Today we’d like to introduce you to Camille Dan.

Hi Camille, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.

I am, first and foremost, a mother of three sons and a daughter. My eldest son, Aaron, passed away in September of 2019. My next oldest son is the husband and father of my adorable granddaughter. His younger brother is a computer graphics artist and video game designer. My daughter is an author and editor, and the mother of my wonderful grandson. At 66 years old, I’ve seen a lot of life. After the death of my son, I have been on the unwanted journey of grief that led me to sharing my story and honoring the memory of my son in many ways.

After graduating University in 1982, I chose to be a Critical Care Registered Nurse. My education in nursing became an invaluable foundation for everything that would come as I went forward in life, especially being a mother. Critical Care was my passion before my first child was born. Motherhood became my primary passion and my first priority. I have missed my career at times, but I have never regretted putting my children’s interests first. My nursing career made me a better mother and the person I am today.

Nursing is a demanding career full of rewards. Disappointments are inevitable, especially in critical care. Every life saved is a blessing. Every life lost is heartbreaking. I worked in ICUs, ERs, CCUs, and on the Hospital Crash Team – the staff who respond to the “Code Blues”. Every shift was high energy and exciting. Not unlike the medical dramas you watch on TV. The teamwork and comradery required for this career, plus the rewards received from helping improve people’s health and lives, are worth every ounce of energy invested.

That brings me to my next occupation as a Medical Technical Consultant for Feature Films and Television. With young children at home, all my energy went towards raising them. I missed my hospital days, but not more than I missed my kids when I was at the hospital. So, I took leave from my nursing career. The medical technical consultant job kind of fell in my lap from the sky. I got to use my nursing skills at a much more manageable pace on the set. Plus, I had a chance to be creative. I worked in nearly every aspect of production, from the movie stars to the film directors, writers, set directors, costume and wardrobe, CGI creators, and editors.

After 18 years, my marriage ended in divorce. I became a single mom of four. My ex-husband had managed every bit of our finances, so I had to learn how to do it all myself with four young children at the same time. I set out to learn about financial management, investment, and balancing a budget while juggling kids with a variety of special learning needs, their school schedules, carpools, and activities. It took a few years, and a lot of studying, before I formed my own company. In time, I became a successful Private Investment Manager.

Everything seemed to be going well until September 22, 2019. My son suddenly passed away in a tragic accident. He fell from a height. There was fentanyl involved, but he died from the fall. That’s all I know to this date. It happened just as Covid entered the picture. The investigation was delayed, and is still ongoing. Since that terrible day, I have been forced to learn about thing I never imagined. I had no idea how many young lives have been taken by fentanyl and counterfeit fentanyl. The trafficking and mortality rates are shocking. It’s like another pandemic behind the Covid pandemic, but it’s taking more lives and devastating more families.

My son was 31 years old. My eldest child. Life seemed to stop for me the moment I was given the news no parent wants or expects. After about six months, the shock of losing him began to subside and the reality began to set in. I was lost in a dense fog of grief, trying to figure out who I was and how I was going to be supportive of his siblings. I learned that grief is a journey of discovering who you will be with a huge part of yourself missing. A journey you get through by taking steps forward and backwards on a twist-and-turn emotional road full of obstacles, on-coming traffic, stormy weather, sudden stops, U-turns, and everything in between that you shouldn’t try to avoid. The journey can be smoother when you find the right support to follow their lead. It takes allowing yourself to feel all the feelings.

I was fortunate to have supportive friends who gave me books to help me in my early grief. Some friends recommended podcasts on grief and healing. Others invited me to grief support groups. Each means of support helped me to take steps forward. I read “Resilient Grieving” by Lucy Hone, “It’s OK That You’re Not OK” by Megan Devine. I listened to podcasts like “We Don’t Die Radio” hosted by Sandra Champlain, “The Next Room” hosted by Jane Asher Reaney, and ‘Path 11 Podcast’ hosted by April Hannah. This led me to find online support groups like Helping Parents Heal. Along the way I found my community.

Little did I expect that I would hear from my son across the veil. I was a science-minded skeptic my whole life. One day on a road trip up north a few weeks after my son’s passing, I was marveling at the array of fall colors along the roadside. Suddenly, I was hit with the realization that my son would never see beautiful sights like this. Just as suddenly, he said to me in his voice, as if he was another passenger in the car, “I do see it, Mom. I see the colors. Not like you see them; I see the energy that the trees are emitting. I can’t explain the colors to you.” I thought I was hallucinating from my deep grief, so I didn’t tell anyone that I just heard my dead son speaking to me. From that day on, Aaron has spoken to me, sent me signs of his presence, given me messages about his afterlife and how the universe works, and he even showed up in images in a research laboratory in Brazil where Sonia Rinaldi conducts scientific experiments in afterlife communication and photographic images. I first saw Aaron’s spirit image in the documentary on her work called, “Rinaldi: Instrumental Transcommunication to the Other Side”. Aaron’s image appeared about half way through as one of the hundreds of unknown images of persons in spirit that she has collected. I nearly fell out of my chair. Sonia keeps a Catalog of Unknowns. I contacted her, and she found over one hundred “trans-images” of Aaron. In some of his images, he moves, smiles, and blinks. He appears with my deceased parents in a few. How would a person in Brazil even know that these people knew each other? Needless to say, I let go of my skepticism after all this evidence.

I was keeping a journal of my grief experience, and Aaron’s signs and messages were filling it. I decided to turn my journal into a book hoping it might help someone who is going through grief. I learned how to self-publish on Amazon KDP and released “Aaron’s Energy: An Unexpected Journey Through Grief and the Afterlife With My Brilliant Son”, in February 2021, and the second edition of “Aaron’s Energy” in April 2021. To my surprise, it became an Amazon International Bestseller. All earnings from sales of my books, “Aaron’s Energy”, “Gathering at the Doorway”, and my upcoming book (tba) are donated to charities listed on my website www.aaronsenergy.com

I met so many people who have read my books, and who had a story of their own to share. That gave me the idea to publish an anthology of some of the stories I heard. So, I curated and published, “Gathering at the Doorway: An Anthology of Signs, Visits, and Messages from the Afterlife”. It’s a collection of personal accounts, scientific research findings, and photographic evidence of encounters across the veil from over 40 authors of a variety of backgrounds all over the world.

From there, I was invited to contribute chapters to “Chicken Soup for the Soul: Grieving, Loss, and Healing” by Amy Newmark, and “The Beauty of a Grieving Mother” by Elly Sheykhet, and to write a foreword for “Looking for Joseph in the Night Sky” by Benita Glickman.

Books became one of my greatest sources of comfort and information on grief and healing, spirituality, metaphysics, afterlife, mediumship, NDEs, reincarnation, meditation, ancient wisdom, sacred geometry, numerology, and more subjects of this genre. There are so many great books available, I started a book club for sharing. The Book Club Across the Veil has grown to over 3,000 followers on Facebook Groups and Instagram. It’s a supportive group for authors and readers to freely share and promote books and resources.

Through all my work, I have met so many interesting, courageous, and loving people. I have appeared on many podcasts, radio, YouTube shows, and at live events. My website is where I share Books of the Month for the book club, resources for grief and healing, plus an extensive list of hundreds of 4- and 5-star books of recommended reading.

Everything I do to honor the memory of my son, Aaron, is at no charge.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?

I don’t think that I have ever met anyone whose life has been a totally smooth road. Life is about meeting various challenges and learning how to overcome them. The biggest challenge I never thought I would have to face has been grieving the loss of my son. No parent expects to outlive their child. Nothing prepares you for it. It doesn’t matter what the cause of death was, it’s out of the natural order to lose your child. With my son went all of my hopes and dreams for him, plus a huge part of my heart and soul. All I have now are memories. I felt empty and lost for a number of years. I felt guilty that I hadn’t done more to prevent it. I felt like a failure as a parent, my most important role in life. It has taken a long time and a lot of effort to come through my grief. Therapy, group support, community support, reading, medication, meditation, mediumship, friends, and family have all been part of my healing. I know that I will never move on from my loss, but I’m moving forward with the knowledge that grief is a reflection of love, and love never ends.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?

Of all my careers, I’m most proud of being an author. I think what sets me apart is that everything I do as an author is in honor of the memory of my son, that I do it all for free, and that all of the earnings of the books I have written go to charity.

It was all so unexpected. I didn’t expect to lose my son, of course. But, I didn’t expect to write a book either. I’ve written three books that have helped people through their grief. As a former skeptic, I didn’t expect that my son across the veil would guide me to a spiritual awakening with his signs, visits, and messages. I didn’t expect to start a book club, especially one that focuses on grief, healing, spirituality, and metaphysics. I would rather give it all up to have my son back. But, that isn’t going to happen. Instead, I have learned to live knowing that he’s always with me, and I can communicate with him in spirit, I just can’t see him.

If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?

Growing up, I was the eldest of four children. Shy but responsible. Back in the 1950s and 60s, children were to be seen and not heard. I had chores around the house from an early age, and I had to help look after my younger siblings. My father was in the US Air Force, so we moved a lot when he was restationed. I went to nine different schools in different places around the world. That made me adaptable and world-wise. It was hard to keep in touch with friends after we moved away. We didn’t have internet back in those days. So, I had pen pals. When my father retired, we settled in Canada where he and my mother were born. I began to make friendships that lasted. I liked The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and The Osmond Brothers. I listened to their music on my transistor radio. I was a tomboy who also liked my Barbie dolls. My mother opened a business in the city we lived in when I was fifteen. She was the most intelligent and capable person I knew, classy and dignified. I worked at my mother’s store through my teens after school and on weekends. It helped me to overcome my severe shyness. I joined the cheerleading squad at my high school, and I loved it. I was fairly athletic and loved sports. I still struggled with social anxiety, but I was improving, and I had a crush on the captain of the football team. With all my family responsibilities, I began to struggle in school. There was little time to do homework. In university, I found myself in studying nursing and everything came together. I was interested in all aspects of nursing, especially the sciences. I graduated with a BScN and a BPsych.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.aaronsenergy.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bookclubacrosstheveil
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/bookclubacrosstheveil