Episode 135: A Dedication to Dad - How I Know He’s Still With Me With Words on Hospice

On each episode, we'll discuss the reasons we now know that our loved ones have survived physical death, and so will we. Welcome to Shades of the Afterlife. Yesterday, when I woke up, I checked my email on my phone. Next thing you know, I was looking at YouTube, one video after another, and a video popped up on the power of gratitude, and this fellow said that if we start our day being grateful and sincerely grateful for three things, that our day will be significantly better and we will

be significantly happier. So I started my day thinking of a few things, and I got out of bed. A little bit later on in the day, I helped my mom out with a few things, and very true, I was significantly happier. This also left me looking for reasons to be grateful during the day and also looking for more opportunities to make a difference. Now I live here with my mom and I know her favorite food these

days is this cinnamon roll called Bobka bab Ka. She can only find it at a few specialty shops and it is very expensive. So after she went to bed last night, I did a little search for a homemade Bobka recipe, and last night I made the dough, let it rest overnight, and this morning I was to finish it and bake it. I woke up this morning, sprang out of bed at five fifty five am, knowing that I had some baking to do. Remembered, Ah, what are

three things I'm grateful for? And what I chose for today is being grateful to hear as I had my window open and heard all kinds of nature sounds, and remembering the sounds of music and the sound of voices of people that I love. I chose to be grateful for the bed that I sleep in, knowing that so many people, whether they're homeless or don't have a bed, that I have a nice, cozy, warm bed. And the third thing to be grateful for, And don't laugh, but

it's indoor plumbing. Yes, there's places in the world that don't have it. And thank goodness we're living in twenty twenty three. And how lucky I am because my bathroom is just around the corner. The older we get tougher, it is on our bladders. Right. I sailed down the steps, rolled out this dough, filled it with this cinnamon butter sugar mixture. I had to cut it a certain way and braid it and put it in the loaf pans, and the most delicious a bobca came out of the oven.

It was like the best cinnamon role you've ever had. My day started out right. A little bit later, when I was getting ready, I happened to notice my quote of the day. I try to always have something inspirational around me, because it's really easy to forget that we are divine souls having a human experience. And this said, the greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose

one thought over another. And oh do I love that, because we have habits for thinking whether we're grieving and have thoughts of guilt where sometimes we just get stuck in a rut, but we can purposely put in a thought of what we're grateful for and sincerely feel it and it will change our mood. So it was a big day, cooking my mother her most favorite thing, knowing that I possessed the skill to make it. But here's one thing I haven't told you. Thirteen years ago today,

my father took his last breath. It was one of the darkest, deepest, most awful days of my entire life. My mind wanted to start going back through the past and not thinking of the cheery memories with Dad, but thinking of the negative things, the fights between my siblings and myself, the fear, and all the things that followed. I consciously made the choice to say Sandra without Dad going exactly how he did with all the things that happened. I would have never done the research on grief. I

would have never studied so much about the afterlife. I would have never written my book, and I certainly would never have this podcast. So today, this day, yes, it's the day my father took his last breath. That's also the day he stepped into the afterlife, and it's also the day of the Bobka. So forever in history, when I think of my dad and his final breaths, I will think of my mom and I enjoying the most

delicious treat. I know that's probably a weird story to start off the episode with, but I'm glad we're together today because as cheery as I can be, when someone passes, the wound is never fully healed. Sometimes feeling a little bit of grief can just reignite some of the memories and some of the pain we felt. It's not an easy road going through grief and getting back into life. While we may not fully heal, we are not alone.

Whether you talk to one person, a thousand people, a million people, sometimes it's your story of how you survived and continued on with your life that is the exact story. Somebody needs to hear. So I have a request. Let your light shine, share yourself, be true to who you are. You are surrounded by love, and you are loved. And if you need a good recipe for Bobka, you just

let me know. I'd love to read you. An email that I just received from a listener, she says, Hi, Sandra, I took your advice and asked my friend to meet me in a dream. I told him that before I went to sleep. The first half of the night, I slept lightly, and as I woke in the night, I said again, Okay, let's do this. I'll see you in my dream. Sure enough, I found myself in the halls of my old high school, and I was feeling grief about the separation that had occurred between us. And then

I felt a tap on my shoulder. When I turned around, it was him. I've had spirit visions before, and they are always glowing with this radiant luminescence. He was brighter than we are here in the physical, and he looked like he was older than my high school memories, but at his absolute best in his twenties, very handsome and healthy. Unfortunately he passed from drugs. Anyways, my mind caught up with me, and I thought, oh, my goodness, you're here. This is crazy. And as I thought it, he turned

and disappeared down the hall and I woke up. I just feel on cloud nine now knowing I can communicate with him, even through a dream. I guess sometimes it is as simple as ask and you shall receive. You know what's really funny as I read you that story, what kicked in in my mind was I never get dreams like that. No, no, no that. Oh we can be so negative, can't we ask and we shall receive? Here's the thing. Your loved ones want to be in touch with you. I'm sure they do, but it takes something

from our side. So on my side, have I made it a practice to go to bed and ask? Am I journaling my dreams?

She was walking behind me and we were communicating telepathically, but she was behind this milky but see through screen that kind of had a great color to it. As we walked, it went with us. I thought it was so fascinating and it was very vivid and left me feeling that she is always with me. The other thing that really resonated was episode one oh nine when you

mentioned apports. I had never heard of this before. When I was at the Vancouver gathering with mediums Carrie and Phil, I was working with one of my classmates who I've never been able to successfully read on zoom Anyway, I ended up bringing up a necklace that was purchased in Egypt by her mother and she inherited it upon her mother's passing. She had lost it this past fall and was devastated, but that part didn't come out in the reading.

On Easter Sunday, she was drawn to look at a picture on some shelves in her home and that exact necklace was draped over the side of the picture frame. She knew exactly where she had left it when she lost it. She said there is no way that she would have ever put that necklace on the picture frame. So I suppose that's another good example of an apport. I just had to share that because the little reading that I did for her actually did have some deep

meaning to it. I love a good story of things showing up out of the blue and what our loved ones can do from the afterlife. The only appport I've ever received that I know of is just a few years ago, I lost one of my most favorite earrings. I was devastated. It's one that I always wear. Tore the house apart, no sign of it. I was traveling, and so I put my remaining earring in the little pocket inside of my suitcase. Yeah, I was devastated. When I got home and unpacked and I opened up to

pull out the one earring, both earrings were there. Wow, that was incredible. Have you ever received a little gift from a loved one? I'd love to know. Anyways, let's go to the break and when we'll be back, we'll hear from a hospice nurse. Also a little bit more of consciousness continuing on from our life episode, you're listening to shades of the afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal podcast network.

was a very difficult, very painful one. But a little game that we had is every doctor, every nurse, everyone that came into his hospice or hospital room, he wanted to make them feel happier leaving the room than when they walked in the room. So he would engage them in conversations, talk about their family, their kids, what they liked to do. And it was a secret little game we played. But they felt better and guess what, we

felt better too. My dad was a fitness nut and he bicycled across the United States three times raising money for charity, and once rode across the whole country of New Zealand. Pretty remarkable guy. He had me record my voice asking him to remember the journey. So he had told me some of the places he went to so in this guided visual imagery session, I guess you can

call it that. I had him recall the places, the faces, the clouds, the weather, the wind on his face, the sunshine, and then instinctively had him remember memories of when us kids were born, his grandchildren's laughter, times we would go deep sea fishing, and what it was like to get a marlin on the hook. He said, listening to that recording made him feel better. The pain wasn't as intense. I brought my computer with me every time we were together,

and I had two sets of headphones. We would watch funny movies, airplane or Carol Burnett videos, and the more he laughed and giggled, that too, helped the pain. If you follow the world of doctor massaru Emoto, he was the one who did the messages in water, where he would take, say, distilled water, and freeze little droplets of it and watch to see what forms would appear. In distilled water. There were no forms in water from some

of the most pristine places on Earth. Beautiful snowflakes would form. In water that wasn't from a very healthy source, negative ugly patterns would form. He had the idea to tape messages on water bottles, and what resulted was that positive words resulted in these snowflake like images, and negative words resulted in these really abnormal formations. He did the same thing with music. Took distilled water which had no formations, put beautiful music beautiful crystals, put some music with really

rough lyrics, and the bad formations appeared. He also found that he could change water. So if he took water from an unnatural source that normally would form these abnormal patterns, and he subjected them to beautiful music, beautiful words. Guess what happened. Snowflakes would form, and that was a loud bird you just heard in the background. He had people all over Japan be part of this experiment. He had them boil one pot of rice and divide it into

two glass jars. In one room, the rice was loved, nice music, happy thoughts, happy words, and in the other room, the other rice was scolded. Negative things were said to the rice. If someone was having a bad day, go sit in that room with the rice. Here's what's astonishing. At the end of the month, people put both jars together, and all across Japan people had two jars of rice, one black and one this nutty golden color. One smelled nutty and a little bit sweet, and the black rice

was foul. So you know which rice came out of which room? Right. I took a picture from the Internet of the two jars of rice, and I kept that up in Dad's hospital room. I felt fear, he felt fear, but we kept the positivity going whether you were ill or healthy. It is so important to know the power of our words, the power of our thoughts, what we listened to. I don't have any children, and I sometimes when I'm an old lady, am I going to be in a nursing homer What's going to happen to me?

I have one of those three D headsets called an oculus, and I can see things in three dimensions like nature. I can travel the world. So my request is going to be great music and keeping that three D headset. So even if I am an old lady in a nursing homeroom, I'll be traveling around the world, and you're more than welcome to come visit me. Next, I want to play just a short audio of a nurse named

Julie who works for hospice. We often hear of hospice nurses and doctors witnessing people as they pass and they're able to see beyond the veil. This is a little different and I hadn't thought about this too much. Is actually hearing the voice of someone as they pass. So let's listen.

time we met him, he was really isolated. He was a hoarder, He did not have many friends or family, and he was really at the end of his robe. I think because he was so desperate, he was willing to change and willing to get help from us, the hospice team. So we really really helped this man. We cleaned out his house so it was livable. We invited a couple of long distance cousins who could come in and visit him and kind of helped him get his life together so he could live out the rest of

his life. After they left, it was mostly him in the hospice team. I would make visits. He ended up living longer than we expected and very very well. So him and I had long conversations about the meaning of life, what he thought, what he thought was going to happen after he died, if he was afraid, just many philosophical

and existential conversations. It was amazing. He probably lived for about nine months, and at the end of the nine months, when he was getting close to death, he had a continuous care nurse in his home, meaning a nurse twenty four to seven. I was the RN case manager, so I would make short visits daily. The last day I saw him, I knew he would die that day. He was actively dying. He was unconscious, he was not aware

of what was going on. So I said my goodbyes to him quietly in my head in his bedroom, and just thanked him for the wonderful relationship that we had. I went to my car and I wasn't really sad. I was happy for him. I felt like we did him, We did a great job with him. I knew he was comfortable and I felt happy for that. I was in my car saying my final goodbye in my head to him, when suddenly I heard his voice. I heard his voice in my head, and I got this wave

of joy and freedom and kind of like flying. And I heard his voice. He said, Oh my gosh, Julie, Oh my gosh, if I would have known, if I only would have known. He was kind of like exclaiming it in my head. And that's like it was like he was excited if I only would have known, if I only would have known. And he didn't really say much, he just kept he kept giving me the feeling of like if I only would have known, how good it is, if I only would have known how good it is.

And like I said, in his life, he had a lot of struggles, and the feeling I got in this moment was that those were gone, those were gone, and he was just completely completely free. It makes me want to cry right now because I could feel his freedom and I could feel his joy. He kept saying, oh my gosh, Julie, if I only would have known, if I only would have known, and you could feel his joy.

I was weeping, weeping in my car, and then all of a sudden it stopped, and I got a text from the nurse inside who said, so and so just died.

a loved one's voice in your head? This man writes, I was my wife's caregiver for several years after her health slowly spiraled down. I went through severe depression. Being a caregiver is the hardest thing I have ever done. I felt truly responsible for my wife's life and well being. Crying is something I don't easily do. One evening, while alone,

I teared up and began to cry. My mother, who had passed three years earlier, spoke to me in her typical stoic way and said, you just do the best you can for her, keep moving forward and don't look back. Then a few minutes later, my father, who had passed six years earlier, spoke and told me, son, you're doing the right thing. I have no doubts about the afterlife, this woman says. In twenty fourteen, my mom died from breast cancer. I was with her every minute until she

passed at home. A couple of months ago, I was driving close to a really dangerous intersection near my home. I hate this intersection. It's an on slash exit ramp for I seventy five in Florida. I was driving the speed limit, headed towards the overpass ramp, and I heard my mom's voice say, as plain as day, Mandy stop. I started breaking in a Tesla shot off I seventy five, seemingly out of control and into my lane. Had I not started to break, it would have hit me and

my daughter's at a very high speed. So I'm a believer after that, and I know my mom is with me. I've never heard my dad's voice after he passed, but at his funeral, when I was pretty sad, I looked to the end of the pew I was sitting in, and in the aisle I saw my dad, clear as can be, with a sudon looking young looking healthy, and it comforted me and I knew that he was still alive.

Let's go to the break and we'll be back. You're listening to Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal podcast Networks.

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hours in meditation. Go that connection with all of it interesting, that is the state of mind with near death experiences. But what makes this so incredible is that even if a person dies not being in that brain state, they are showing on an EEG machine that they move into that brain state. So this ties in with a new announcement that is coming from the Institute of Noetic Sciences. They have a contest going on for the person who

can prove that our consciousness survives physical death. They had one hundred and eight people apply and they are now down to ten finalists and they will be judged by senior scientists and we should have the winner on June twenty five of twenty twenty three. The Institute of Noetic Science is a nonprofit research center. It was created in nineteen seventy three by Apollo fourteen astronaut and sixth man to walk on the Moon, Edgar Mitchell. Their website is

noetic dot org. I'd like to continue with more words from hospice nurse Julie. I think you'd find her YouTube channel very interesting, simply hospice Nurse Julie. She has over two hundred and forty five thousand subscribers. She has many experiences of people passing away and just before they do, interesting things happen. So let's listen.

usually in someone who is very alert and oriented. They're not confused yet, they're not having hallucinations, they're not agitated. They will just suddenly start seeing their dead relatives, loved ones, usually mom, dad, grandma, grandpa, and uncle, a child who had died, a pet who had died, and they will start saying how these people are visiting them, saying they're coming to get them soon. That's how it usually manifests.

Every once in a while, it happens right before someone dies, and it does happen in people who are confused, who have dementia. I will always say visioning is something that's clear and something that's non agitating. So people like people who have dementia can sometimes have hallucinations that are agitating to them. They think they see a man in the corner. They're scared, they're paranoid. That's not visioning. Visioning is always

something that is clear and comforting. We don't know why it happens, but it happens so often that we educate people about it, and as hospice providers, we usually use that as an indicator, Like if someone I'm seeing is very alert and oriented and then suddenly they're telling me that they're seeing their dead relatives every once in a while, that tells me they have probably about a month to live. It's like a clear indicator. So that's one of the funomenaus.

The other one is called the rally or terminal lucidity is the real name the rally. The surge is the nickname. I've seen it in my own grandmother. It happens in about one third of all of our patients, so one in every three, and that's when they are very they're getting very close to the end. They're not quite actively dying, but they're like in that transitional phase and they suddenly

get a burst of energy. They feel better, they're talking, they're having the best day they've had in a long time. That's what you hear a lot. You hear that a lot. Maybe they're even walking, talking, being joking, getting their little sass back. My grandma got her sass back and was like this food's not hot enough and then they suddenly

die right after. So the indication of the rally is that it's like they're doing bad ooh really good, really good day or so, no longer than a day or so, and then down they die or they die within a few days after that. So that's the indication of that was the rally, and we like to educate about it before it happens, so people can really relish in that moment because it's usually only for a day or so. Now, if someone gets better and is like that for weeks,

not the rally, that's not the rally. The rally is very quick. We don't know why it happens, but it happens a lot, so we educate so again people can kind of relish that moment. The death stare or the death reach. I put them together, even though they're two separate things. Some people can have the death stare and the death reach together. Sometimes you just see the death reach. Sometimes you just see the death stare. And that is

when someone is this sounds like what it is. They're staring up at the corner for hours at a time, not moving their gaze, even if you're like hello, they don't move their gaze. They're staring, and then sometimes they'll add the reach in with the stare, like they're reaching for someone or something, or even for a hug. Sometimes you'll see the stair and the reach and the smile like they're seeing someone and they're hugging and embracing. It's wild and I see it all the time, and people

see it all the time. We don't know why. Sometimes people can tell us. Sometimes we'll say what are you looking at up there? And they'll say angels, or they'll say my dad, or they'll say my mom's here, and they'll go to hugger. So it just depends on the people. Again, don't deny it. As long as it's not that my whole thing is like, as long as it's not causing them any pain or they're not hurting anybody out or themselves,

it's okay. Sometimes people at the end of life can do some of this stuff where they're picking at things and doing stuff with their hands that's not this. This is it's very distinct. It's very much like, you know, a distinct reach or reach up to the corner that they're staring at. The other one is choosing when you're going to die. I have seen this in wild forms, like people being like I'm dying today and you're like, what, No,

you're not. You're not actively dying. As a hospital nurse, so you can kind of tell when someone's getting close and they're in the active stages or transitioning. I had a patient literally decide they were going to die and then they died that night, and there was no form of like overdosing or anything crazy like that. They literally just chose to do it and they did it. It was wild. I have some videos about that. I'm sure

you guys may have seen them. People will wait until everyone gets to the room, to the home, into the city, into the state, something like that, and then they'll die. People will choose to wait until everyone leaves, so they die alone. Some families get really upset about that. They'll be like, we were holding vigil, we were all at the bedside, we were saying all our I love you, and the loved one kept hanging on. They didn't die, and then, slowly but surely, one person would be like, Okay,

well I'm going to go home and shower. Okay, well I'm gonna go get a coffee. Okay, well, I'm gonna go, and then slowly but surely, then everyone's gone for a moment or two, and then the person dies. This is like a thing usually we see like people who are private like to die alone. People who are really social are super into family, are really yeah, like into like

a social gathering. We'll wait till everyone gets there. I've seen someone who was actively dying, which means fully unconscious changes and breathing, changes in skin color, looks like they're going to die any day, lasts like that for two weeks, waiting for someone to get there because they had a huge, large family and they were waiting for all these people to fly in. So it was pretty It was pretty wild.

The woman who decided when she was going to die, I wasn't there for that, but I did sign her up for hospice and she barely made it on meaning like she was very borderline appropriate. So she wasn't looking like she was to die anytime soon. And I got called in for a death visit about a week later, and I was really surprised because it was her, and I went to go visit and the caregiver told me that that night she was basically saying her goodbye to the caregiver and to the sun and saying like thank

you for taking care of me. Promise me you'll take care of my son, because her son was older but had some mental the disabilities. And the caregiver was like, what are you talking about. I'll see you in the morning, Like, don't talk like this, what are you talking about. And she was like, no, I'm tired, I'm going home. And she said I'm going home. So the caregiver was like, okay, well you're already home, but okay, well good night, I'll see you in the morning. And she was gone the

next morning. She had died. So some people just know, some people just know, they can feel it. And then last but not least, I like to talk about animals, so our animals, our pets, can really know what's going on. I've seen many animals act differently, act strangely, take on the symptoms of their owners who are dying. They'll be a super protective of their owners. They won't leave the underneath the bed. They'll stay underneath the owner's bed while

they're dying. They'll stay in the bed with the owner while they're dying. They won't eat and drink like their owner until the owner's gone. So animals are very intuitive and and know what's happening. Of course, not every pets like this, but I've seen many pets like this. But it's very fascinating to think about. And I also have talked of many veterinarians who say that pets often have different phenomena that happens during their death and dying process.

That's a lot like humans. So very curious. Let me know in the comments what you think. Okay, love you guys. Bye.

hospice workers are. Unfortunately, my dad passed in a hospital and although the staff was really nice, they had certain regulations as far as how much pain medicine can be administered, so unfortunately my dad died a painful death. They couldn't turn up the pain medication fast enough due to worries about malpractice suits, etc. I now know that the soul leaves the body before physical death, so I trust that that is true and my dad didn't suffer. I encourage

you to find out more about hospice. That's the way I want to go, preferably at home, with hospice workers coming here so I can still look at my birds and the garden from the wa But you may wish to volunteer. There's plenty of opportunities to sit with patients, and I know personally some listeners who volunteer and it has changed their thoughts and have them really believe that

life after death is true. How many stories do you need to hear or witness people reaching up for their loved ones and calling their name before you realize people really are there to greet us. So let's go for the break and we'll be back. You're listening to Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal podcast Network.

before pressing the record button for this final segment. I want to talk about my dad a little bit about his journey and how I know that he is still alive today. But why I procrastinated is because I am an emotional being as you are, and sometimes talking about our loved ones is we have that fear like a Pandora's box if we owe, but we don't know what's going to come out. We are emotional creatures, and you know, I don't mind if I cry on this show. I

don't I'm human. But for myself, there is so much involved with the time around his death, not only losing Dad, but losing communication with my siblings, most of which has not yet been resolved, and it may wait till the next world before it is. Some wise person told me that relationships can be like circles, that they come apart in the bottom and sometime they do reunite. Is it

this world is it the next? I don't know, but I do feel that Dad left this earth exactly the way he did, and even the part my siblings played in it, the fights that we had, et cetera. Without things going exactly the way they did, I would have never gone on the journey to discover why people become so crazy around grief, how our brain changed when we're grieving all the emotions that are involved. I would have never continued delving into evidence of the afterlife, and certainly

I wouldn't be here with you today. So Dad, siblings, Mom, I love you all. My dad was born on his mom's eighteenth birthday. Could you imagine that? Oh, babies were born young those days. He got his pilot's license when he was sixteen, went off to being in the Air Force, and ended up being a pilot for American Airlines. I was Dad's little girl. Although I have a brother and sister a year older than me and a younger sister five years younger. I was the one that got on

the best with my dad. He taught me to fly, and yes I have soloed airplanes. I'm not currently a pilot, but I do know how to do it in case of an emergency. When I went off to college and then started working in the restaurant business, Dad and I we didn't lose touch, but that relationship certainly wasn't strong. He and my mom had gotten divorced when I was a teenager, and he went on to having a couple other relationships with nice ladies, but our relationship was rather estranged.

I would see him once a year. He lived in Daytona Beach, Florida, and I was a chef working with race card teams, so every time we went to Daytona, I got to see Dad. In January of twenty ten, not only did I get to see Dad, but he was admitted into the hospital. We found out this tumor was really wreaking havoc in his body. At that point, they gave him last rites, but he went on to living another five months before his passing. I was really deep into learning about the afterlife, but Dad was also

very deep in Catholicism. He and his girlfriend went to church every single day. And I got to spend so much time with my dad because my siblings were all married and I was the single girl, and I had good time off between my racing events, so I could spend time with Dad, which was so precious. The day came that I really felt like I needed to share

with him everything I knew about the afterlife. Again, I was afraid because he was so religious, but I asked if it was okay to share, and he said yes, and with his big brown eyes, he just looked at me as I was telling him story after story after story. But in my mind's eye, I saw a yellow Piper cub airplane with black lettering, I felt, and I heard a man laughing with the message, John, I got to take my toys with me. I felt like I should tell my dad about that, and his eyes filled up

with tears. He asked me to repeat myself. I felt like this man was saying that he was wrong that he did get to take his toys with him. My dad had survived cancer from thirty years prior, and he went on to helping many cancer and AIDS patients really try to embrace life fully while we're here. He had a friend named Jim who owned a yellow airplane with black letters who had cancer, and Dad was trying to help him fight it, like you can beat this, and he said, Jim, you don't get to take your toys

with you when you die. And so for Jim to be coming through saying John, I did get to take my toys with me. At that point, my dad wanted to hear everything. After I shared with him, it felt like our bond got even closer. He made me promise that I'd write a book about everything. I knew about the afterlife, I didn't know how I would do it, but yes, indeed I have his actual death. I won't go into now, too long a story and too much

to relive, honestly. But after he passed, not only did I see him as I told you earlier, standing in the church at his funeral, but I met a lot of people in my journey as I started my first podcast, which is called We Don't Die Radio, and so many people said, is your dad in the afterlife? And I said, yes, was his name John, Yes, see a pilot, Yes, And they would give me a message from him. I've also had times where before I go to sleep at night,

I'd say, Dad, are you with me? And I would get a slide show of our memories that flashed before my mind's eye really quite quickly, and things that I have long forgotten. To me, that's a sign from Dad, because there's no way my mind could have come up with those things that quickly. Of course, Sonia Andaldi down in Brazil, who gets these pictures and voices of people

in the afterlife. I had sent a message to Dad in the hereafter and said, hey, I noticed lady in Brazil, who's doing all these experiments, if you can figure out how this works, if you can put your face on one of her photos. From time to time, Sonia sends me some pictures of people that are unknown to her, and lo and behold. In her experiment was a picture

of my dad. Now not only a picture, but she sent me the video of the static energy that transformed itself into maybe a two second viewing of my dad and also another gentleman who my aunt says was her uncle, and then the picture disappeared. It is a picture that looks very close to what he looked like in the Air Force, but we do not have this exact place picture,

So it's a wonderful thing knowing that he's around. I also remember the wonderful reading I had with Reverend Rita Berkowitz, who wrote the book The Idiot's Guide to Communicating with Spirits. She is a retired spirit artist. So not only did she draw a picture of my father, but she told me some beautiful messages, and just to confirm it was really him, she told me some of the most specific

things that no one else could know. Do I talk to my dad as much as I tell other people they should talk to their loved ones no, and I think that's okay. I do a lot of meditations, and there's sometimes when I'm just about to go into that daydream type state that all of a sudden, there is Dad loud and clear in my brain, and I just feel his presence. And sometimes when I'm waking up in the morning or coming out of the meditation, there he is. Personally.

I think Dad is right by my side, helping me, help you and others to believe that relationship that became estranged during my adult life. I feel we are closer than ever. Right now. I want to read to you the last birthday card my dad ever gave me, and it's good advice to all. It's how to make a beautiful life. Reflections for a daughter on her birthday. Love yourself, make peace with who you are and where you are

at this moment in time. Listen to your heart if you can't hear what it's saying in this noisy world, make time for yourself, enjoy your own company, Let your mind wander among the stars. Try take chances, make mistakes. Life can be messy and confusing at times, but it's also full of surprises. The next rock in your path might be a stepping stone. Be happy when you don't have what you want, want what you have, make do. That's a well kept secret of contentment. There aren't any

shortcuts to tomorrow. You have to make your own way. To know where you're going is only part of it. You need to know where you've been too, And if you ever get lost, don't worry. The people who love you will find you. Count on it. Life isn't days and years. It's what you do with time and all, with the goodness and grace that's inside you, make a beautiful life, the kind of life you deserve. And he wrote, I love you so dearly. Words cannot express my love

for you. Love pop Aw, Thanks Dad. I did put a website together after my dad passed, just as a tribute, and it helped me channel my grief into something. You can still see that at John Champlaine dot com. I'm so grateful I still have my mom with me. Does she believe in life after death? Not so much. However, she's gone from not believing to being open to hearing my stories and we've had some of those psychic cool

moments together. So remember, don't push this on anyone. People will come about their own beliefs in their own time. In closing, I want to remind you that our home base is we Don't Die dot com. Come join for one of our Sunday gatherings. You never know if your loved one will come through in the medium demonstration. They're always so special. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for sticking with me on this journey. You are dearly loved, my friend, and you are not alone. I'm

Sandra Champlain. Thank you for listening to Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.