Life-threatening events can certainly cause the magic of life to disappear. Does it really disappear? No, but it can certainly feel like it is gone.

Life presented an urgent unexpected event last month. It was a beautiful sunny Saturday in Colorado when I made my regular morning call to my Mom in Illinois. We talk several times each week, but this morning she was feeling dizzy. I told her to drink her water, make sure she was not skipping meals and see how she feels in the next couple days.

She called a few hours later. The caretaker in her independent living community checked her blood pressure. Her blood pressure was 226/167. My 90 year old mother is someone who is vital and active. She has never had high blood pressure. Her dizziness had increased since we talked that morning. The scariest symptom was the lagging garbled speech when I was talking to her.

My first reaction was total panic. I started thinking about the scariest diagnoses. It was critical that I pull myself together to make the 911 call. The next call I made was to Mom’s youngest sister there in Illinois. She was going to meet Mom at the hospital. Anxiety and panic were running the show with my thoughts shuffling through files and files of choices. That is when the first magical moment happened.

I took a deep breath while saying “Mom is being watched over and is surrounded with loving caring people. No matter what the result is all is well.” I instantly felt the anxiety and panic melt away. The remainder of the day was waiting for test results. All tests came back negative (blood work, CT, MRI, etc.). The negative tests felt magical all by themselves.

The magic continued with my next conversation with Mom. We talked about life and death. She said while in the ER she was not afraid of dying. Those are powerful words to hear as her daughter. We have built an amazing mother-daughter relationship throughout the years. We honor and respect each other with a beautiful loving connection. I told her that she could pick a better time of year to make her big transition. We both laughed. The snowy winter weather has been unforgiving between Colorado and Illinois.

I also shared with Mom that no matter what happened next I was ready. I have observed people scrambling when a loved one is about to die. Perhaps they want to make up for lost time? Mom and I talked further about not having any regrets. We talked about many memories of our travels and laughed at many of our stories. We both felt the blessings of having each other. We also talked about future plans.

For me to say that my magic disappeared would not be a true statement. Magic showed up everywhere in a few short days and continues beyond the urgent moment. I talked to Mom last night and she sounded better than ever. Magic lives in all circumstances and events. My biggest gift to myself is to allow the magic to flow no matter what!