The Only Solace—Chapter Three—The Days Following
The first few days following our discovery of Danny were the hardest. I think the agony is the greatest at the beginning, before your mind has fully accepted the inevitable and rails against all logic to invent another outcome. The image comes to mind of an ice cube, trying not to melt on a hot day! You can’t stop the melting but you resist it, which evokes enormous suffering as your mind wrestles with reality. For me there is sadness and a sense of failure in resignation, however, it’s less excruciating and exhausting than the mental struggle to un-write the written.
That first night after I crawled into bed I grabbed my computer and sent out a mass email contacting everyone in my address book. Between friends, family and the all the people who at one time or another had contacted me for spiritual healing, the list was sizable! The email briefly stated that my son Danny had passed of an overdose and requested that everyone send him a prayer. I then forgot about it as the next day found us knee deep in funeral arrangements. Although I am an interfaith minister, Jerry and I both come from Jewish families. At the time of Dan’s passing we were members of a synagogue in Hastings-on-Hudson, and so we naturally turned to our roots, which meant that we would have a Jewish funeral, which meant that all the arrangements had to be made immediately! I can’t say that I understand this, but in Jewish tradition the body is buried within a few days of passing and so there we were, making decisions we never dreamdt of making, in a hurry! It’s an agonizing, insane and unreal time. I must again mention Aaron who painstakingly worked out many of the arrangements for us, right down to buying Danny a new suit to be buried in.
Needless-to-say, the next few days were a haze of surreal events that I moved through in shock, grief and disbelief; underscored by a pervasive sense of guilt, because I had failed to protect my child! However, it was precisely at these moments of agonizing guilt that I first thought I heard Dan talking to me inside my head. I would hear the words in my own voice but I would hear it. “Mom”, he would say, “this was not your fault. I did it, not you. Don’t beat yourself up. There was nothing you could have done, “ and then I’d think, “Well, that’s true” and I’d feel better for all of about 10 seconds, until I decided that it was merely my imagination that I was hearing.
Still, this continued to happen. Interestingly, I would always hear these thoughts when I was at my lowest ebb and truth be told, they always calmed me down considerably. I remember thinking that listening to what I was hearing inside my own mind was more comforting than talking to anyone, and that if I could just accept it as real, I would be able to heal a little. The problem was, however, that I was unable to accept what I was hearing as real. The thoughts, none-the-less, persisted. As soon as I would begin to berate myself, the thoughts would rush into my mind and immediately counteract my cruel accusations. For example, my mind would start attacking me with remarks like: “You should have known, you should have called and woke him” and then almost immediately I would hear, “But Mom you couldn’t have known, I didn’t even know,” which I believe to be true. I do not think that Danny expected the mixed-drug reaction to take his life. Still, I couldn’t know if these thoughts were coming from Dan or my own inner mind, but wherever they were coming from, they were both the sane and kind.
It soon occurred to me that what I needed to do was to make an appointment with the medium Glenn Dove in order to connect up with Danny through a means that I trusted. I had known Glenn since 1995 and have had the privilege of sitting in private sessions with him many times over the years. I had grown used to conversing with both Harry Edwards and my father on a regular basis through Glenn’s well-developed gift of mediumship. I wasn’t sure if it was too soon after Dan’s passing for him to come through to me, but I felt certain that at the very least, my father and Harry Edwards would, and that they would give me information about Dan.
Without mentioning that I had lost a son, I called Glenn Dove’s office and scheduled an appointment at his earliest convenience, which, due to a cancellation, was in less than a week. Danny had passed on the 1st of July and I had managed to wing an appointment for the 8th! Bravo for cancellations! I brought my daughter Jessica with me. We were driven out to Glenn’s office on Long Island by a close friend, also a bereaved parent who kindly offered to escort us.
Almost as soon as the session began, Danny came through with my father. Following are excerpts from the session that took place on July 8, 2008. Present in the room was Glenn Dove, my daughter Jessica Migdol and myself. I want to point out that the information completely concurred with what we already knew to be true. Some of those facts are:
- Danny passed of a mixture of alcohol and prescription drugs.
- Danny’s favorite person in the whole world was his little sister Jessica.
- Jessica was due for a birthday on July 28th.
- We had recently moved into the city, we were staying temporarily at my husband’s office/apartment and we were soon moving into a new apartment.
- Jessica was starting a new school in the city.
- Aaron had planned to travel to Florida to take the Florida Bar Exam on the week that Danny passed.
- I had set up a huge prayer list for Danny.
- Danny had never met my father who passed before Danny was born. Danny had seen my father’s portrait everyday because it hung in our home.
- Danny was reckless.
10. Danny loved his car.
11. On the day before the evening he passed he had a talk with his father who told him that he was playing “Russian Roulette.”
1st Glenn Dove Session—-Sheri and Jessica—July 8, 2008
Glenn: Always, if I make mention of a name and you recognize it, let me know. People come in sometimes that you’re not expecting. You can come in with a mindset, expecting one thing and somebody else comes through. Let’s see who comes in first. A couple of people are coming. I know there is someone over on the younger side…
Sheri: Yes.
Glenn: Because there’s an untimely passing. Hold on one second. Your dad’s behind him and points to his head. Someone was having a real hard time mentally. I’m not clear mentally, is what it is. I’m assuming the older male, I don’t say older, your dad wasn’t old-old, but then I’m getting younger.
Sheri: Yes.
Glenn: And this has just happened!
Sheri: Yes!
Glenn: Oh, this is just….
Sheri: Yes, very recent.
Glenn: Cause he’s telling me “Now.” This is really weird, because yesterday, I believe, I think your father tried coming to me because I was sensing somebody and I kind of felt it him, and he was trying to bring this younger male to me. Yesterday I did something like 9 readings, I went all day, came home, did phone readings last night because I’m taking off the rest of the week to go on vacation…so I didn’t contact you. I knew you would be coming in today. I don’t understand whether somebody had a head issue, because he’s pointing to here and here. (Glenn points to his head). Maybe somebody wasn’t right up here, or something happened or both…it’s like I’m not clear headed, my head is foggy. It’s almost like I brought this on to myself. That’s what happened. This is either a suicide or an accidental…oh, I’m more confused. I don’t know how clear they are because he says….we’re talking like a week or two…
Sheri: Yes, a week ago…
Glenn: Usually it’s about 6 months before they can make it through.
Sheri: It’s a week.
Glenn: Other than my father, who came through the night he died, most of the time it takes about 6 months to a year before somebody is really able to come in, but your father said it’s because of him that he’s coming up in front. D-A? Hold on…
Sheri: Yes, D-A…
Glenn: Oh, wait a second…my God, I thought he was saying it’s Dad. It’s DAN?
Sheri: Yes
Glenn: Oh my God. Okay. But he says he took his life?
Sheri: Well…
Glenn: He was very confused before. Whatever he did, because he says something about, I don’t know if you know what happened but he says, he wasn’t clear.
Sheri: I think it was accidental but I wouldn’t know.
Glenn: Um, I’m going to differ a little with this one because he says something about, he says he wasn’t clear with this. I have to go with your dad because he is the stronger one who is bringing it in. This is really weird because your father said something about this to me yesterday and I wasn’t sure what it was and I was going to call you but I knew I was going to see you and I wanted to wait. But that’s what he is talking about. He’s pointing to his chest and his head. That’s what I’m confused about. Unless he wasn’t focused on what was going on. You know, something went into his system, because that’s what he’s telling me.
Sheri: He took something.
Glenn: That’s what it is because I feel like, from what comes up in front, he had an emotional imbalance, he ingested…I get 2 different things going into my system and then that just led to everything that happened.
Sheri: Right.
Glenn: I don’t feel a total intention but there was a disregard for his life, the way he ran it.
Sheri: He was reckless.
Glenn: Reckless in that sense. I don’t know if this is a second one…did somebody else go over or this is the second time in doing….I mean you don’t do this 2 times…but in other words did he try to do this before? He says, he’s borderline with this before and um, I’m trying to get him to talk. He’s next to her. (Jessica)
Sheri: Of course.
Glenn: Who sides with who in the family, and for some reason, not to be insulting to you, your father’s behind you but he has to sit with her, he tells me that out of anybody,… it’s funny you brought her today.
Sheri: It’s not funny…This is his baby
Glenn: Out of anybody, that’s the one he has to come to. What’s with the school? He says, “Do what I say, don’t do what I do”. He’s pushing her forward. He seems okay. He seems like he’s at peace on that side. I have to say that I bow down to your father because this man took the whole thing, handled the whole thing. I guess they’re made aware of it ahead of time, because your father says, “There was nothing I could do about it.” He didn’t know your dad?
Sheri: No
Glenn: He says, “I’m able to put people to the faces. He didn’t say it but it’s almost like, you put a name to the face. But he makes it seem like he knew the face but he didn’t know the person. Now he goes, “I am able to put the person to the face”.
Sheri: He saw pictures of them.
Glenn: Right. It took me a second as I was saying that. Um. What’s the birthday?
Sheri: Her, (Jessica) birthday is July 28th.
Glenn: Your birthday’s coming up. He’s turning around. He wants a party for your birthday. He’s going to put his humor into this. He will go into a rest period, but he said, “I’m waiting for the birthday”. He wants to be around, and he sort of gives me this feeling like you better enjoy it. In other words he says, “Don’t mourn this! Enjoy it”. He is mentioning about a car.
Sheri: Oh Danny’s car.
Glenn: It’s funny because in a way, he goes, it’s almost like you figure this kid is out of the woods and he’s sort of going along and all of a sudden he said, it’s just like, I don’t want to call it a relapse but he says, he just wasn’t going to get it all together in this incarnation.
Sheri: I knew that.
Glenn: And he said, he did all he was supposed to do. He could have done worse. And he says that he has a lot on that side…they’ve already told him he’s going to have a lot on that side to deal with. In other words, that will be laid out for him. It’s weird because I keep asking him, “Did you do this?” and he said, in an indirect way he sort of just did this to himself. I don’t want to say a totally conscious way, but was this a party or something?
Sheri: Daniel’s life was a party.
Glenn: God! He makes me feel like, he’s gona fly by the seat of his pants in life and just…but of all the things, I don’t know if somebody contacted a group that pray for him, but something’s been done for him and he said, he’s felt these waves of like, a prayer…a wave of prayer. He’s said he’s been getting these waves. He said he will go into a rest period shortly. He’s hanging for the birthday. He’s very protective of her. It’s kind of funny.
Sheri: He always was.
Glenn: I’m trying to ask if it’s intentional and he says in an indirect way. It’s almost like an escape because he makes me feel like I am walking down a hallway and I see an exit door and he just decides to go out the exit, so I’m thinking, it’s not that I necessarily set it off, or necessarily wrote a note, but yet in the same sense, he was just playing Russian Roulette with himself. “I’ll take this, I’ll do this…I’ll combine these”…knowing it was just like….you know. I still don’t understand the head and the chest thing or why he’s doing that. Because he says something about, my head…he was so cloudy and then he did something else on top. And then he motions to his throat and his neck.
Sheri: Did he suffer?
Glenn: No. Not at all. He was just in and out. He wasn’t conscious. He was just in and out. That’s what happened. He wanted me to recognize it. Was your other son away? Was somebody supposed to be away at the time because he was apologizing that someone had to take a trip here. In a way, he’s a little taken back because he didn’t realize the wave of…
Sheri: Love?
Glenn: Of everything, yeah. I can’t imagine how he didn’t but it’s like I see with my kids. They have everything…I always say to my kids, I didn’t have half the things you had growing up and I do it because I want them to have it, whether it’s the trips, or when my son needed a car. And he said, “You did more than that”, but he said, “for some reason, no matter what you did”…
Sheri: It was never enough.
Glenn: And it would never be, because this is like, I always tell my son, it’s always “I want this, I want this.” As they get older it becomes bigger things…it’s no longer dolls or power rangers. It becomes cars or whatever. But did you ever notice how that doesn’t even satisfy you.? You always go on to the next. First I want a house. Then, I want a bigger house. Now I don’t want a big house. I want a smaller house. And he said, he just never. It was right in front of him. He says to say thank you because he understands that if he asked you for the world you would have tried to give it to him and he said that he recognizes his personality as being like, you know, the rebel…like being the rebellious. And it’s almost like, he said, sometimes it was uncontrollable, that he would do things and watch himself do it and not even know why he was doing it. And this is what happened at the end.
Was he supposed to start working or something and he wasn’t because he said, he makes a joke about it and he says, “I was supposed to get myself together”, as if everything was being set up for him. And he says, with all these things that were done, not for you, you were never in a selfish mode…he’s apologizing to some friends as well. Like I said, he’ll be around a little bit. But then he will go into a rest period. It’s your father’s family that stepped in he said, and I can’t say intervened, but came right—grabbed him and pulled it right through. This is what he is implying.
Understand that I don’t audibly hear him. They’re not really talking to me. I’m sort of getting a mental sensation. But what’s interesting is… it’s so real to him. And he is describing something that I have heard so many times, even in the state that he’s at. When you get over there, whatever you are here, you are there, so mentally your environment always reflects, on this side as well, your environment will always reflect your thought processes. As I was taught many years ago and the statement goes: your outer reality is always the place where your thoughts become objectified, materialized. My environment will always reflect my thought and my heart…but he’s making me feel like it’s much more real. Almost like you’re waking up from a weird dream, but then he knows he has all this stuff to take care of, but this is how he wrote it out, so he said. Even in passing, I’ve got to tell you something…it isn’t like he’s coming back and going “Wow, I should have”. This is who he is. He’ll hold true to himself he said. There’s no one to blame. I have to say again, it’s not a direct thing, but he really did this. It wasn’t like total accident, he says, he just kind of put himself into oblivion, in a sense. And he’s done this more than once, I don’t know whether he’s just, you know, pulled through it a few times and no one realized it, or you know…
Sheri: I was often worried.
Glenn: Oh, that’s what he said, he goes, “In one way there’s this massive loss, but in another way”, He goes, “Tell her it’s okay to feel relief because that’s what she’s feeling. It’s like a very weird relief you’re feeling.
Sheri: I’m not feeling it yet.
Glenn: Well, you will. It’s like, you’ve been going at it for so long and all of a sudden. What amazes me, in the midst of all of this, his concern for her. (Jessica) I’m saying to myself, I didn’t really know him well enough, I maybe met him once or twice. But his disregard for certain things, but in the same sense what I just find humorous is that, it’s almost like all the things that you’ve instilled, which you thought went in one ear and out the other, he’s now throwing on her. Which is hysterical because I’m saying to myself, here you said to him, “Bing, bing, bing,bing, bing, here’s the rules” and he turns around now, he totally was against them, he’s totally gona break them, and now he’s going to her, “It’s the rules!” I’m thinking to myself, this is like my kids telling me I’ve become my father….I go, “No, I was cool”. It’s almost like, he’s just flipped a role and so I think he’s letting you know that everything you say has got its place, or its point with it.
Sheri: I keep thinking that he is giving me advice. Is that true?
Glenn: He’s been coming. He says again he’s going to need a rest period but he said that your father was the one. I have to tell you, yesterday, this is so weird. Your father came to me and I was going to say something…I thought he said something about your son….but I was so crazy, I had so much going on. But your father came once or twice, and I realized it was him, and he said he was just trying to give me an idea because he was trying to hold him on that side where he is, because he will go through this rest period. He’s not a dark place, he’s not in a low place, that’s what we concern ourselves with. But he says that…what is this? He moved already? I’m confused with this. You guys…you’re moving?
Sheri: We moved into the city. He had his own apartment for the first time.
Glenn: I’m telling you. He said, it’s just like he’s looking at it all and thinking to himself, “How could I have not gotten this?” He had everything he could possibly…but sometimes there’s no contrast. Sometimes you know, I look at my kids, I wonder, how can they not get it? But they don’t know any different. They’ve only grown up with this. They’ve always had certain things. Basically they say, “I need”—and I run out and I get. My son doesn’t know any different and so he can’t see it.
Sheri: He couldn’t see it.
Glenn: Everything in this world is done through comparisons. What I’ve learned is you can’t have somebody speaking unless someone is remaining silent. You can’t have a team win a game unless somebody loses a game, you can’t be tall unless someone is short. So whenever I ask either of you anything about your lives, the answer will be based on the comparison. I’m happy, I’m sad, I’m full, I’m hungry. Everything you say, when you stop to think, has its equal and opposite. In this particular situation he had nothing to compare. He did in theory, but he didn’t understand it because it wasn’t experienced. He’s okay with this. He says that shortly he’ll take this rest period and then he said he’s got his work cut out for him because he said he’s got to go through reviewing what he’s done in his whole life. He feels like his brother and his father had a different relationship than him and I bring it up because he says,“You should never feel like”…he understands that he was given opportunity. In one way he wasn’t in competition, because he said, “That was never me”. But in the same time sometimes he feels like, not that somebody’s favored, but sometimes you know, one person does things differently and he goes, “I had to work through all of that. But he’s coming along with this. It’s going to take a little while.
You’re moving again now?
Sheri: Yes, we’re moving again. We are staying temporarily in an apartment above Jerry’s office. We will be closing soon and moving into our new apartment on 99th st.
Glenn: Okay. Because he’s talking about the move. He’s surprised even, and your father is such a help, he says that he’s surprised how free he feels. Even though he’s probably more in a burdened state then some other people, he says he’s surprised how free he feels with everything .
Sheri: Danny?
Glenn: Yeah. It’s interesting. I don’t think it’s something that any of us can comprehend until you experience it. It’s almost like….we can explain what it’s like to be a parent, or to be married. And I used to think I knew what it feels like. I thought, “I know what it’s like to have a kid. My brother has 3. I take care of my nephews. And then when I had mine it was like, “Oh my God!”
Sheri: Danny’s feeling freer over…
Glenn: He’s starting to understand the freedom and he says it’s hard for us to understand because while we’re still in the mortal coil as we call it, you’re not going to recognize this. I don’t get the working. Is he supposed to be starting work?
Sheri: He was supposed to start working for his dad.
Glenn: Your other son is also working with him?
Sheri: The brother works for the dad too.
Glenn: Okay, because he says something about…he always saw himself below his brother. You know, you can’t do that. Each kid is separate. She can’t compare herself. Everybody has their own little niche. He always felt like he wasn’t going to stack up, he wasn’t going to add up. You know, it’s like, this one had the credentials…I’m listening to this and I’m saying to myself….I go through this all the time with my guys. As I said, my youngest is going to that prep school where his brothers go. His brother graduated top in his class and this guy just made it in. But, that’s his journey in life. That’s what he chose. So this is what Danny chose in life and he says it’s a whole flip…he says he’s trying to understand it. He’s okay. He said that no one’s left him over there. I don’t know whether you asked him, because he said whether you realize it or not, you must have either said something to your dad, because he said no one’s left his side He says, tell her… he makes a joke like it’s okay, you can lighten your grip…meaning you, because he said, “Everybody’s made sure.”
Now, on that side, what’s going to happen? Well, you can be in a confused state of mind and then your environment will reflect it but he says, “No, I just have to get my rest and then, he said, “I will be about”.
Sheri: He liked his rest.
Glenn: Yeah, he’s funny like that, because he’s like a sleeper. He’s one of these people…So, he said, It’s funny because I thought he was going to say it’s like a bad dream but he made me feel like, this is the dream and that’s the reality. What’s overwhelming is his concern for his sister and his family realizing now what would happen. Sometimes, in self reflection, in one’s passing, as it happens like that, you never lose consciousness. You’re conscious before you’re born, you’re conscious during your life, and when you go over. There is never a point when you’re not. But, he said, “The realism of all of it.” I think it’s in his self-reflecting of what his life was like, he feels that it was so short, that maybe part of his karma was in reflecting and watching it…seeing how he basically was handed all these things. And the other thing I need to mention, this is for you and Jerry. It wasn’t like you did anything that I would say do differently. And your father is shaking his head. He said it is very important I give you that message. He said, “There’s nothing you could have done”, he said, “That would have made any difference,” and I’m thinking like wow and he goes, “No one.” In other words it isn’t like, if I would have tried harder—no…he said. He’s talking about trips to California and putting him here and trying that. He said part of it was karma for you to be tested because you came in to take on children and he said you had karma, just to let you know. Your dad is letting him talk. He said you have family karma, children karma in this lifetime. This was part of your trip, to go through a whole thing of having children and taking on children and doing it, and this is what your devotion would be, and your priority. And he said, so you did all that you could possibly do. And he said, in a certain language, he’s basically a screw up. He’s a little blunt with things…that’s the way he comes through with this, but he’s funny and he said, you know, it’s who he is. He says, “I guess I have to review all this now, there’s no free lunch with this because you’re just reviewing yourself…if you try to BS your way out of something…you’re just talking to yourself.” That’s the one thing, nobody is telling him he did something right or did something wrong, and he goes, “I’m not feeling like I have to do something, prove something. For the first time”, he goes, “I feel like I can do what I want and I’m told I can do whatever I want”, and the point is there’s no right or wrong and yet, he goes, “I sort of throw guilt on myself.” And this is really funny because here’s a case where on this side people are going, “You’ve got to get it together…you should go to work…go to this person…go to this counselor, and you know, it’s almost like as if it kept him always like, “Okay, I’m the crazy one if you want me to do all this stuff.” On this side he said, “No one puts any limitations on me at all” and because of that he’ll do it to himself. And he says, “They’ll just leave you”. Over here he’s explaining that if you say you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to do it. And he said that the weird part is that there is this total freedom and he goes, “But it’s scary because no one is telling you that you are doing something right or wrong, you just experience the result of what you want and then that will feel good or it won’t feel good. So, he says, this is the process he is going to have to go through. He’s apologizing to the family, like I guess grandparents…older people in the family too because he said, something that I have heard a million people say, and it includes you, no parent or grandparent should ever witness a child going over. For that he reaches out. He said, and your dad said also, there should be another child coming into the family.
He’s sort of getting an orientation. It’s being explained to him that he can go and he can do what he wants to do, but through his own reflections he says, “I will get some rest” and then he says “I’m going to” and it’s going to sound…these words coming out of his mouth but he says, “I’m going to be getting to work”. So there’s an odd one because he was supposed to go to work and he says, “Well, in a way I’m doing it…there’s no short cuts.” Almost like, “Shucks…I did this thinking I’m going to get out of the work and there’s no getting away from it.” I’m just hysterical at the way he comes through like, all of a sudden, the responsible sibling giving the younger one…like you know…sounding like something you and I would say. So, maybe there’s something to be said about that. He mentions some educational things in front of her, not just school but some things she may get herself involved in. I won’t color what she should be doing but he said, “She’ll have to do with some helping of other people down the road and he said this experience is going to aid in that, so he goes, “People will listen to her.” So he wants me to recognize this. There’s supposed to be also a trip…he says something about there will be a trip planned. He will be in and out for a while till the end of the month or so and then he’s going to take a bit of a rest period. He’s going to try to contact you. Watch the most common things as I’ve always told you, a fragrance…I find lights going on and off…things of that nature …that stuff happens, so just to be aware about it because this is what he’s presenting and showing up in front. Your dad’s been around you constantly, in a sense that you can’t even imagine, in a very intense way. You willed him in whether you realize it or not. Everybody over there has got it all under control. So, he’s still got some things to sort of deal with.
Sheri: How could he not?
Glenn: He’s going to. Life is taken a certain way and so we do come back and we do have options. So, he says, “Oh no. In no way am I”…and this is like I said before, he has plenty of work. To reach certain levels you have to work at it and he says, “Oh, I know that” but he said he was concerned…It’s funny. He was concerned. He said his one regret is that he never thought of the ramifications of the acts he did on other people. And he said, “For the first time in my life” and this is still his life, he goes,“That’s what’s hitting me the hardest.” So he said, “The ramifications of what I do affects other people” and he said that he’s feeling the intensity of other people feeling his loss and that’s sort of like, how do I say…an echo flaps back on him, so his own act is now coming back to haunt him. So, he says, “Sometimes when I feel a little pulled down, I’m realizing it’s not that I feel that myself”, he said. Other people have felt frustrated about him. You know, they miss him or whatever. So he said, “Sometimes it’s a little difficult”, and that’s what can send a person down. So that’s why I always tell people, “Don’t mourn a person when they go over, celebrate them and send them positive thoughts.”
Sheri: So hard not to.
Glenn: Listen…I don’t know. I’ve been doing this my whole life and I don’t know if I could sit in that chair and go through what you are going through. I know a woman who was a bereavement counselor who lost her daughter and almost had to be put away. I can sit here and preach this all day but I don’t know what I’d be capable of doing. I know in theory what’s right but until you go through these experiences…
He walked over to you again…no offense, he starts to laugh but he’s got his hands on her shoulders. It’s almost like she has to have something of his to hold on to. I feel like I’m holding someone’s shirt or jacket. She may maintain something of his, which he feels might help keep the link between the two of them. He will be around so you can talk to him, or your dad. Your dad just stepped up. Your father said that this took a lot out of him but he wanted to make sure that you knew he was okay. Your dad did come to you, and you’ve been talking but he said your sleep has not been solid. Your father said, he’s been trying to come through but you weren’t clear enough. So just watch because you may have a few events where you might sense somebody around, so don’t think you’re crazy. In a way the move is going to be good because your father said the new environment will be such that it will be a new thing for you, a new start. It’s very hard to be in an old place where you’ve been for so long and you look and you go, “Oh, my goodness…so and so always used to sit here.” So, he says, “ In a way that’s all going to work out together” and they are all kind of working with her with the school and stuff like that, so you’ve got a lot of push there with it. They’re going to stand back. They are stepping back.
So, once a day just talk to him for about 2 minutes a day. He will feel the intention. You can say something to him like, “Just let me know that you are okay” and then sit still for a moment. If you do it on a regular basis, he’ll come through.
This session brought me enormous relief! Danny was okay, Danny was with my father, Danny had survived death, Danny was still Danny! I had believed that personality survives death for a long time, but when Danny passed, my sorrow and resistance were so great, that I was initially unable to access any of that knowledge. However, having this session changed everything by reassuring me of what I already knew: that Danny is still the same conscious being that I knew and loved, that he exists in a different dimension and that if I want to be in touch, I have to seek him where he dwells. The words came back to me again and I knew I that I would spend a good portion of my time and energy exploring and learning how to connect up with Danny.
One of the things that surprised me was the fact that Danny mentioned the “waves of prayer” that he experienced. I knew from my healing experience that energy directed to humans from spirit could be very powerful, but I didn’t realize how powerful it can be when it is directed from humans to spirits. It pleased me to think that those prayers reached him. Danny goes on to comment about the value of prayer directed to them on that side from us on this side, in many future sessions.
What I found very reassuring was the accuracy of everything Glenn talked about, right down to the last detail. From the fact that Dan had taken 2 different substances to his reckless lifestyle, to his protectiveness of his younger sister, Dan was true to form. It was as if we were having a conversation, openly and honestly discussing what had taken place since the last time we had been together. Even more evidential to me was the fact that Danny was Danny. His personality was intact.
It began to occur to me that Danny and my father weren’t hanging around the medium; they were hanging around me and it is because they knew that I would go to the medium that they made it their destination as well. As I left Glenn’s office I vowed to take Danny with me and to think of him, my father and Harry Edwards as my “spiritual entourage.” From that time on it became easier for me to open my own channels to hearing Danny and receiving messages and signs directly from him. I just started to listen to what was going on inside my own mind without dismissing it as figments of my imagination!
I began to find that when I was extremely despondent I would feel a presence around me and then I would be flooded with thoughts. I heard all of these thoughts in my own voice, but it was the content of what I heard that made me sit up and think, for in the midst of despair came words of love and comfort. It was hard to imagine that I could supply that kind of balm to myself when I was so grief-stricken. .
I remember vividly going to the cemetery shortly after Dan’s funeral. My husband and I stood at Dan’s majestic gravestone and cried. We couldn’t believe that this was where our son had ended up, under the ground at 22 years old, with nothing to mark his life but this black granite gravestone. I could see that Jerry was overwrought and then I heard these thoughts. “You guys can stand here and cry over this piece of land all you want but I’m not under there. I’m out here and I’m getting back in the car….and I’m riding shotgun”. Now, this was so Dan that I was awestruck! He often fought with his siblings over who rode “shotgun” in the car. I strongly felt his desire to see us move away from his grave because at least right now, it was unearthing raw emotions. Sensing this I walked over to Jerry, took him by the arm and led him back to the car. “Danny wants us to leave,”, I said.
It was moments like this that made me believe that it was possible for me to have a communication, on my own with Danny. As time went on I began to benefit more and more from these moments of connecting up. They filled me with a strong sense of Dan and helped me to miss him a little less. Admittedly, I can’t see him and I’d give anything for five more minutes in his physical presence, but when I allow myself to sense him and to listen to what I believe to be his thoughts, I am, to one degree or another, lifted up by it. Sometimes I cry, but it’s a good cry.
Sometimes the ideas would come so quickly that I would turn on my computer to type out what I was hearing. The following material is dated July 13, 2008, 12 days after Danny passed. I call it: Words of Wisdom From Dan:
“You’ve got to develop a little bit more of that “fuck it” attitude. You can’t sweat everything all the time. There is a medium ground between caring and not caring, the middle road, where one cares, but not to the point of devastation. You will self- destruct. I, in life, leaned too far to the not caring side and therefore could not adequately protect myself. You, on the other hand, can sway so far to the caring side, that you do the harm to yourself without needing to put anything in your body. It comes right from the emotions into your physical body.
I beg of you to lighten up, for your own sake as well as mine. Remember how you used to say that you are as happy as your most miserable child? Well, your misery can only bring me down because it fills me with remorse. I understand your dilemma but, understand mine. If you want to help me, to lift me up, then lift yourself up and you lift us both up. You are a strong woman mom, stronger than you think. Pool all your resources now that have gotten you through in the past. Know that I love you and always will and that you are the one that always said, “Love is the only thing that spans the grave.
There will be time for us to venture forward and for me to join you in your work, as you have always known I would. Give me some time to get my bearings and I will come through for you time and time again. We will grow stronger and in time you will walk with both feet solidly on the ground, knowing that I am by your side at all times.
If you must cry mommy, then cry for all those who are suffering now, they are all over the place, the lost and lonely ones, the poor and hungry ones, the sick and disabled ones, the oppressed and forsaken ones. Don’t cry for me, for I am ok and so are you. This separation as you see it is temporary and nothing so tragic has happened here. This is the life we lead, one that incorporates death as surely as it encapsulates birth and one cannot exist without the other.
Go forward in peace and trust that I am with you and that you have not been forsaken, you are only experiencing another facet of life that many have experienced before you and that many shall experience after you, the loss of a child. But those children are only lost to you in the flesh. In spirit each is alive and vital. If only you could see just a small glimpse more than you do. But remember, faith is belief in that which is not visible. If it were self evident, why would there be any need for faith?
I leave you for now with the fervent prayer that you rise up and live up to the knowledge that you have worked so hard to cultivate. I know that these are big words for me, but it is your vocabulary that makes this possible. I just send you the impression. You flesh it out in words.
Mommy, I love you more than ever. Can you feel it? Open up your heart and feel it. It is stronger than the pain. Like you always said, Love is the strongest, most powerful force in the universe, the only thing that really makes life worth living, so feel it now.
I was moved by what I had written. I hadn’t thought of my grief in terms of how it could be affecting Dan. I kept thinking about what he said about needing to lift myself in order to lift him.
“Well, your misery can only bring me down because it fills me with remorse. I understand your dilemma but, understand mine. If you want to help me, to lift me up, then lift yourself up and you lift us both up.”
It made a lot of sense, especially in his case where he passed by his own hand. Guilt has never been a stranger to me so I could easily imagine feeling terribly guilty if my actions had brought so much pain to so many. But how was I to lift myself? What a tall task, yet as his mother, how could I not try?
For the first time it really struck me that what I feel and do still affects Danny. This seemed radical to me, even though I had believed in the presence of spirit for a long time. Now I wondered how I could think that Danny existed but was without any feelings? He may be a bloodless ghost but he is not soulless.
When I asked myself if there was any way that I could lift my spirits I found myself confronted with enormous resistance to feeling better. There was almost an unspoken understanding that if Danny could not enjoy a meal that I certainly shouldn’t either. It seemed sacrilegious to do anything that my son couldn’t do and even my breathing had become shallow.
However, now I felt obligated to think about Dan’s words because they made sense. If I accepted that he had gone on, (and I had) how could I negate his feelings? Wouldn’t I feel remorse if my actions, accidental or otherwise, had brought about so much suffering in the people I loved?
As a mother, I have always tried to help my children in any way that I could but this seemed a tall task. Still, if it would help Danny, didn’t I have to consider it? What I discovered was that I was not allowing myself to experience any happiness, because, in light of Dan’s passing, I felt it was wrong. I had a lot of thinking to do about this. If I was going to live believing in the valid presence of spirit then I had to make room for it, and be open to the messages that came to me, either through my own spiritual window or that provided by the mediums. I realized that to accept that Dan exists also means being open to his experience and if my sorrow was causing him to feel remorse, then I knew I had to work on it.
“If you want to help me, to lift me up, then lift yourself up and you lift us both up.”
I knew this wouldn’t be easy…the joyous bereaved? Come on. Isn’t that the biggest misnomer? But underneath all this confusion my heart was dancing to think that Danny really was himself, in another form and in another realm, yes, but himself! His spirit had survived death and was still with me. I decided to work to keep my heart and mind open and to continue to explore connecting up with Danny in any way, shape, or form I could find.
Joey Nervish Singh passed on February 11, 2011
Brittany and Aiden passed on February 27, 2010
