My Journey Through Grief To Spirit

I thought I would write a little bit about my experiences with grief and spirit over the past two years. I’m hoping it might help someone else who is struggling – even if it just helps them to realise that they’re not alone.

As many of you know my German Shepherd Hollie passed in March 2021, she had been my constant companion and a constant source of amusement. Moreover, I had had at least one dog in my life for a good 24 years until that sad day. Hollie left such a huge hole in both mine and Martin’s (my partner) life and my heart was completely shattered at her parting, but I didn’t just feel empty because of Hollie, I felt lost and like my whole purpose in life had been taken away. I know to many it sounds ridiculous and I was often met with the “pull yourself together” mentality, but for 24 years I had been a doggy Mum, they were my reason for getting up each morning, my reason for getting exercise, they kept my brain ticking over researching various ailments and cures, I’m surprised I didn’t go completely bald from the number of scares they collectively gave me lol Most of all they filled my days with love and devotion – in just one day it felt like all of that had been ripped away from me. What was I supposed to do now? What reason did I have for getting up of a morning or going out for a walk? I had become so accustomed to Hollie’s howls – in equal parts delight and impatience at the preparation of her doggy dinner – and now there was only silence. I find it hard to think about that period of time, so I won’t deep dive into my feelings.

The first thing I noticed during this time was that very few people understand what you’re going through – grief really is a very lonely process – especially as I had lost a dog and not a person, but tell me what the difference is because in my eyes love is love and I loved Hollie as much as any person in my life! My own family were dismissive – they’ve been through it themselves and sadly it didn’t bring out much empathy towards me. If I had lost a child, a parent, my partner then I believe there would have been so much support out there for me, but this was just a dog and I shouldn’t feel the same depth of grief, so there was nothing. I felt so lonely and so lost. To top it off I had someone pose as a friend who really did not give a damn about my feelings at all – just an energy vampire that I cottoned on to later on and cut out of my life. Luckily I had Martin and a few truly lovely friends that did understand me and did listen to me. I wonder where I would be now without those individuals?

Moving on from the deepest darkest depths of grief as that is not somewhere I wish to dwell on for too long. It wasn’t long before I had my first “encounter” with Hollie! I was sat watching the television one evening when I was suddenly aware of a presence on the floor beside my leg, it was so familiar that I didn’t stop to question and looked down to ask Hollie what on earth she was up to, but in that very second I remembered that Hollie wasn’t here anymore! The feeling persisted and I just knew that it was Hollie wanting to get up on the sofa – something we didn’t really allow when she had been on the earth plane, but now she could come up on the sofa with me any time she liked, I welcomed it. After that both of us felt Hollie around a huge amount of the time, sometimes we saw her or heard her – neither myself nor Martin have seen her just as she was when she was on this side of the veil, but we have caught flashes of black, little lights and Martin even experienced what he describes as a starburst! We would go out in the car, just doing the weekly shop, and would both feel Hollie with us, she now likes to stand with her head right between the two of us looking out the windscreen – she always was incredibly nosey lol Now I am not one of these people who believes that everything little thing is a sign and I certainly do not imagine the presence of spirit – I have always tried hard to debunk every single experience I have had and as a result some have been chalked up as unexplainable but not definitively spiritual or supernatural, however, these experiences were most definitely Hollie and spiritual – on one occasion Martin and I drove to a local shop to drop a package off, as we drove from home I commented how it didn’t feel like Hollie was with us, or perhaps she was just in the boot curled up, it felt strange. We dropped off our package and again I commented how strange it was that I couldn’t feel Hollie, normally she would accompany us in the shop. We got back in the car and drove off to do a food shop, we weren’t very far down the road when Hollie’s presence came back into her usual spot between us in the car! I couldn’t make sense of it at first, but then I remembered that the shop we had visited was right opposite the horrible vets she had hated, they were so awful that I sought out a holistic vet who has made the journey to the other side himself now, but who helped Hollie enormously and never frightened her. Hollie knew where we were going when we got in the car at home and when we popped in the shop she didn’t want to come with us because (I believe) she was scared that she may have to visit that horrible place again! Once that danger had passed she came back to us in her full energy.

So now I not only realised that when we pass we don’t necessarily go anywhere (I will touch on this a little later), but also that at least some of our fears don’t leave. This surprised me, I didn’t expect Hollie to be bothered in the slightest that she was near a place that she associated with pain and anxiety, and made me realise that who we are, our likes, dislikes, fears and our basic personality doesn’t change when we pass – if you liked smoking, for example, in this life then I honestly believe that you will like it in the afterlife too – for Hollie the fear and dislike of that vets had been so intense that it had stayed with her. The other interesting thing I have noticed going forward is that she doesn’t leave when we go there now, perhaps my reassurance that she will never have to go again has sunk in? This has been eye opening for me – I believe in reincarnation and perceive each life as a combination of lessons and that the particular lessons we choose to learn dictate whether we are male or female, our cultural background, our religion and to some extent our personalities, but I have had the opportunity to explore this more and I do believe that a large part of who we are doesn’t change, obviously our experiences each life time must shape us and that is the intention I believe, but who are at our core stays the same. What this means in terms of people who we would perceive as evil I honestly do not know – I can only reflect on my own experiences.

Another interesting experience was during a walk at a local nature reserve, there is a bird hide there that Martin and I like to visit and watch the birds from, it also gives a welcome rest on the walk. On this particular day there wasn’t anyone else in the hide so we sat quietly looking out at the birds, taking it in turns with our only pair of rather dilapidated binoculars and after a little while we left to continue our walk, but something was bothering me – I had had this incredibly strong impression whilst we were in the hide of Hollie being in there with us, I could recall her nails on the wooden floor, it was strong enough for me to think it was a kind of déjà vu, a memory of a time she had been on the walk with us, but I couldn’t recall a time that had actually happened – I thought my memory was playing tricks on me and asked Martin if we had ever walked Hollie here, but he was adamant we hadn’t even when I questioned repeatedly. What I had experienced wasn’t a memory at all, I believe Hollie was there with us at that very moment, impatiently waiting for us to hurry up and continue the walk – hence her nails on the boards. We have often felt her on our walks and I believe that she can still pick up the scents of other animals as she often darts off into areas that would have lots of “smells”.

Perhaps the biggest thing I have learned is something I touched on earlier, that when we die we don’t necessarily go anywhere, or at least not for long. This surprised me the most I think, as I assumed Hollie was with my other dogs and loved ones in spirit or wherever it is that our souls return to once we leave the physical world. I thought perhaps she would pop in to see us on occasion, would come for walks with us and maybe a drive sometimes, but I didn’t expect her continued presence, yet she is here all the time, to the point where we now feel her absence rather than her presence a lot of the time – this happens when Martin goes out to work, she will accompany him in the car, but then gets bored and comes home to me again! She now has more freedom than ever and does whatever she feels like doing. Before this I thought that my loved ones (people and animals) passed to the spiritual realm (for want of a better word) upon death and stayed there for the majority of their time, occasionally coming to offer support, I always called out to them to come and see me, even doing spells for Hollie to visit me, but it’s not those on the other side that need to reach out – it’s us! Our loved ones are always around us, especially if they were close to us, all we need to do is raise our vibration and be open to signs they might send to attract our attention. These last two years have made me very reflective and more interested than ever in what happens to us when we die. I have been a heavy user of YouTube as there is so much information on there, one channel I particularly like is that of the well known medium Allison Dubois, I have found her podcasts and interviews insightful and very easy to understand. The way Allison puts life after death is “we are their heaven!”, meaning they want to stay close to us as they love us just as much as we love them and wouldn’t want to be apart from us.

There is so much more I have learned but this is just a blog, one day I will write a book and it will be filled with more of my thoughts, experiences and what I have learned during this journey.