In my shock, I dismissed it. ‘Go away,’ I thought. ‘I don’t want to hear this. It can’t be true.’
I had to work that day but I rang the hospital first thing and they told me Mum was absolutely fine—quite perky, in fact. And then at quarter past eleven I got the dreaded call to say that she had died very suddenly. I was filled with fierce anger. How could someone so good be taken? Having been warned in advance didn’t help at all. In fact, I was angry with the spirits who had warned me and I pushed them all away in my grief.
I should have known that Mum would come back to me in spirit. Of course she would. The following year, when we were staying with my parents-in-law, I woke up in the night with an unbearably sharp pain in my chest, finding it extremely difficult to breathe. I’d never experienced anything like it in my life and was convinced I was dying but there was Mum’s voice in my head, saying softly, ‘Don’t worry. You’ll be OK.’ I was rushed to hospital where they found I’d had a pulmonary embolism—a blood clot in the lungs. The doctors told Mike it would be touch and go whether I made it through the next twenty-four hours.
Meanwhile, my daughter Nicky, who was nine by this time, woke in the night and heard my mother’s voice telling her that she wasn’t to worry, that I’d been taken ill but that all would be well. The next morning when the news was broken over breakfast that I had been rushed to hospital and was very poorly, Nicky piped up: ‘It’s all right. Nana told me she will be fine.’
Of course, I recovered, and when I heard what Nicky had said, I realised that she has the same psychic abilities that I have. She gets visitors too.
Mike and I set up our own catering business that became very successful over the next few years but still I resisted listening to the voices in my head so we made mistakes. In particular, we changed the way our company was managed, even though I knew in my heart of hearts that it wasn’t the right thing to do, and we ended up losing our business, with huge debts to pay off. We had to sell our house, all the antiques and pictures we had collected over the years, and even our youngest daughter Tanya’s horse. It was a difficult time for all the family, and one of the lowest points in my life. It took us a long time to get back on our feet financially and decide what to do next.
A few years later, still searching, we moved in with my mother-in-law in Shaldon, South Devon, where we stayed for several months in a tiny room, cramped in with all our remaining possessions.
I went out for a walk along the cliffs one day, for some reason leaving my dog behind. I was lost in thought, just putting one foot in front of the other, when suddenly I looked down and realised that my toes were protruding right over the edge of the grass. The rocks on the beach were about a hundred feet below and I was more or less suspended over thin air. I’m not the kind of person who would ever consider suicide but I remember thinking, ‘Oh well, I suppose it won’t hurt for long.’
No sooner had I thought that than I felt my elbows being gripped firmly from behind and I was lifted off the ground, through the air and put down again behind a barbed wire fence a couple of yards further back. It was almost like being Mary Poppins. I sat down hard on the grass to get my breath back. What on earth had just happened? Who or what had saved my life?
The barbed wire was there to stop people getting too close to the unstable cliff edge and I’m not sure how I had managed to get on the wrong side of it, because my clothes weren’t ripped at all. I was suddenly aware there was a hand beside me pointing across to the piece of turf I had been standing on. I then noticed that the turf was curved downwards because it was only three or four inches thick and the cliff was eroded away underneath. I should have fallen to my death.
I sat on that grass for a long time thinking about the feeling of those hands that had gripped my elbows and I realised I had been saved by two angels, one on either side. It wasn’t my time to die. There was more I was supposed to do in this life and it was up to me to find it, but to do that I would have to open my mind to the areas I had been trying to ignore for so long. I had to start listening to the messages I received from angels and understanding that most things happen for a reason. It wasn’t just by chance that I met Mike the day he nearly knocked me down—we were meant to be together. It wasn’t by chance that we lost the catering business—I was supposed to do something else with my life.
Shortly after this, I was in a doctor’s reception making an appointment when I heard the receptionist chatting to some nurses about someone who did tarot card readings. I asked who it was and was told there was a lady in Newton Abbot, not far from there.
‘Are you interested?’ a nurse asked.
I surprised myself by answering, ‘Actually, I’m a medium myself.’
I went to see the woman in Newton Abbot and she looked up as I walked in. ‘I’ve been waiting for you for five years,’ she said. ‘I knew you would come. There’s a gold star over your head.’
More and more, the angels were nudging me to work with them but I was still held back by the fear that people would think I was stupid or weird, as they had when I was a child.
‘Trust in us,’ the voices in my head were saying. ‘Have faith.’
The tarot woman told me that I was definitely going to become a professional psychic. I did a reading for her and she must have been impressed with what I told her because she began to recommend me to her friends, and it all took off without any form of advertising at all except word of mouth. It was as natural to me as breathing. Someone came in and sat opposite me, and voices would come into my head. I just had to pass on the words.
It was gratifying work, because I knew I was bringing comfort to a lot of people. When helping clients to get on with their lives after a bereavement, I could show them that the bond of love that had been there on earth was never lost. It felt like a worthwhile thing to be doing. Other people came with financial worries or business decisions to make, or emotional problems in a relationship, or fears for their children, and in all cases I tried to help them through the difficult times they faced.
One day a woman for whom I had done a reading came to me and said, ‘I would love to learn how to do what you do. Would you teach me?’
I told her I didn’t think I had anything to teach, but she thought otherwise. I had no teaching experience but when I considered it further I realised I could probably do it.
I spoke to a few other people and quickly put together a group of six students, which seemed like a good number. I had no idea what I was going to teach, so the night before I sat in my bath and talked to spirit and they gave me the whole format for the course, just like that. The next morning I stood up without any notes, trusting in spirit, and the words came out easily. I think my students were pleased with what they learned because at the end of the day, they all asked if they could come back for more. And then news of my course spread rapidly by word of mouth until I was travelling the world, teaching courses in loads of different countries to groups of ten people each time. It all happened generically without any planning. Someone would phone with an invitation and I’d agree to go and then more work would flow in as a result.
My own troubles weren’t over, though. When my daughter Tanya was seven she was abused by someone in a position of trust and became very disturbed as a result. I tried to pursue this man through the courts but was told it was his word against hers. All he got was a rap on the knuckles. It was a very hard time and I was deeply depressed about it all, yet trying to be calm and comfort my daughter as best I could.
One day I was taking a course in Guildford, Surrey, sixty miles away from where we were living at the time. I was walking up the high street towards the place where the course was due to take place when a little man wearing a dark brown raincoat came up and tapped me on the arm.
‘Your mum wants