Going back a decade, various people saw Dhumavati around me but couldn't name Her. A Sufi healer described Her as a wise, elderly lady who swiftly showed the healer a curse that had been placed on me. A Reiki healer also received guidance from Her while healing me, and described Her as a tough grandmother spirit who had drawn close after watching and evaluating how I had handled some serious ordeals.
Other healers and psychics saw Her and interpreted Her as a grandmother type energy that watched over me. Many observed that She seemed like a very harsh grandmother spirit, but with a hidden compassionate side.
Yeah, that sounds like my Ammamma Dhumavati.
She dwells in my blood as an ancestral spirit, often speaks to me in Telugu, and guides me as a true guru. Sometimes She is snippy, and once She scared me with Her old woman's cackle (it was a creepy, witchy cackle that I frankly never want to hear again), but She is also kind, fiercely encouraging, empowering, grimly protective, and wise.
And it has to be said...for all the shit She gives me, I like Her so much better than either of my biological grandmas!
My maternal grandmother is a selfish, treacherous narcissist while my paternal grandmother is a sociopath. They both manage to keep up the appearance of being a socially acceptable granny: cook a lot of food, make a great show of being devout and religious, etc.
These two are allowed to maintain their masks by my shallow, narcissistic, greedy family that doesn't particularly like them but definitely likes social validation. My biological family has no idea what love or honesty really mean.
Dhumavati is who She says She is, forthright even when She's being extremely mysterious. Unlike my biological grandmothers, She doesn't bother with social niceties. Also unlike them, She actually loves me and would kill to protect me.
She also feels like both a personal ancestress and an archetypal ancestress. Dhumavati seems to represent our most ancient, neolithic female blueprint. The First Mother, the Mitochondrial Eve.
I see Her in the hints and whispers of the primordial water dragon goddess Tiamat, before She was usurped. I see Her in Bestla, the mother of Odin, the Giantess who represents an ancient feminine blueprint before the coming of Asgard's golden goddesses. In my UPG, Bestla has all of Odin's powers and wisdom, and is Herself actually a Norn. Bestla is the original leader of the Wild Hunt. Not Odin.
Dhumavati is a very similar ancient Female Power. She is a memory of the matriarchal world that is now lost.