My Why

A Dedication

This page is held in loving memory of my daughter Brandi, whose death — fast and fierce, on February 3, 2025 — made the calling undeniable. She was 52 years old. She was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer at Christmas, and six weeks later, she was gone. We didn't have time to catch our breath.

In the midst of that loss, everything became clear. We had walked the threshold of death together several times before — what we came to understand as "Death Walking." In that shared knowing, we recognized the path when it opened before us one final time.

On one of our last "walks" together, she said quietly,

Mom, you’re ready to do this work…

This work is not just a calling — it is a devotion. To presence. To listening. To honoring the sacred threshold between life and death.

Walking With Death

The hospital bathroom was harsh with light—too bright for something so tender. Machines kept their steady rhythm, marking time we both knew was no longer ours to measure. The air felt cold, clinical—so unlike the moment about to unfold.

When my sisters said they were coming, Brandi decided she wanted to take a shower. There was a determination in that choice, so like her—still managing, still tending to others, even now. We prepared the small walk-in shower together. I helped her undress, steadying her as she sat beneath the spray.

She was naked. I stood there, fully clothed except for my socks, looking at her, then at myself, and thinking—this will not work. There was no separation for what this moment required. So I undressed, too.

And then we began.

The water ran over her, over us, and the world outside fell away. Time shifted—slowed, softened. It felt as if we were the only two beings in that space.

I bathed her, and—true to who she had always been—she guided me. Even here, she was herself. My hands trembled as I washed her body, humbled by the sacredness of it.

And what I felt was something I recognized: the same knowing as when she was first placed on my chest after her birth. Skin to skin. Not erotic, but elemental. A bond beyond language—touch, warmth, presence.

Memories surfaced. Birthing her. Bathing her as a baby. Holding her as life began. And here we were again—washing, anointing—now at the threshold of her leaving.

The water felt like a blessing. The water and the bathing felt ancient, creating a sacred space for what was unfolding.

Somewhere in that exchange, I realized this would be her final bathing. And with that came something unexpected—not panic, but peace.

As I washed her, something settled in me. Not of love—but of something lived and shared in this physical world. I knew, with a clarity that needed no explanation, that what we had come here to be for one another had been enough.

In that moment, our story had come full circle.

That knowing carried me through the days that followed, through her transition. It carries me still.

As a Death Walker, I recognized what was happening—the subtle shift, the quiet readiness in her. We shared that awareness, a connection shaped not only by love, but by this understanding of the threshold she was approaching.

I was aware others around her were not ready—unknowingly attempting to process their own unfinished moments.

I understood they needed more time.

A mother and her child. At the beginning, and at the end. Water, touch, presence—no separation.

In leaving, she taught me, what I had spent a lifetime preparing to understand.

— Musa