Psychic Mediums

What if the signs we ask for don’t just come once—but keep finding us in ways we can’t ignore?

Psychic Mediums

As I continued to deepen my understanding of the other side, it felt natural that the next step would be connecting with people who were trained and skilled in communicating with it.

I could write an entire chapter about Asha. She has been my psychic medium, spiritual guide, teacher, and mentor for over ten years. She is also the sister of my best friend from college—someone who came into my life in a way that now feels anything but accidental.

But before I share more about Asha, I want to rewind to an earlier experience that opened this door for me in a very different way.

A few years after my mom died, I started watching Long Island Medium featuring Teresa Caputo. I was captivated. Watching people connect with their loved ones—and witnessing the healing that followed—moved me deeply. I would often cry during episodes. At one point, I even submitted multiple requests for a reading. They never called.

But then, three years after my mom passed, Teresa came to Cincinnati.

I bought tickets and brought a friend. We had aisle seats—close enough to feel part of it, but with no real expectation that anything would happen.

At the time, a couple of meaningful things were unfolding in my life.

My daughter Molly had just landed her first professional musical theater role at age twelve in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. She played an Oompa Loompa and one of the school children—a paid role, which felt like such a milestone. The show was performed in a beautiful historic theater downtown, with a billboard proudly displaying Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.

We were thrilled. And I couldn’t help but feel my mom’s presence in it. She had been the one to introduce Molly to theater—taking both of my kids to performances, making it special with dinners and overnights. She planted that seed.

And if I’m being honest… my mom would have been her biggest fan—and probably would’ve taken a little credit for Molly’s success, too. That was part of her charm.

Around that same time, it would have been my mom’s 75th birthday. A few weeks before the show, we gathered with close friends—people who loved her deeply—and released Chinese lanterns in her honor at a nearby park. We wrote messages of love and hope, then watched them rise into the sky.

It was beautiful. Sacred, even.

And then something happened the very next day that I still can’t explain away.

One of my dear friends—who lived about a mile from that park—posted on Facebook that she had found one of the lanterns in her front yard. She had no idea it was ours. I hadn’t told her about what we had done.

She wrote about how beautiful it was… how she could tell from the messages that someone had been honoring a loved one and that she had said a prayer for whoever had released it.

But here’s what stopped me in my tracks.

This friend is a professional singer—musical theater, Broadway. I had asked her to sing at my mother’s funeral, something my mom would have absolutely adored. Musical theater was one of the ways my mom and I connected. One of the first operas I ever saw was Phantom of the Opera, which she took me to for my birthday.

And this same friend—Teresa—had once played on Christine in Phantom of the Opera on Broadway.

Out of all the places that lantern could have landed… it landed in her yard.

That was not a coincidence.

That was my mom.

Saying, thank you.

Thank you for bringing your beautiful voice to my farewell.

It was one of the first moments where I felt her reaching back—intentionally, personally—and reminding me that she was still there.

So, on the drive to Teresa Caputo’s live show, I found myself talking to my mom.

I said, “I know you probably won’t come through—there will be so many spirits trying to connect—but if there’s any way you can give me a little sign… maybe mention the lanterns we released for your birthday, or something about Molly being in Willy Wonka… just something small.”

I didn’t really expect it to happen. But I said it anyway.

When Teresa came on stage, she explained how she lets spirit guide her—often being drawn to people experiencing deep grief or unresolved trauma. She also said something that stuck with me: sometimes messages “piggyback.” Even if she isn’t speaking directly to you, your loved one might still be communicating through someone else’s reading.

Not long after, she came to our side of the room—right near our seats.

She said, “Who here released balloons in honor of a loved one’s birthday?”

My heart started racing.

I raised my hand and said we had released lanterns for my mom’s birthday. A few others spoke up too. But Teresa paused and said, “No… I feel like this is connected to a child. Blue balloons.”

It turned out to be a mother whose four-year-old son had tragically died after being accidentally backed over by his father while playing hide-and-seek.

The message was heartbreaking and beautiful. The boy spoke about his parents fighting, telling his mother it wasn’t anyone’s fault—that it was an accident—and asking them to stop blaming each other.

They had released balloons for him.

Just as we had released lanterns for my mom.

At the very end of the reading, Teresa said, “And your son says, ‘I love you more.’ Do you understand that?”

The mother nodded. It was something they had always said to each other.

And then it hit me.

I remembered my own story—the one I shared in a previous blog—about my mom in the hospital. My last words to her after she died were, “I love you more, Mom… and I win.”

My mom had always been witty.

In that moment, I felt it so clearly—like she was saying, “Actually… I love you more. And now you can’t say it back, so I win! Ha!”

Even now, I can hear her laughing. She had the most wonderfully mischievous laugh—warm, infectious, and full of personality. It was the kind of laugh that made everyone around her smile, and in that moment, I laughed. I cried. I felt her.

And then, as if that wasn’t enough, Teresa moved across the aisle to a three-generation group of women—grandmother, mother, and daughter. She began speaking about their grandfather and mentioned something placed in his jacket pocket at burial.

They laughed and said, “Yes—that’s his ticket to heaven. We do that for everyone.”

Teresa smiled and said, “I love that… a ticket to heaven. Like a golden ticket—like Willy Wonka.”

I about lost it.

There it was again.

My mom had come through—not just once, but multiple times. Referencing the lanterns. Echoing “I love you more.” And now, somehow, weaving in Willy Wonka.

You could call it coincidence.

You could explain it away.

But I don’t experience it that way.

For me, it’s not even belief—it’s a deep, internal knowing. A soul-level recognition.

Whether it’s through a psychic medium, a dream, a hawk, or a perfectly timed message… I feel her.

And each time, it reminds me:

She’s still here.

And maybe… she always will be.

Which is what gave me the courage to take the next step—not just noticing the signs but sitting across from someone who could help me hear them more clearly.

That’s where Asha comes in.