IN THE GLOAMING OF GRIEF (Part 4 of 4)

Nearing the end of a day when air creates color as it says
its goodnight; the color whispers possibility for a better, new day.

Fall, a word that defines my tumble on the grief path.

Fall, the season that delivers me to Me . . .                                        

I look back, have been blessed with strong communication from Matty in spirit, the signs began the day of his passing. The signs and synchronicities, our new language; validations that his energy is somewhere close by. I can see what he intends for me to see, sometimes I even receive physical sensations of his presence—a smoothing of my hair on Mother’s Day, a comforting pressure on my back during bedtime rituals for  his children as I silently  regale “Daddy” with stories of his little ones while waiting for them to nod off for the night. As comforting as these beautiful hellos and messages are, there is a growing sense of being consumed by an internal numbness that comes with my inability to reconcile Matty in the physical everyday to eternal Matty in the spirit world. In my mind’s eye I hold the image of a bridge between the two worlds. A bridge separating a chasm that needs to be crossed in order to find him. That image creates a false sense of separation. I have been trying to cross that bridge when in reality, he is so close, all I needed was a stroll down the boardwalk.

MY personal link with Matty

My awareness, my awakening, my key, my pot of gold at the end of the rainbow—finding MY personal link in my connections, finding Matty; this is the pause in my story for this frame in time. I’m sure there is more of the unexpected to come. It’s been a long year but oh! so priceless in rewards.

Hindsight is inviting me to take a bow, listen to the applause I’m giving myself—a new sound to my ears. My psyche, my heart join in and my soul rejoices in my remembering. I accept my role and find myself in the last act of this play In the Gloaming of Grief  as it is closing out year three of Missing Matthew.

The synchronicities are bountiful, the signs are coming faster than I’ve ever EXPERIENCED. I’m taken back to Halloween. Jason my eldest is enfolded in the spirit of the holiday. He is attending a party and has chosen to go as a 1970’s table tennis champion. He’s dressed in the perfect costume and has adorned a wig, headband and wristbands along with a pair of glasses. He sends me a picture and it is if I am staring at Matty come back in physical form to celebrate his second favorite holiday. I lose my breath and wanting to let Jason have his night, I mention nothing about the similarities to his brother and let him know his costume is great; enjoy your party is my wish for him. Whoever comes in contact with the photo in this age of social media is stunned by the vision of Matty he exudes. There are no holds barred in friends letting him know he’s channeled his brother! We talk the next day and now that the cat is out of the bag I jokingly ask him if he heard the unforgettable song from Ghost, “Unchained Melody” when dressed in costume— the one where Patrick Swayze comes back to our world for a few minutes. 

Matty, never one to miss a party must have gotten wind
that Jason was going to be celebrating in the presence of an Ice Luge
for cold shots—making its Halloween Bash debut.

November rolls around and I am headed straight for the Merciless Months as coined in the past. This is a new year and I’m hoping grief spares me the anticipatory grief of the upcoming 11 special days we live through from Halloween to January 7th, trigger days. My mind processes one way, my body another.

We find out that Bear is lactose intolerant and I decide I am going to deconstruct a cookie recipe and put it back together without dairy. This is coming directly from my heart. The Little One loves sweets and at three years old, this is a difficult transition for him but the benefits outweigh the changes. I meet with success. The cookies have the same look, chewiness and I can’t tell the difference between the dairy and non-dairy versions. I’m cleaning up the kitchen and after putting away dishes that were on drying mats (no pun intended), I am greeted by the most perfect smiley face I’ve ever seen! I thank my Matt and laugh out loud. He’s been with me the entire time I’ve been in the kitchen and now he's speaking to me in a language I love to speak.  I go to the stove top and oven to continue clean-up, and check on the cookies that are cooling.  I am greeted by a sad-face that is saying to me: “Mom the cookies look sooooo good, but I can’t eat them”.  Recognizing his wit and tenacity to communicate,  I am beyond thrilled. This is a visit from Matty! The signs, the spiritual shorthand that we now speak, hold the essence of his personality. Unmistakably.

Cookies, made with Love for his son and an effort coming directly
from the heart, elicit this wonderful visit from Matty.

Bruce’s birthday passes, our wedding anniversary is the next day, my birthday is in a few days. Hubby surprises me with an overnight get-away to a country inn in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire. The morning of my birthday, I awaken and ask Matt to please make sure I am totally aware of any sign or message, should there be one, on my special day. He has sent signs every birthday since his passing. As we are in the car driving up north the song Unchained Melody plays and I tear up, a trigger to his and Jason’s blending on Halloween. Hubby and I chat about how unusual it is to hear this song. It's an oldie and I recant my conversation with Jason and the link to this song. The song ends and my phone’s notifications app rings. I look at Facebook Messenger and a message comes in exactly at 3:13 from Beth D’Angelo (Grow Hope Project on Facebook), a friend and sister in grief, growth, healing and hope. The time stamp is significant. 13 is Matty’s validation number. Its my birth day and the number displayed on all his  sport jerseys throughout his school years. The message is beautiful. A gift from spirit to her heart and then from hers directly to mine. Here are Beth's words, her birthday wish for me:

“If I were in your neighborhood, I’d ask you to lunch or dinner...I’d ask for the most perfect sky to shine down on you and illuminate your own bright light...

I’d sit at our lunch/dinner table and make sure you were comfortable with the ambience and at the perfect time.....I’d get up and offer my seat for Matty and quietly touch your shoulder, kiss your cheek and whisper, “I’ll be right outside- take all the time you want with your son”.

I can’t think of anything more meaningful to give you, Diane.

So, with this birthday wish, I am asking Matty to do what he can to give you whatever he can to be with his mother on her birthday.”

Happy birth-day, my dear sister  💜

The feeling that came over me was powerful, extraordinary and very physical. I may be unable to find the proper words to describe but I am going to try. I would wish this EXPERIENCE for every bereaved parent on their Special Day. Time with my son, what an exquisite gift! As I’m reading Beth’s beautiful, meaningful words, this energy envelops my body. Energy that feels like the pull you get when you place two magnets in close proximity, touching, and then pulling them apart. It was outside of me, was going through me front to back and back to front and lasted the entire time I read my birthday wish. A true Spirit hug from Matty. Tears of joy, tears for the beauty of the EXPERIENCE, tears because I know my Matty is also giving me this birthday wish. The miracle of the Universe shows itself once again and the words thank you do not seem enough. Matty stays for dinner and sends two of the songs he’s used to communicate as further validation however, there is no validation needed, he is with me. Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah plays followed by Ed Sheeran’s Thinking out Loud. I am overcome. I feel the personal connection—gratitude to grace. 

November 19th brings two perfect heart signs to my awareness. “I Love you Mom, you’re getting the heart-hang of this”, I interpret.

Matty's sense of humor and wit are imbued in his communications.
Next, the heart on pavement filled with water and leaves . . . "I'll never leaf you Mom"

Thanksgiving Day, my Aunt and Cousin tell us of an auditory (clairaudience) EXPERIENCE they were blessed with before the holiday. They were at the Mall and clearly heard “Hey Auntie” in a voice they say was  distinctly Matty . . . but how could that be? Thinking that perhaps Jason is at the Mall as they have that genetic, familial sound-alike voice and laugh, the Ladies immediately check around inside and outside of the store and there is no one in the corridor they are in. The entire family gathering for the holiday is touched by this recent sign. We all love our Matty visits. The day progresses and Matty makes his grand finale entrance delivered by my two oldest granddaughters—his niece and his daughter. I tell the story of this sign in the blog post titled Bubble Matt—My Thanksgiving Sweet.

What I’ve learned is that MY personal link originates from my heart, from an act of Love as simple as baking cookies for a very loved little boy. I don’t even have to be conscious of this act. Love must ring a bell, Love must hold its own vibration that has a direct connection to spirit. MY connection, my personal link shows up in the every day heart to heart communications, from silent thoughts to gifts as grand as my birthday wish from Beth. My awareness was nudged, my heart was open, I believe, I trust and I was prepared to receive. There was a sharing of Love in the energy I felt from Matty—the long awaited supernal bond.

I am fortunate to have found a deep friendship with Rachel. She is an Evidential Medium and my dearest friend first. She has taught me much about connection with spirit and has always known and relayed that the passage into personal connection rests within. There is nothing else needed. Grief’s volume is set too high for me to hear and absorb her words clearly. My EXPERIENCE now pulls all the pieces together. Looking for and finding my personal link in the connection moves me forward as I am carried by my son.  Initially Mediums held the connection through their links and I was ever so grateful for the validation that Matty lives on, Love never dies and that in spirit he guides and watches over me. That something missing was my personal link in connection;  a personal link that would let me converse without an intermediary, the direct connection that would unmute my end of the conversation allowing me to EXPERIENCE the closeness of a relationship with Matty in spirit as it was in human form.

Why has this lesson taken so long? My guess would be this is a teachable moment for me and perhaps for others. Even though our paths are unique, in sharing we may be able to convey the feelings one may not be able to put into words. My blog posts have Matty’s signature all over them. You can hear the difference in cadence when Matty inspires, through his spiritual voice—our Language of Love. All I need, all we need to personally connect and partake in these supernal EXPERIENCES can be found within. It is up to each of us to find our own personal links and trust the journey. Heart versus Mind—Being versus Doing. Spirit perseveres and is with us even though we may be having difficulty finding our way. If I go back to the analogy of my phone conversation with Matty had he moved out of state; this is what I believe. I dial, the phone rings on his end. He picks up, I know he is there; I hear his Hello.  Unbeknownst to me, the mute button on my phone is turned on. I’m talking, then shouting “can you hear me”. He cannot until I become AWARE that I’m muted. There is no comfort, no satisfaction derived from this telephone call. He hangs up but will always answer again when it rings. When I am un-muted, MY personal link in our connection shifts the conversation, the comfort, the satisfaction completely. Unmute the heart and turn the volume of the mind down. Our children in spirit are close to us, with us. They communicate and we can’t reciprocate until we can heart them; yes heart  them— goes one step beyond hearing them. The communications can be subtle, unexpected, delivered by another and can come in a form meant solely for you. Believe, be aware, trust. Do the hard work.

I have run into many companions along the way; old friendships and new, teachers, books, lessons, movies, songs, triggers. I've created space on my path so that these human, loving people and non-human much needed paraphernalia can walk with me when needed. Whatever emotions(s) sit(s) in my heart and cloud the mind (because sometimes they show up in pairs)  has/have also walked beside me; fear, loneliness and as unbelievable as it may sound . . . Gifts. Yes gifts, bestowed upon me by my sorrow, my sadness, the darkness, the quiet, the empty—the very hard, hard work. In grief I have befriended them and in so doing, they have shown me their other side and walked me forward.

What gifts can I possibly perceive after my world, my beliefs, the core of me has been completely upended? With loss comes rebuilding, repair, renewal, reentry.  I surrender to the SomeOne/Source/God/Universe/I AM that is greater than I. I find a blank slate in me. I have been gifted a heart than can see. It now possesses a direct link to my soul allowing me to hear, listen and feel with a sensitivity that originated when the special in Matty fused with the special in me. It has been opened to giving, sharing and receiving that beautiful energy that is Love and Matty. I’m seeing the beauty, living with and communicating the glorious essence that is my boy in spirit.

Matty's words for the ending of this post were the first to find their way onto the keyboard, with instruction to hold 'til the end . . .

"Grief is complex, multi-layered. It is not all sadness, despair and depression. There is space for joy, happiness and laughter. It is not a dirty word. It is a human word. It survives the dark of the ache and thrives in the light of joy and is born of the human heart’s ability to Love and the need to experience the circuitous, convoluted, entangled, intricate, knotted jumble of emotions and feelings, tears and smiles, falls and uplifts. It is not meant to be minimized, quelled or compartmentalized. It does not have to wear a public face . . . it needs to wear the bearer’s face." 

My grief has turned down its volume. I feel its vibration as it finds its proper place in my heart. It mingles, becomes one of the necessary functions. Its purpose is to remind me that my son lived in the physical, that I continue to live in the physical, that we learned to Love in the physical, that I will miss him in the physical. The soul holds our spiritual connection along with the wondrous, mysterious gems I glimpse as well as the secrets the Universe is safeguarding for me. The physical is what makes me human. My tears are the very real release that my heart occasionally needs, like the cleansing out breath of air when held too long in the lungs. My tears do not shame me, they awaken me to the balance I’ve found in living between my two worlds. They have an open invitation to be felt in the present, in the moment in which they occur. They honor the Love I have for my son. I will remain human until my last breath is taken. This is my “Now Normal”.

To read Parts 1, 2 & 3, please click the links below:
IN THE GLOAMING OF GRIEF (Part 3 of 4)
IN THE GLOAMING OF GRIEF (Part 2 of 4)
IN THE GLOAMING OF GRIEF (Part 1 of 4)


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