Maxie came to me in a vision on Monday, brought on by a hypnotherapist.  Cynthia is someone I saw a couple of years ago when I was being plagued by a bunch of issues surrounding an apartment building that was left to my brother, cousins and I by our grandparents.  The apartment building was a place I lived in for several years in my 20s and my brother also lived in.  Ted and I took over the management for a brief period and I was harassed daily by one of my cousins about it.  The issue kept me up at night and made me sick during the day.  Cynthia helped me get clarity about how to get myself out of the situation.  I like hypnotherapy because you don't have to do a lot of talking to get to the crux of the issue.  You are in a sleep like state and the outside world just goes away for a little bit.  You can see things more clearly and make decisions a little easier.  As I wrote, I had a very powerful experience last week when Maxie came back to me in a dream and I could actually feel his spirit.  So, I went back to Cynthia to help me conjure him up again.  I don't care if it is really his spirit or if it is just a way for me to feel closer to Max. I need to be with him.
I went up up up in the sky and arrived at a beautiful cloud filled space. Cynthia asked me to envision a wise person there - in this vision, the part was played by my grandfather, Jack, a man who loved me unconditionally and to whom I had an extremely close bond (and who I still miss every single day).  Grandpa Jack told me that Maxie was there with him and he went through a cloud-like door and came back with Max in his arms.  Maxie was wearing his little helmet, covered with stickers that Ted lovingly spent hours picking out and arranging perfectly.  He had a little grin on his face and was chewing on his little fists.  I started crying and said "Maxie, I love you so much...why did you leave me?" and he answered "I love you mommy".  I cried, "are you coming back to me?" and he answered, "I love you mommy."  I said, "Don't ever leave me again Maxie!" and he answered, "I won't!  I love you mommy." 
It was strange to me that he was wearing the helmet.  Cynthia suggested that perhaps it was  reminder of how much we cared for him.  How we spent so much time and energy in our love for him.  When Maxie was a newborn, I didn't think much of the fact that his head was a little flat on one side.  He was vacuumed out of me, came through the birth canal...the doctors told me that lots of babies have misshaped heads after birth that end up rounding out on their own.  After 6 weeks, his head didn't seem to be rounding out and he was always looking left, so I asked the pediatrician about it.  Max's pediatrician suggested we go for a consultation at Cranial Technologies for a Doc Band (or helmet).  Indeed, at 3 months old, Max was put in the helmet and after only 6 weeks in it, his whole head was rounded out.  The truth is that he looked SO CUTE in the helmet and he was such a good boy about it.  They told us that the Doc Band actually helps prevent SIDS in that it creates a breathing space for the baby even if he/she were to roll over on their tummies.  Max was too young then to roll on to his tummy anyway and was actually sleeping half of the nights in his swing.  Across the front of Max's helmet, Ted stuck "MAD MAX".  Just like with the tattoo, I worried that the Jews would get mad.  After all, Mel Gibson starred in that movie and he doesn't like us....AT ALL.  Ted, never caring about what people think, assured me that nobody would care.  The funniest thing that happened was when we brought Max to Costa Rica with us while he was in the helmet stage.  A few of the other people on the plane thought it was cute that we put our baby in a helmet to protect him during the flight.  Actually, explaining the helmet to my Costa Rican friends was somewhat futile.  It probably just seemed like another crazy American thing to do.  Regardless, I knew that Max would grow up and thank us for it and even if he didn't, the photos would look awesome enlarged on his bar mitzvah poster for people to sign (do kids still even do that?) I saw another baby in a Doc Band at breakfast the other day and my heart broke.  I miss him so much and I see him everywhere, all of the time, and yet I do not feel him as easily as I would like to. I struggle daily to bring him back, knowing that will never really be possible.