Shadows, Beams, And A Final Goodbye

Before I begin writing about my experiences let me warn you that this will be long because it is the first time I'm putting a lot of this out there. I was about 14 when all of this begin.

A little background: my mom was diagnosed with recurring cancer about 8-9 months after my dad left us so we had to move in with 2 of my aunts and my maternal grandparents because my mom could not afford to pay rent on her own.

When we first moved into the new house my mom, younger brother, and I shared the master bed room which was huge. At the far end of the room there is a little hallway that leads to the master bathroom and it has a closet on each side. My bed was on one side of the hallway entry and my mom and little brother's bed was on the other side. The second night we spent there my brother mentioned that he woke up around 2 am to use the bathroom but froze when he saw a white, glowing figure in between both beds that slowly rose from a sitting or kneeling position and walked down the small hallway towards the bathroom. My mom and I dismissed his story because he was only 11 so we thought he was either dreaming or imagining things.

One night when I was about 15 or 16 I was lying in bed awake around 1 am when I heard a female crying in between both beds. It sounded closer to my mom's bed so I assumed it was her at first. My mom was going through chemo and sometimes cried at night when she thought we were sleeping because she was in pain physically or emotionally because, in case you're fortunate enough to not have met anyone going through this, chemo is a female dog. Anyway, I stayed still for a couple of minutes listening to the crying because it didn't sound like my mom and I was trying to analyze what might be wrong. When I couldn't just pretend like I didn't hear anything anymore I said "Mami?" and she replied, her voice completely clear and obvious that she hadn't been crying, "yeah, baby?" The crazy part is that as soon as I said "Mami" the crying stopped abruptly, no sobs or sniffles or anything. I asked her if she was ok and she said that she thought it was me that had been crying but she knew sometimes people just have to cry so she didn't want to disturb me. At that point I sat up and told her it wasn't me. She said it was probably our dog having a bad dream then. I looked around through the dark and spotted my white dog in a corner on the opposite side of the room. I agreed with her because I was spooked and hid under my covers.

The next day I brought it up again and she told me that she didn't think it was my dog, she just didn't want to scare me. A few minutes before the crying started she felt something rub her leg almost soothingly. She thought it was her grandma crying because her youngest granddaughter was in such pain.

A few more years and experiences which I will refer back to in a later story, and my mom was in the hospital. At first it started like any other time she was hospitalized but her condition quickly deteriorated. I spent the nights with her at the hospital and there were several times when I felt something off in the room. One night I didn't spend the night at the hospital but I got a call from my aunt that my mom was calling for me and she needed me and my brothers to go to the hospital asap. When I arrived the nurse was changing the bed sheets but my mom was too weak to get up so I had to help kind of hold her in a sitting position as they maneuvered around her. She was trying to be her silly self but it was clear something was wrong. She looked up, stared behind where my aunt was standing and screamed "Lucy be careful with that shadow behind you!" We looked and didn't see anything so we assumed it was the medicine making her hallucinate.

The next day my cousins came in to stay with her while I got something to eat. I didn't know about this until recently and I never mentioned the shadow incident to anyone either, but my cousin, Karla saw the shadow as well. My family is very religious although I am not, and my cousin said that she was singing some gospel to my mom when my mom said "keep singing, the shadow doesn't like it when we pray or sing." Soon after that my cousin saw a dark shadow in the corner behind my mom's bed. As it got closer to my mom she saw two white beams of light on either side of my moms hospital bed and the shadow backed up and disappeared.

Her sister had a similar experience. My mom was already in a coma when my cousin experienced this, but she said she was holding my mom's hand and praying when she had an urge to look up. She saw a dark shadow on the opposite side of the room that started moving towards them. It startled her so much that she got up and got closer to my mom. Once again, the two beams appeared by my mom's bed and the shadow disappeared.

Keep in mind, none of us had spoken to each other about these experiences until I mentioned what my mom said to my aunt.

The last thing that happened to me was the night my mom passed away. It was about 4 days after my cousins experienced that in the hospital. My mom had been sent home on Hospice and the day she passed my dog died as well. My dog died in the morning and I was so sad that I slept all day. Around 9 pm I had a dream that I was lying in bed and my mom walked up to me, healthy and happy, and said to me "I love you mi nina ('my girl' in spanish) but it's time for me to go." She then kissed me and I woke up. I went to her room and told her I loved her and was just going to get something to eat. I kissed her forehead and went downstairs. I hadn't even sat down to eat my pizza when my aunt ran downstairs and told everyone my mom had stopped breathing. I honestly believe my mom said one final goodbye to me before finally letting go.

I apologize for the length of my story but thank you for taking your time to read it. I would love to know any theories on what the shadow and beams surrounding my mom in her final days were.