I See You

April 25th, 2022, I was five months into defining my identity and reclaiming my life. I had learned to laugh again, started to love myself and I was living my best life or at least I thought I was. I was on my annual girls’ beach trip when I got the call that would stop my soul. It stopped me in my tracks and pierced every part of me. My sister Gabby had been in a horrible car accident and was being flown to a trauma center. I was two hours away and I felt like I couldn't get there quick enough. The next 5 days were just a blur. On April 29th her soul left us. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. There was a hole so deep and so painful, something I'd never experienced. How was I going to get through this? Why did this happen? When I start reflecting there were so many spiritual encounters that had taken place three weeks before the day of her accident. Little things that just reminded me that I needed my faith, friends and family. My friends had thrown me a 50th birthday party and my other sister Arristie came to it. I was so thrilled to have her there with me. Over the years my siblings and I had grown apart for various reasons. Later I would find out that Gabby had insisted on Arristie coming to the party. (I am proud to say Arristie and I are now closer than I could have ever dreamed. She is my best friend.) The morning of Gabby’s accident I was sitting on the beach when a woman had walked up to our group and started speaking to us. Now if you know me when I go to the beach, I tend to be somewhat of a recluse. While I may be in the group with all the ladies, I am usually reading a book and minding my own business. This is where I connect with Spirit and everything else going on is completely blocked out. For some reason I could feel this woman looking at me and I was slight nudge by something to look up at her. This woman was named Cynthia Lewis. She shared with us that she had had a stroke. When in the hospital the doctors were telling her husband that she wouldn’t make it. She told us she was unable to speak but could hear everything that the doctors said. Over the next few days of Gabby being in the hospital I ran into Cynthia and her friends a few times. One of the days they prayed with me and she told me that it wasn’t a coincidence that we met. God had directed her over that first morning to speak to me. She told me I needed to be Gabby’s voice since she couldn’t speak. Gabby held on for a few more days so that everyone was able to say goodbyes. Then in Gabby’s true fashion she decided to go out on her terms and donate her organs, saving five other human lives. Each of these moments were a Divine Synchronicity. Things that were divinely guided for me to experience. Losing Gabby taught me one of the most selfless acts that we can do as a human is to show unconditional love and help someone who might not be able to help themselves. Gabby lives on in our memories, but she is present with me every day in spirit. She is my guardian angel always guiding and protecting me. While grief can cause so many different emotions, I have been able to find peace. Grief is different for every individual. They say that it gets easier with time. I’m not sure about that statement. For me it’s about seeing and feeling each sign that is presented to me. The breeze that came out of know where when I was writing this sentence. The white feather that blew upon my leg walking down the beach. The red cardinal chirping on the fence until I acknowledge it. The rainbow, butterfly or in Gabby’s case a dragonfly. A friend gave me a deck of inspirational card after Gabby died. I began pulling a couple of cards each morning. I could shuffle the cards and mix them up and 4 out of 5 times I would pull the dragonfly card. After several weeks I started researching the meaning of dragonflies. Dragon flies are one of the only creatures that can go up, down, forward and backwards. It loves being by the water. The dragonfly signifies transformation. Letting go of the past and transforming into the beautiful creature that you were meant to be. I now have a beautiful dragonfly tattoo to remind me to always be open to change. Embrace the transformation. This was a Divine synchronicity. I am still processing the grief however it is more about focusing on the lessons, the positives and the memories. I choose to focus on the things that bring me peace. Yes, I have moments of sadness but I choose to not loathe in the sadness, yet I choose to celebrate the spirit that she is. Losing Gabby, I realized something about grief, I had never grieved the various relationships, molestation and traumas that I had experienced. I was good at suppressing feelings, deleting them and diving into my career. My career was my safe haven. It was the one place I felt safe, secure, confident and valued. I discovered grief isn’t always about the death of someone. Rather it can be about letting a dream go, letting a friendship go, letting a relationship that does not serve your higher being go. It can be about letting that part of you that protected you all these years go. Releasing that inner hurt and loving that little child.