Lives & Layers of Grief; Releasing through the Heart

I heard a loud noise in the distance; it was painful, dis-stressing & coming from deep inside someone’s soul..... It was me!!  I suddenly came back into my body and realised it was me!  The sound was primal I never heard such a sound come from a human being and it was coming from me.  I was bent over, holding my heart and stomach, my Dad one side, my sister-in-law the other, the consultant in front of us and nurse to the side.  I felt my Dad touch my back (through his own pain) and my sister-in-law was holding me.  Everything had gone black, I hadn’t fainted but everything went dark.  The consultant looked shocked when I seen her face finally.  She had just told us my Mams brain tumour was malignant and there was nothing they could do.  This is when my heart truly broke for the first time.  I physically and energetically felt it break.  Everything tore apart inside me that day; the rip I felt was horrendous to say the least.  I was broken, I was lost, I was inconsolable.  I hurt so much for so long I didn’t know if I could live in this world anymore!  How could I live without my lovely Mam!?! And how could I get through the process of so much emotional turmoil pouring out of me!?!

This was the start of my journey with grief and steps toward something so much bigger; The Ascension Process.  http://www.ascensionyogahealing.com/  It was February 2011.

I’m a very practical and realistic person but I’m also extremely open -hearted and energetically sensitive so sometimes the more we love the more we feel pain and sadness.  My Mam gave me the gift of spirituality and knowledge about our Guardian Angels and Archangels from a young age, I’m honoured to say that she wasn’t just my Mam she was also my first spiritual teacher.  Without my beliefs I don’t know where I’d be now and yet even with them I’ve had to go through this crippling emotional journey.  BUT so much bliss and beauty has come from it too so I want to share my journey in the hope someone who reads this will know it’s going to be OKAY; in the hope you will know you are not alone; in the hope you will let it go; in the hope you will please let yourself grieve; in the hope you will know you have support; in the hope you will find lessons and positive moments in every pain that you feel , release and let go of, and finally in the hope you will know you are so loved, beautiful soul.

I knew my parents would die someday, I knew I would die someday yet I didn’t know how this was happening to me!  My Mam!  I was only 32, only 32!  I felt like I was just a little girl who couldn’t loose her mammy.  It just goes to show you that no matter our ages we are still just little boys and girls, still just pure innocent love itself.  I was honestly ripped apart from the inside out.  Nothing ever before felt so bad, so painful, so confusing, so upsetting, so heart-wrenching, so wrong!  I’ve been through some tough times previously, like a divorce from an unsavoury (being kind with this word lol) man, minor head trauma from a road accident and all the grief and emotional and physical discomfort I’ve been through in the past for and a half years and still nothing feels as bad.  I miss her every day, in every way; her laugh, her support, her honesty, her hugs, her advice and her love.  As lucky and blessed as I am to now experience her presence, spiritual guidance and feel her love still, it doesn’t take away from the days you just want a hug or a coffee and a chat J This is my lovely, imperfect but perfect to me Mam, Maureen.

I had already stepped onto my spiritual path having become a yoga teacher so I know this grief; this heart release was and is part of my journey.  My Mam was so proud of me taking the step to become a yoga teacher and to travel to do so, she was excited and supportive even though she was concerned for me heading to South America ‘where all those drug pushers are’ lol.  Teaching my first yoga class she came along to practice and support me and as I adjusted her in postures a few times she wanted to know why I was picking on her haha AND at the end of the class after Namaste Mam clapped, yes she clapped.  I smile inside and out every time I think of these moments and so many more.  Mam always came out with random phrases or comments and we’d all laugh.  We are so alike, her and I, appearance, heart, and personality so I apparently do the same random things and we (my family) now call them ‘maureen-isms’ haha I know she’d love this.  I’d say something and my Dad, brother and sister-in-law would simply say ‘Maureen’.  I’m honoured to be so like her and honestly love to hear people say this to me.  Don’t get me wrong we went through the usual Mother/Daughter pains through me growing up and an uncomfortable time while I was with the man I naively married but these were all real moments through love and one day my Mam became my best friend.  We grew together spiritually especially through my bad relationship and divorce; we both needed help and guidance so we began another little journey together through something which was maybe meant to happen.  So many wonderful lessons and positive moments and steps forward through pain.

We need to feel pain to move through it.  We need to delve into it and its not comfortable but we only get what our higher selves knows we can take and we get breaks from it too.  Remember you can also ask for breaks if it’s all becoming overwhelming.  I’ve had lots of beautiful, happy moments over the last five years of discomfort, always believe light does come through darkness.  I have chosen to be in each and every moment happy or sad and this is so important for us all to do and move through.  If I can do it you can too.

‘It’s always good to cry’ my Mam repeatedly told me this and Holy God did I take this literally.  The first year or more I cried every single day; every single day for about thirteen or fourteen months.

After we left the doctor’s office that day we chatted in the corridor and we needed to get my brother to the hospital to speak with him, he was working as we hadn’t expected this chat on this day.  My sister-in-law rang him and told him to come straight over.  I stayed in the corridor a while longer to compose myself as I didn’t want Mam to see me this way under the circumstances as she’d only be upset if I was upset because that’s what great Mammy’s do they selflessly are always more concerned about their children than themselves.  The doctors and nurses were going to speak with us all together later and with this type of tumour and the location my Mam was finding it difficult to comprehend things so the exact detail given would be delicate.  I prayed so hard to keep it together for Mam.  They told her it couldn’t be operated on and they would start with radio therapy and see how that went.  My Mam, tumour or no tumour, was far from stupid so she asked how long did she have with and without opting for treatment.  They diplomatically replied it’s hard to tell especially with the brain but with treatment anything up to five years and without treatment anything from three to five months.  She knew, she knew deep down, she was a spiritually and energetically connected woman. 

Practical me kicked in a while later and I wanted more information so I asked to speak privately with the consultant.  I asked her to honestly tell me from her experience what she believed to be case and she said with radium we’d be lucky for three to five months.  It was three months!  I had known this already as I got this feeling as I prayed; and I prayed so hard that my Mam would not go through horrendous pain.  Funnily enough my sister-in-law had for a long number of years worked on the neurological ward my Mam was now in, so we were all very familiar with stories regarding brain tumours.

So anyway, anticipatory grief kicked in, I went between being practical me to grieving me and back and forth again.  How do you go to work knowing, especially with brain tumours, anything could happen at any time?  I was in fight or flight mode a lot.  I went home to my own apartment to sleep there, (before things got tougher for my Mam and I would be needed more at home), for all our sakes to keep things as ‘normal’ as possible.  (I don’t actually believe in the word normal but this another story lol).  I’d wake in a panic and ring home or get up and go straight over there.  I tried practicing my yoga but come the second sun salutation I was back on the floor in a heap crying.  This was good I needed to cry of course but it was also intensely uncomfortable.  The tears were different, I realised they were these gel like tears; soul tears, my first time to experience these but most definitely not my last!  I sat to meditate and it was good and it was uncomfortable but this is meditation and its brilliance so I was doing my best to help myself while being gentle toward myself.  I bought books on grief and read about anticipatory grief which I knew I was going through, so this was helpful.  A lot of the books on grief itself I realised a year to two later were saying grieving periods should be six months to a year HA not for me.  I’ve since through study and experience found out that a lot of our ascension release is through the heart so it wasn’t the fault of the psychologists and psychiatrists who wrote these books or that they were wrong it’s just things have dramatically evolved.  My grief for my Mam opened the biggest door on my spiritual path.

Mam had always been an advocate for hospice care but it took me a while to come round when the idea was put to us by a care nurse who had been calling to our home.  Mam had begun to slip into long periods of deep sleep and this was a sign of the start of her final journey.  She loved her home, I wanted to care for her and it also meant her time to leave us was drawing near! But we couldn’t give her all the care she needed at this time and it also meant we could just sit and BE with her and the wonderful nursing staff were there to provide any medical assistance and instant pain relief.  (I had to pause here as I remember the next moment and I now write through tears.)  My Dad and I sat on the bed with Mam the morning she was due to be taken to the hospice.  At this stage she found it extremely difficult to comprehend things and due to the fact the tumour was primarily right brain it also meant emotionally she acted a little differently.  On this morning I gently explained that an ambulance was coming and we were going to all go to the hospice for her to get the extra care we couldn’t give her and to help with the pain that was coming and going in her head.  She first asked why were we sending her away, oh Jesus my heart ripped and I swallowed to try not break-down right now.  'Please God give me the strength I need now at this very moment’.  I know deep inside my Mam would never really believe we’d send her away of course but this still really got to me and my Dad as we didn’t want her to go anywhere and would have given our right arms to keep her with us forever.  After reminding her how she loved hospice care and how she had wished my lovely auntie who had passed on the year previous had gone there she asked ‘is it the place where I went all the way over’ and she pointed out the window (she had lost words at this point but she meant Saint Lukes the cancer treatment centre which was over the south side of the city at the time) and when we said no way she was okay with it then.  We promised she would never be alone and she was then content.   I left my Dad to sit with Mam and walked slowly and steadily out of the room to go upstairs to let the tears flow.

We never left her side; there was always one of us with her.  We took turns to stay through the night and relieved each other for breaks and yet also spent many days there together.  The staff rolled in a lazy boy chair one day so we’d have a bit of comfort through the night and we managed to get some sleep on and off.

Mam began to see angels coming and going checking on her.  Archangel’s Michael and Azrael were definitely present; hallucinating can definitely be a part of brain cancer but this wasn’t that as I felt them too.  She asked me one day ‘who’s the man with the steel face?’ I said it’s one of your beautiful angels and I asked her was she scared and she said ‘no, I want him to come back’.  I smiled.  This is what happens you see, we see the beauty and we want to then go but our timing is exact and Mam obviously had to wait a little while longer.  Mam then went in and out of consciousness and had completely lost the power of speech now but we could communicate through our eyes, this was such another wonderful experience through pain.  She finally went into a full coma.

I was with my Mam  in the hospice on the day she took her last breath.  I’m so grateful for this.  My Dad and brother were there too.  It was a beautiful sunny Saturday morning and Dad had been there through the night.  When I got there and walked into the room I knew something had changed.  My brother was already there sitting by my Mams side also and I walked back out to ring my sister in law.  I said something has shifted and she needed to make her way over.  Dad and my brother went down to the cafe for a cup of tea and I sat with Mam holding her hand.  Her breathing took a dramatic turn and I got a fright and jumped.  I hit the buzzer and the nurse ran in, she asked where my family was and she ran (literally) to the cafe to get them.  I was already in tears when they came in and we sat together as she let go.

Coincidentally Mam passed away from this earth on the Feast of the Ascension.  A piece of me left that day with her.

While Mam was still at home she had started making plans for her passing and funeral.  She wanted to be cremated and didn’t want to be made to look ridiculous with that makeup they put on you after you pass!  :-D  I promised I’d do her makeup for her and was honoured to do so.  I knew the minimal looked she liked and until she passed had the most beautiful skin and didn’t wear make most days apart from a little mascara unless she was going somewhere special.  On the day she was released from the undertakers I managed to apply her makeup through tears and trembling hands.  She looked a little different of course but still beautiful.  I’ll never forget how she looked just after passing away, she glowed, there was literally a glowing white light around her body and she looked about sixteen.

Mams funeral and cremation were beautiful and surreal at the same time.  Later in the day I just wanted everyone to go away, or for me to go away, I was drained.  I went home and curled into a ball and let the full grief take hold.  It was raw, it was so hard and I cried and cried and cried and cried and cried and cried.  I felt so vulnerable that I couldn’t even walk outside my front door.  One day I went to leave my apartment and as my hand reached for the handle it stopped and as I looked down at it I realised I was frozen and couldn’t do it.  I couldn’t open the door and I couldn’t leave my home.  How could I go out there into the world and my Mam wasn’t in it anymore.  So I cried and didn’t go out but I tried again and I tried a few times until one day I could go out.  That day I walked with my head down and eyes low, you feel so vulnerable, so raw, like your soul is on show that you can barely look up, you feel as if everyone can see your pain.

I felt so lonely in my grief yet I didn’t want anyone around me either.  I wondered why I hadn’t met the love of my life yet to have someone to hold me so close and tell me it’s going to be okay or to simply be there and say nothing at all.  It felt so unfair, I’d already been through so much in my young life emotionally and I couldn’t understand why I had to go through this alone!  But I did.  Now I understand this is the way it had to be but at the time I didn’t.  For a period I grieved not just my Mam but also the romantic soul relationship I didn’t yet have.  I let the grief consume me!  This was my way, I let myself feel absolutely everything, I respect it’s different for everyone but this was my way.  Most friends and family respected my grief and a lot didn’t and relationships changed or ended.  Please never try to force a grieving person to do something you feel is right for them, this can be dangerous please listen and HEAR what they are saying to you and respect them, this is love.

It comes out of the blue some days; you think you are having a good day then ‘wallop’.  I was only back to work, working in the airport at the time and I was looking forward to my daily treat which was my Butlers coffee (and the free chocolate that came with it).  I was taking life one breath at a time, it was the only way I could do it.  Having ordered my coffee I proceeded to the next counter to pay and as I opened my mouth to speak all that came out was a sob and tears!  This was obviously completely unexpected for me so imagine how the poor girl across the counter felt.  The grief pours out from every orifice at any unexpected moment.  I managed to take a breath and wordlessly smile at the girl as I handed her money.

‘Noooooooooooooooo..............’ I was sitting after breakfast and looking through my phone at all my text messages between my Mam and I.  I went to save them (i think) my mind was so fogged over.  Next minute it was like I seen the whole thing happen in slow motion  ‘delete all’, ‘yes’ and they were gone!  Jesus the pain from my stomach to my throat and the sobbing and beating up of myself that followed.  It was like I just lost her again.  How did that just happen? Why?  I was devastated.  I wanted to curl up and die, ‘why the feck was all of this happening to me I can’t do it anymore, I’m not a bad person I just want to feel ok again please God help me because right now I don’t know how much more I can take’.  There are lots of little moments like this we go through.  I’m sure that happened for a reason, everything is of course stored in our hearts but while you’re grieving every little precious thing you hold onto means so much to you.  My sister-in-law rang later and I broke down on the phone and she came over with my nephew.  Just a little baby, as tears fell from my face he pottered over to me and out of the blue hugged me and he held on and he didn’t let go.  That’s no coincidence that’s how connected our little people are and a gift from God.  He healed me that day.

Life changes and this is where we need to work on letting go, we all have to let go of something or someone at some stage it’s a part of the cycle so I was okay with my life and relationships changing even if I didn’t know where my life was headed at this stage, being so lost in my tears.  I was okay with letting go but my heart still ached and I had to go through the human emotionally release to be really okay.  A little piece of my simply heart broke away and it will remain my Mams forever. 

My connection with spirit, source and my beautiful angels deepened.  I began to experience my angels presence on a deeper level and I seen my first opening of angelic light one late night in bed.  I was lying there crying and praying and as I opened my eyes I seen this beautiful white light open up high over the door near the ceiling.  Another time when my Dad got the call his sister wasn’t doing well in hospital and he debated out loud to me ‘should I go now or wait a while’ I seen the same flash of angelic light open up so bright high up near the ceiling.  I got the message loud and clear and advised he should go now and I’d drop him straight there.  She passed away not long after this.  I went through insomnia for a long time.  I began to see spirit and angelic orbs especially late at night as I lay in the darkness and I’d sit and watch as long as I could, smiling and moving into bliss before finally finding sleep.  I told my family about these occurrences and they listened but my growth was a little confusing for them initially which is understandable.  One day my brother got annoyed listening to me and told me I needed to come back to the real world.  At first I felt wounded but then I understood two things; firstly this was his grief you see, he was confused in many ways after losing our Mam and this (me) was adding to his confusion; secondly he was my Earth Angel that day, I needed to hear that from him because this was the first time I was slipping into the space of wanting to be ‘there’ and not ‘here’.  He’s my younger brother  but he’s also my voice of reason and logic when I need it and I’m so grateful for that as he’s such a great support and brilliant friend.  He was also my son in another life (he’ll throw his eyes up to the heavens when he reads this after hearing it already haha)

Through my grief I got breaks, the rollercoaster that it is.  Remember you can always ask for breaks as well and you will be given them.  Following on my spiritual path I wanted to learn more so the natural next step for me was to travel to India and this came as an overwhelming urge.  My first time to India was 14 months after we lost my Mam and this was such a beautiful experience, I embraced every part of it, connected to source even more and knew I’d go back, which I have done.

Four years later I was on my hands and knees AGAIN.  I felt as if I was beginning the grieving process all over again.  What was this?! I felt as if this grief was so similar to the grief I had /have for my Mam but knew it was for someone/something else but couldn’t put my finger on it.  What was it?!  I needed some help and my family were concerned for me at this point also but respected I had to do things my way.  I was referred by a good friend to a spiritual angelic healer and BOOM we connected as soul friends and I connected to source even deeper.  I studied Integrated Energy Therapy with her and found my bright high energy going to good use (on the days I was clear of course).  Through a healing with my dear friend I explained about the feeling of loss and new grief I was going through. She then saw the whole scene unravel.  I was a native Indian and I was playing with my two beautiful children about five and six years of age.  I got on a horse to show them how I could ride it and the horse bolted.  Further afield the horse reared and I came off.  I was killed instantly due to a head injury and they seen my spirit leave my body in a bright blue smoke.  I was now in this lifetime grieving for the loss of that life and the two little children I left behind.  Through the healing I felt the pain in my head and the grief in my heart.  I saw little snippets of this myself but not the whole scene, too painful for me to see.  At the end of my healing I felt myself die.  This was the doorway in for me to start going through and seeing past/parallel lives in my meditations and sleep.  I had now cleared this past life grief and felt instantly better although it took a little time for the full sadness to pass.

My next experience I was sitting at home in meditation and I saw myself as this free spirited white witch.  I had an olden times alternative medicine type shop and the walls were lined from floor to ceiling with shelves of glass jars full of herbs.  A wooden counter ran around the front of the three walls of shelves.  I was there dancing around the floor space in circles arms out stretched; long wavy hair down to my waist, a long free flowing skirt and dusty pixie type boots.  I could see an elderly woman sitting in a chair in the corner.  She was a maternal figure to me, mother or grandmother, I wasn’t sure yet, grey hair swept back in a bun (chignon) and no expression on her face whatsoever.  The scene jumped to me being taken across a dusty, sandy square to a raised platform with a tall stand and rope hanging down.  I realised I was about to be hung.  As I was standing on the platform looking around there was a crowd of people there to watch.  I couldn’t believe what was happening to me, I was so free spirited and living by the heart in a time not open to this whatsoever that I was also a little naive!  (like earlier in this life)  How could someone betray me! Then I seen her, the crowd opened up and she walked through.  It was my mother; I knew at this point this maternal figure was my mother.  Her facial expression still didn’t change and it was the last thing I seen as everything suddenly went dark!  Wow!  I feel now that this was also my Mam from this life, who has been my Mother many times over.  She’s evolved big time eh (hahaha).  As I thought about this after meditation I was bemused and intrigued at the same time.  It’s okay though, these were the times then, she didn’t know any better and probably believed she was saving my soul more than anything else.  We’ve all had past lives you know where we did some not so nice things, part of our learning and spiritually growth.  I still hadn’t cleared this past life completely; this was all new to me.  Vertigo came over me once again and issues down around the lumbar and sacral spine (ungrounded!).  So a healing, cranio sacrial therapy, chakra and mediation work later the symptoms passed and I cleared the pain and grief from this past life.

I had read books by Brian Weiss; a psychiatrist, past life regression therapist, author and teacher.  His name started popping up more and he was passing through Dublin for an evening event and I wanted to go but the tickets were sold out.  I noticed he had a full weekend workshop in London, so back to London it was.  This weekend he did a few group regressions which now come easy to me after the years of practice with meditation.  Another poignant moment in one of my past lives was a death due to heart break.  Aha!  Maybe this is linked to the lack of romance in my present life! Haha  I was a big oaf of a monk.  I looked down and saw big man feet in sandals.  ‘Ugh’ I thought to myself I think I prefer being female.  I was in Europe somewhere, it feels like Rome to me.  I’m wearing a large full length robe that reminds me of an old sack from potatoes, there is an oversized hood and a rope for a belt around my waist.  My head is bald on top.  I’m standing in a big square, its dark and dimly light with lots of cathedrals and buildings around.  The scene jumps to a crowded room and I’m looking across the room to this girl with dark eyes and she is in pain.  I’m in pain.  We are in love and can’t be together.  The next scene I’m standing in a cell (my bedroom of the times) and as I lean forward against the stone walls I feel the ache come into my chest and collapse and die from a broken heart; heart attack.  Phew that wasn’t nice.  That night back in my room more tears came to complete the release.

Each time leading up to these past life grief releases I feel overwhelming discomfort, sadness, pain, emotional, mental and physical.  Each time I clear that past life I feel immense relief; peace, joy and bliss move gently in and I’m able to take the next steps on my path.  I don’t always see what I am clearing either, so please know that you don’t have to be able to ‘see’ it to clear it.  You may begin to see it in time with practice but don’t ‘look’ for it, let that happen naturally.  We just have to trust and also find peace in the moment we are in.  This is very important, if we can find peace in any given moment we may be in we will help ourselves beyond belief.

This is all part of our journey and my prayer for you is to let yourself grieve for what or whoever it is you are grieving for.  We all truly have the ability to heal in fact we already have healed in spiritually terms!  Let that grief take you on a journey that I promise you will never look back on.  Always look for the lesson in every situation and learn from it.  When we let go we grow.  Feel and offer gratitude for at least one positive in your life every day you feel this pain and every day you don’t.  Go give your Mam a hug for no reason.  If you’re relationship is not perfect remember nothing is and she has her own pain she is trying to work through also.  If you aren’t lucky enough to have a relationship with your mother go give a mother figure to you a hug, or a friend, or your child, or your partner all of them.  Just go give someone a hug! J

And remember as my lovely Mam says ‘It’s always good to cry’.  Cry; cry, your little heart out and be kind, loving and compassionate toward yourself.  There are many ways to help yourself, meditation, yoga, any exercise that works for you (remembering to be mindful and listen to your body’s wisdom; if it wants to rest let it rest don’t fall into the mode of moving to run from your emotions and pain, find the balance), alternative and spiritual healing modalities, being outdoors in nature (sitting or strolling), talking to a grief counsellor, being with (talking or not) good friends and family you feel comfortable and safe with, spending quality time with children (my nephew was our little earth angel) they remind us to laugh.  You are on a very special journey and you are needed here.  Healing is catching, let us heal ourselves and we in turn help this earth to heal.  Lets us heal one heart at a time.

Blessings

Namaste

Ashling xxxx