The angel of doom has visited me...

I'm quite a fan of psychics and I tend to love to have my angel cards read. I believe the angels (and yes I do believe in angels very much) can bring you no harm and every reading I have had has been very life affirming and comforting.
Until I had a reading on Friday night, with a local woman who shall remain nameless. I arrived expecting, well, I don't know, some comfort, some reassurance, some promise that I will continue to beat this depression, that my career is going in the right path, that my son - currently bumping through the shitty sevens will not turn into a reprobate. What I got was this... and I'm paraphrasing here - partly for comedy purposes and partly because she talked a whole lot and it would be impossible for me to tell you it all.

Anyway:
Angel lady: *mumble mumble* angels *mumbles about timelines* angels... more about angels.
Me: *confused, wondering if she has started yet*
Angel lady: *turns over card- sucks in breath, turns over another card, sucks in another breath* then  proceeds to tell me that

• My mother is getting ready to "cross over" to the other side. But not to worry because all her loved ones would be there, so sure wasn't that just clas
• Oh my maternal grandmother - yep, she's ready to leap that big divide too - but probably after my mother, or maybe before...
• My paternal grandmother (the one who is actually quite ill) well, she's a goner too - but to put it in perspective (and she said this with a smile) "You'll be surprised who goes first".
• And finally, for her parting shot, a man close to me has cancer. He's not been diagnosed yet. But it's there. So ner, ner de ner. *

I wasn't feeling the angel love to be fair. And while I'm not one to mock anyone's beliefs the fact that she then launched into a whole speech about how Jesus visited her bedroom and, then, my (possibly... we didn't discuss it) heavy periods were directly related to Padre Pio's stigmata and well.... it's fair to say I was disturbed.

But as much as I  could not take this woman seriously, when my mother as rushed to hospital in an ambulance on Sunday, I couldn't help but wonder if scary angel lady knew her stuff.

Thankfully, after surgery, my mother seems to be on the mend but the worry... well, that will take a while to get over.

I'm still convinced scary angel lady was full of toot - and that makes me angry. Because if you don't genuinely have a gift... why speak to people? Why scare people? Why make random statements which lead a person to live in fear?

Letting go

I went for the angel reading yesterday - I'm still mulling it over. Some of it was completely off the wall - some seemed to relate to the relations who had accompanied me and were sauntering about upstairs in the shop.
A lot was spot on, I suppose. Yes, my confidence has taken a battering over the years and I'm certainly not the assertive young woman I once was when I thought the world was at my feet (Yes, I know it still is, but life has a habit of getting in the way...) She pinpointed events (oh how I remember how absolutely dying in love I was with a tall dark haired man only for him to take a fancy to one of my friends.... And how on another occasion I sat one day and just stared into space for hours unable to move, crippled with depression, but how an angel was by my side the whole time...)
She pinpointed that I was crippled with anxiety and that particularly lately things had been tough.
She told me it would be okay.
But she also told me I needed to put more of me into my writing. I'm trying to mull that over. I think I do put a lot of me in my books, and in my columns. Some times I feel as if I lay myself out on line too much and that is why, at times, I feel completely raw as if I have no secrets.
But then again there is so much of me that is just me - that I put on a show, plaster on a smile and become "author Claire" as opposed to boring mammy/ wife Claire who just gets on with things and has some Very Dark Thoughts from time to time.
I 'm just not sure which one of those ladies is real me though. Is it the bubbly, confident one who can make people smile or is it the boring, moping, dour one who makes people switch off. I'm a little bit afraid of both.
But I do remember that day, aged about 19 when I got all glammed up for a night out with friends (including the big crush). He looked at me, genuinely really shocked at how well I scrubbed up and he flirted mercilessly all night. He even stayed over (he slept in the living room, you dirt birds). He made a move and I backed off - always a little scared. That same week he told our mutual friend he was mad about her and "Claire was okay... but he really liked her".
And thus sealed my belief that I always was the consolation prize.
The angel lady gave me some techniques for dealing with negative feelings and they are helping, but having brought things I'd thought I'd long forgotten back to my consciousness, I now have to work through them. I have to make myself believe that I am more than "just ok".