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  I would say that before he met Allison, Jim was scared and uneasy about death, he had only dealt with life every day at work delivering all of those babies for as long as he could remember. Jim was surrounded by life and now he was being forced to become acquainted with life’s distant cousin, ‘death’. He would say, ‘I hope I have been good enough.’ And believe me, he was golden—more than good enough! But he just seemed full of doubt and uncomfortable with the life he had so enjoyed previously.

  Allison met with Jim on 10 September 2010. I had gone out to get my hair done and do some shopping. When I returned to our hotel, Jim was the most peaceful, calm and content I had ever known him to be. It took a while for him to open up, but eventually Jim shared with me some of the things Allison had said.

  Allison described Jim’s father and their dog and some personal experiences they had, which convinced him that the messages were no coincidence. During the reading, Allison also talked about a grandfather who was coming through to him. Jim said in her ‘scribbling’ she kept making dollar signs. Jim couldn’t help chuckling over that because ever since he had to stop working we’d been getting royalty checks from gas wells that his grandfather had retained the mineral rights to. She also told Jim that he was the second person whom she knew to have pancreatic cancer, and the other person was her father-in-law, whose name was also James—as it turned out, this was another connection that was not just coincidence.

  Jim did not directly ask Allison how long he had to live. He did tell me that Allison said he would be able to make what he called ‘my birthday trip to Hawaii’, but it would be very, very hard on him. Jim said they had a nice hug as he left that made him feel pretty good.

  In September we went to MD Anderson, the cancer treatment and research centre at the University of Texas. By the end of October, though, Jim’s cancer had got much worse, and in the first few days of November his oncologist decided to change the chemotherapy and put Jim on treatment that was a lot stronger. This new treatment made Jim extremely sick.

  A month before he had won the Victoria Country Club First Round Club Championship in golf. Now, all he could do was sleep. Until this point, he had not lost his hair, either. He had been proud that he’d had cancer for more than a year, undergone chemotherapy and kept his hair. But then he started losing his hair, and pretty much his self-esteem, and he was so weak he stayed in bed most of the time, often with a fever. He started losing weight, too, as he just had no appetite.

  Just as Allison had said, Jim was most sick in November. We went back to MD Anderson for another dose of chemotherapy. One week later Jim’s most recent tests came back and his cancer was escalating. So the treatment was changed again and now involved four different kinds of chemotherapy, one by mouth and the other three by IV. Jim was so sick. At one point, he even said that if this was living then he had to talk to the oncologist because this was not living. He didn’t want to eat. He didn’t want to talk on the phone. He didn’t want visitors. He didn’t want to leave the house at all.

  December 8 was Jim’s birthday, and I didn’t want the day to go by unrecognised, for I knew this would be his last birthday on this earth. I wanted to have some kind of celebration. He was feeling a little bit better, so at the last minute we had some friends over. A few days before our trip to Hawaii, Jim seemed to be feeling upbeat. We drove to Houston on Saturday and he only had a bowl of soup that night; Sunday morning he had some cereal and milk. But that night when we boarded our flight he felt nauseous. Two hours into the flight my husband started throwing up. He told me he thought I was going to have to take him to the hospital when we landed in Honolulu. From the plane I called a surgeon we knew and he advised me to take Jim straight to an emergency department. However, even though he was still vomiting, before we landed Jim said, ‘Let’s just go on to Maui and get the kids to the condo and see how I do.’

  We were there for one day. Jim was trying to feel good. The next day he felt terrible, and shortly after midnight we went to the emergency department in the Maui hospital. It had great doctors who offered some forms of treatment, but Jim said he just wanted to go home because he knew he would really get the best care for himself there. That morning, around 5 a.m., I made the flight arrangements to leave Maui to get back to Houston. We left Maui around five o’clock in the afternoon on December 22 then arrived in Houston at six o’clock the next morning and drove home.

  A month later, on 22 January 2011, my heroic husband passed away.

  Thank goodness the Sunday before Jim died I had gone to the nursing home where Jim’s mother lives and brought her to our house to see him. She has dementia but she’s ‘with it’ if you talk to her one on one; if you have three people in the room talking at the same time, she gets confused.

  Even though it was late when Jim passed away, I told the kids to go to the nursing home to tell their grandmother the news. I knew it would be better for her to hear it from them. Jim was a well-known physician in our community, and it would have been terrible for her if someone said, ‘Oh, Mrs Hayes, I am so sorry to hear about the death of your son,’ before we had told her ourselves and processed it with her.

  The kids went to the nursing home at about 10.30 p.m. and discovered that Jim’s sister had been there that day and moved their grandmother to Dallas. Allison had warned me that this would happen, and I think the prior knowledge helped me cope during a time when I needed all the help I could get.

  Allison and I had talked about how death sometimes makes people do insensitive things, but at least I knew what to expect so I could roll with it.

  So now I’m taking it day by day. I know Jim’s around me, and that he’s feeling good again. I miss our talks and sharing our daily highs and lows. I miss being part of a couple, but I will carry him in my heart with me through life, so I guess I’m not really alone after all.

  MEETING JIM

  Now that you have read Dot’s account, I want to share with you how meeting Dot and Jim affected my life.

  When my cousin Mark called and told me that Dot wanted to book a reading with me for Jim, I initially said no. This was because I bring through the dead, but I was being asked to counsel the dying, and that petrified me. What if Jim didn’t like me or couldn’t get past his professional background in medicine? What if I said something that made it worse for him? This wasn’t my forte; it was unfamiliar ground for me.

  On top of those fears, his name was ‘Jim’, and he had pancreatic cancer, just like my father-in-law, the one I never met in life. Our daughter Fallon was born five years to the day that my father-in-law, Jim, had died in the same hospital. Our daughter Aurora was born two years to the day of my father-in-law’s funeral and a day before Joe’s birthday. I saw Joe still struggle with losing his dad all these years later. Part of me wasn’t sure that this wouldn’t affect Joe, seeing a man of similar age, name and illness pass through our home and our lives. Or maybe it could help Joe to process his father’s passing, something he had never entirely been able to face. He missed him so much. I spent weeks thinking about this, weighing the possibilities and wondering, ‘Could we handle it?’

  Fortunately, my cousin Mark is a very smooth talker and he’s able to convince anybody to do just about anything—and that’s what he did with me. In spite of all my reservations, I agreed to set my fears aside and read for Jim. He was dealing with a time issue here, so now was not the moment to lose my cool.

  Jim came over on September 10, two weeks before the anniversary of my own dad’s passing. I had many conf licting emotions raging through me.

  The first thing I noticed was that Jim had the kindest blue eyes, and he was one of those guys you look at and know he’s a doctor; he exuded the energy of a doctor. He sat down and we talked for a few minutes so that I could put him at ease. This was, after all, a unique situation. We talked about what happens when a person dies, how they can reconnect with the living, and how they can still participate in the lives of their loved ones. This seemed to calm his nerves a little.
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  During Jim’s reading I brought through many of his relatives and I described their personalities and gave him names and other details connected to the ones he loved. The more details I conveyed to Jim, the less stressed he looked and the more at ease I was. As the reading progressed, he seemed more and more light-hearted and even amused by the information that was coming through from his family.

  I razzed him, ‘See, it doesn’t hurt a bit! This is a completely painless process,’ and we both laughed.

  I felt a bond with Jim for many reasons. It was a most precious experience, one that has changed me. Now I know that I can help the dying, too! Before my reading with Jim I was so afraid to face that fear, to feel his pain, his very life slipping away. But then I realised it really wasn’t slipping away; it was simply changing forms. I also felt so honoured that with Jim’s limited time, he chose to spend part of it with me, talking about life and death, talking about his wife and kids and how much he loves them all and savours every conversation with them, every moment. What a guy! For so many years he delivered babies and reassured their mothers that they would be just fine—he was an instrument of life. It made perfect sense why death and exiting the world didn’t feel right to him, because it’s not what he knew.

  When we were finished, I hugged him goodbye, wanting to hold on to him and keep him here with us, but it doesn’t work that way, does it? I know we all wish it did.

  I saw Jim six weeks later. He looked different. He had lost some of the colour in his face, but he still looked happy. He was still among the living. We were at a fundraiser for—what else?—pancreatic cancer research. We had a lovely, yet emotionally draining evening. He and Dot dropped in the next day to give our family T-shirts from their favourite football team, the Texas Longhorns—such a sweet gesture.

  January rolled around. It’s my favourite month because I was born in it! We had a birthday party for me on the night of January 22, a Saturday, and it was that night when Jim let go. I remembered back to when I met Dot and how I kept seeing the number ‘2’ connected to Jim. Then I realised it was because Dot and Jim were married on March 22, my dad passed on September 22, and now Jim on January 22.

  Days after Jim passed away, Dot told me that Jim had said our meeting had made him less afraid to die. Can you imagine that? Being able to touch a dying man in such a personal way. Hearing those words was one of those rare moments that made my life profoundly worth living. People often ask me what their life’s path is, and it’s nice to know that each of us has the capacity to touch others’ lives for the better. If we all tried just 10 per cent harder to help others, think of what a wonderful world we’d leave as our legacy.

  To Jim, I want to say, ‘Thanks for the memories and for pushing me to be better at what I do and how I live!’

  UNBREAKABLE BONDS

  While writing about those who have to endure the excruciatingly painful loss of the love of their life, I also wanted to show you the f lipside of loss—the reunion.

  Although often one half of a couple will pass away first, the day does come when they’re reunited, together forever. Occasionally, I have the unique honour of bringing an inspiring couple who have passed away through for their family, and the dynamic duo speak of their unbreakable bond, their life together as they walk hand in hand on the other side. In these cases death actually brings them back to life, because once again they have each other.

  I met Jill at one of my events and also conducted a 30-minute reading for her. She missed her parents terribly, having lost both of them to cancer at a young age. I knew nothing about her parents, but I was on the verge of finding out why these two people were so special to Jill and her entire family, and why she needed me to reconnect her with them.

  The relationship with our parents is one that can’t be replaced or forgotten—it’s one of a kind, unparalleled. When I bring someone’s mum or dad through, I take it very seriously because I’m fully aware of how precious those relationships are to all hearts involved.

  At the start of Jill’s private reading I wrote ‘Mum’ and ‘Dad’ on my notepad and I drew a line from those two words to Jill’s name, trying to grab their attention. Within seconds I could hear her mother—who felt very warm and chatty—begin whispering messages for Jill. So I brought Jill’s mum through first, since her mum had quite a strong need to reconnect with her daughter, and her dad was politely letting his wife go first.

  It was a loving and light-hearted reading, with many trips down memory lane for Jill. I love these moments where the communication is so crystal clear from the other side that the living are totally taken aback because the messages are specific to their everyday lives. The reading also made it obvious that Jill’s parents are much younger now, and neither of them have cancer anymore. They still adore their children, and they will watch over their little grandchildren all the days of their lives. Jill’s story reminds us all that we’ll forever be in the arms of those who we love.

  JILL’S STORY

  My sister, brother and I were very lucky to have two wonderful parents! We had a great childhood and were very close to our mum and dad. We had a family full of honesty, trust, a lot of laughter and fun, and an abundance of love.

  My mum and dad were high school sweethearts who were hard workers, yet they always made time to enjoy life. My mum had a very positive attitude and could see the good in any situation. She was very friendly and loved people. She could talk to a stranger for hours if Dad let her. My dad had a way of making the person he was with seem like the centre of his world, whether it was me doing homework with him or a client in his office. Because of his job as a journalist, many people saw a stern, powerful person and didn’t have the pleasure of knowing who he really was. He had a great sense of humour, and anyone that knew him will tell you how sarcastic he could be. Unfortunately, my parents were taken from us too soon, leaving much sadness, many questions and a huge hole in our family.

  Within the first five minutes of my reading, Allison commented that I was a very pragmatic person. This is absolutely true, and I also tend to be quite sceptical, so you can imagine that grasping the idea that I could talk to loved ones who had passed and that they could talk to me was difficult to do. However, I was a huge fan of the show Medium, and the real Allison DuBois piqued my interest. I read her books, and after each one I was more convinced that there was at least a little truth behind this.

  In April 2010, I attended one of Allison’s seminars in Denver, Colorado. I had read on her website that she would pick just a small number of people from the audience for a personal reading. The possibility of getting a message from my mum and dad was very thrilling, but I knew it was a long shot that I would be chosen from the large crowd. At the seminar, before Allison spoke, her assistant explained how the readings would work. People would be selected based on how ‘loud’ their loved ones on the other side were, and the stronger spirits would determine who would be chosen for a reading. When Allison came on stage and asked the crowd who would like a reading, I raised my hand along with almost everyone else in that room. You can imagine the shock when I was the first person chosen. I said a quiet thankyou to my folks for being pushy.

  Allison spent about fifteen minutes with me, passing on messages from my parents. This sceptical, pragmatic person left that night on an emotional high, now convinced there was some truth to the belief that my parents were still with me. At the end of the night, I signed up for a private reading.

  It took Allison’s books to open my mind, and her reading at the seminar to convince me. But it was the private reading, more than a year later, that actually made me listen to what my parents were saying. I consider myself extremely blessed to have had the opportunity for a second reading to process this evolution.

  In both readings, Allison started off by saying that my mum came through right away and talks A LOT. That’s my mum, the talker! Before the first reading, Allison knew nothing about me, my parents or the way they passed, but apparently Mum was filling her in.
My mum was talking about the female with cancer, and Allison asked if either my mum or my mum’s mum had passed from cancer. I lost my mum to brain cancer when she was only 54.

  Later, when speaking with my dad, Allison said he wasn’t revealing how he died; he wasn’t telling her anything. However, she could see that he was holding his chest like he was in pain, or was having a hard time breathing, and that he might have had a hand in his death. My dad passed away from lung cancer at the age of 55. He smoked, and he felt a lot of guilt and remorse for smoking even though he knew the risks.

  Cancer is a very cruel monster that disrupted our lives and caused us a lot of pain. It doesn’t surprise me that my parents found it important to connect to me by discussing, or not discussing, their cancer. Allison assured me that they didn’t have it anymore and they were healthy. I needed to hear this.

  Allison said my parents were both presenting themselves at a younger age. She said my mum was beautiful with very long hair. She was, indeed, beautiful and had very long hair. She was presenting herself at the age of 23, and said that was a very good year for her, filled with joy. I was born when she was 23. Furthermore, my dad was presenting himself at the age of 25 because it was such a happy time. Again, that was his age when I was born.

  One of the first things Mum kept talking about was ‘the boy and the girl’, and Allison explained that usually meant she had a boy and a girl, or there would be a grandson and a granddaughter. At the time my sister was pregnant with twins—a boy and a girl. Allison said my mum was acknowledging her future grandchildren and wanted my sister to know that she would be there with them and protect them. She also said Mum was referencing May, and there was a strong family tie to the month, either a birth or a passing. The babies weren’t due in May, but my sister’s doctor had told her that, because twins usually come early, they could be born in that month. Also, my mum passed away in May.