FB Message from Julie Tilden Brown And Her Dream About Brendan.

Julie

Hi Wendy, Corinne, Alexa, I wanted to share a dream I had the other night about Brendan. I drove to Niagara Falls because we were having a memorial celebration there for him. I arrived and it wasn't at the falls like I expected it would be but instead we gathered at a calm pool downstream. A river made its way into this glass room, like a greenhouse.It was beautiful and warm inside. I looked around and saw all the familiar faces that loved Brendan and everyone sat along the edges of the river and dropped a stone into the water. I didn't realize we were suppose to bring a favorite or meaningful rock but I reached in my pocket and there was one, from my favorite beach (Egypt, in Scituate where I grew up). So I dropped the rock in and everyone was just sitting around the edges in silence, just listening to the sounds of the stream. My eyes filled up with tears and as I was wiping them away, I looked up and Brendan was standing there with a big smile on his face. He had a black dog on a red leash. It was a small black lab. I know he loved his cats so I'm not sure why he had a dog but I bent down and patted the dog and said, "I wasn't expecting you here!" Brendan through his eternal smile just laughed and slowly said I wasn't expecting me either." And we just stood and smiled at each other for a while before I woke up. Isn't that a beautiful dream?! I believe that we're visited by the ones we love in our dreams. I've always had such vivid dreams that I remember in great detail so this was really special to experience. I think he's smiling at all of us and letting us know that he's in a really good place.

Corinne

Thank you darling Julie for sharing this vivid dream. It seems that memories of Christmases past are popping up in my consciousness on a moment to moment basis and I'm filled with sadness & longing. Your sweet recollection brings aa abit of solace and comfort. I feel so blessed that Brendan was so dearly loved by so many. To know that he's doing well takes some of the sting out of my heartbreak. xoxo C-

Julie

Sending you hugs, Corinne.

Corinne

Alexa

I love this Julie
I’m a big believer in the power of dreams too.
He’s been on my mind a lot these days, especially after losing Marty recently as well. I am certain B is talking to all of us who love him in his own way.

Julie

8:22 AM

so amazing Julie, thank you so very much for telling us the dream. You described it so incredibly well that I could feel myself there too! Of course I am crying....as usual...I want to share something magical that happened this morning; so here is something I think is very interesting. I have chronic insomnia and I try to choose 8 hour continuous relaxing sounds on YouTube before I go to sleep. Last night I randomly chose this collection of sleeping/calming music. I woke this morning and was about to change the music and I notice the screen. To me it looks just like Brendan rowing a boat into the stars. I like how the the stars and fog are moving. I could just image Brendan saying, "I gotch your back Wendy, I gotchu....." which he said a lot when I was going through those months dealing with cancer. I'd love you to look at this link, you'll see what I mean. I'm including the photo of him that I took overlooking his secret beach, because the image in the boat has a similar look. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EEq9S4BT5E&t=19919s

Sleeping Music, Calming Music, Music for Stress Relief, Relaxation Music, 8 Hour Sleep Music, ☯3500

Sleeping Music, Calming Music, Music for Stress Relief, Relaxation Music, 8 Hour Sleep Music, ☯3500 - YellowBrickCinema’s Sleep Music is the perfect relaxing...

youtube.com

1

Alexa

Brendan and I shared the dreaded sleep issue of insomnia. I could imagine him there as I sleep, rowing us into the stars, his way of looking out for me.

Julie

That’s beautiful Wendy. Yes it looks like him...he was guiding you through your dreams. I know this time of year must be particularly hard. Sending you big hugs.

thanks Julie...Yes...It doesn't seem to stop being hard. However I'm so looking forward to see Corinne & Al next week for 6 days. Hugging them is the closest I can get to hugging Brendan.

Oh yeah, I just saw this on my nightstand. I forgot that I wrote this before going to bed last night. I wanted to see if Brendan would talk to me in my dreams on Solstice. And it looks like did!

Like he did

Seen by everyone

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See Brendan Guiding Me in His Boat Towards the Stars

Dec 22, 2018

I choose a random YouTube video/sound to sleep to for 8 hours.  I choose this Sleeping Music, Calming.....I look at the screen upon waking and there is Brendan rowing the boat, looking after me.

Click Here

Saudade: Portuguese Word Describing My Grief

After all these months I finally found the right word, but in Portuguese.

Saudade: (Pronounced: sowdaj) One of the world's most untranslatable terms. The word means: to evoke deep soul-rending sadness, flavored with longing and melancholy.

SadnessPainYearning

When my grief therapist asks me how I'm feeling, there's never precisely ONE word in English to describe it. So I just say, "sadnesspainyearning" really fast 3x's. Luckily she 'gets' me.

None of this matter Toots, What matters is in the heart.

Early Solstice Morning, coming out of a fitful sleep, not quite awake.... I hear Brendan's voice. He says nonchalantly, "We changed each other for the better Toots." I see him, wearing a headband and vaping, contemplative.....looking just like he always did.



I'm thinking about my obligations this morning. The car payment and the extra rent. How will I maintain it for the next four years before I can retire?....And then....Brendan's voice in my head:

"None of this matters Toots, what matters is in the heart"

"Speaking of your loved one can keep their presence with you from far across the boundaries of the point where life meets death. It is a way to honor them, and a way to honor your feelings. It keeps their love alive in you. It extends the meaning of their life into the world in powerful and meaningful ways. It gives them back a voice in a world hell-bent on forgetting.

It’s okay to speak of them, to them, and even for them when there is good that can be done by you because they have lived. What better way to honor a life, than to extend this love to others?" from Rebelle Society

Cocoon: A Short Film About Grief & Loss

Article: Loving My Son, After His Death

Article: Loving My Son, After His Death


By Nora Wong
Dec. 2, 2016

I can feel their unasked questions. People wonder how I can still stand, still walk, still laugh. But they don’t ask. You can’t ask that of a mother who has lost her child. My son, Daniel, died three years ago at the age of 22. When people ask me, “How… are you?,” that pause, that inflection, tells me that’s really what they want to know.

I am tempted to tell them that it is I who am lost, not he. I am lost in my search for him, knowing he is nowhere on this earth. And still, it would not surprise me if he were to appear by my side wearing only his jersey boxers eating a snack at the kitchen counter. At times I can almost smell his warm cheesy breath and his still-boyish sweat. But when I look over my shoulder, he is not there.

My mind invents stories. Daniel is not dead; he is lamenting the performance of his fantasy football team with high school buddies while they wait on line for ice cream at Magic Fountain. He is in his dorm room at Stanford, talking deep into the night with his friends. Daniel is lingering with new friends on the rooftop of his investment firm in Boston where he just started working.

“Where are you, Daniel?” I shout the question to the sky when I am strong enough to bear the silence that follows. “Why did you die?” Even that has no real answer. His doctors think Daniel died of new onset refractory status epilepticus, or Norse, a rare seizure disorder in which healthy people with no history of epilepsy suddenly begin to seize uncontrollably. The majority of patients die or survive with significant brain damage. There is no identified cause or established treatment for Norse. This cloud of uncertainty does not obscure what I know: My child is dead.


The instinct to protect one’s offspring runs through mothers of virtually all species. I violated the basic canon of motherhood. I failed to protect my child. That my child is dead while I still live defies the natural order.

I love my husband and our two surviving children, but I couldn’t simply transfer my love for Daniel to them. It was for him alone. And so, for the longest time after his death, my love for Daniel bruised me.

So unbearable was my occluded heart that I called out to him in desperation one day: “What will I do with my love for you, Daniel?”

My eyes were closed in grief when suddenly I seemed to see him before me, his arms bent and lifted upward in supplication. In my mind’s eye, his face was suffused with love and tinged with exasperation, a common look for Daniel.

“Just love me, Mom,” he says.

“But where are you?” I ask.

“I’m here!” he answers with frustration. And then he is gone.

I had not heard his voice since the day before he suddenly fell ill. I spoke to him while he lay unseeing and unmoving in the hospital bed. I told him I loved him. I begged him to speak to me. I begged him to come back to me. He never answered or moved to squeeze my hand. The only flicker from him over his 79 days of hospitalization was a single tear. One day a tear slid from his left eye down his cheek and disappeared beneath his chin.

And now, months after he had died, I felt him before me.

“Just love me, Mom. I’m here!”

His words unleashed a torrent. I fell forward, my tears streaming. I felt breathless with release. I could continue to love him. I would love him in a new way.

It was harder to do than I expected. I would see him everywhere, in every full moon, in each brilliant day. My spirits would soar. But there were days when a weight in my heart made each breath shallow and every step an effort.

On the worst days I sit before my laptop and pour out my feelings to the only person who can take in my sorrow and remain unbowed. The keyboard is damp when the final refrain leaves my fingertips: I love you, Daniel, I love you. I miss you. I miss you. And then I press “send.”

Daniel’s friends continue to visit us. It is a pilgrimage of sorts. My heart tightens when I see them. Their presence illuminates our immeasurable loss.

His friends reveal to me how much Daniel meant to them. Now there will be a missing groomsman at the wedding and empty air in the place of a steadfast friend. At the end of one visit, a young man asks, “Recognize this sweater?” I don’t. “It’s Daniel’s,” he explains. I suddenly recognize Daniel’s old cotton sweater stretched to fit his friend. The young man folds forward to touch the sleeves of the sweater, hugging himself. He is tall and blond and athletic. He and Daniel were opposites in looks and temperament, best friends since nursery school. He had just returned from Moscow where he was working. “I wear this when I travel,” he says, touching the arm of the sweater again. “It’s so soft.”

I encourage Daniel’s friends to tell me about their work and their plans for the future. At first they are self-conscious, and their voices are tender. They don’t want to hurt me with their future plans when there is no future for Daniel. But as they speak of the things they will do and the places they will go, their excitement breaks free. I smile into the glow of their unlined, earnest faces and I feel my son. I think they feel him too. For a moment we are all reunited.

I will carry this child for the rest of my life. He lives within me, forever a young man of 22. Others will carry him as they move forward in their lives. He will be with them when they look out to the world with compassion, when they act with determination and kindness, when they are brave enough to contemplate all the things in life that remain unknown.

I still search for him, but without desperation. I look for him in others. My search is lifted by his words: “Just love me. I’m here.”

Nora Wong, the executive director of the Norse Institute, is working on a memoir.

I Miss You In Ways I Didn't Know Existed

Dream of Brendan....Sunday, December 16

I had such a sad dream last night. I was able to see Brendan only at a certain time of day at a certain place. I think it was a combination of the Trader Joe's Parking Lost (I meant "lot" but I typed the word lost by mistake?) and the University.  I was able to see him at a distance only.  He was always on foot and wearing his green backpack.  In the dream I had become accustomed to being there to watch him so that I could see him again. I was only allowed to see him from a distance.

But after some time passed, Brendan no longer showed up at that place or time. In the dream I start sobbing and crying out in agony. I fall to the ground. The loss is so great that I can't stop crying.....

The Goal of Grief is NOT closure. In fact, I think closure makes part of us die.

.


#Repost @confessions_of_a_funeral_dir with @get_repost
・・・
You don’t have to walk away from your dead!
—
The idea used to be that a healthy grieving process ended in detachment. Freud called it decathexis, the removal of emotional and mental energy. Some people call it by other names, like:

Moving on
Getting over it
Letting go

And the most popular term: Closure
—
The goal of grief is NOT closure. In fact, I think closure makes part of us die.
—
I don’t think dead and alive are mutually exclusive. I don’t think it’s either dead or alive. For most of us, it’s both. There’s very real ways that the dead are alive and there’s very real ways that the living are dead. It’s a mixed reality that fluctuates through your journey.
—
Moving on from the people we really love — dead or alive — creates an emptiness, a loneliness, a dead space. It can make the living partially dead. So that closure rarely brings health and peace, but added grief and pain . . . emptiness. Because if closure is the goal, you’re asked to not just bury your loved one once, you’re asked to bury them twice.
—
I think if we allow our love to stay, if we keep that love open and alive, there’s a sense that we will never fully lose them. Because even though they’re dead, their love can remain alive in you.

Comments

Green is the Heart Chakra....It's the color of Love

When I Googled "Green Is The Color Of The Heart Chakra"

What I saw in the sky when I was on my way to your house. 

Before I found out about the accident. February 5, 2018

Brendan's Patron Saint: St. Dominic Savio

Not really his patron saint. His mum told me that he wasn't confirmed so I had to find one for him. 
Although, truth be told, I think he directed me to this.....

Grief Quotes........Expressing the way I feel.........

Post from Corey Wells June 24th

Roots In Ireland

Sunrise Dec 7, 2018............You've Been Gone 10 Months Today

There is an ancient Celtic saying: "Heaven & Earth are 3 feet apart, but in the 'thin' places that distance is even shorter."



Sunrise Dec 7th........10 Months You've Been Gone

My Email To Animal Hospital of Soquel

My email to Animal Hospital of Soquel...

Good morning,
I've been receiving messages about appointments for Whiskey, Brendan Leung's kitty. Whiskey is now living with a friend in a different area. Unfortunately her daddy (my sweetheart Brendan), was killed in a tragic car accident 9 months ago. I know how much Brendan appreciated all of the staff and vets that took care of his kitty Jackson who died April 2017 and his kitty Whiskey girl.


I also want to thank you personally for providing such an excellent service to our little family.


Sincerely, Wendy McMullen





Dearest Wendy- words can't begin to describe the sadness we all feel hearing this news. Please, know we are thinking about you all even though some time has passed since the tragic loss of sweet Brendan. Let us know if there is anything we can do for you, your family or for Whiskey.

Thank you so much for sharing your story.

Sincerely,

The Entire Staff at Animal Hospital of Soquel

death is but a bend in the road of life leading to the infinite

Arthur Findlay Gravestone

Cat Meme Brendan

Our Loved Ones in Spirit WANT to be remembered

Grief can be prolonged if it's not shared
Crying is like a rainbow bridge., it lights up two worlds.
Grief is the soul crying so tears are very important.
Allow People time to grieve. Allow them to talk. Don't shut them off.
We have too many people who don't want others to grieve & that's dangerous.
Suppression is not good for anyone.
Love like Life Can Never Die
Our loved ones in spirit WANT to be remembered.

by Mavis Pattilla,  England's Arthur Findlay College

This Reminds Me of You Brendan...and your notorious hugs!

Childhood photo of Brendan's Dad: Al Leung and a Birthday Message

 
December 5th Al Leung's Birthday....

Corinne Posted on Facebook:
"Wow, 75 years. Sitting on Dad's knee in earlier times. Happy Birthday Kiddo." 

Thinking this must be 70 years ago?

Brendan's Great Grandparents. Chinese Ancestors

There's no mistakes....it all happens in perfect order

"There's no mistakes....it all happens in perfect order" Jeff Olsen


"Tell your friend that in his death, a part of you dies and goes with him. Wherever he goes, you also go. He will not be alone." Jiddu Krishnamurti


"The plan is perfect and it is working itself out in it's perfection"

A Skateboard Meme For You.....

Brendan....remembering your Jesus Clock

Just remembering your Jesus Clock honey. 

The Day Will Come When My Body No Longer Exists But.....

Electric Catnip.....

Electric Catnip For You Brendan

I Miss You! And the Boy.......

Response to Post on Modern Loss----The Sound of Grief

I lost my beautiful sweetheart Brendan, 9 months ago as well. It was horrible when I was speaking on the phone to the nurse calling me about Brendan's accident. Then screaming for his friends to pick me up asap and take me to the hospital because I couldn't drive myself . Then the agonizing animalistic scream I let out when the surgeon came in and said Brendan would not survive.

 Two days later another surgeon came in and said he had declared my comatose boyfriend brain dead and therefore pronounced him dead. I tried to hold it together in front of his entire extended family but I couldn't---another howl of excruciating pain. Then my final goodbye before they took his body to harvest his organs for donation. He looked like a beautiful prince on that hospital bed. But the surgeons were waiting outside to harvest his organs. 

Leaving Brendan was the most unbearable thing I've ever gone through. Sobbing I told him, "I will never forget you, I will always love you for the rest of my life."

No one teaches us in school what death is, what grief is. I have a Master's Degree but never knew what this kind of pain felt like! Wasn't prepared for it. Never majored in it......YES, I've let out many animal Howls of sheering pain. I have had no control over it. I don't know if it helps because mine seems like a reflex that I can't control.

My early morning dream Dec 1

I wrote this down as soon as I woke up so I didn't forget because I'm always amazed how quickly I forget dreams shortly after waking up.


I write it in a style that sounds as if I'm talking to Brendan......


In the dream I am trying to drive to where you (Brendan) are as fast as I can. I go down the wrong street and I turn around quickly and I start driving again. I see a thin, tall, short haired woman on a horse, she is wearing a green shirt. For some reason I know that she is from Scandinavia. She thinks I'm going to get somewhere ahead of her and she says in an accent, "He's a very important person. When you get there, can you save me a spot?" And I say yes, even though I know I'm not going to any lecture or whatever it was that 'He' the person who is giving the lecture, was supposed to be..... I'm driving as fast as I can again, trying not to get lost....I'm trying to get to you as fast as I can.


You're not in a hospital. I'm driving to a place that you are being cared for. But I get to the building or it was more like a two story house, and I'm meant to give a speech about a really stupid product along with another person. I'm sitting in the audience and I suddenly think...."What am I doing down here? I came to see Brendan." I race up the stairs....on the way to Brendan I'm hearing a recording of him; he's telling me things on the recording that sound like he was obsessed with someone else or distracted by the memories of someone else." (In the dream, it seems like a memory I'm having about something that happened before the accident---when he was alive)


When I get to the room you (Brendan) are on a bed looking at the ceiling....What I notice in an instant is how completely sober you are (no alcohol effect on your personality) how grounded you are emotionally. You are not wearing your glasses. You see me and in an instant you grab my arm and I lean down and we kiss. You're holding on very firmly to my arm and you say, "Wendy, Wendy, you are the love of my life." You are so sincere as if you had been laying there on the bed a long, long time and thinking about it.

Then you move the blanket on you and I can see that you have an IV bag connected to your left calf. You say, "The nurse says I can leave as soon as I'm finished with the left leg." I'm confused so I respond with, "Then why did you die?"You look at me surprised. The most striking thing is that Brendan is so unaltered by alcohol or anything else. I say, "you don't get out of here, you die."


And he pauses for a minute a little surprised but he's not afraid and he's not sad. It's more like, he had forgotten that he dies...He knows how profoundly sad I am; and he looks at me very calmly and very intently, and the last thing he says is, "But I made you a better person didn't I?"

Beautiful Brendan & Mystical Ocean

 One time you made the comment, 

"I don't know what you see in me." 

And I said, 

"I am you inside". 

I Would Rather Have Known You For A Moment, Regardless Of The Sorrow....

I could only be grateful when I realized that I would rather have known you for a moment than never at all. I would rather endure this inexplicable pain of outliving you than to never have seen your face, spoken your name. I would rather be yours and you be mine regardless. Regardless of the sorrow, the sleepless nights, and the years I will walk this earth, carrying you in my heart.

(Scribbles & Crumbs)

Filmed my birthday weekend in Mendocino County Nov. 9-11, 2018

Another film in Mendocino County distributing your ashes....

Mendocino, Portuguese Beach... featuring a jelly fish

Soooo beautiful seeing your South Shore friends distribute your ashes Thanksgiving...

Elegy by Siegfriend Sassoon

Elegy 

“Your dexterous wit will haunt us long, 
wounding our grief with yesterday, 
your laughter is a broken song; 
and death has found you, 
kind and carefree. 
We may forget those transient things, 
that made your charm and our delight, 
but loyal love has deathless wings, 
that rise and triumph out of the night. 
So, in the days to come, 
your name shall be as music that ascends, 
when honor turns a heart from shame…
O heart of hearts! O friends of friends!” 

Siegfried Sassoon

Grief Lasts As Long As Love Lasts

There Are No Right Words.

On Grief, Loss and Bad News…

An Article About Grief That I Found Valuable (click to access the article)

Friend,
Will you sit with me for awhile
And listen to the song of my despair?

You see, a chunk of my heart has been taken.
It was here with me just yesterday
And now it has returned to me as dust.

I promise, I am not expecting you to
utter perfect phrases of solace,
Instead you may speak silently
and express every word
without uttering a sound.

Science May Be Able To Explain My Connection With Brendan

Could Consciousness All Come Down to the Way Things Vibrate?

I love this article because it gives me a clue as to how Brendan and I were in a perfect synchronicity together especially in the final weeks before he died; how it all came together.  
Things like:

The Resonance Theory of Consciousness

Spontaneous Self Organization

I'm looking forward to reading the book:


"Sync: How Order Emerges from Chaos in the Universe, Nature, and Daily Life,"


And other profound theories like:


"communication through coherence."

&

internal biological oscillators

I've asked that some of my ashes be mixed with yours

I've recently updated my google doc concerning the wishes I have at the end of my life and when I die. I've instructed my children and the rest of my family and close friends that I want some of my ashes mixed with your ashes Brendan. I don't know where they should place us together after that; but I'm leaning towards wanting us scattered together off the cliffs of the Mendocino Botanical Gardens in Ft. Bragg.

I just read the last words that were spoken before the death of several celebrities. At least 4 out of 20 of them spoke about being reunited once again with their partners/spouses.  I can't wait to see you again Brendan. I will wait of course, but it will be so nice to see you again.  I love you and desperately miss you!

When Death Comes....

𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗗𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀


When death comes

like the hungry bear in autumn;

when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse


to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;

when death comes

like the measle-pox;


when death comes

like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,


I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:

what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?


And therefore I look upon everything

as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,

and I look upon time as no more than an idea,

and I consider eternity as another possibility,


and I think of each life as a flower; as common

as a field daily, and as singular,


and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,

tending, as all music does, toward silence,


and each body a lion of courage, and something

precious to the earth.


When it's over, I want to say: all my life

I was a bride married to amazement.

I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.


When it's over, I don't want to wonder

if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,

or full of argument.


I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.


- Mary Oliver -


(New and Selected Poems 1992)

Love is really the only thing we can possess....

.....you will grieve forever....

Brendan's Google Map: Travels & Images with Brendan's Ashes and/or t-shirts, bumper stickers....

Brendan's Google Map

Blink and an Eternity....

"When someone sends me a note to say the one they love died 6 weeks ago, or 6 months, or two years, I always say – it’s both a blink and an eternity, isn’t it? They’ve been gone forever, and they were just right here." Megan Devine