Angela McPherson settled into the psychic therapist's couch , hoping to find some direction in her love life.
Little did she know then that the man leading her through the past life regression session would end up being the man of her dreams.
The divorcee had never met therapist Derek McGillivray before, but felt drawn to his warmth and was comfortable in his presence, as if she’d known him for a long time.
Angela closed her eyes and focused on the soft tones of his voice. Soothing music played in the background, helping her relax.
After turning 50, the lovelorn reflexologist felt stuck in a relationship and general life rut.
Always open to spiritual therapies, and trained in wellbeing practices herself, she had booked a past life regression session, hoping to find answers.
Therapist Derek, who had been recommended by a friend, explained to Angela what was going to happen during the next hour.
She says: “Derek has a lovely soft voice and that really adds to it all. It’s all about the vibrations. He really put me at ease.”
Soon she had fallen into trance, and Derek guided her as she travelled back to her many previous past lives across the centuries.
When she reached the 15th century, she discovered she had once been a woman in Dundee called Mharie McCloud.
Angela, who lives in Elgin, Moray, in Scotland, says: “I couldn’t see my face, but knew I was a woman, as I could see my long dress and boots.
“I remember the noise of the marketplace and the smells of rotting food mixed with herbs.
“I felt I was bigger than I am now, taller and bigger-framed.”
Mharie was being forced by her father to marry a man she didn’t love – and there was someone else Mharie wanted.
Angela says: “I have a vivid memory of a strong-built chap lifting a sack and there was just this feeling that I liked him.”
Derek, 56, who is also a medium, recalls: “I asked Angela in the hypnosis who she wanted to marry instead. Her voice changed slightly and she said, ‘Charlie Anderson’.”
Gently probing Angela, Derek asked her what Charlie looked like.
Angela pictured Mharie’s true love – then she opened her eyes, sat bolt upright and pointed straight at Derek. It was, she says, an epiphany – Derek was the man she was destined to wed. She hadn’t immediately been attracted to him when she met him – but now she knew he was the one.
The mum of two says: “I’ll never forget the feeling of warmth in my heart and I got tears in my eyes imagining the man I wanted to marry. In that second I knew it was Derek. It connected to that feeling of knowingness I’d had when I first met him.”
At the time, Derek burst out laughing. But, nearly five years on, he says: “The people in past lives might look slightly different, but their eyes are always the same.”
After the £65 session in February 2018, the pair had a coffee near Derek’s Aberdeen office and Angela was overwhelmed by her feelings. She says: “I had this big smile on my face and Derek had it too.”
She messaged him after the session to say thank you. Derek felt constrained by professional boundaries – but texted back after a pal encouraged him. Two months later, they had their first proper date.
Derek, who has also been married before and has children Jason, 25, Victoria, 23, and Layla, eight, says: “Angela had done some work as a wellbeing therapist in the past, which really interested me. I soon discovered we were so like-minded [and] I was blown away. It’s very rare you find someone so similar.”
In June 2020, Derek proposed by hiding a blue diamond ring and letter under Angela’s pillow.
He says: “The meaning behind the stone really fitted Angela well.
“The stone represents strength, and that was something Angela needed in life.”
Angela, 56, had turned to Derek to sort out her emotional life. She says: “I’ve always been interested in spiritual and psychic things, since I was a little girl. I wanted to have a completeness in life, and I’ve always been interested in past life regression, so I thought it would help.
“To think I met the man of my dreams during a hypnosis session – it’s just unbelievable. He was everything I needed.”
The couple married last April at Elgin City football club. Aptly, they chose as their theme the time-travelling TV series Outlander, in which a combat nurse is thrown back two centuries to 1743.
Angela’s dress was made by an Outlander costume designer, their wedding cake was castle-shaped shortcake, and the party favours for their 85 guests were drams of whisky.
And the curious connections continued. The newlyweds drove to their honeymoon in Penzance, Cornwall, in a car Angela saw in a vision a week earlier.
She says: “I’d been doing affirmations and visualising and I kept seeing myself in a cherry red car with heated seats.
“Derek and I went to this showroom 20 miles away and, sure enough, there was the car! The salesman told me to sit in it and I knew when he said it had heated seats it was the one.”
They pounced on the £12,000 2019 Vauxhall Mokka. Derek adds: “You can’t make this stuff up.”
Angela runs her own spiritual therapy business alongside Derek in Elgin, where she is a complementary therapist and “foot whisperer” using intuition and psychic talents to see “the soul inside the sole”.
The pair’s tea leaf-reading events, at which people share their stories, made the finals of the Eventbrite Most Curious and Colourful Events competition.
Angela says: “I can’t believe I saw Derek in one of my past lives and that now he is my future.
“We both believe very strongly that we were together in that past life and should have married then, but at least we’ve been able to do it now.”
