The Healing Journey

November 23, 2024

Rosemary’s brother died at 15 in a car accident, and she still thinks about him every day, years later, but something happened a long time ago that has special meaning for her.

As she recalled, “We had a dog when I was late in my teens, but he was really my brother’s buddy. When my brother passed away, the dog lay in front of my brother’s drum set for days. Then, the day after my brother’s funeral, the dog ran away. Imagine the family’s anxiety, after so much grief to be encumbered with even more pain.

“My sister and I searched for days,” she said. “For years, we looked for him. Then, one day, on the way to church, we thought we saw him in this field.” They stopped the car a distance from where the dog was and got out. “The dog stopped running and stood still for a long time, just looking at us, and then ran into the woods,” she said. Both women agreed that it was time to stop looking. “My sister and I agreed that he was telling us our brother was at peace and that he would soon be with him.”

She still looks for signs from her loved ones who have passed on, including her husband Jack, who died several years ago, and her parents. “Sometimes I find them in the clouds,” she says. “And sometimes I find them in what the grandkids say.”

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