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AIBU?

To be freaked out by creepy music box in dead SILs room?

61 replies

Mixxy · 14/05/2013 20:30

My husband and I live in his deceased apartment. She died 6 years ago. Her old bedroom is the general 'nursery', though baby who is 11 weeks old sleeps in our room. I put the baby in the stroller in the nursery as we are about to go out to do laundry. I went to gather his sheets from our bedroom and when I came back there was my SILs childhood music box playing, (from where, I can't find). It's like the creepiest horror movie ever. I'm on my own in the apartment. I don't believe in ghosts, am not religious and am not spiritual. Funnily enough, I'm exactly like SIL when she was alive. AIBU to be utterly freaked out by this?

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SolidGoldBrass · 14/05/2013 22:14

If it's in the loft then a mouse or a squirrel or something probably set it off.
Ghosts do not exist.

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Dawndonna · 14/05/2013 22:16

2oldtobeaamum
((((hug))))

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Mixxy · 14/05/2013 22:21

SGB A loft area in a NYC apartment bedroom (roughly 14x12) does not have squirrels living in it). The music box was an old wind-up one.

I know rationally that ghosts don't exist. But why did the music box start playing?

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YoniWidge · 14/05/2013 22:22

Freaky? Or nice?

If you believe in ghosts, the afterlife, whatever (which you must, to some extent, in order to be freaked out by it) then can't you convince yourself that this is nice? SIL has come to visit her little nephew and looked after him (by playing a tune) when you had to leave the room.

No? Just me who's the freak then? Or who tries to see the positive in everything!

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Mixxy · 14/05/2013 22:24

No belief in the after life. No. And funnily enough, DH is Jewish but not religious. They really have no after life to be worried about.

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Amrapaali · 14/05/2013 22:26

My daughter's toys set themselves off randomly. One woke us up at 2:00 AM last week. A loud rendition of the My Little Pony theme song.

There was another toy train set pressing against it.

There is a very simple, logical explanation for the music you heard. Go ahead, don your best Sherlock hat and go snooping...

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YoniWidge · 14/05/2013 22:37

Well in that case, it needs to be a logical solution.

Um...

Er...

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Ledkr · 14/05/2013 22:37

Has it stopped now?

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Mixxy · 14/05/2013 22:48

Music Box stopped after a few minutes.

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WorraLiberty · 14/05/2013 23:00

Maybe I should tell my DH. It might make him upset, but then again, maybe it would be of some sort of comfort to him.

Of what comfort would a completely logical explanation be?

You said you apparently don't believe in ghosts, therefore there's obviously an explanation that you simply haven't found yet.

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Mixxy · 14/05/2013 23:08

WorraLiberty I don't believe in ghosts, that's why it seems so strange to me that it would scare me so much. Maybe the (still unfound) music box just went off itself after 6 years. The room was cleaned by a professional service before the baby was born about 4 months ago. Maybe they wound it up and it's just going off now.

Anyway, I went into the room and I spoke to my SIL. I told her that we hoped she wasn't upset that her old bedroom is our DSs nursery now. That she is welcome to visit him and play with him anytime she wants, just to try not to scare me. I told her that we named our son for her and if she wanted to visit my DH, he'd be more than happy to know she's ok.

I feel as daft as a brush and was a bit teary-eyed.

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WorraLiberty · 14/05/2013 23:40

Sorry you're not making sense speaking to your SIL and not believing in ghosts, but I understand you're upset obviously

If it's upsetting you then try to put it out of your mind (easier said than done I know).

Just put it down to one of those unexplained things of which there are 1000s in life.

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Mixxy · 14/05/2013 23:41

I understand its not making sense, no need to make me feel any more daft than I already do.

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hiddenhome · 14/05/2013 23:43

Perhaps it moved briefly (vibrations) and that's been enough to prompt the action into playing a little bit.

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WorraLiberty · 14/05/2013 23:46

I didn't try to make you feel daft

In fact I don't think I could have put my post in a nicer way whilst still making the same point.

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KurriKurri · 14/05/2013 23:50

Music boxes have wind up mechanisms - they can easily be affected by changes in temperature, a knock from a mouse or squirrel that has got into the loft etc etc - maybe you have been keeping the apartment a bit warmer since you have a baby and that set it off. Whatever - it wasn't caused by a ghost.

Ghosts don't exist.

But things that suddenly remind us of someone we have lost are upsetting, so it will have shaken you up, but please don't give any kind of thought to it being anything other than something disturbing the mechanism (or a child's music box overheard from another apartment - the Pas de Deux from Swan Lake is one of the commonest music box tunes in existence - my DD has it on her music box)

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SarahAndFuck · 15/05/2013 01:17

We were given a music box for our wedding, it was a wind-up one that had a lid you lifted off completely.

To make the music play, you had to lift off the lid.

Every morning it used to start playing on it's own, with the lid still on, as the sun came up because the change in light in the room triggered the mechanism.

Could that explain what happened to you? A change in light or temperature? Or if it's stored in a box or something, could it have slipped slightly and played a little bit because the key was then able to turn?

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Mixxy · 15/05/2013 01:25

DH came home and found the music box in the loft area. He thinks I'm being daft and that its just some remaining hormones from pregnancy (making me worry, obviously - not setting the thing off). He thinks its just some an old mechanism. He took the box and ran it round to his mothers house, saying that it was making me jumpy. MIL is delighted to have to box in her possession. So that ends that mystery.

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RafaellaNhaKyria · 15/05/2013 01:40

Agree if you have a baby monitor, that's it. Once I put dd down for a nap and a few minutes later heard voices. I went to her room and stood at the door, to hear a mans voice reading a bedtime story. Harold and the purple crayon. He said "Elizabeth, do you see how the moon followed Harold?". Dd's name is Elizabeth. I completely lost my mind, ran in and grabbed her startled self out of the crib and ran from the house. From the front yard I called my dad in tears telling him about the ghost in her room, and he asked if the baby monitor was on. Yes..... He suggested I call the neighbor behind us, so I did. Turned out they ha a little girl named Elizabeth, the dad was reading Harold in her room, and they had the same brand of monitor.

Despite the explanation and subsequently feeling like an idiot, it still to this day creeps me out remembering standing by her door listening to it!

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RafaellaNhaKyria · 15/05/2013 01:43

Argh just saw you found the explanation to your mystery. Now I feel silly for not having read the entire thread before posting

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DangerousBeanz · 15/05/2013 01:46

Not really connected, but my son once had a religious experience when Jesus started talking to him out of his guitar amp.
I thought he'd been on the waccy baccy until he convinced me to come and listen- and lo the sermon on the mount it was.
Turned out the amp was picking up the radio mike from the methodist chapel next door.

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Cravingdairy · 15/05/2013 01:56

Sorry for your family's loss. It's lovely that your son is named for your SIL. You can look forward to telling him all about her.

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Mimishimi · 15/05/2013 07:44

Last year, my daughter was mucking about on our exercise bike and I asked her to get off to do something. She had not been riding it especially vigorously. Usually it stops spinning after a minute or so even when I've been riding it (vigorously) and suddenly hopped off without stopping it properly first. So DD got off and I told her what I wanted her to do. The pedals kept spinning and didn't slow down at all. After the first minute passed we just laughed and joked about her 'working out', by the third minute we were staring at it and the fourth minute we started freaking out. During this time, it did not slow down at all. After 4.5 minutes, it suddenly stopped like someone put the brakes on by backpedalling. Then we both felt a chill go through us at the same time. DD said "I told you Z said there are ghosts in this building!" which is true, her brother had been claiming for about a year that he kept seeing ghosts, one of which was a child. Since he's at the age for imaginary friends, I didn't think much of it.

Still, I laughed this off and just thought it was a freaky coincidence. A few days later, I called out to my son and distinctly saw a curly headed little boy run into the study. I followed him in but couldn't find him. I started getting annoyed then I heard my son and daughter giggling in the bathroom - DD was brushing his teeth and when I questioned her claimed he had been in there for at least three minutes. It was very peculiar. The building is only ten years old though suppose there was a freestanding house or two before it.

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TheCountessOlenska · 15/05/2013 08:03

Is anyone else more interested in the NYC apartment, the ballet dancers and SIL's untimely (?) death than the music box?

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MissPB · 15/05/2013 09:20

CountessOlenska - yes! that made me think of the old book Flowers in the Attic!

OP - hopefully you won't feel freaked out any more now that the music box has gone. Make your home a happy home with DH and your beautiful baby x

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