Comfort and Communication

This is Lee’s story, as told by Angela Borrello. Our “Opening Our Hearts” stories are based on people’s real-life experiences with loss. By sharing these experiences publicly, we hope to help our readers feel less alone in their experience of grief and, ultimately, to aid them in their healing processes. In this post, we tell the story of a young woman whose friend was killed during a carjacking. 

Credit: nick.com

Twenty-four hours after I heard my friend had been killed in a botched carjacking, my body began to shut down. It felt as if a sharp cramp was creeping up the back of my legs, torso, neck and into my head. By the time the pain had spread to its full extent, I was immobilized.
But as I lay shrouded in the vast cloak of grief and pain, all of a sudden I felt my friend’s presence enter the room. Although I don’t think I’ll ever be able to fully explain it, it was one of those things I just knew in my gut: In that moment I knew he was there. I felt him move through the room. He came to where I was resting and lay down on top of me, and I felt the weight of a body over me. There was a kind of comfort in his presence, unexpected and unique as it was. And then, just as quickly as he came, he left.

As I lay shrouded in the vast cloak of grief and pain, all of a sudden I felt my friend’s presence enter the room.

Some time later, when I was still struggling with the loss, I visited my friend who has a capacity for clairvoyance. She told me she felt my late friend’s presence enter the room. He then communicated a message for her to relay to me: “You need to open the box.”

I couldn’t believe it. The box he was telling me to open was one I had carefully constructed for myself in those painstaking 24 hours after I learned of his death. Every piece of him, every memory was too painful to think of. So to cope I imagined a box, placed each piece inside it, shut the lid and locked them away. I felt it was the only way I could keep going amid the pain of losing him.

But I never mentioned doing this to anyone, so you can imagine my surprise at hearing this message.

I found comfort in knowing he was there and that it was coming from him. Just as I knew it was he who was in the room after he died, I knew in my gut that this message too came from him.

So to cope I imagined a box, placed each piece inside it, shut the lid and locked them away.

A few years later I met my late friend’s daughter. She happened to be visiting my city, and we met during her stay. Although I was not close with her during his lifetime, we became good friends. In a way, death opened doors for me: this child of his and I consider our friendship somewhat of a continuation of him.

One night when we were out with a group of people, out of nowhere she said to me, “Your father and your uncle are here.” Yet both of them had died years before. I again found comfort in knowing they were there with us, even if it was just for a short time — just as I felt in the moments my friend was present. Their return made me feel as if I was a little less alone in the world.

Grieving is still a process, as I imagine it always will be. But I believe their energy remains. Whether it stays in one place or changes in presence, it’s still here. They are still with me and always will be.

This piece was originally published in 2014.