The Angels Were Circling

In 2014, I attended my first angel reading with a dear friend. I remember wanting so badly to receive a sign — some message, some whisper from the other side — but the truth was, I wasn't ready. I was moved by the readings happening around me, touched by the emotion in the room, yet I felt strangely disconnected. I wanted a sign, yes, but I wasn't open enough to receive one.

Two years later, that same gracious friend invited me to her home for another reading, with the same medium. But this time, I was carrying a deeper longing in my heart.

My best friend Lauren had crossed over in 2012, giving birth to her son in the process. Her passing left a hole in me that nothing had ever truly filled. I wanted guidance — desperately. I wanted her to tell me how to keep her memory alive, how to best honor her and her sweet boy.

I sat in that room anxiously waiting for my turn, watching message after message delivered to others. I had to sit in the stillness of waiting far longer than I expected, and the anticipation made every minute feel heavier.

Finally, the medium paused and said, “I have someone coming through with a name similar to Laura Ingalls.”

I knew instantly. That was my Lauren.

Her message was simple but full of the love that always radiated from her. She sent immense love. She wished she could have stayed, but she couldn't. She asked us to keep her little boy connected to her — to keep her memory a soft presence in his life. “Make it easy for him to know me,” she said. “Remind him.”

It filled me. It comforted me. But if I'm honest, I wanted more.

And then something completely unexpected happened. The medium paused again.

“There's another angel here for you,” she said. “A lion — strong, steady, and protective. Her name is Inez Lyons.”

I froze. I had no idea who that was. A lion? An Inez? The name meant nothing to me.

But the message she brought was powerful: “You are anxious about timing. Trust the timing of the universe. Time isn't going to run out. Things happen in divine order. Everything is working perfectly for you.”

It wasn't until later that I learned the truth.

Inez Lyons was my grandmother — my father's mother. A woman I never knew. A woman who suffered what we now understand as postpartum depression. A woman who, in 1946, was placed in an institution when my father was only six years old — and who lived the rest of her life in institutions until her passing in 2001.

I had never spoken her name aloud. I had never even known her story.

Yet she came through as a lion. Strong. Protective. Watching over me long before I ever knew her. She tried to reach me then — years before I was ready to listen.

And here is the part that still gives me chills: Lauren and Inez share the same birthday — seventy years apart. In spiritual numerology, seventy carries a profound meaning: one leading another. Not overshadowing. Not replacing. One guiding, protecting, and ushering the next forward.

I believe with my whole heart that Inez welcomed Lauren on the other side. Two women bound by grief and love and loss. Both lost their sons — one to an era that silenced and institutionalized her, one to a goodbye she never got to say. Both loved deeply. Both had their voices taken by circumstances beyond their control.

And maybe that is exactly why they came through to me — together.

Because I wasn't listening then. But I am listening now.

The seeds of my spiritual awakening were planted long before the dragonflies arrived. The angels had been circling for years — waiting for me to finally open my eyes.

They are reminding me that I come from women who endured the unendurable. Women whose stories were almost lost. Women who refuse to be forgotten.

Remember these two names. Lauren. Inez. They come back into this story — in a golden field at dusk, when I needed them most.