"I didn't believe in mediums. But when one mentioned my fertility, I was converted."

It takes something really special to get me to spend an hour and a half in peak-hour Sydney traffic at 7.30am in the morning, but there I was.

Far from being bright-eyed or bushy-tailed, I was on my way to the Western Sydney home of psychic medium and author, Judy O’Brien, who was going to give me a personal reading.

Considering her two-year waiting list, it was a pretty big deal.

When it comes to the field of psychics, mediums, clairvoyants and the like, I’m curious and open but with a healthy side of cynicism. However, considering Judy’s reputation, I was apprehensive about what she was going to share.

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The minute I arrive at her home, Judy greets me with a hug. I am then ushered into her studio where she presents me with a plate of crystals, and asks me to pick one. I choose the vial with the rose quartz.

Judy starts the session by calling her spirits, angels and Jesus (she’s Christian, she specifies). She closes her eyes and begins to ‘speak to them,’ rubbing her hands to bring in extra energy.

Unlike psychics, Judy’s powers come from her ability to converse with people who have passed – she calls them ‘spirits’. For me, this was my grandfather and grandmother on my mum’s side.

She (accurately) describes my grandfather as a “fatherly figure” with “a very big smile”, and my grandmother as a petite, softly spoken woman with a knitted shawl around her back.

Then things start to get weird. Four minutes into our session, Judy says something that leaves me flawed.

“I also need to say, children will be around you. They’ll be in your life. You’re concerned about that.”

I recalled a conversation I had with a colleague literally the day before where I said that because of my PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome), I sometimes wonder if I’ll have issues falling pregnant.

It seemed like an overly weird coincidence.

There were other bits of our conversation that struck a chord. Relaying a message from my grandmother, she said the following:

“She says, ‘you should put a jacket on’. It’s been windy, so not all dresses are good.” Fair call. Also, the sentiment of ‘wear a jacket’ is something all kids with ethnic grandchildren will be able to relate to.

“She also wants you to buy new shoes. Even the other shoes you wear, [they make] your heels hurt and your calves hurt,” Judy shares.

Another fair call. I regularly complain to friends and colleagues that I need to wear better shoes. The heels and boots I currently have on rotation are giving me blisters and I’ve needed to ask for bandaids on more than one occasion. The coincidence seemed… striking.

“Also, she likes your hair tied up, [because] she says you write ’til 10 at night,” she continued. She was correct. I cover the evening shift for Mamamia, which means I finish work at 10pm on most nights.

Throughout our session, Judy flits between topics, depending on what the spirits tell her. We talk about work, my family, an overseas trip I'm planning on taking (it's true, I've already booked the leave for it) and how she thinks I'll maybe one day move to New York.

"Not now, but one day," she says. We'll have to wait to see if that one pans out.

Speaking about my family, she says someone has a cough (unbeknownst to me at the time, but my brother did), someone had a toothache (my dad) and she mentioned I'd be going to visit soon - something I had been planning on doing.

"It's either tomorrow or this weekend. You're going for dinner but she [my grandmother] says there's a celebration. Or there's good news coming up. So when you're going over there, there's good news she says."

I kind of mentally bookmarked the last bit, but found out that very evening that my brother had successfully got a graduate job he applied for. It's one of the many weirdly accurate takeaways from my chat with Judy.

And finally, the kicker: As our session was coming to an end, Judy asked me if there was anything else I wanted to know. I felt like I needed to fulfil the trope of 'single, millennial woman' seeks the help of a medium for romantic guidance and that's exactly what I did.

But first a bit of context: In the life cycle of a crush, there's the fun bit where you're infatuated, the part where things either work out or not (my situation) and then the annoying emotional hangover that sticks around until you eventually move on (if it doesn't work out). I was still partially stuck in the last phase.

Among other things, she described him physically to a tee, the dynamics of our... thing, before finally saying:

"She's [my grandmother] just saying that to me, 'that's not the one,'" she says.

"Let go of a relationship because you don't need that anymore. It just wasn't the right person, do you understand that, please?

And yes Judy, yes, I do.

As it turns out, if you want to emotionally sever ties with someone you'd rather stop thinking about, a near-stranger relaying messages from your dead grandma will do it.

Bar the other insights Judy shared and the deepened feeling of connection I felt with my grandparents, I truly left her studio feeling lighter and clearer. Any evidence of the cynicism I had felt going into the experience had abated.

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While I went to our reading from a place of curiosity and didn't go because I wanted closure from a loved one that had passed, if I had needed the closure, I would've wanted Judy's generous, warm and empathetic self to be the one to relay my loved one's messages.

For someone who spends a huge bulk of her professional life conversing with the dead, Judy has (understandably so) learnt a few things about life and death.

"When you pass, it's like an anesthetic. It's like when you go to sleep and when you wake up your family is there. It's really peaceful," she says.

"Just know they're always around us but they can't do the work for us.

"I always let people know, there is life after life. We don't die, so that love will never die."

Judy O'Brien is set to release her second book, The Voice of Spirit - The World Through my Eyes in early March. You can follow her on and keep up to date with her events via her Facebook page or visit her website, here.

Have you ever gone to a psychic medium? Tell us in a comment below.