How do children know?

when I was 7 years old... my mother came through the gate after one of many many visits to the hospital to see my father.

I watched her from the window as she turned to close the gate and tears started flowing. I sobbed to my sister... 'he's dead... my father is dead...'
then my mother came in and broke the news... embracing us... telling us the blessing he asked her to say to us every night. I cried every night for a year...

Years later I heard Elisabeth Kubler Ross speaking on death and dying and she told of her experiences with children. An example was a certain child who hadn't been told her mother was dying, drew a picture of her mother's overturned chair at the dining room table, while the rest of the family were all occupying their seats. Displaying her awareness, DESPITE NEVER HAVING BEEN TOLD.

As I watched this programme, I remembered my own experience. My mother told me, she never spoken to us about the fact my father was dying because it had been too difficult for her to accept. Yet I knew my father was dying... felt I'd been brought up knowing this...

And this was the ground which was laid for the most crucial experience of all... when my daughter, Gra-anna, committed suicide... and my beautiful grandson, Awen, who you can see in this photo and others in my albums, needed to be spoken to - have me meet him right there in his experience, in the bewilderment and pain he was experiencing... telling him his mom is holding him so close in every moment ... he has a very special angel - a mom spirit guardian.

One of the most powerful moments of my life was when I went to see my daughters body. The last time I'd seen her was a couple of months before on a visit to London. She'd been living in the UK for about 6 years... Gra-anna had met me at the airport - her beautiful radiant face appearing from nowhere, beaming hello...

...time to go in and see her body which had been prepared... suddenly it occurred to me.. what about Awen.. almost all of 4 years old.. should he see his mom's body too? No one had spoken about this. Though Ian, his beautiful father told me he had been wondering about it, when I broached the subject. Part of me felt he should, part of me wanted to protect him...

The compassionate woman who worked there and also owned the funeral service place overheard us... she said how her heart was going out to us.. and told us we should ask Awen. That this is what she always encouraged people to do and she always found children did want to see their loved one's body...

It was like a breath of fresh air - AHA! Of course! I asked Awen, who said very simply, 'Yes, I want to see her.' I prepared him, saying she would look like she is sleeping but would no longer be in her body as she is spirit now and is holding him so close...

Ian and I and Awen went in and he stood looking quietly... after a while he asked what the thing over body her was and we explained they were coverings they had put on her ... then Ian took him out quietly and I stayed... holding this space for a short while.. the last moments I'd ever be with my daughters body on earth... this now slightly ashen face with a trace of a smile the autopsy people had probably placed there which didn't hide.. what.. what was the silent roar I could almost feel tangibly? What were her moments in this transition? This wrenching from the body where she'd experienced such adventures and so much trauma....

in subsequent months and years.. I experienced her journeys again.. sometimes struggles ..much joyousness.... always busy, this beautiful girl! Who loved mother earth and her offspring incomparably...

When I left this room... there was Awen looking at the aquarium chatting about to the fish...

moving from one moment to the next...
as children do....

in that moment I took a great lesson...
about flowing with things...

this is happening...

now this

... now this...

always in the moment
...always the moment sacred...

living as a child