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One night, I was sleeping peacefully on the couch in the living room. I suddenly woke up, turned on to my left side, and found myself staring at a shimmering angel. This image was different from the way I usually saw angels. This angel was very large, possibly around seven feet tall. She was dressed in a long, flowing gown with huge wings protruding from her back and appearing above her shoulders. I don’t know if it was the darkness of the room, the bit of moonlight coming in through the window, or the glow of the television, but the angel beamed with a muted, beige light. A halo of energy wrapped around her dark hair. She was holding a large, round tablet in her smooth right hand. I stared at the angel in complete awe as she stood in front of me. Then she calmly informed me, “Your mother is on the death list.”

I looked at the angel for a moment, stunned by what I had just heard. I asked what she meant with a nervous laugh and a shake of my head. I tried to convince myself that this wasn’t real, and yet I felt compelled to pay attention to her message. The angel stated again, “Your mother has been placed on the death list.”

“No, no, that’s not right,” I whispered as I started to cry. I begged the angel to please take my mother off the list. I tried to negotiate for my momma’s life. I tried to bargain that if Mom and I could just have a few more years together, I would let her go then, but the angel refused. “It’s too late,” she whispered to me. “It’s already done.” Then slowly she began to dissolve into the air around me.

I found myself suddenly staring into nothingness until I felt completely alone. I popped fully awake then. I was lying on the couch in the living room. The television was still on just as it had been when I laid down to sleep about three hours ago. It was almost three in the morning now. Everything looked the same as it had been when I had fallen asleep, except now I was shaking and crying. My heart was beating so quickly in my chest, I felt as if I had just run a marathon on steroids.

I got up from the couch and stumbled to Mom’s room in the back of our two-bedroom apartment, where we had moved about three months before. I stood in the doorway and looked in at her slender frame stretched out on the bed. She was so small I felt as if I was gazing in on a napping child. Watching my mother sleep peacefully I knew she was safe here, but I still could not erase the message that I had received just a few minutes before. I stumbled back to the living room couch and sat down heavily. My mother…on some death list? Why would I even imagine something like that? Feelings of shame and guilt washed over me as though, by experiencing such a strange vision, I had done something horribly wrong. I thought back to the images I would see as a child. Yes, they would come true, but I didn’t rejoice in them. Some of the visions could upset and terrify me sometimes, and I was experiencing that anxiety again. What could possibly have been on my mind as I had drifted off to sleep that night?

Five weeks later, my mother died from complications of colon cancer.

At the time of this dream, we hadn’t even known that my mother was sick. She was diagnosed at the beginning of February and was gone by mid-March. I’m thinking about this now because today, March 16, 2026, is the 16^th anniversary of Mom’s passing. I think about her now and wish I could call her to talk about life and the universe. We understood each other so well and always felt like we never had anyone else to talk to probably because we both are autistic and have other mental health conditions.

Mother and daughter relationships can be tumultuous at times. Our relationship certainly was and you may read about those times in this blog. But I’m so grateful now, especially on this day, the anniversary of her passing, to know that my mother and I truly made amends by the time she crossed over. I was living in Southern California and my mother moved from Kansas to live with me for the last 9 months of her life. I am so grateful that we had those 9 months to grow and to truly understand ourselves and each other. We had been given time to put to rest old resentments and disappointments and anger. How can I be angry with my mother when we share the gift and burden of autism and mental health struggles? We had nine months to love and support each other. That was a gift from the universe.

I’m writing this blog about my autistic journey and all the things my mother and I did right and all the things we had done so wrong in order to understand the full extent of the lessons we had received in this lifetime. And hopefully I will have time to accomplish this before my own passing. If this blog helps other people struggling with these conditions than I will know that my mother and I had fulfilled our life purposes.

Happy heavenly anniversary, Momma! Love you