The Sickroom

A family member of mine bought a Victorian house built in 1877 last year and I went to visit so I could help clear all the old energy out, burning sage as I went. There was only one room that had a definite energy to it, but no details were coming through to me at the time. When I had finished my walk through, I mentioned that I thought the room may have been a sick room once. Around this time I had started seeing a therapist to talk about my abilities and how I struggled with mental health because of them. Up until last year, I had no energetic boundaries and was at the mercy of spirit voices, emotions of the living and the dead that weren’t mine, etc. The day before I was planning to visit my family member at this house for the second time, about 10 o’clock in the morning, I was folding laundry in my room when I started to feel anxious. There is something on the periphery of my awareness that’s trying to come in. I get nervous. I can tell it’s a woman and that she’s from this house. I try to say that I’m not open to communication and that I will be tomorrow when I’m on my way to the house. I continue sorting laundry and putting it away in my kids’ rooms, but really what I’m doing is pacing anxiously back and forth. The feeling has not left me and my heart is pounding. I’m listening to music in my headphones and more details start to filter through my consciousness; a woman’s face wearing a cloth mask that covers her mouth and nose. Finally I’m so worked up and preoccupied that I can’t pretend to do laundry any longer and I sit down to sketch what I’m seeing in my mind. This was actually the first spirit drawing I ever did. After I was done I started texting my therapist. I told her what was going on and sent her a picture of the sketch.

She told me I was most likely feeling this woman’s anxiety, and to ask her if she had any message. I replied “Yes, more is coming through. I am extremely emotional. I think she had a son, who was sick and died. The message I’m getting is that she tried her best to save him but it wasn’t enough. She’s telling me ‘You have sons so you understand.’ I think her son is stuck there with her.” I believe that her son fell ill and died during the 1918 influenza epidemic that ravaged Vermont and many other states. My therapist walked me through trying to move them both on and I eventually calmed down. I was extremely drained after that experience, and stayed in bed for the rest of the day. I have spent the year since doing a lot of work on personal spiritual boundaries and trying to get to know and work with my spirit guides. Since that experience last March I have done two other drawings, and the act of sketching has helped me channel the energies that I sense. I look forward to continuing along this path to tell their stories, and plan to visit a place where I can do a new sketch at the end of the month.