggest smile, teeth showing, from ear to ear. She just stared at me, not saying a word. Suddenly I saw this short, bald doctor with glasses. He was holding a metal clipboard. He looked down at some papers on it, and said "your mom is't sick anymore, she doesn't have cancer".

After his words, I looked at mom on more time, and we spoke a thousand words without saying a thing. It was the weirdest thing. It's as if she was showing off or had won the lottery. She was so proud of being pain free and wherever she was and proud that she got to come tell me she was okay. I woke up and realized that if anyone would beg God to let someone know they are okay, it would be her. I have had 2 or 3 very odd experiences that are hard to explain to "reality", so I choose to believe it was her, somehow.

To those of you grieving a parent or loved one, know that there IS another place, which I call Heaven.I am not overly religious. I am Catholic but don't go to church much. I was taught that something like this wasn't possible. But let me tell you, the love I felt in that dream was nothing less than my mother or God himself being merciful to me. Call it what you will, God, energy, Spiritual connections, there is life after death. Look for the signs, be open minded and you will feel the presence of your loved one when you least expect it.

 

Peace

 

[reader]

Dear meathead,

Thank you for sharing your story with us. I know many of us take comfort from your words.

Thinking of you. Sending my thoughts and prayers.