Has any media made you too scared to sleep as an adult?

[ClassicStripe]

Went to see Ghost Stories last night. Was absolutely brilliant and thoroughly enjoyed it. It did make me jump out my skin a few times and it was very fun and creepy. However I ended up spending most the night laying awake feeling scared and listening to every creak last night. I nearly had heart failure when the baby started crying at 3am. I’m no stranger to being awake with anxiety or stress but it must be decades since I’ve laid awake at night scared!

Yes, the Elizabeth Cage book series by Jodi Taylor. They are creepy and I can’t read them in the dark!

A friend of mine quit their evening job after watching Woman in Black because they could no longer stand being alone after dark.

The play?

I watched it, got home, put all the lights on & phoned my mum. It was the most terrifying thing I’ve ever seen & yet it was all done through atmosphere & suggestion.

The film adaptation with Harry Potter.

Ghost Stories is brilliant and still adds an edge to my drive home in the dark, and I saw it on its first run!

After the play, I purposely avoided the film. Once is enough!

When I was quite young, about 10, I watched an old black and white horror about a man who shrunk people to doll size and injected people with a sedative and stole from them.

It absolutely terrified me. One night I felt tiny footsteps creeping up my duvet and hid under the covers but it was the cat.

Threads (the 1984 film)
I was too scared to leave the house for about 3 days never mind sleep.

What's wrong? You don't want to break down in the foggy, watchful woods in a car you're not licensed to drive??

I think I saw this on the second run so the film hadn't come out and I didn't know anything about it.

It was extraordinary. However, I didn't sleep until about 4 am. And I said they should hand out tranquilizers and hair dye with the tickets 😂

@ClassicStripe If you start a thread on "culture vultures", I'd love to read about it. It must've changed quite a lot since then.

I still remember it all too well 😱👻 (slipped that in for @SoScarletItWas )

editing to add - I've seen "the woman in black" three times. The first time as a teenager, I was too frightened to be the last one up to bed because then I'd have to climb the stairs in the dark.

I used to "enjoy" horror film s as a teen but I've completed lost my nerve with it all. My sister saw Woman In Black and said it was a fantastic play and it sounded good but I just couldn't!

There have been some news stories and a couple of real life stories that have kept me awake in adulthood, I don't need to go looking for more horrors ☹️

@PeopleTalkingWithoutSpeaking I tend to think of horror as being stuff with blood and gore in it. I can't watch that, but I can talk about ghost things till the cows come home.

I didn't sleep properly after I watched Whistle and I'll come to you. I've still only ever watched it once! Never again!

I suppose this counts as media… that bloody photo of the monk ghost from Ripley. Every few years it randomly comes into my life, all starting when I was roller skating on our street (remember Fisher Price skates that you could ratchet larger as your feet grew?!) and I went arse over tit and had to go home to have my mam pick gravel out of my knee with tweezers and then drown me in iodine. And she’d recorded this documentary from a few nights before about Kodak debunking fake ghost photos as double exposure etc… and this was the one photo they couldn’t debunk. Stuck with me then and every time I think I am fine it randomly pops up somewhere online or in a book. Bet I dream about it tonight now!

I was going to say the same thing! To be honest it’s kept me awake often over the last 40 years…

Elizabeth Cage books for me too! Terrifying!

I’d say The Ring (Japanese one) as a student. And the Hostel movies.

But more recently as a middle aged adult I’d say one or two of the Black Mirror episodes. The military one and the one where they were scaring someone on purpose for Halloween like an house of horror type thing. Some of the gory scenes from How to get away with murder. Also gory scenes from Killing Eve (still had to watch it though!). I think gore in general can be a trigger for me. I don’t tend to seek out horror much these days though, I also used to love it as a teen but now find it too genuinely terrifying to be “fun”.

As a child I still recall a particularly terrifying episode of Doctor Who freaking me out completely! And a psychological horror called PaperHouse as a teen.

I saw Ghost Stories on this tour and loved it but it was truly terrifying! My rather bemused husband had to come with me when I brushed my teeth that evening! Brilliant play!

It's been 40 years since I saw The Shining at the cinema and large hotels still freak me out!

The news story about the man in America who was watching TV in his bedroom and the entire room fell down into a massive deep sinkhole gives me very rational terror about the complete unpredictability and insecurity of life

So glad others are saying the Elizabeth Cage books. I was reading one during the night in a remote place in the country a couple of years ago and had to both stop reading and turn the light on (read on kindle usually so don’t need a light on to read normally). See there is a new one out in a few weeks for some cheery summer terror.

Yup, another one for Threads here.
In the last couple of years, The Babadook and Hereditary are two films that did stop me sleeping.
And the first episode of the Uncanny podcast, about Room 611 in the student accommodation in Ireland. I had to keep the light on all night after that one.

I can relate. I had to get rid of a lovely rocking chair after seeing that play, just couldn't have it in the house 🤣

OMG that photo creeps me out so much too. I actually love ghost stories and looking at ghost photos, but that one? No way!

Oh dear

I bet that's the cause of many an unwanted rocking chair!

I was initially confused by the mention of the Ripley ghost. Was thinking there wasn't a ghost in Ripley, but I had the TV show on my mind.

So I presume we mean something from Ripley Castle, there's so many photos online. I wouldn't know which one was freaking people out. Obviously, do not post it in this thread 😂

The Ring.

I wanted to leave the cinema but was in my early 20s and with a friend so didn't want to look a twat or make them think they had to leave so I had my eyes closed for the last 10 mins or so.

Struggled to sleep for a night or two.

It didn't help that I worked on an adolescent unit at the time and there was a girl who was really lovely but when I was working a night-shift and she suddenly appeared through the dark during checks in the early hours with her hair hanging in her face - I thought I was going to have a heart attack.