Have you, or anyone you know, ever actually SEEN a ghost?

[LifesTooShortToLearnPolish]

I mean actually, visually, witnessed something. I'm not talking about strange experiences, items moving/disappearing/reappearing etc.

I'm curious about this, the sort of visual experiences people have, what they're like, the type of 'person' they've seen.

I'm not interested in opinions on whether such things exist. And for clarity, I'm not entirely sure myself, however I do credit others' experiences and respect their beliefs.

I did have a visual experience of my own in my bedroom of my student flat, about 35 years ago. It was a weird old place. In a dim corner I saw a man with a blazer and hat standing in the corner. He looked annoyed. I ran out to get my flatmate but no one was there when we went back in. Felt a bit stupid.

What's your experience? 😊

All 3 of my children when they were small used to say night night to the man who sat at the top of our stairs. They’re now adults and each of them described the man who was kind and tucked them in 🤢 I used to laugh about it and play it down, we had a window at the top of the stairs and that’s where he sat apparently, his name was Mr Keddes and they all still mention him from time to time. DH worked away at the time and I wakened up one night thinking DH was touching my face, there was someone stood beside my bed and I thought he’d got an earlier flight home. When I jumped out of bed there was no-one there, perhaps it was tiredness? The man that was standing beside my bed was the same man that the children described and drew pictures of. When we moved from that house the children were 5, 7 and 10, they talked for months of missing Mr Keddes after we moved.

A few months after my MIL died DH and I were sitting in the garden and heard the gate open, there was no wind and it was a warm summer evening, DH got up to see who it was and he swears he saw his mum walking down the road away from our house. When he ran after whatever he saw there was no-one there.

Some people believe in spirit and some don’t. I don’t believe in ghosts but I believe in spirit, there’s been too many instances in my life not to believe.

A lot of my relatives have had experiences.

I grew up in a well-reputed "haunted house". There were certain rooms that the cats swerved and guests preferred not having to sleep in.

DM once experienced a sudden chill and skirts appearing from the hemlines up. She put it down to her imagination until going to a stately home and talking to a volunteer who said that people often saw ladies appearing from their skirts upwards in the long gallery. When she mentioned it to my rather cynical DB, he blanched and said "OMG, I've seen her too". It turned out that he was totally drunk, woke in the night and a middle-aged woman in Victorian clothing appeared from the ground up next to his bed. He decided that he was hallucinating, rolled over and didn't think much more about it.

There was a lady who was widowed shortly after moving in who spent several decades living there in the right era so we've always used her name for the ghost.

We used to live in a flat that was part of a very large Scottish castle. At that time there were just a few rooms rented as flats. Most if the castle was empty apart from the caretaker and his wife. We had my DSIL and DBIL staying with us with their son who was about 4 years old. One night we were sat around our huge fireplace with a log fire going.. The adults were talking and our nephew was playing with toys in the floor. He stopped playing and started staring at the wall at the side of the fire.. His mum said what are you staring at. He said "the lady". "What lady?" "The lady there next to the fire". He wasn't a kid given to flights of fantasy or one that had an imagination that would lead him to making up stories .

A week before they arrived the dowager owner of the castle had died after being bedridden there for many years. We lived in a part that was the old nursery where her children has spent many hours.

I'm not a great believer in ghosts. But he saw something I can't explain. It could have been his imagination but it seems unlikely knowing what he was like as a child.

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My mum said she was jumping up and down on a trampoline in the garden as a child and saw a girl ghost through the window in one of the rooms on the top floor of her house

Yes, me, when I was 3. We were staying with friends who lived in an old nunnery in Kent, but I didn't know that.

I have a very clear memory of sitting on a bed in a bedroom, talking to an old lady in black. Just sitting talking. It wasn't scary or anything.

Then I remember sitting having lunch with everyone - I was the youngest child and only girl there - and the dad of the family asked me where I'd been whilst the boys had been playing outside. I told him I'd been talking to the old lady in the attic. He went very quiet and told me not to be scared. I wasn't scared. Turns out I'd pretty much exactly described something that a handful of other people had in the past.

But like @Feelingstrange2 I don't believe in ghosts.

DDad always said he saw the ghost of his father, on the night he died, when he (dad) was staying in a hotel in the
Midlands one weekend in the 1960s. My GF died suddenly, DDad had no reason to believe he had died, and he'd had no phone contact or anything with him for a few weeks.

A cat. I stayed over at a friend's house and kept getting woken by her cat jumping onto the bed. Turns out she didn't have a cat but the lady who had the house before her had loads of them

I used a live in an extremely old house. There was a man that wandered the landing. Very scary. There were other things as well. Never really believed before I lived there. Couldn’t move out fast enough

I had something similar that I hadn't thought to include as I had discounted it at the time.
Staying in my boyfriend's flat when I was 18, I couldn't sleep. The darkness was deeper and blacker on BF's side of the bed. It then sort of got more concentrated in one area beside him, and formed a human-like shape. I started to panic, even though I thought I was imagining it. This 'figure' then bent down over BF, at which point I started squealing and flailing and woke him up. He made fun of me for a bit then we went to sleep. At about 7 am the phone rang and BF's mum told him his granny had died a few hours earlier. He went as white as a sheet, and later said he was convinced she came to say goodbye. He told his mum. It brought them both comfort.
I thought my brain was making things up as I was bored/restless!

My nephew who is 3 sees a man in their house quite often. The previous owner (a family friend) actually died in the house. At first we thought he was dreaming as it was while he was in bed but as time went on he was seeing him all over the house. He isn't frightened at all and sometimes will have a conversation with him. I recently moved house and when they came to visit for the first time my nephew got really upset and wouldn't leave the hall way, he just stood facing the wall crying. After a while he came around and said he didn't like my house. Didn't think much of it at the time but a week or so after we'd hear footsteps upstairs and lights just randomly coming on. Very odd, I have always been sceptical but really do believe he sees something.

I had a hospital experience too. As a nurse working night shift, I also saw a lady walk to the end of corridor and turn into the last private room which was reserved for patients that needed to be in isolation. At that time the room had been closed and cleared by the cleaning staff so we k ew at that time it wasn't occupied. I went up to check out what the lady was doing and guide her back down the ward... but nobody was there.

I've lived in a house that was constantly getting things lost then mysteriously show up. Kids Christmas presents that were in loft totally disappeared...
And in the outhouse scratched into the wall it said help me . Hubby smoothed it over and repaired the wall but it kept reappearing.
We kept having knocks on the door but nothing there ( cottage was on its own in countryside no neighbours)
One night we heard tapping at the windows... hubby crept up to front room window ready to pull curtains back to see who it was..,, all he saw was a white ladies hand flat against the glass on window. Taken back by seeing this, he rushed to front door ... nothing was outside, no security lights were triggered nor were there any visible evidence on the gravel leading to house.
Very very strange

I'm in on my own and freaking out now ! I reckon to have been my dog and cat but in the night so realistically could have dreamed it. I'd lose the plot if I saw a spooky man or woman

Oh, that's terrify. Sounds very Wuthering Heights!

Don't have nightmares @PollyRuby 😊

My son has had a few things happen . When he was younger 8-10 maybe . He told me he would see a man with white hair. Wearing a suit. He had chattering teeth. And he used to take "smokey" things from his inside pocket. Ds did not know were called cigarettes.

Another time he saw something on the stairs it was like a dark/black figure that represented a person. Ds was crying and begging me not to go up the stairs. I was trying to tell him there's Nothing there he was so upset and just kept repeating its there its there.

Another time he was a teenager. We were all chatting etc .then ds said he can see something he could feels something he got upset . He was shaking. Then he went sure white his face was sweaty and he suddenly spoke in a deep voice . It was litterly 2 words but I could not understand. I just said what. Because I had not realised. Ds then started sobbing. He then went into the kitchen to get drink . He then said he could see someone with a knife. He started screaming and sobbing.

Hew not mentioned anything since . He's 21 now . I mentioned the last thing to him a couple weeks back. He does not remember it. It freaked him out a bit when I told him.

When my mum was nursing at a London hospital she has a similar experience to you @BannnnaSplit.

When I was a kid we lived in a house that was apparently haunted. One of my mums friends visited and saw them (man and dog). It was the middle of the day

DH and I were wandering around the churchyard of an old church in the centre of Leeds. We’d stopped to look at something and a young lad walked past us towards some steps that lead to the gate out. He looked perfectly normal, jeans, a backpack, headphones. We followed him to the steps but when we reached the top he was nowhere to be seen and the gate was closed. We thought it was odd as he’d not really had time to go out and close the gate after him, and there was nowhere else he could have gone. But when we got to the gate it had a huge rusty old chain and padlock on it, clearly hadn’t been opened in years.

Of course not. 🙄

One got in my way on the stairs in a Premier Inn once. He was definitely there but he wasn't actually visible. Later confirmed by the staff that there was a ghost in the building, and some people refused to work the late reception shift because of him. They said he was the man who owned the building before it became a hotel.

Yep…in my room, several times, used to see her often standing by my bed and watching over DS when he was a baby. I’ve also seen one in other parts of the house.
when driving to dfil in the midlands. We usually take the route with the back country roads, on one road there’s a hotel/spa on one side and shit loads of farmland the other side.. I’ve seen the ghost of a young guy around 6 times in the journeys we’ve taken. Dfil is a ex police traffic officer, he said years ago, like the 70’s a young lad who was semi drunk came out of the hotel, crossed the road to go for a wee and got run over as he was crossing back over. I’m not sure how true or wether all the facts are there but seems plausible.

my dad worked on the underground and sometimes rode in the front on his way to work and has seen several ghost in certain tunnels.

Omg this is incredible! SO interesting!!

I went into the cloakroom as a child (I shouldn't have been there it was break time) I saw one of the cleaners there I apologise and went to walk out backwards (70s child never turn your back you get your butt swatte) she vanished

Sleeping and dreaming of my old (sadly deceased) cat cuddling and dribbling on me in my sleep like he used to I bought home a cat within a few weeks who cuddles me and occasionally dribbles on me when I'm trying to sleep (not as enthusiastic as original cat but still) I like to think he visited to remind me what cuddles I was missing

Oh I love these!

i am the worlds biggest non believer however last year while I was walking the dog I became really breathless and stopped and sat on a bench. Suddenly I felt what I can only describe as a feather touching my face. I put my hand to my face and turned around and saw a man behind the bench. He looked totally normal except he seemed to come from nowhere. I said hello and he just looked at me. I wasn’t scared or spooked in fact he made me feel calm and my breathing improved. I got up to leave and he watched me, he was so close to me and yet I did not feel threatened at all. It is bizarre and I knew something wasn’t right but I didn’t care. He then just vanished. I have no idea what it was all about and to be honest I have not really spoken about it for fear of being laughed at. I have thought of every excuse … maybe due to my breathing I was hallucinating etc but I know this is not true. It was most definitely a ghost spirit. I have been back to same spot many times but never seen him again. I do always feel a calmness though when I am sitting on the bench.

I'm not remotely interested in ghosts or spookiness yet I did have an experience 50 years ago. At 9 years old, my Mum took me to visit an old friend in a big house. It was late so she tucked me up in bed, assuring me she would join me shortly. A girl my age in a pale nightie was running up and down the landing and, tired, I decided to not engage til next day. Mum came to bed and I told her. Eyes wide, she made me swear to never, ever mention this to anyone. Over the years she would not be drawn on it, until I mentioned it again in my 20s. She said her friend lost an 8 year old daughter the year before we visited. She'd drowned in the sea.

I can't believe I had almost forgotten this until tonight. I have to preface this by saying I am the least woo person on the planet.
But about five years ago I went with a friend on a night time tour of the Brontë parsonage in Haworth. A group of us were standing at the top of a small flight of stairs listening to the guide. I was at the top looking down at the guide who was at the bottom. Behind her was a massive window that looked out on a kind of passageway. It was dark. In that passageway I saw a woman in a long white dress walking away from the window, her back to us, then she disappeared.
I told my friend afterwards and she found it hilarious that massive cynic me had seen a 'ghost'. And kept making whooing sounds at me as we drove back home over the moors.
There must be some logical reason for what I saw but for a while I became a bit of a believer.