A lot happened in the short amount of time between when my grandma got sick and when I lost her. The timeline is something that I feel like I will forever hold dear. In my last full conversation with my grandmother, she spontaneously called my sister and I on video chat and she talked to us while I was on my way to work. She spoke of all the things she normally mentioned, we said our goodbyes, we told her we loved her and that we would talk to her later.

The thing that I thought was odd about that goodbye, was that she asked me to call her on my break. She never asked me to call her that quickly. She would usually say something to the effect of “call me later, talk to you soon” but she never told me to call her on my lunch break. I didn’t think too much of it, but the next time I was able to really talk to her, she was on oxygen. We spoke for a moment, she was able to talk to me, but I could tell it was hard for her to speak for very long, so I told her to rest and that I would call her again soon. She gained her wings a few days after that.

I fight tears typing this memory of my last moments with my Grandma because, like everyone I know that has lost a loved one, we wish we had more time, we wish the phone call was longer, we wish we could have visited one last time. I know that I called my grandma often, I know that I always made sure I told her how much I loved her, and how much I missed her, but I wish I could have done more.

She helped raise me my entire life. My memories of her are all good ones; rocking me on her legs when I was sick, hanging out with me at the mall. She would always stop at McDonald’s and get a fish filet with fries and no salt with a Diet Coke. It wasn’t until I became an adult that I realized it was never called a fish filet, and that it was called “filet of fish”. She would walk me to the library as a kid and feed my love of books. We would go to random stores and she would ask me to pick something out that I wanted, and I was always browsing book stores for my next favorite read. We would sing karaoke together as my Grandpa would say we were out of tune 😂. I would help her with her little yard sales and packing her balikbayan boxes.

My Grandma held one of the biggest parts of my heart and losing her was something I feared for forever.

ANYWAY

The point of my post was not to reminisce about my Grandma, but to tell you about a dream I had after she passed away.

Whatever your spiritual or religious beliefs are, I have to say, there is definitely a common thread between people that have lost loved ones, and then dreaming of their loved ones saying goodbye.

A few days after losing my Grandma, I had a dream. I was being driven by someone on the backroad of somewhere. It was evening it seemed like. looked like a storm was coming but it wasn’t raining yet. I was thinking that I needed to find my Grandma because I knew she was leaving and I needed to see her before she left. I ended up catching her going in the opposite direction as I was on the road, and we flipped a U-turn and met up with my Grandma in some garage. We both got out of the car and hugged each other super tight. We were both crying and I was telling her

“I don’t want you to go home yet, I don’t want you to go”

and my Grandma replied “I have to go”

It was then that I woke up and I was balling my eyes out. The rest of that day was a hard day. But I knew that she was telling me goodbye. She was giving my soul a last hug from her. She was letting me know that everything was going to be okay.

I heard somewhere that when we lose loved ones, we are so saddened by that loss, we are sad for them. The reality is, when our loved ones gain their wings, they are at peace. They are surrounded by their lost loved ones. They are happy. The reason why we are so saddened is because we are sad for the moments we won’t have with them, the moments we will miss them, the moments we want them to have with us.

I am sure that our loved ones are sad to leave our physical world. but once they gain their wings, they can be with us always. They will be with us in all those moments, they are beside us when we need them most.

Maybe you don’t believe in the afterlife. Maybe you don’t believe in spirits or them being able to visit after death. But for me, I find comfort in knowing my Grandma reached out to me. She gave me a hug before she left. We cried together, we said goodbye. And she waits in heaven with Grandpa and her siblings, for the day that we are all together again.