He survived a septicemia and left the new era: the testimony of Arianna Valezo conversion

For years, Arianna Valezo sought to fill an inner vacuum with parties, trips and even “therapies” of the new era. However, nothing managed to heal the wound in his heart. Everything changed at 33, when after complications in childbirth, she suffered septicemia that led her to the edge of death. In the midst of an induced coma, he says he had a vision that transformed his life and took her back to the Catholic faith.

“In those two days that I was in an induced coma was that our Lord gave me a vision and then asked me to share it with the world for his glory. I felt that I came out of my body; I no longer had a physical body, it was like a spirit, and I began to descend to a totally dark place,” recalls Arianna, 42, in an interview with Aci Press

From a Catholic childhood to rebellion

Arianna was born in Ecuador, within a Catholic family, but has resided all her life in Peru. He graduated in Psychology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru (PUCP) and specialized in cognitive-behavioral therapy and in rational-emotional therapy, with a particular approach to adolescents and adults. He has worked many years in human resources areas.

“My parents are Catholics, very believers. In my house I always prayed, we were going to Mass, the rosary prayed,” he recalled.

During his adolescence, Arianna was attracted to the adventure. Little by little, his choices were taking a more liberal course and his distancing from God became more evident. “I was very restless, I wanted to explore everything. I started going to parties, to try different things.”

Later he sought answers in various practices of the new era, a type of spirituality that mixes esoteric, oriental and pseudoscientific beliefs. “I tried to get into yoga, reiki, regressions, ayahuasca … but the void became bigger,” he lamented.

After two sessions of Ayahuasca, he says he began experiencing fear and the feeling of a strange presence. The nights became difficult, I needed sleeping pills and lived at a dizzying pace, looking only for “having a good time” and filling her life with pleasures and trips.

It all started to change when, by 30 years, her father invited her to consecrate Jesus for the Virgin Mary according to the method of San Luis María Grignion de Montfort. “To please my dad, I accepted.”

During the 33 days of preparation and when consecrating, he began to notice an inner turn: “I felt more peace, more desire to approach the things of God. He was more often to Mass, although he was still returning to the world. ”That experience marked the beginning of a spiritual transformation process, which would continue in the following years.

The caesarean section that changed your life

At 33, Arianna became pregnant with her then partner. “I said: I’m going to dedicate myself to my daughter,” he recalled. He prepared carefully for a natural delivery, but after 16 hours of labor they had to practice an emergency caesarean section.

“I had my daughter, I returned home and started feeling bad: fever, swelling, heat in my body. They told me: ‘You have septicemia, you have to operate already.’ I was absolutely terrified. I remember having been in the hospital room; it was 11:00 pm and I saw entering a priest,” he said.

That night he received the sacraments for the first time in many years. “A priest gave me the confession, communion and anointing of the sick. I felt a peace that I had not felt a long time ago.”

The doctors decided to induce a coma, because their organs were committed and did not know if the night would spend. Ariana didn’t know if he was going to wake up. It was then that he had an experience that changed his life.

The coma experience: darkness, battle and light

In the midst of that state, Ariana lived what she describes as an experience close to death. “I felt that I came out of my body; I had no physical body, it was like a spirit without the limitations of the body, and I began to descend to a place … totally dark.”

There he contemplated scenes of human suffering: war, poverty, hunger and vices. “I saw the war first: a lot of pain and blood that was ran. I also saw poverty, people starving. I saw everything that has to do with lust … people seemed happy, but inside they had no light; it was only darkness.”

“I also saw everything that has to do with the cult of the body. For many years I dedicated myself to my body … I wanted to be skinny, I spent a lot of money on that. I saw people desperately exercised, with ‘perfect’ bodies, but inside they had no light,” he added.

He also discovered those who worship false idols: “I saw people worshiping their jewels, their beauty and money; they also laughed, but inside there was no light.”

Arianna says that in the center of that place a being was presented that first showed himself as a beautiful woman and then as a man, trying to seduce her with false promises: “He told me: ‘Ariana, you just have to worship me and I will give you everything you want.'”

It was then that a spiritual struggle began: “I began to pray and ask: ‘Lord, take me out of here; I am Catholic; I love you.’ I think that the sacraments I had received that day helped me implore God and not fall.”

In the midst of that fight, he felt that a powerful hand took her out of darkness. “I heard a music: thousands of children singing, the most perfect melody I had ever heard. I saw a light brilliant light than the sun and I felt that I was going to see God.”

What he experienced then marked her forever: “I came to what I can describe as the presence of God’s love. It was like raising the veil and receiving rivers and rivers of love. I felt the presence of God and also the maternal presence of our mother, which hugged me.”

That encounter revealed the greatness of divine mercy: “They undressed my soul and fell into account that I had nothing to give the Lord. I felt great shame, but at the same time an infinite love that spilled on me.”

He also says that he saw living lights as little candles: “Each was a prayer that someone did for me. There I understood that the prayer is alive, which really sustains and transforms.”

Although he did not want to return, he understood that it was not his time yet: “He had a second chance.”

When he returned in himself, he woke up at the hospital connected to machines and tubes. “The doctor said: ‘It’s a miracle, you woke up fast!'” He was hospitalized for 28 days, with several operations. “Inside my heart I felt that something was happening,” he said.

His return to the Catholic Church

After surviving, Arianna returned home with many questions. “I started to feel within me a great change in my heart, but it was not so obvious what was happening,” he said.

Amid uncertainty, he sought guide in his prayer group. The priest who accompanied him, Father Ramiro, advised him: “Prayer, prayer, prayer.” That recommendation became a compass.

With the support of his sister, who had traveled from the United States, began to pray more intensity. “He taught me how she prays and, when she returned, I kept praying,” he recalled.

That was the beginning of a spiritual path. Arianna began attending daily mass, to receive the sacraments and to confess frequently. “I made a first confession that lasted like three hours, and then I started the weekly confession. I was dying to receive Jesus in my body, in my heart,” he says.

But this process was not free of obstacles on a personal level. A trip to the United States with his little one would mark a turning point. There, in a charismatic prayer group, the servers invited her to a release session. “I felt that everything I had to give up came out of my heart. I felt as if I had just been born. I have never been so clean from heart and soul,” he recalled with emotion.

That experience gave him the clarity he needed to make firm decisions in his life. Since then, Arianna deepened in prayer, sacramental life and the decision to live in chastity. “After liberation it was easier to make certain decisions in my life: to leave environments, friendships, and give myself to 100%. That process took me about three years, but it gave me the strength to remain firm in my conversion.”

A new life and mission in the light of Christ

Today, Arianna’s engine is the mission that, according to her, God has entrusted her. “My desire is to help bring souls to God through the testimony he has given me for his mercy,” he says with conviction. Throughout the last eight years, he claims to have received in prayer – personal as a community – the confirmation of this call.

“The Lord, when this mission gave me, told me: ‘I want this testimony to reach every corner of the world.’ I didn’t see it feasible, I didn’t see it possible,” he recalled. However, thanks to social networks, your experience has already crossed borders.

“People from all over the world write me saying that they have seen the testimony, that they were on YouTube and appeared out of nowhere, and that it touched them. Then I know that is what the Lord wants,” he explained.

For Arianna, his task is clear: “The Lord only asked me to give the testimony, and then he is the one who does the job with people.” Aware of this mission, he ensures that his greatest desire is “to be able to fulfill it throughout my life.”

In these years he has already received invitations to share his testimony abroad, but for now he has chosen not to accept them.

“My priority is my daughter, who is small and very vulnerable. But once she is already bigger, my desire is to be able to travel the world doing this,” he added.

For Ariana, all his way confirms a central truth: “There is no love equal to the love of God. There is no therapy, no success, or pleasure that can fill the heart as his mercy does.”

“He gave me a second chance and I want to use it for his glory,” he concluded.