February 7, 2005 forever changed my life.

At 2pm they found the love of my life, Jeff, dead from an overdose. At the time we were both living in halfway houses and trying to get back to what we gave so freely away to that fix. We have a son together who will be 6 next year and Jeff was the only father that my 13 year old son ever knew. Needless to say it has been extremely difficult, not only for me but for my boys.

The "encounters" started this past September, the day before school.

Ryan was going into the 8th grade and Tristan was starting kindergarten. Ryan woke up close to midnight hysterical, pale and crying. I asked him what was wrong and he said he just saw Jeff sitting next to Tristan's bed watching him. He told me that he was wearing an Oakland Raiders shirt (his favorite football team), his Avalanche hat and looked really sad. Had he not looked so terrified I would have thought he was dreaming. The shirt he described was one that his mother had given Ryan the day of the funeral (brand new, never been worn). I keep the shirt in the back of my closet so that Ryan can't wear it until he gets older.

That evening I looked in my closet and found the shirt had been moved and also had been worn. I knew that Ryan had no clue where the shirt was so seeing this I knew that Jeff had indeed been here.

The following day when I woke up our son Tristan was sleeping in bed with me, I asked him why and he said because daddy was sleeping in his. It definitely gave me chills.

More recently, the first week in November, both the boys played their last game of football and that evening Tristan ran out of his room saying daddy was there and Ryan (who was sleeping at the time) was saying out loud "would you please stop moving". I got out of bed and walked towards their room and saw a figure laying next to him and in that split second he was gone.

Since then I have had some people more experienced in this area help me to find out what is going on. Is he trying to tell me something; tell me he's sorry for leaving, that he loves us, that he is okay or is he just letting us know that although he may not be here physically he will always be with us spiritually?.

As I sit here typing this I know in my heart that if I just believed enough that he is just showing my oldest he's around and to let me know he misses us too.

There is a part of me that is still skeptical of all this, but I can't explain the happenings and because of that and the innocence of both my sons, I have to believe he is with us and wishes he had made a different decision that day.