Internet Radio Show
Alzheimer’s As a Way for Healing Families
- Maggie La Tourelle
- Download
- Click "" below to listen
In today’s episode of “Healing From Within”, your host Sheryl Glick author of The Living Spirit ,which shares stories of spiritual awakenings, spiritual communication, healing energies, miracles, and ways to engage your intuition for a more balanced life, welcomes Maggie La Tourelle , author of The Gift of Alzheimer’s, which as Neal Donald Walsch wrote in the foreword “A perfectly wonderful book…that provides us with a window into the deepest aspects of this disease.”
Maggie, who is a psychotherapist, holistic healer, and author of Principles of Kinesiology and has lectured at some of the UK’s leading universities originally trained as an art teacher incorporated her many spiritual gifts and integrated all while accessing a greater awareness of multidimensional life forces. Maggie gives a moving account of her evolving relationship with her mother who has Alzheimer’s and an understanding of the physical emotional and spiritual needs of people dealing with Alzheimer’s.
The events chronicled in Maggie’s book began when Maggie was faced with the prospect of losing her only sister to alcoholism and the approaching death of her aging parents. Only a year after her sister passed Maggie’s mother Pat was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer’s affects more than 5 million people worldwide causing pain not only to its suffers but to their loved ones as well. Maggie discovered a positive aspect of the disease as she realized it offered a gateway to a higher plane and different world. What if those suffering with Alzheimer’s know something we don’t? Maggie discovered after her mom moved into a nursing home that although not always lucid, Pat seemed more aware of the fundamentals of human life than ever before bestowing Zen-like advice to her daughter….”Be in the moment—freedom is important, and patience.”
Alzheimer’s is defined as having 7 stages and is a neurodegenerative disorder causing damage to the brain that results in a plethora of neurological and physical disabilities from forgetfulness, anxiety and an inability to manage complex life tasks in the earlier stages to more advanced symptoms of rigidity, immobility and impaired or lost speech as the disease progresses.
Although this is a personal account of my mother and me as we faced her struggle with Alzheimer’s at the end of her troubled life which included postpartum depression and bi-polar disorder, it is also a multidimensional story spanning both this world and the other World which she traversed seamlessly. It shows that Alzheimer’s is a perfect vehicle for a journey of the soul and it is also a wonderful example of conscious dying. The first part of the book introduces you to the family and events and sets the scene, the places, and the emotions of all involved. The Central Part of the book is The Heart and Soul Journey which is an edited transcript of the journal Maggie kept during the last phase of her life when she had late stage Alzheimer’s. The Final Part of the book—Reflections Revelations and Recommendations attempts to make sense of what happened and explores its implications for people with Alzheimer’s. The final chapter “Closing Thoughts” takes a universal perspective considering how the issues raised by this Heart and Soul Journey might be relevant to our lives now.
Maggie’s mother talked about two worlds. “When Mum says to me that it is difficult working between 2 worlds I think is this a hallucination?, a delusion, or a profound connection to another dimension. Will we stay firmly grounded in this physical life?, or be open to another world and explore it. While Alzheimer’s often strips a person of power reducing them to silence and a state of seeming nothingness it seems Mum might be experiencing a process of evolving into another state of consciousness.”
Her language has changed since an honest exchange about our past difficulties and the reconciliation that followed. It seems we are now on a philosophical and spiritual journey together..Mum says to me I’ll soon be better. I don’t like not being able to move around.” In the physical world, poor Mum is very disabled now and more or less wheelchair bound. As a former dancer and physical education teacher these physical limitations are exceedingly difficult for her. She also tells me I’ve had a big operation and they have taken things out….Could she be referring to the other world and the emotional clearing work she and I are doing??? Mum tells me she has had two women visiting her who come about twice a week. The staff tell me no one has been visiting. She tells me not to worry, when I leave she has relatives who visit and help her… this is a reference to the Other world I believe. I have become aware that Mum is very sensitive to what I am feeling and this is enabling us to be closer… Then Mum says “Don’t cry We are learning we are immortal Margaret. I will be around. I’ll flutter around you.””
Sheryl says, “There is the truth Alzheimer’s and moving closer to the other side has allowed her to know.”
Yes , this is what she is starting to show me on our Heart and Soul Journey: we are immortal. I need time and space to absorb this Maggie expresses to us.
Sheryl Says… “When I was trying to understand spiritual communication and messages received by mediums or highly intuitive sensitive’s….the words time and space kept coming into my thoughts and what I finally realized was, There is no time nor space: everything is happening simultaneously..the past present and future swirl within the energy of all that is that we are all part of.”
During the last 3 years of Maggie’s mother’s life she recorded their conversations. These along with Maggie’s commentary from the heart of her book The Gift of Alzheimer’s and Maggie discovering that in the midst of endless repetition and confusion her mother had moments of insight and great clarity: often sojourned into another world where she gained deep wisdom. Maggie believes that Alzheimer’s being a protracted end of life experience offers us an opportunity to gain insight into what is happening at the end of life. When we are conscious of this transformation or new vision, we can help to support our loved ones and enable them to experience expanded consciousness as they transition to the other world.
Sheryl Says… “As a hospice volunteer for 8 years Reiki Energy Teacher/medium I have journeyed to those higher realms of life and enjoyed the peace love and wisdom of our loved ones in that dimension. In my book the Living Spirit in what one young woman shared you will be in that place also. I wrote, “ One day I visited a young women Marie who was having trouble breathing, She was also deeply embarrassed about having all the people there taking care of her. I held her hands and said, “We are all in this life together, and today we will help you, and tomorrow you will help us…….. I asked her mother Anne if we could sit quietly together for a while…Within a few minutes Marie fell asleep and with my eyes closed I sensed a grandmother in Spirit standing in g golden sun filled grassy area….I mentioned that to Anne and she told me her own mother, now deceased, had a near death experience while in hospice. Upon awakening she told Anne a well dressed man in a wheel chair had invited her on a plane ride to California and had shown her a field of tall grass that swayed in the soft breeze. There was one large red flower in the distance….He told her when she was ready she could live in that beautiful spot….Anne never told anyone that story…Years later when Marie was ready to be married her grandmother appeared to her in a dream and asked Marie to look out the window before she left. Marie saw tall grass swaying in the breeze and a large single red tulip in the distance. The description of the place and the flower were one and the same. For me this was proof that a place of beauty awaits us if we have positive thoughts and display positive actions during the course of our lives. We may manifest the quality of life in the next dimension by our actions in this life.”
When Margaret’s mother got to late stage Alzheimer’s it seemed she found peace and calm. This change from a negative state to a positive state is reported by many in the late stages. It suggests that most of the suffering is in the eyes of the beholder rather than the patient..if we acknowledge our own distress rather than projecting it on our loved ones that may help us engage them in a positive rather than anxious and fearful way. My mother exhibited the usual symptoms of Alzheimer’s, repetition and frequent confusion, but also moments of clarity wisdom reflection and deep insight.
Maggie writes, “I found I was energetically sensitive. I was picking up on things in other people’s feelings that I knew weren’t mine: a phenomenon that healers describe. However being a pragmatic I was also skeptical. There was only one way to find out whether this intuition or my healing ability was correct, so I embarked on a comprehensive healer training program taught by a very gifted and experienced healer and psychic In order to verify my intuition more objectively, I studied kinesiology: a holistic therapy that uses muscle testing to access all aspects of the person, structural, emotional, chemical and energetic, and select the treatments that will bring them back into balance and harmony. My training in healing counseling and kinesiology complete, I began my practice as a holistic health care practitioner and later added integrated psychotherapy to my practice. My training in kinesiology and NLP enables me to notice eyes dominance and interpret what it might mean for the person. When you observe someone usually one eye appears more awake than the other. The “awake” eye is the dominate eye. Although eye domination is more or less consistent it can change temporarily as a result of certain kinds of activity. Sheryl says…I was in an advanced what you might call Ancient Mystery School years ago and there was an exercise we practiced where partners looked into the left eye and remained connected and sometimes there were shifts or insights into a person’s past life experience…We were always asked to check out the left eye as for determining past life interests as that was often the more dominant eye or awakened eye.”
Maggie also mentions many left handed people are slightly dyslexic…I am right handed and slightly dyslexic..maybe it has to do with other neurological connections or soul sensitivities
Albert Einstein proved that when matter such as molecules and atoms are broken down we move beyond the material realm into a realm of energy. Energy vibrates and the speed at which it vibrates is its frequency. One doesn’t have to be a physicist or healer to know the feeling of love is quite different than the feeling of hate. Love generates a faster vibration and higher frequency than feeling fear. When 2 frequencies are brought together the lower one will always rise to meet the higher one. This explains why love will eventually triumph over adversity All religions and spiritual teachings tell us that love is the gateway to heaven or the Other World…energetically the Other World has a faster vibration and higher frequency than our material world. This raises the question of whether everyone with Alzheimer’s when they are in an altered state of consciousness feeling love resonating at this frequency might be able to access the Other World and have positive experiences…Discovering that is Amazing.
Maggie writes, “ Mum tells me my hands are hot…I wasn’t trying to do anything and was unaware I had hot hands just then, though I first discovered this phenomenon when I started working with energy and healing years before. Healers often get hot hands when energy is flowing from the Source. It is important to emphasize that healers don’t actually do anything other than focus their attention on the person, feel the connection, and let energy radiate or flow. Margaret tells the story of the lost roses mother’s day card…..the rose card was my gift to my mother to say thank you for being my mother not for the gift of life but the ultimate gift…. the gift of life everlasting.”
“We are all living in Other worlds. I have no past, present or future. I love my family… A Rush of illumination, lots of light. It’s difficult working between two worlds. I have access to like a first aid box, I can get to it anytime. I can go there and everything is just how I want it. Everything my ideas, thoughts are from…. I’m remembering all the difficult times, all the people…” Sheryl says “I just had a session with a client whose mother is in a care center with dementia and a broken hip She told me her mother was telling her all the stories from the past and seemed to be having what we think of as a “Life Review” that may happen when we die, but she is having it now.. Sheryl says, ‘Years ago a client, a nurse, sent her daughter to me for a Reiki healing session as her daughter was off to college and having some anxiety about it….When I put my hands over her eyes I heard a childhood lullaby and mentioned it to her. She started to cry and told me her grandmother who her mother was caring for had Alzheimer’s and no longer recognized them….she was so sad….I responded that her grandmother’s soul was sending us that song, along with her love for them, and that while her brain and body were altered, her mind or connection to Spirit and her soul were the same loving grandmother she always was. As a healer and medium I truly believe that..”
Margaret La Tourelle author of The Gift of Alzheimer’s has shared her amazing journey with her Mother as their souls and hearts connected while traveling through the last stages of her illness, through time and space, love and the gift of life eternal, to understand the Two World and more that are Universal in nature.
We have discovered in today’s discussion that often illness or challenge may be an opportunity to dig deep within our reservoirs of compassion and love to remember the infinite beings of energy we are, living a dual nature as both physical and soul beings. Positivity patience and deep affection for her mother enabled Maggie La Tourelle to record many of her mother’s newfound understandings of her feelings and ways to express them with hope and love, and a new view perhaps of her eternal soul nature, the Other World or world of spirit that awaited her when her life journey was over.
In conclusion Maggie wrote, “It is our emotions our feelings that give meaning to our lives and this is no different for people with Alzheimer’s. Although their physical body and parts of their brain are deteriorating , their emotions live on. This means people with Alzheimer’s can stay connected to others and to the world through feelings, right to the end of their lives. “
Maggie and Sheryl as health care professionals would have you remember there are many ways to ensure the care of those suffering…and to make them feel safe…be fully present with them and love and respect them while providing opportunities for them to enjoy their day, creativity, and to express their feelings.
