Guides Can Be a Source of Support

I’ve talked this week about trauma, especially unsupported trauma. This is where an event or situation takes place that overwhelms a person’s nervous system (their fight/flight/freeze/fawn response gets stuck in the “on” position), their brain senses a threat to them, and they feel powerless. And then they are alone with these feelings or when they try to reach out for support, they’re ridiculed, told they’re wrong, told not to be “so negative” and to only “think positively,” or otherwise invalidated.

I’ve said that sources for that support can (hopefully) be friends, family, partners, therapists, and coaches.

Another source of support is your guides. Spirit guides, angels, animal spirits, beings of light, all can provide you with that needed support and validation.

I hear two primary arguments from people about looking to guides.

1. Relying on non-corporeal beings is not as effective as relying on people physically present in your life
   
   
2. Guides aren't real

Let’s take these one at a time.

Relying on non-corporeal beings is not as effective as relying on people physically present in your life

It’s different, yes. No question. But different doesn’t mean worse or less effective. We’re trained to trust what we can see, smell, touch, taste, and hear. We’re not often trained to trust what we feel energetically.

Religion works really well for some people. And I’m sure they’d say that relying on God or Jesus or Allah or Hashem or Brahman or El or any of the other thousands of deities found in human religion is at least as effective if not more than relying on humans. Humans can let us down. Humans get caught up in their own lives. Humans forget. Humans sometimes put their own interests before others.

If you’re lucky enough to have a human in your life who has never once let you down, then more power to you. By definition, trauma survivors have known the less pleasant sides of humanity. Many of us have been betrayed, hurt, rejected, and worse.

 

Guides aren’t real

What reality are you talking about? The reality where people have a near-death experience (NDE) and their lives change? The reality where people experience miraculous healing, and their lives change? Or maybe the reality where there are numerous stories about a rescuer—tow truck driver, paramedic—who, when asked about later, no one has ever seen or heard of?

Or how about my reality? The one where the more I worked with my guides, the more I healed, the more I was guided to people who could continue to help me heal, the more I began to trust myself, love myself.

Look at the results. If a person has a mystical or spiritual experience, meets their guides, or is the recipient of what might be called a miracle, and as a result, they also experience more joy, more love, more peace, and more healing, then I’d encourage them to continue.

If, on the other hand, their health and relationships deteriorate, they trust themselves less, and they live in a constant state of fear, anger, or numbness, then whatever they’re doing isn’t working.

That said, with the hundreds of people I’ve worked with (professionally and informally) over the years, helping them with their guides, not one of them has suffered as a result of relying on guidance.

Set in Motion

SET IN MOTION

This is how everything changed.

This is how a life was saved.

This is my story.

Trigger warning for a brief mention of past suicidal intention.

Also, bonus content in the last minute.

https://youtu.be/MGMtIuwkXU0

Soul Guides: What I Do . . . For You

Can you guess which of the following paid occupations I've NOT had?

1. Law clerk

2. Mental health counselor

3. Journalist

4. Researcher

.

.

.

.

.

That was...a trick question. I've had all of them. But I want to talk a bit about my work as a mental health counselor.

In the early 1990s, I was hired by a residential addiction treatment facility for women who were pregnant or had children under age three. My job was initially to create a relapse prevention program that offered additional resources and tools to residents who were survivors of trauma (most notably child and domestic abuse). I then began counseling these women, as an adjunct to other required therapy, on how they could cope with their manifestations of trauma instead of self-medicating.

In this facility, we focused on those who self-medicated with drugs or alcohol, but there are many more who self-medicate with shopping, gaming, gambling, sex, relationships, self-harm, food, exercise, and on and on. It was the beginning of trauma-informed addiction recovery there.

Fast-forward thirty years and I’ve healed decades of abuse I endured. I've raised two children to healthy, well-balanced adulthood. I've been through my own intense trauma treatment with EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing) and Somatic Experiencing®. I live a trauma-informed life.

I am not a mental health counselor anymore. I’m not licensed and I don’t practice therapy. I also don’t consider myself a healer. I do, however, offer coaching.

What’s the difference?

Here's my take:

A therapist helps a person heal their present by addressing what led them to this point (e.g.: trauma, core beliefs, emotional avoidance, etc.). Especially in clinical settings, it requires a "problem/ solution with measurable progress" paradigm. It is the surgery of the psyche, going after the root of the issue.

A coach helps a person change their present by addressing their thoughts, beliefs, and actions in the present moment and moving forward. It can operate as both problem/solution and also support/ celebration/accountability. This is the physical therapy of the psyche.

A healer helps a person change their present by addressing their energetic and physical health in the moment and moving forward. This is the medicine of the psyche.

While there are some overlaps, they largely have their own areas of focus.

When I’m coaching, we honor the past and acknowledge that it has an impact, sometimes profound. But we don’t go digging for it. We don’t go back to the past to try to heal it. That’s for therapy, which I usually recommend be trauma-informed.

Instead, we focus on the now. And that’s where intuition and soul guides—mine and yours—come in. Because guides can see patterns and what can happen if you continue to engage in the same patterns of thought, belief, and behavior. (Some humans, including me, can do that too. Guides are better at it.) 

If you’ll pardon a food metaphor, you’ve been picking at a plate of rubber chicken, cold lima beans, and undercooked Brussels sprouts for a lot of your life, because that’s what other people told you that you were supposed to want. That’s the life that would please others. It doesn’t please you.

You want a plate of, well, your ideal meal. Food that makes your taste buds come alive and your brain sing with dopamine. Some people—and sometimes society in general—have told you that you can’t have that ideal meal because of who you are, or because of your race, your income, your religion, your sexuality, your gender, your job, your weight, your intelligence, your mental or physical health, or something else. 

Working with your guides and/or your intuition is the fork or spoon (no sporks here) that is going to get that ideal meal to your mouth, bite by divine bite. (Usually not all at once; divine stomachaches are not a walk in the park.)

And I offer more than one-on-one coaching, because not everyone is into that. I’ve been writing articles for years on these topics, and I have a new book coming out later this year: 10 Things Your Soul Guides Want You to Know: Especially if You Have Anxiety, Depression, Chronic Pain, or PTSD*   *With arguments and questions from a human with all four 

If you’re at all interested in any of this, sign up for my weekly email list, with informative articles, resources, book updates, fun with guides, and more: https://bit.ly/SheynaGalyanNews

For more information: https://linktr.ee/sheynagalyan

Stay In Your Lane

I spent several weeks in June helping my oldest son get all the practice he needed to take his driver’s license road test. And he discovered, as all of us who learn to drive do, that when driving on the highway, even small movements at the wheel can significantly change the trajectory of the vehicle when you’re traveling at 60 miles per hour.

The refrain he most often heard from me during those highway trips was, “Stay in your lane.”

So imagine the surprise and a certain amount of frustration when that became the refrain from my guides to me.

It went like this.

I was scrolling through Facebook, as one does, finding myself getting sucked into reading arguments about Covid-19, about masks, about the USPS, about racism, about the upcoming election, and about politics in general. People were doubling down on conspiracy theories, supplementing them with QAnon talking points. And my energy went from open and peaceful to fear and anger.

“You need to get off of Facebook,” Dresden, my primary guide, cautioned me.

“How are people believing some of this?” I asked. “Have you seen this?”

“What I’m seeing is you not getting off of Facebook.”

“This is just wrong!” I continued. “This isn’t true at all. Science debunked this years ago.”

“Don’t go there.”

“Here, look. Someone else posted a well-written rebuttal from a verified source. I should copy this source for use in the future.”

“Sheyna,” Dresden said in a tone I hadn’t heard in a while. “Stay in your lane.”

“What? I’m not driving.”

“You’re heading in a direction that will not take you where you want to go,” Dresden said. “Remind me what you uncovered as your mission.”

I remembered a kind of psychic download that I’d just recently received. “I connect you to your true self and your own kick-ass team of guides, who are ready to help you live a powerful life of love, joy, and freedom.”

“And what did you then discern was your mission on social media?” Dresden asked.

“I share what I've learned and experienced — both pleasant and unpleasant — in my journey to that powerful life of love, joy, and freedom.”

“And how is this,” Dresden waved toward my phone, “helping you stay true to your mission?”

“Um…”

“You think you’re just browsing posts,” Dresden said, “but is it taking you anywhere close to love, joy, or freedom?”

“I need to know where people are, where they’re coming from,” I argued, knowing already it wasn’t helpful.

“How is allowing yourself to get mired in anger and fear going to help you experience love, joy, or freedom, or for that matter, helping anyone else experience that?”

“It isn’t.”

“And what will?” Dresden prodded.

“The things I’m drawn to: meditation, time in nature, talking with you, laughter.”

“So…?”

“So, I don’t need that rebuttal? Or any other evidence that would support where I stand on these issues?”

“That isn’t your mission,” Dresden said. “Not this time.”

“I need to be very mindful of what I consume on social media,” I said. “Stay true to my mission. Stay in my lane.”

  

Uh...

Uh…

“Um,” “uh,” “you know,” and “like” were verbal diarrhea, according to my eighth grade speech and debate teacher. He added that using words like this made us sound stupid, and I did not want to be seen as stupid, so I threw myself into eliminating every filler word possible.

Two years later, working a summer job, I drafted my legal research on a pro bono case involving the definition of the word sunset for my father, a well-known attorney in the south San Francisco Bay Area at the time. Rather than rewriting it, he thought it good enough to present to the judge as I’d written it. Then he asked me to accompany him to court for the case.

The judge recognized immediately that it wasn’t my father’s writing style, and asked who wrote the brief. My father said I did, and motioned me to stand. Then the judge addressed me.

“What do you want to do for a career, young lady?”

“Um…” I began.

I didn’t tell him I wanted to be a writer, because my parents already convinced me I’d never make any money at it, and I should give up that dream. I didn’t tell him I wanted to be a psychologist, that I wanted to guide others toward healing emotional wounds, because I’d already been lectured on the “soft sciences” not being real science. I told him I was thinking of law school.

I wanted his approval. (He was a judge, after all.) I wanted to present an image that others would approve of.

For the next twenty years, I did my best to perfect that image. I called it my mask. And behind it, I was dying. I didn’t want to always look and be professional and competent and constantly prove myself and subject myself to judgment every time I opened my mouth. I wanted to live in jeans and go without makeup and give voice to the voices in my head—those of my guides and those of the characters that had stories to tell.

I had a 90s power suit, was the assistant to the executive director of a university business department, and spent a good deal of time on the phone soliciting money from wealthy donors. I wanted to write and watch the clouds go by and eat ice cream messily.

In my thirties, I got that chance. I had kids. And I wrote two novels. And I spent a lot of time looking at clouds and hunting for Little Boy’s Other White Sock.

Now I’m just into my fifties, my kids have become well-adjusted young adults, and I’ve embarked on my true love—even beyond writing: teaching others how to connect with their soul guides, their intuition, and their joy, and how to use those in every aspect of their lives. In making this shift in my work, judgment came back. How should I dress? How professional do I need to look? What should I say?

Uh…

But here’s the thing: I don’t want another mask. Now, when you get me, you get me, ums and uhs and awkward silences and all.

There’s actually a science behind all those filler words. Sometimes I use them to let others know that I’m trying to find the right word, that I’m not done talking yet, or that I’m trying to sift through my thoughts and all the input my guides are giving me. (It can be very noisy in my head.) So, Mr. R. in eighth grade speech and debate, I understand what you were trying to teach us, and, um, I reject the sacrifice of authenticity to the altar of image.

And now, in the middle of this global pandemic, when millions are unemployed in the United States, and we’re all stressed to some degree about who’s going to get sick next and if they’ll survive, and what about the economy… I encourage you to give yourselves a break. Accept all your ums and uhs and live in denim if that’s your gig and embrace who you really are, not the image you’ve been trying to project.

We have enough false images in the world today. It’s time to be real. And whole.

Connection

Time to reconnect
Breathe
Listen

The gentle whispers
Soft as caresses
Reminding me
I am
Loved and lovable
No need to 
Prove anything 

Trust
It will all happen
As it should 

My focus
Must be on 
What I can do
Not who sees it
Or doesn't 

The goal is Connection
For those who wish it
And it cannot be forced
Where it is 
Neither wanted
Nor needed 

Breathe
Listen
Trust
Connect

My (True) Scariest Story

I’ve told a lot of scary stories. Some are published; some aren’t. But there’s one scary story I’ve never told: mine.

It’s time.

It’s time because it’s been holding me back for thirty years. It keeps me at a distance from others, untrusting, wary, afraid.

It’s easier now for me to say publicly that I’ve been seeing and speaking with my spirit guides since I was little—running the risk that disbelievers will question my mental health while those on the religious right call me evil—than it is to tell this story of my past.

It is the last great block in my healing, the thick quicksand of shame that slows my progress, keeps me from moving forward, and takes a toll on my mental and physical health.

To those who know me, this may or may not come as a surprise. Any relatives who read this may find it difficult to accept, and that’s okay. None of us want to hear less than stellar things about those we love.

It really begins in my early childhood. 

I grew up in a chaotic, frequently violent home. My mom’s mood could change from jovial to angry at the drop of a hat, and she’d sometimes go into rages for no discernible reason. My dad liked getting reactions out of me, and intentionally used sexist, racist, homophobic language. He sent me pornographic photos (always exposed males) via email. He repeatedly talked about my body in a sexualized way, through my childhood and well into adulthood. He frequently touched me inappropriately, claiming each time it was an accident. He said he was a “dirty old man” like his father, and he took pride in that.

My mom blamed her moods on me. On what I had or hadn’t done. Nothing was ever good enough. I was never good enough. The gifts I gave her weren’t thoughtful enough, my housecleaning skills didn’t meet her standards, I talked too much, I didn’t call her enough, I was in her way, I’d distanced myself too much. And how dare I be happy when she was feeling sad. Anything she liked that I didn’t was a rejection of her.

And when I reacted the way one would expect a child to react, they told me I was wrong. I was too sensitive and needed to learn to take a joke. I was ungrateful for wanting or needing more than I had, or for desires that were different from theirs. I was a prude for not wanting to be touched or ogled. I was a slut for wanting to experiment with makeup at age sixteen. I was ungrateful for not setting my life aside to be there for them whenever they needed me.

My feelings of hurt or anger were labeled selfish and ungrateful. My mom said I ruined every family gathering and holiday, but I felt completely powerless. I attempted suicide more than once, and my parents ignored it. When Child Protective Services got involved, my parents got me into therapy, but then told me that they’d only pay for it if I told them what I told the therapist. 

I later found out the psychiatrist they hired to see me was someone for whom my dad had done work, someone who owed him. And that psychiatrist shared everything with my dad anyway. So much for confidentiality. After a handful of sessions during which the psychiatrist diagnosed me with depression and tried to convince me to take medication, they quit paying, saying they weren’t the problem. I was.

They brought up every time that I’d conflated two similar events (a known and normal trait of human memory) as evidence that my memory couldn’t be trusted. Every detail that I got wrong, every time I remembered events out of order (even when all the events were true), they told me I couldn’t trust what I remembered. I was prone to suggestion. I made things up.

But then, in the early 1990s, they admitted to me the things they’d done. They wouldn’t go so far as to call it “abuse” because to them, that meant broken bones and hospital visits. All I had were memories of welts, bruises, sickening touches, hurtful words, and a broken spirit. They said they did the best they could. They did say they could have done better. And then they shared some horrifying stories that they remembered, times when my mom “snapped” (her word) and went into a violent rage she couldn’t remember later. My dad recalled times when my mom called him at work, telling him to come home immediately, because she was going to kill us. And how my dad came home and wanted to know what my brother and I had done to cause this.

I didn’t feel vindicated. I just felt numb. I wish the story had ended there. 

But within a year or so of their confessions, they discovered the False Memory Syndrome Foundation—an organization founded by a guy who was accused of child sexual abuse by his adult daughter. (Those accusations against him were later corroborated by other family members.) It didn’t matter that I had never forgotten any of my memories, that none of them were repressed, or that the only therapy I’d had up to that point was the psychiatrist who’d shared with them everything I’d told him. My parents jumped on the bandwagon and claimed that everything I labeled “abuse” was actually a false memory, implanted by a therapist. They were innocent victims.

Granted, the psychiatrist I saw was unethical, but his only agenda in treating me was getting me medicated, which I consistently refused. 

They went one step further: they told all of our relatives and family friends that I was a victim of so-called “false memory syndrome,” that I was sick and not to be believed. They said they had no idea why I maintained this vendetta against them, but they were the victims. 

To this day, I don’t know what my relatives think about that. No one’s ever talked about it with me. But the family I knew growing up never talked about the unpleasant stuff. Everyone pretended it didn’t exist. And those who did dare speak about it were shamed. “We don’t air our dirty laundry in public.”

I found a letter that my parents had written to my husband, urging him to have me committed to a psychiatric hospital “for my own good,” and pleading with him to see their side, how much I was hurting them.

My husband witnessed some of the abuse. He read the threatening letters and email, he heard the sexual comments my father made about and to me. He remembers well pulling up to the house to pick me up for a date when I was 17, and hearing my mom screaming at me from inside the house because I had tried to fix a cheap necklace clasp and it broke. He heard similar screaming at me over the phone when my mom would call me.

I responded the way I honestly think a healthy adult would respond: I cut off contact with my parents. (This gave them more fodder for the “our daughter is sick” file.) A couple years later, my brother reached out to me via email. I was wary, but I wanted family so badly. I had my husband, a few friends, but no one else. I wrote back to him, but I was anxious about how much I told him. I tried to keep everything vague. I’d double- and triple-check my email before I sent it, because I couldn’t trust myself either. 

I didn’t trust doctors, therapists, anyone who offered something to me, because I was certain they’d want something in return, and whatever they wanted would be debilitatingly painful. I didn’t trust anyone enough to develop friendships, and the isolation fueled the recurring depression and anxiety I’d had since my early teens. I’d try to work, but I would wind up in the hospital with suicidal intentions. I thought everyone else would be better off if I was no longer on the planet—if they even noticed that I was gone. 

Throughout all of this, my guides were with me, but I didn’t always choose to listen to them. In the worst of my depression and self-hatred, I had a hard time connecting with them. And to be honest, I questioned if they were real, or if they were part of the delusions that my parents claimed I had. They were never wrong, and they always made me feel better, but maybe they were just the creations of a sick mind.

In 2003, I got into therapy. I’d kept copies of all the emails and letters I’d sent my parents while I was in touch with them, along with their letters to me. I gave them to the therapist. I avoided talking about memories and stuck to my current conversations with my parents, most of which revolved around their parenting advice about my two children, mostly warning me that I’d have spoiled children if I didn’t spank them. The therapist said the letters and emails were one of the most severe cases of gaslighting she’d ever seen. 

Eventually, I trusted her enough to tell her about my guides. She was skeptical at first, but asked a lot of questions. (My guides answered some of them.) She took my case to a board review, which included psychologists, psychiatrists, and clergy. They discussed it, considered other diagnoses, and unanimously declared me a “mystic.” They didn’t know how, but they were completely convinced that the entities I talked with were both divine and real.

My therapist heartily encouraged me to work more with my guides. I began to stop doubting their existence. And slowly, I began to trust them. 

For years, they talked about how I also needed to trust myself. Taking baby steps, I let go of my self-doubt too. When I posted in a very vague way on my blog about what it was like growing up, and the time CPS came to the house, my brother angrily commented that I was wrong, that none of this happened, that I was lying and hurting everyone. Fortunately for me, I had a witness to the CPS investigation—my best friend in high school, who also witnessed some of the things my parents did and said. But that experience left me too frightened to publicly state anything about what I’d experienced. Until now.

In 2009, my mom died. My dad had died a few years earlier. Going through my mom’s house, I found a file with my name on it. In it, she’d amassed every article she could find on false memories. She also had printed email correspondence with my brother. Back when he’d reached out to me by email, and I’d cautiously started talking with him, he was forwarding my responses to my parents. Between them, they’d discussed this, agreed it was best that I shouldn’t know what they were doing.

This time, instead of feeling like I was wrong or sick, I was angry.

My guides led me to a coach who was able to help me have experiences of trusting myself and trusting others in a safe space. Bit by bit, she helped me see that I could share myself with trusted people, safe people, and be supported. Even loved.

When I was later faced with another betrayal—this time from my (now former) faith community—I chose a different response. I walked away. 

I share all this with you now for several reasons. First and foremost, because I need to end the silence. In silence and secrecy about this, there has been shame, and I have nothing to be ashamed of. Instead, I want to walk forward in integrity and authenticity, and that requires honesty and speaking my truth. My guides are 100% behind me in this, and their support has given me the courage and strength to sit down and write this.

Second, I’m sharing this because every time I have wanted to post something about my experience, whether with my guides or about how I grew up, there has been an imposing What will people (especially relatives) think? hanging over my head. It keeps me in a wounded child position. I do not owe anyone my silence in exchange for maintaining their comfort.

Third, I’m sharing this for all of those who want to share their truth, who want to be free from the shame, but can’t yet. Maybe it’s not safe. Maybe they’re not ready. Maybe they still believe the gaslighting, the lies that it’s somehow our own fault, that we’re only speaking up to get attention, that we’re troublemakers or bitter, that we can’t let it go, we’re too sensitive and can’t take a joke, that it’s all in the past and we should forgive and forget.

No. I have forgiven my parents for myself, but to forget is to condone what was done, and what is still being done to others. To forget is to dishonor the past, to say it’s all okay now. It was not, and is not okay.

And as I see now parents and partners of people I know gaslighting them, verbally abusing them and then claiming they’re making it all up, that it’s their depression or anxiety talking, that what they remember are false memories (or fake news), that they’ve blown it all out of proportion, I can keep quiet no longer.

I am not sick or deranged or making it up or trying to get attention or wanting to file a lawsuit. I am claiming my truth and standing in it. I am no longer ashamed. I am free to be who I am, regardless of what others think or say.

And for all those who get me on a deep level, when you’re ready, I’ll be here and we can stand together.

Healing and Food

My turbulent relationship with food began when I was an infant. The story, as my mother told it, was that she was unable to nurse and had zero support with breastfeeding (not unusual for the late 60s). The pediatrician told her to put me on a formula feeding schedule, and to stick to it, no matter how much I cried.

Some variation of a schedule continued throughout childhood. Mealtime was when I was to eat, hungry or not. If it wasn’t mealtime, there was to be no eating, lest it spoil my appetite. I learned early that the availability of food depended on the clock, not on a sense of hunger, which I was feeling less and less.

Growing up in a family with chaos and often violence, and no boundaries whatsoever, I often felt like I had no control over what happened to me. And then I discovered as a teenager that I could control how much food I ate. Or didn’t. And I discovered that starving myself gave me a kind of emotional high, a temporary feeling of power that was intoxicating. By the time I graduated from high school, I weighed less than 90 pounds, and I was thinking that 75 was a nice number to shoot for.

Dieting was a common thing, growing up. My mother was frequently trying one diet or another. She had these “candies” called Ayds (pronounced aids) that I would sometimes sneak out of the pantry when I was really hungry. They didn’t taste great, but they stopped my stomach from hurting.

In college, eating was a when-I-have-time event, folded around writing papers and going to classes. In my junior year of college, in 1989, I was eight miles from the epicenter of the Loma Prieta earthquake—the one that disrupted the World Series, broke part of the Bay Bridge, and collapsed a double-decker freeway in Oakland, killing quite a few people. We had so many aftershocks, I was terrified to cook in my apartment kitchen. We had no running water and no electricity for a couple of weeks. I survived on ready-to-eat snacks. I didn’t realize then that trauma is cumulative, and that the trauma I survived as a child meant that the earthquake trauma was that much worse for me.

After I got into therapy in the early 90s, as I began to deal with all that had happened and how it affected my current life, I was put on antidepressants. They helped with the suicidal thoughts (which I’d had—and acted on—since I was sixteen), but they also caused massive food cravings and weight gain. I gained 70 pounds within a year.

During the next ten years, I struggled with infertility. Most doctors blamed my weight. One doctor actually ran tests, and we discovered that I ovulated—at best—twice a year. My hormones were out of whack. I had too much cortisol, too much testosterone, and wildly fluctuating levels of estrogen. I added these to the reasons I hated myself. My weight continued to increase.

In 2000, the stars aligned and I got pregnant. It was, early on, a high-risk pregnancy. My blood pressure was too high, then my blood sugar spiraled out of control. I was on bed rest for half the pregnancy. I had hyperemesis gravidarum, a fancy term for morning/noon/night sickness, that lasted seven months. The only things I could keep down were Welch’s 100% juice grape popsicles and Betty Crocker Potato Buds instant mashed potatoes. I was on insulin until the baby was born, when my blood pressure and blood sugar returned to normal.

I got pregnant a second time, only instead of high blood sugar showing up at thirty-two weeks, it showed up in the fourteenth week. Four years later, I got pregnant a third time, and developed gestational diabetes 48 hours after I took a home pregnancy test, somewhere around five weeks pregnant. That baby was stillborn at five months. A few months later, I was diagnosed with fibrmyalgia.

In each of my pregnancies, because of the gestational diabetes, I was put on a “diabetes diet” for pregnant women. Once again, I was eating based on the clock, as well as counting carbohydrate grams and testing my blood sugar. I learned what my body liked and what made my blood sugar soar. After our daughter was stillborn, I gave up the diet. I figured I didn’t need it anymore and I was busy with a toddler and a preschooler and running a new publishing company.

In 2009, I tried a low-carb diet. I lost thirty-seven pounds in nine months, had a lot more energy, but wasn’t able to sustain it. It’s hard to eat so differently from everyone else. I already knew that, keeping kosher, but within my own home, at the dining table, it was harder still, watching everyone else eat bread and potatoes and I was stuck with a salad and a bland chicken breast.

Fast-forward nearly ten years. I’ve been working with a life coach for four years, doing in-depth healing for nearly as long, and in EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing) for trauma therapy for two years. I fully accepted that the loving people I’d been able to see and hear since I was three years old—but no one else could—were my spirit guides, and when I stopped arguing with them and really started listening and acting on what they said, my life got better still. My therapists had questions for my guides, and were impressed with the answers. They jokingly said that with guides like these, therapists weren’t necessary. (They are. Sometimes I learn best from people “with skin on.”)

I healed enough emotionally and spiritually that it was time to look at my physical health. I was about a hundred pounds overweight, if I went by numbers alone. I hated to count things (carbs, points, calories) and I hated the sense of deprivation I felt on a “diet.”

I took a year-long class on intuitive eating, based on the book by the same name. I learned how to not base my eating on a clock. I learned for the first time what hunger felt like. I learned to honor my body.

But I still felt unwell. I had frequent fibromyalgia episodes, depressions, panic attacks, and debilitating fatigue. An author friend posted about eating a keto diet, and recommended the movie Cereal Killers. I watched it and was inspired. So I did something that had not occurred to me to do earlier: I asked my guides for advice on how/what to eat, and if this way of eating would help me. They were immediately forthcoming.

Don’t eat, they said, the following:

• Wheat

• Oats

• Rye

• Barley

• Spelt

• Sugar

• Artificial sweeteners (aspartame, sucralose)

• High glycemic-index fruits (oranges, bananas)

• Most beans

• Most root vegetables (potatoes, carrots)

• Most starchy vegetables (corn, peas)

Oh, I said. So, like year-round Passover, but without the matzah or sugar?

Do eat, they said:

• Fish (no shellfish)

• Poultry (with skin)

• Beef (in moderate amounts, and grass-fed, pasture-raised, antibiotic-free wherever possible)

• Green leafy vegetables

• Berries

• Avocados & guacamole

• Eggs

• Nuts

• Seeds

• Plain, whole-fat yogurt

• Cheese

• Natural sweeteners (stevia, erythritol) in moderation

My Passover comment came back around when I started eating this way and within less than a week, experienced exponentially more energy, less pain, better mood, and a disappearance of my cravings. I realized that every year during Passover, I felt much the same way. I always figured it was because I liked the holiday: the special dishes, special recipes, eating at home. Now I realized while those might have been true, the real reason for my increased joy and energy was because of what I was eating.

I began this way of eating in early May 2018. I found a never-before-felt passion for cooking and low-carb/keto recipes. My guides told me not to worry about counting anything. This wasn’t about maintaining specific macronutrient numbers (as in a strict ketogenic diet). This was about eating food that nourished me and testing other foods to see how my body responded to them. I was to continue my intuitive eating—eating when I was hungry, not eating when I wasn’t, no matter what the clock said.

Within five months, I’d released an unnecessary thirty pounds. (I no longer refer to “losing” weight. It’s not misplaced and I don’t want anyone finding it and returning it to me.) I felt better than I have in…probably decades.

And then came my first real test.

Within the space of a month, I attended two conventions and a multi-day training workshop, involving flights to both Vancouver and Los Angeles. At first, I was careful about what I ate, despite what I perceived as limited options. But “just a taste” of one food became “just a serving” and then “just a meal.” I continued to test my blood sugar, and was amazed that my body didn’t respond adversely to a small piece of cheesecake and some rice with my chicken. Maybe this meant I could loosen up a bit?

No. It did not. Just a small amount of wheat, and then oats another time, sent my body into a painful spiral. For days at a time, living out of a hotel, I was eating at restaurants, not all of which were keto-friendly. Several times, I chose being with new and old friends over eating at a restaurant that would support my way of eating. And because I didn’t value myself enough, I put their restaurant preferences over mine. I didn’t advocate for myself, and they never knew that I was going to pay with physical pain for eating with them at that restaurant.

That was a disservice both to me and to them.

Once I returned from Los Angeles, my final trip for a while, it took me three weeks to finally get over the carb cravings, regain my energy, and stabilize my mood. That was a painful lesson in making my needs important.

I realized that I was also looking at my way of eating with some judgment. I was looking at it the way my mother looked at my keeping kosher—as being a “picky eater.” She had nothing nice to say about my keeping kosher, or eating anything different from her, for that matter. If it inconvenienced her, it was unacceptable.

I was expecting everyone else to see my way of eating as a choice, something I could simply choose not to do when it might impact others. I never checked that out with them, but knowing them as I do, and taking my own judgments and pain out of the equation, they would have absolutely supported my way of eating, up to and including going to a different restaurant.

Then I read a book about eating an anti-inflammatory diet. Recent studies have strongly indicated that fibromyalgia (along with depression, bipolar, and possibly chronic fatigue, among others) is caused by neuroinflammation in the brain. Reducing inflammation in the body (and brain) by eating foods that are anti-inflammatory and avoiding foods that cause inflammation can drastically reduce symptoms.

How interesting that my modified-keto/no sugar way of eating is nearly identical to an anti-inflammatory diet. The only difference is that the anti-inflammatory diet has more carbs—mostly from beans, rice, and root vegetables—than I can safely eat, given my blood sugar.

My brain latched onto this: now I can tell people that I’m eating an anti-inflammatory diet for my health, and then it’s not a choice!

My guides shook their metaphorical heads. Why must I defend what I eat based on an assumption of others’ judgment? they asked. Why is it not enough for me to say that I eat what supports and nourishes my body? Why do I feel the need to explain that I regularly test my blood sugar to keep close tabs on what carbs I can and cannot eat?

Oh.

Here is another area where the lesson I learned well in childhood—that others’ opinions matter more than mine—continues to play out in adulthood. The wounded child is certain that friends would choose their preferred restaurant over eating with me, thus proving my low self-worth, proving that I don’t matter.

The reality is, any friend who would value their choice of restaurant over eating with me is not truly a friend. It’s better that I not go to lunch with these people. There are plenty of people who want the best for me, who do believe I matter, and that what I need to support my physical health also matters. There are plenty of those people. Even when the hurt child within doesn’t think they exist.

We women are conditioned to play to others’ preferences and interests, even to the detriment of our own. And anyone who believes deep down that they don’t matter has it even worse. But your health does matter. My health matters. We matter.

And now I’m going to go own that while eating my keto-friendly lunch.

Beauty in Loss

May 9, 2018

Nine years ago today, my mother was dying. It was sad, and painful, and beautiful.

Let me explain.

The day before Thanksgiving in 2008, my mom was diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer. She was given six months to live. One week later, I pulled my kids—then seven and five—out of school and the three of us drove from Minnesota to California so we could spend some time with my mom. We stayed nearly a month.

I’d like to say that this time was pleasant, full of fond memories and loving connections, but that would be a lie. My kids enjoyed getting to see their grandmother, but I was already grieving. My mom’s diagnosis meant that all the hopes I had of ever having anything like a normal relationship with her, one in which she wasn’t constantly tearing me down, were also dying. This was confirmed a couple months later when chemo failed and my mom chose to go on hospice.

In April 2009, I got the call that it was time, and a day later, I was on a flight back to California. I was very clear that I was doing this for me. My mom had said to me that she didn’t really care if I was there or not when she died. I’m not sure if that was true, but I was sure that to be in integrity with myself and my own belief that family means something, I had to be there.

For two weeks, my brother, myself, two personal aides, and the occasional hospice nurse cared for her, talked to her, sang to her, and tried to keep her as comfortable as possible. One time, she told me that we should let bygones be bygones and leave the past behind. My hopes of making peace with her perked up. Then she said she could never forgive me for how much I’d hurt her. Those last weeks were an emotional minefield and every night, I’d collapse in my hotel bed in tears, echoes of countless nights as a kid when I cried myself to sleep.

I have a gift, though, that saved my sanity during this time. I’ve been able to see and talk with my spirit guides since I was about three. They offered me comfort and love, and over the years, they also gave me a broader perspective of life and death, of what family truly means, of how unconditional love feels, of Home. And so, after a long day of caring for my mom, trying not to take her hurtful words personally, I’d share what I was going through with my guides. My fears, my pain, my grief, my anger. One of my guides told me I was here for a reason, and it wasn’t for my integrity.

“What, then?” I’d asked.

“Pay attention. You’ll know.”

Despite not eating or drinking for nearly two weeks, my mom held on. She’d wake (or regain consciousness) and demand to know why she was still here. Why she hadn’t died yet. She said she was ready to go.

One week into May, I half-joked that maybe she was holding out for another Mother’s Day. My mom said she thought that idea was stupid. I paid attention, watching the comings and goings of the hospice people and a handful of relatives. I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary.

Until one day I did. I was sitting in the chair I’d appropriated next to my mom’s bed, sitting near her head, when I started to hear what sounded like a radio being tuned. Voices, sometimes overlapping, slightly echoing, clearly having a conversation. Sometimes it was louder, sometimes I could barely hear it. I thought maybe a radio or computer had been turned on, and I did an inspection of the house to make sure. Nothing turned on. Nothing coming out of any speakers. The sole TV was off. The voices continued, and as I caught snatches of the conversation, I made out that they were planning something. Who was going to be where. There was talk of a meeting, and who would have the honor of meeting “her.”

As the day wore on, I became more and more aware of movement in the room where my mom’s hospital bed was. I could make out figures, though not much more. Some were standing, others sitting, seemingly half in this world and half not. Gradually, the room filled with these beings. Some acknowledged that I saw them and nodded in greeting. All were giving off a palpable feeling of love and acceptance.

I knew that whoever all these beings (people?) were, they were here for my mom, and I realized that they saw her differently than I did. I’d like to think that they saw her soul, saw its inherent beauty and love. I saw more movement near my mom’s head and then could clearly see sparks of light dancing just above her forehead. I was entranced with this sight, feeling pure joy. I wondered if that was her.

Later, the low hum of voices from the various beings in the room was getting louder. I suddenly felt hands on my shoulders from someone standing behind me. The presence was familiar and reassuring, and then the hand on my right shoulder squeezed briefly. When I turned around, hoping to see (or verify) who it was, the space was empty. And no bodied person could fit behind my chair.

My mom unexpectedly cried out my deceased dad’s name, half- conscious. She woke, looking around. “Where is he?”

“Did you see him?” I asked.

“No.” My mom seemed agitated at this. “He’s waiting for me. I need to get to the harbor. I don’t want to miss the boat.”

I asked her more about this harbor, about the boat she was going to take, about how she knew where to go. She seemed to know exactly where to go until she tried to describe it, and then it wasn’t so clear. Mostly she was anxious that she wouldn’t make it in time. I asked her if this boat was waiting just for her or if it was picking up other people too. She thought about it and concluded that it was just for her. I suggested that they wouldn’t leave without her, and she relaxed, agreeing.

Nine years ago tomorrow, my mother died. It was Mother’s Day. It was sad, and painful, and beautiful.

Mom's hospice bed and the flower left by the mortuary.
May 11, 2009.