Life can never prepare you for something like losing a child, but when it happens, just know that you’ll have the tools. And if you don’t, you’ll find the tools that you need to get through it.
I am one of those people that does believe everything happens for a reason, and although something as tragic as a child’s death can be unbelievably unbearable and extremely hard to face with grace, we managed to do just that and turn our lives around. Let’s just say a whole new perspective of life was thrown onto us in a big way. This was our chance at life, how we want to live it, what we give to it, and if she couldn’t be here to live it, how could we live it in honour and for her to the best of our ability. It was like I saw again through fresh new eyes, and so began the birth of ‘Hanako Therapies’ and a whole new career.
I had a very successful dance career, travelling the world, getting to work with incredible choreographers and people that I had admired and inspired me to follow my dream. As a child all I ever wanted to do was to be a dancer. I worked hard and went to perform in dream shows such “Steel City”, “Tap Dogs”, and being a penguin in the motion capture film “Happy Feet 2”. I had the absolute time of my life.
It was while I was pregnant with Sierra (our stillborn) however that I began my search to branch out and look at Natural Healing therapies to study. I had had a few injuries during my dance years and also a few ailments that never really shifted until I began getting acupuncture and having energetic healing sessions. I was fascinated by the mind body connection and now I had time to pursue it being pregnant. I received the module in the mail for ‘energetic and spiritual healing’, but wondered how I could take on a 2yr Diploma when we had a new baby on the way.
Just a few months later our little Angel Sierra was born, just 2 days off her due date she was stillborn. Nothing could prepare us for this, it was like our whole world had been tipped upside down and we were left to rebuild. And left to rebuild we were, but this time we had our own little guiding light to lead the way. She was such a push for me to go and do the Diploma, and when I look back on her pregnancy and birth, the whole experience was very ethereal, nothing like my other 2 pregnancy’s. This was her path and I believe our contract with each other to lead me down another path that would tap into my other gift, that is of Healing. I then went on to complete the Diploma in ‘Energetic Healing’, an absolute incredible experience. I wasn’t sure how it would all pan out but I just knew that this was where I was meant to be in this moment and I knew I wanted to be able to help others.
We then wanted to tick something else off our list that we’d been wanting to do for a many years and that was to move to the USA for a year of adventure. So that’s what we did and this is how Hanako was born.
Using my Energetic Healing skills and learning Aromatherapy and Kundalini Yoga Teacher training while in the USA, I began infusing them all together and I began blending oils for energetic purposes and intentions.
After creating 34 products for my own personal healing use, it was my husband that said, ‘you need to share this’ and so we began the journey of bringing “Hanako” alive. She brought out such a strength in us both (my husband and i)that both of us never knew we had. Life is short, have no regrets, I know it is the cliché saying ‘life begins at the end of your comfort zone’ but for us this rings totally true. We had lost one of the most precious things in life, and from this point forward we saw things like,we’ve hit the worst and been at rock bottom so really what have we got to lose . Hanako would never had come about if we had not of been gifted with this precious little soul. She has been an absolute Gift and each day is a reminder to work at being the best possible people we can be.
I loved performing but there was a part of me that knew there was something more I needed to do and needed to give. My advice to anyone that is looking at changing careers is that it doesn’t have to be an overnight switch. Start taking courses or doing things that makes you come alive inside. You’ll know what they are because your heart will sing, you’ll feel joyous and at peace. Follow these little messages from the heart and all will fall into place.
Explore and have fun. Life is meant to be lived, enjoyed and made colourful.
Picture by Julie Healy
