Messages From the Dead
Since my last post our family has experienced tragedy that has kept me from keeping up on this site. My mother passed away, and though it was not entirely unexpected, it was a terrible experience. Mom suffered from a stroke 10 years ago that left here severely disabled and she had a problem with choking and aspirating due to paralysis. Though she could still talk, she was difficult to understand at times. She could eat by herself but it was difficult for her.
The family took care of her for several years until it got to be too much and then she was put in a care center about four years ago. Essentially her aspiration problem continued to get worse until this past March when she developed pneumonia. She was at the care center when my brother went to visit, he found her collapsed with the nurses working on her. She was hospitalized that day in ICU.
After about a week they told us that her only chance of survival was to have a feeding tube put in her stomach and one in her throat where they could extract the buildup in her lungs. If they did this she would never be able to eat or drink again.
Though it was tempting to give them permission for the procedure just to save her life, myself and my brothers and sister were hesitant because mom had already suffered so much since her stroke.
Before she had been hospitalized, mom kept asking me about spending Easter with us and we discussed this. When she regained consciousness in the hospital I encouraged her to get better for Easter, she would just shake her head. She knew she would never live to see Easter, though no one had told her yet. This is where I also should mention that just a couple of days before she was hospitalized she mentioned that she had sensed someone standing next to her bed in the middle of the night, and they talked to her but she couldn’t see them. I assumed this could have been delirium due to her illness, and it could have been, but I now wish I had questioned her more about it.
Finally we asked her if she wanted the tube, or wanted to be taken off life support without it. She indicated that she did not want the tube. When life support was removed, she just kept saying she wanted to go home. I don’t know if she meant home to the care center, or home to God. After life support was removed she refused any further treatment, she would not let them suction out her throat and within a day had developed pneumonia again.
The doctor had told us that she probably would only last a few days off of life support so we were not surprised. She was moved to different location where hospice took over her care.
I was going through a nasty divorce that had been initiated just after my mom was hospitalized, and as a result was in a desperate fight to keep my children. (He pulled some pretty mean and deceptive stuff while trying to use the system against me, even as he knew my mother was in the hospital dying.)
I could not spend as much time with her in her last days as I should have due to this reason. I did not want her to know what was happening so I never told her anything about why I had to leave hospital frequently, or couldn’t stay with her there the whole time, and this upset me. I only hope now that she understands. I just didn’t want her to pass on with what was happening to me, worrying her.
She went under the care of hospice on a Sunday morning and by Tuesday night they told us she probably only had a few hours at most. The whole family gathered at her bedside, and there are quite a few of us. I asked the hospice nurse if a priest had been contacted; this was imperative to my mother’s beliefs. To her credit, the nurse scrambled and was able to contact a priest, even at that late hour.
When I first sat down next to her bed I noticed there was a strong soapy perform scent around her; they had just cleaned her up. My mother was unconscious, but when I would talk with her she opened her eyes on a couple of occasions.
When my mother passed, for me the experience was horrible. It was the only time I had dealt with death directly, and I forced myself to be in the room so that I could be there for her. Just as the priest entered the room, my mother passed.
Naturally every one present was extremely upset. I went outside so that they could clean mom up and prepare her for the mortuary to pick her up. From that moment and throughout the rest of the night I had the strangest feeling my mother was right with me. I commented to my siblings that I felt mom was closer that she had been for a long time, like she was really there.
I don’t know if that was just a shocked psyche kicking in, or if it was truly her presence. The next morning I was climbing the basement stairs to the back door, and when I reached the landing I smelled that same perfume soap smell that I had noticed the night before in my mother’s room. It was very strong.
That night I was in the state somewhere between wakefulness and sleep when I heard my mom call my name three times. She called my name in the same tone of voice that she would use when she was urgently trying to get my attention. It brought me fully awake.
Within days of my mom’s death, and before her funeral, four of my adult children dreamt of my mom. She could not have her funeral until after Easter due to it being holy week. She told my daughter in a dream that she understood that our finances were bad and that we had no choice but to do a cremation, but she did want the funeral to be nice.
Three of my other adult children received dreams, with short messages. My brothers and sister also got small signs of mom’s presence during the following days.
My mother’s children were her life, and if there was any chance of getting an after death communication, I knew it would be with my mom.
I wanted to be able to afford a headstone by her birthday, but as finances are bad due to going through a divorce and paying for a funeral, it probably won’t be possible. I wonder if she is disappointed, as many things have happened since deciding to wait on the memorial stone. I’ve had pictures fall of the wall and brake, paper towels completely unravel and lying on the floor, etc.
Needless to say I have been ridden with guilt for not being able to spend as much time with her in her last days as I should have, plus I wondered if I shouldn’t have just ordered the procedure done anyway, though I feel it might have been a selfish thing to do on our part.
I have always been interested in EVP and I recently started recording them again. While recording I picked up something that I think might be mom. It is very faint and it is necessary to listen closely as I haven’t changed it at all or removed the noise. It sounds as if she is saying something like “couldn’t help me”
