TW: domestic violence, suicide, death 

The week leading up to the powerful Pisces Full Moon on Friday, September 13th was intense for me, to say the least. 

On Monday of that week, 9/9, I turned 28. A milestone that I truly never imagined myself at, which made it feel quite surreal and significant. Twenty-seven held a lot of transition and change for me. I’ve been in my shit with moving to a new state and starting life over…dragging my feet, kicking & screaming through this time of growth like a child throwing a tantrum. It’s uncomfortable. It hurts. I’ve never related to a mandrake more in my life. But this is where the stuff happens.

Midweek I experienced the first of several rites of passage that allow me to hold titles I know in my heart, but have been afraid to voice aloud. Guided by my beautiful and lovely mentor who holds a grounded yet liminal space for me as I step into these powerful titles.

My relationship with the tarot was rekindled. A tool for healing and potent medicine which has sat under my nose for years. Through some guidance, I finally picked it up & began to really study it. Card after card, the lessons permeate me on every level. There’s always more meaning & another lesson to learn. I feel so grateful for my loved ones who allowed me to practice reading for them & let me share a powerful tool for healing.

Many cards have been resonating with me & showing up to with invitations that I need to hear, but one in particular has been on repeat. When I came to Five of cups, I knew the energy of this card oh so well. A deep loss and grief that we did not give it’s due at the time. They say time heals all wounds, but in order for that to happen we have to allow the tears to fall and the grief to be experienced. 

Hermit Energy.

I love the energy of September with Virgo & The Hermit. Growing up in the Midwest, it signaled a great change in the landscape, my birthday, back to school season, dewy mornings, and time to slow down. When Autumn rears its beautiful head these days, I still think of all that, but I also think about other events that mark this time of year. This time of year feels different than when I was a child. Marked by the death of a close friend and sister, and being in the depths of an abusive relationship. 

When I got the call & learned that B had taken her life, I crumbled. I was with my abusive partner. We were taking a weekend away between travel to two conferences. I was not in a container where I was allowed to sit with my grief & let it be. All I wanted to do was go to Ohio. I was not able to attend her funeral & hug those who loved her most or share memories & stories. I didn’t say goodbye or get the closure that I needed.

Instead I sat in shock while he called her selfish & invalidated my grief. I was told that it was ‘easy to see why she would take her life with a friend like me’. I felt guilt for not being able to prevent it, for moving across the country & not staying in touch enough that I knew how much pain she was in. Guilt for being so wrapped up in my own shit that I didn’t see this coming. My feelings were confirmed through harsh words from someone who was twisting and distorting my sense of self and my reality. During the months when I should have been feeling, processing & healing, I was stuffing everything inside & my emotions were tied up in dealing with the monster I had invited into my life.

From October to February, I struggled until I had to explode my life. The dust had yet to settle, and I did what I do best. I ran. I ran away to seek refuge in all the beautiful & warm things of this world in an attempt to undo the damage I had been through. I still felt that guilt & shame, but they were like visitors I became comfortable with. I tried to move on with my life as one must do.

In retrospect, it’s silly that I expected I could not feel my grief and with enough time it would just disappear. Grief over losing someone I love & grief over allowing an unhealthy relationship to take that away from me. We live in a world that invalidates our emotions & doesn’t have time to stop for death. Nobody asked about it, so I didn’t talk about it.

Past.

I think back to my first brush with death. I must have been about 8 when my mom’s stepmother passed away. It is irrelevant that they did not share blood. Grandma Sheila was the mother that my mother never had. It is not lost on me that my mother could have lived a very different life without Sheila’s influence. She embodied ‘the mother’ with her maternal, caring, & warm, unconditional love. When she died of breast cancer, I felt that loss in the depths of my being. I cried harder than I had ever cried. Certain experiences in my childhood left me at a loss, I was numb or I didn’t know what I was supposed to feel. This was not one of those. It was sadness & grief. I struggled with understanding how someone could be among the living in one moment, and the next be here, nowhere, & everywhere all at once. I remember driving from the viewing to the cemetery where her physical form would be laid to rest. I couldn’t stop crying. I was processing my first experience with death & it hurt like hell. I’m an empath & now I understand that, but I was overwhelmed by emotions that weren’t all mine. It was a lot & it needed to come out. It fell out of me in the form of hot tears with no end in sight. I wailed & hollered. My older brother (rightly so) asked me to ‘shut up’. I understood this as my grief & emotion being too much, too loud, & taking up too much space, but that moment does not need to continue to define my emotions & healing process. 

When it came time to grieve the loss of my friend and sister, I felt unworthy of grieving her. I had not been a good enough friend. I was codependent in my romantic relationships and our friendship had always come second. I never allowed us to have the 1:1 time our friendship deserved. I was not a perfect friend. Does that make me unworthy of grieving a loss? Absolutely not. 

Nearly 3 years later, the universe has been nudging me and 5 of cups has popped up over & over with its invitation to give ourselves the space to grief what we didn’t give its due at the time. As I work toward cyclical living, I knew that it was time to honor B, to give myself the closure I never received, & to allow her to move into a different role in my life. One where I can allow her move on & serve as a guide that I can call on in times of need, rather than clinging tightly to her memory, resisting the fact that she’s no longer in the physical, & not allowing either of us to find closure. 

Timing.

The energy of the full moon is potent. A time to reflect on the intentions, manifestations, & goals we set with the previous new moon, to recharge esoteric and divinatory tools in the milky light, to release what no longer serves us, & be mindful of the powerful energies we are operating in. Pisces is watery & full of emotion, so the tears get flowing. Rituals of release should be done once the moon has reached its peak and started to wane (the energy of the moon is releasing, so we follow suit). The full moon was on Friday, September 13th so I waited until the evening of the 14th. Fortunately there were also clearer skies that night in Alaska, so I could actually see the moon. 

I journaled all day about B. I reread emails she sent me in 2009 when I was living abroad. I cried & laughed as I could hear her saying all the funny things she wrote. I allowed myself the time to bask in her memory, to look at pictures, & to remember our time together. 

I had signed up for a Full Moon Ritual with the lovely Jena Talmadge, @themountainwitch & I’m still not sure I have words for how beautiful & timely the space she held for us was. When calling on spirit guides, I invited my girl Hecate to join & I also asked B to come. I haven’t seen her so vividly since she left her body. We were able to exchange a hug & it was clear to me that she is most definitely on my team. Jena pulled cards for a group reading & there were two that really stood out for me. They are from the Postcards From The Liminal Space deck by Bakara Wintner & they were ‘Just Passing Through’ & ‘Forgiven’. 

So what?? About a month or so ago, I got a luna moth tattooed on my sternum with the phases of the moon surrounding it. The luna moth has always been a favorite of mine, but it kept coming into my dreamscape & daydreams. I get tattoos to marks milestones in my life & I just knew it was time for this one. B is my luna moth & embodies ‘Just Passing Through’ for me. She taught me many valuable lessons, but she wasn’t going to be here forever. She came into my life for a reason & although I wish we could have parted ways differently, I’m finding peace with what is.

After my first reading with Jena months back, I sat in meditation asking Archangel Raphael what I needed to focus on in order to move forward with my healing, I heard the word ‘Forgiveness’ so clear. I had assumed that this was in regards to something else & it likely still applies to that, but I have also carried a tremendous amount of guilt around my relationship with B & a good bit of anger at her for leaving the way she did.  

The cards are illustrated as such & you can read more about the story & illustrations behind them if you’d like: 

Image via Everyday Magic (read more on the meaning here)

Image via Everyday Magic (read more on the meaning of this card here)

I had planned on doing this ritual after our Full Moon Reading, but this was all the confirmation I needed that it was indeed the right time. 

Ritual.

I went out onto the porch & sat as the sun sank on the horizon.

I brought a smudge stick I made from Artemisia Tridentata (sagebrush) from Wasco County, Oregon. The place where I learned of B’s passing & a landscape that held me & my grief in a way that nobody in my life did. Sagebrush is fragrant and abundant during early October. B wore flower crowns often. I made one from sagebrush when I got the news.

I lit my candle, cast my circle & called on my guides.

I lit the smudge stick and I spoke to B as if she was right there. Sharing the things I needed to in order for forgiveness to happen.

I sat until the sky turned dark & the waning full moon rose into the sky.

It was the goodbye, ritual, & closure that I have so desperately needed during these years in order to process & grieve this loss.  

I kept the ritual itself very simple & relied on my intuition to guide the tools needed.