My Friendship with a Psychic Healer
By: Rev. Sheri Heller
Tags: Women, Friendship, Loss, Spiritual, Love

When a mutual friend encouraged me to schedule a reiki session with Nicky I was skeptical, but receptive. Apparently it was during those treatments that spirits came through. So, we set up a time to meet at her home office out on Long Island.

She wasn’t what I envisioned. Perhaps I anticipated an exaggerated mystical persona. A woman reeking of frankincense, cloaked in a black velvet robe, and draped in crystals and Goddess pentacle jewelry. Instead this unassuming salty, down to earth woman greeted me. I felt immediately at ease.

I didn’t quite know what to expect. Would I float off the massage table? Have mystical visions? Turns out it wasn’t quite that startling, but it was pretty close. At first a light warmth emanated from her hands as she scanned my chakras.

“This is nice,” I thought.

Then I heard her frantically scribbling notes. It was all very relaxing and surprisingly benign. What followed blew my mind.

Within the pages of her notebook were recorded snippets of my life history. Along with the memories gleaned from my energy field, Nicky received messages from my late father and paternal grandmother, who evidently were with us in the room. Having never met her before it astounded me how meticulously she understood the traumas I endured in childhood. She felt my pain and identified definitive moments in time seeking attention.

That day left me befuddled. I was disturbed by my father’s appearance and his apparent overtures of repentance. I was moved by Nicky’s recognition of my grief and her handling of the injuries I incurred through years of systemic abuse. Within an hour she knew me better than most.

A few months after our initial meeting I attended Nicky’s wedding in St. Croix. It was there I discovered her playful exuberant nature and her hopes to segue from working in the public sector to developing a private practice. My suggestion that she drop by my midtown office in NYC to consider subletting space, led to our working together. It also afforded us opportunities to discover our commonalities, most notably that we both searched for the light in the darkness.

Our professional collaboration and our friendship deepened my awareness of her harrowing history beset by familial violence, addictive disorders and severe childhood rape trauma. Amid a landscape of destabilizing traumas, the emergence of her supernatural episodes were misconstrued as madness. It was a nun, Sister Josephine, who took her under her wing at sixteen years old, offering her respite and guidance with coming to terms with relentless ‘visions.’ She also taught her reiki.

As I came to appreciate what a loving compassionate and grounded woman Nicky was, I felt secure with referring therapy clients to her for ancillary reiki support. She made it emphatically clear that I was not to give her any historical information about who she would be meeting. I informed clients who were receptive to receiving spiritual guidance that Nicky may reveal information unbeknownst to me. They may even experience a visitation from someone in their life who passed.

Most folks were intrigued and even nonchalant. In the aftermath however, they were astonished by the insights and messages they received. To this day those I still work with periodically mention their experience with her. It was daunting how she could read their suffering and glean insight into specific undisclosed thoughts and memories from their lives, including names of people who ‘showed up’ to offer guidance.

Like myself, those who entered into this unique experience with apprehension and skepticism emerged believers.