Image above: My happy Buddha and I, Christmas 2019
As a psychic, I learned a bit of psychic self-defense a few decades ago. But a couple of things have happened since then—I have become even more sensitive than ever, which is good, but makes it very hard to go to places like hospitals, airports, shopping malls, sporting events, etc.
The other thing that has happened is that my husband of twenty-five years has developed cancer. Stage IV. Metastatic. That means there is no cure, only “life extension”—seemingly at any cost. But that is another story.
When you are psychic, sensitive, empathic, whatever-you-want-to-call-it, you tend to absorb the energy of the people around you. This is manageable when you encounter challenging energies in places like clinics or schools, or even psychic fairs and healing events, because at the end of the day, you can smudge yourself, go home, get a soothing bath or meditation, or do whatever you need to shed the stray energy absorbed that does not belong to you.
But when you significant other, or a parent, or (Goddess forbid!) a child; when you are living in the same space as the one who is suffering with a terminal illness, you may find you have no place to go to recharge and cleanse your aura.
I love my husband—he’s kind, funny, just about the nicest guy on the planet. But he has had health problems for years. But he never acts like he is unhealthy—he tries to do stuff he shouldn’t, he takes on more than is advisable, and laughs through it all. He is inspiring. He is handling this way better than I am.
Not only am I dealing with my own personal emotional soup over this prognosis, and the open-ended-ness of it (like the sword of Damocles), but below my awareness, my energy field and my body are absorbing and trying to process his energies as well. I often feel pain where he feels pain, or have an upset digestive system when he has an upset digestive system. I am tired when he is tired. I lose my appetite only to find he is not hungry either. I simply cannot tell sometimes whether what I am feeling or experiencing belongs to me or to him.
There is no “cure” for any of this. This is life as a sensitive. And this is just life. People get sick. People you love get sick. People you love die. We all die.
But short of a cure, I am discovering some ways in which to find some relief for me, and to give myself hope for a future without my best friend.
At first, I knew I needed something to look forward to—something to have to give me reason to go on afterward. I joined a local art group and found new and compassionate friends who shared my values and sensitivity. I already had a community of psychic and healers, metaphysicians and Lightworkers that I had connected with in recent years through my own work at body/mind/spirit events in the Pacific Northwest. The art group was a non-profit and I became more involved in an effort to give myself days when I could be mostly happy. This was a psychic survival strategy. And it helped.
Despite his diagnosis, hubby persevered. He is now a five-year survivor, but is still a sick man. We live in a lovely small home, in one bedroom and one bathroom, so we share a great deal of energy in the course of a normal day.
Taking time to get away from home helps. Either with him—which helps us both clear our auras-or without him. So I go to waterfalls with friends, or go to visit a friend in another city, or just spend the day out of the house doing other things. But I am a natural hermit in my old age and I prefer the comfort and freedom of my own home, where I can write, paint, create, putz, sleep, eat, whatever as I feel like it. So I am not a social butterfly who can fill her hours with light-hearted and possibly meaningless interactions with casual others.
But this, too, is another coping mechanism. I immerse myself in that next book, or my current painting, or spend a day or two at a time deep into making jewelry or fiber arts or whatever. I taught myself to spin wool. I started working on three-dimensional pieces. I found a local labyrinth I can walk.
And I try to do visualizations—although some days it feels like I simply do not have the inner strength to resist the fatigue, to generate any ambition, or even to do some spirit journeying. I imagine myself and my husband as two separate eggs of energy—not the conjoined, double-egg we often are. I picture myself cutting the cords between us, but that feels like I am abandoning him, somehow throwing him under the bus. I visualize him surrounded by a rainbow or bright white healing light. When he is sleeping, I often hold my hands over him, radiating healing energy. I don’t know for sure, but I think this may be part of the reason he is still here.
But he’s been feeling more and more poorly, more and more of the time. I managed a big metaphysical event this past weekend and I was totally renewed energy-wise, and a revitalization of my ability to be joyful in the world. Now—I am no longer a young woman, and my body has its own bugaboos, but even though I was physically exhausted, I still had more energy and ambition and capacity for joy.
But now that the event is over, I am back home again, mostly 24/7, in our mutual energy soup. I coped today with a long healing bath and a nap, with a quick trip to the store, just to get out of the energy field for a few moments, and now I am writing this while he tries to nap in the midst of pain.
Like I said, there is no cure for this—for either one of us. But I will continue to do the things that help me stay strong(er) so we can finish the journey together in a joyful and loving manner.
If you have a similar experience and have any tips to share, please post them here in the comments.