To ask what's the weirdest/strangest/creepiest thing that has ever happened to you?

[fruitysmoothie]

As the title says...

We live in the house my husband grew up in, having moved in when my MIL passed away a couple of years ago. I occasionally get a waft of cigarette smoke (she was a smoker) and when our son was tiny and I was feeding him on the sofa he used to look up sometimes and smile as if someone was standing in front of us. I'm not really a woo person but it would be lovely to think that MIL could see the little grandson she just missed meeting.

Loving the woo! Keep it coming. :)

I have a few really crap ones, the least crap of which was when I was looking after my friend's DS, who would have been about 18 or 20 months old at the time.

I took him up to bed and halfway through reading him a story, became aware that he wasn't listening to me at all, but his attention was riveted on a spot by the door. I asked him what was up and without taking his eyes off the spot, he raised an arm and pointed in the same direction, and just said "Nana".

My friend's mum had died shortly before he was born.

Oh, and I used to get sleep paralysis a lot in my 20s. I have been pinched and pulled at and often heard white noise and/or felt a malevolent presence when it happened. My DSIL told me it's spirits coming to check you out, get the measure of you or whatever, so I used to find it incredibly frightening, until someone told me what actually causes it. :)

My two cousins and I adored my grandmother. She had a rather tumultuous and disappointing relationship with everyone else in the family. (Because they're pretty awful, really....) Her funeral was on a stormy, rainy day. Just as they were winding up the euology, there was a break in the weather and the sun shone in, directly onto the rainbow fairy we girls had put on her casket. When we walked out of the crematorium there were three rainbows - one inside the other. I've never been remotely woo until that point. Then on her first birthday after she'd died (she would have been 95) I was talking to one of my lovely cousins and looking over the ocean while we discussed how excited my grandmother would have been to meet the twins I'd just discovered I was carrying and to hear that my cousin had just gotten engaged when what popped up on the horizon? Three more rainbows.

A man came round the neighbourhood asking if we wanted trees pruning.

Then when I came out to show him my garden he said he would do my garden for free if I showered with him! !!!!
Then when I called to book for me to pay him and his friend to trim the garden. He asked if I have any Irish in me, then said "you will after you've been with me".
I really need a cheap gardener otherwise I wouldn't even breathe same air as someone so weird.

Two little tales to tell - first one I experience quite frequently. We live in an old house, and often when passing from one room to the next, there is the definite smell of wet dog. There are no other signs of anything - I've never seen or heard a dog there - and we have no pets. No doubting it though, and other people have commented. The smell comes and goes very suddenly. DH is boringly convinced that it is something to do with the weather.

The other one is much more mysterious and happened to my sister about 20 years ago when she was living in an old, top floor flat with her then boyfriend, in Cheltenham. They were both asleep one night when something woke them both at exactly the same time. They were both unable to speak or move, as leaning over them was a large, black shadowy figure. She described it as totally black, and looking like a tree with branch-like extensions at the top. She said it gave her a bad feeling of evil. It seemed as though it was just watching them. Then very suddenly it flew off through the door next to her bf's side of the bed with a whooshing sound.

Once it had gone, the frozen feeling left them and her bf leapt out of bed grabbing some kind of weapon, and ran after it. There was no sign of anything - the door was locked, windows closed, and their big german shepherd dog was quivering on the landing. The only unusual thing was that the lightbulb in the bathroom just outside their room had blown. The dog would never go into the bathroom in that flat for whatever reason.

It never came back whilst she lived there, but her boyfriend would never talk about it.

Anyone else had anything like that?

I have another good one from my stepmother. Will write it when I have time.

My father was staying in a hotel in Killarney, Ireland with my mum. They were just falling asleep when he had that frozen feeling as if he could not move and as if something was bearing down on him. My mother instinctively asked if he was alright (she didn't have the frozen feeling but sensed that something was wrong). Then she saw something rise up off my father's side of the bed and it 'flew' out the window. They asked for another room that night.

I have goose bumps from reading these

The thing I fear is if there is no after life we are gone for ever and ever and ever which to me is terrifyingly as it is eternal

Ohhhhhhhhh. Just got to page not founds story and seen its around Savernake Forest . That place has always filled me with fear for some unknown reason. Micheal Ryan shot his first victim there. It's an ancient forest and no doubt ley lines pass through it as it's by Malborough , Avebury etc.

someone just knocked the door and I nearly had a heart attack

I love reading all this stuff!

I'm the least spiritually sensitive person ever - despite growing up in a 700 year old house which used to be a church and apparently has a monk buried under the floor I've never seen or sensed anything remotely unearthly!

Strangely, the things that (if you're that way inclined) could be attributed to a ghost such as floorboards lifting up, electrical things breaking, the doorbell ringing with nobody pressing it etc these all happen in the new extension rather than the old church.

Oh and I've definitely marked Savernake forest as a "never visit" place!

Loving all of these! (Until DS cries out in the night and I'm too scared to go to him because I'm imagining all these spirits/demons/faceless ghosts )

I've told this one before, but when I was 3, I woke up one morning and my great gran was lay in my bed next to me. She was asleep and smiling. I walked into DM and said "Nanny Peg Leg is in my bed asleep" (she had lost a leg a few years prior so this was her affectionate nickname). DM's face dropped and she went running in to find my bed empty. Anyway, turns out that Nanny Peg Leg had actually died in hospital the night before, and DM had been with her when she passed.

Ooh just thought of a few more. One is woo, the other could be explained away as a coincidence?

So the woo one. When my great gran was young (I think about 20 at the time) her DF passed away quite suddenly. As was the norm back in those days, her DF's body was brought back to her at home for a few days before the funeral. She was absolutely heartbroken and spent most of those days just sat next to the coffin downstairs crying. One night, her DH was getting quite worried, so he stood at the top of the stairs and called down to her to come up to bed.

She started walking up the stairs, and as she got towards the top, she suddenly looked up to the side of her DH and started smiling and saying "Dad, I'm coming, I'm coming". Then she held out her hand as if she was reaching out to him. Her DH grabbed her hand, pulled her quickly towards him and gave her a gentle slap, and she apparently collapsed in his arms sobbing saying that she saw her DF, as clear as day stood there. Her DH (so my great grandad) used to tell this story, and he is sure that if she had managed to reach her DF, then something would have happened to her there and then and she'd have died in some way and passed over with her DF.

Then the not so woo one. When I was 17, my DF was told that the brain tumour he had had for the last 2 years was now terminal, and he only had weeks to live. As it was getting towards the end, I was staying with my uncle for a few days because as his house was only minutes away from the hospice. We got a phonecall one morning asking us to come in ASAP, and as we were driving there, the song that DF had always sang to me started playing on the radio. I knew ther eand then that he was going to pass away that day (we'd had a few false alarms in the weeks leading up to his death, but he'd always managed to pull himself back. He'd had his last rights read to him 5 weeks prior, and then the next day was sat up in bed laughing away ) Anyway, 6 hours after I'd heard this song on the radio he passed away with all of his close family surrounding him. There's been times in the last few years when I've sat wishing he was here to help me, and I'll always hear that song come on the radio a matter of hours later. It always makes me smile.

Marking my place to read later

Ooh I have 1 more!!

Not really woo, but one morning my colleague came over to me at my desk to tell me she'd had a dream the night before, and in it I had sent an email round the office to tell everybody that I was pregnant and expecting a boy.

We laughed it off, because I was 22 and had not long bought my first house with DP and children were not on our radar for at least another few years. Anyway, a few weeks later I had been feeling a bit dodgy and AF was late, so I did a pregnancy test and it was positive! When we worked out the dates, we realised that I must have been about 2 weeks pregnant when my colleague had the dream. Oh and we ended up having a boy

👻 shameless placemarking

That music one is common, I think - happened to me, too. My dad was a musician and when in his 80s, with cancer, still quite active. We didn't know it at the time but what turned out to be his last ever visit to us, we went to town and to his favourite shop - that sold instruments and sheet music.

As we walked in the door, the background music changed t the start of The Barcarole, from 'Tales of Hoffman' - my mother's favourite ever piece of music (and in a musician's family there were thousands of pieces of music being played, but that was her absolute favourite). My mum had died over 30 years before, when I was a kid. My dad and I just looked at eachother and immediately I knew he was thinking what I was thinking - but as my (jealous of a long dead first wife) stepmother was there, neither of us needed to say a word...

My dad used to play around pubs and clubs, and cinemas in his youth. Sometimes I'd go with him to turn the music. I knew all his stock favourites. After he died, I went out to Betty's Tea Room for my bday. The elderly pianist was in and he proceeded to play - all those songs like 'Slow Boat To China' my dad used to play. He also played 'I'll Be Seeing You'. My dad's favourite ever job was playing for Anne Shelton who was famous for that song and indeed he accompanied her singing it... I just sat there with tears pouring down my face but strangely, enjoying it, too.

KarmaNoMore The stone circle that I had a hideous feeling from was in North Cumbria. I was only aware of stone circles on the west coast, tbh!

Some of these are so moving. Sorry to those who have lost loved ones

Karma I go to Castlerigg a lot, and have had the opposite feeling. But then felt some of the ones in Cornwall to be a lot more 'hostile' (weird, eh?) But it turns out I have a lot of ancestors from very close to Castlerigg so maybe they recognise their own, kinda thing?!

Talking of the Lakes though, I have a friend who used to walk extensively up there and lived there for a while and she swears she was once in this very remote place, where the tourists don't particularly go, and came across a complete - but rather creepy - 'fairy house' - an entire, perfect little place in miniature. Something told her not to get too close and that somehow she 'shouldn't' have seen it... (She is quite down to earth in everyday life and doesn't drink or do drugs I should say!)

Castlerigg though always feels 'dead' to me if there are loads of tourists around, but if you can catch it where you're the only people there, it is pretty good.

Oh just remembered another! Had been clubbing one night years ago went back to a friends, I wanted to go home it was about 5 in the morning so he walked me back..walking down a long road and this old bloke on a bike went past I thought it must be a postman or something,,literally 2 seconds later the same person cycled past us in the same direction we both looked at each other like wtaf! Even he shit it that much he got a taxi home for a ten minute walk!

The radio stories have just reminded me of another thing that happened a few years ago. DH's Grandad had just died, only two weeks after his wife, DH's Gran. We had travelled there for the funeral and stayed for a couple of days afterwards with DH's Aunt, who was understandably in a very bad way. The idea was that having us there, with our young dds who she loves, would lift her mind.

Unfortunately the day after the funeral her little dog got out of the garden, ran in front of a car and was killed. That evening I was sitting in the conservatory with DH's Aunt who was howling in pain , having lost both her parents and her beloved dog in the space of only a few weeks. I didn't know what to say. The radio was softly playing in the background but gradually seemed to get louder. A gospel choir was joyfully singing a version of the hymn that the previous day we had sung at Grandad's funeral. It was beautiful and so full of hope. I don't in fact believe it was a message of comfort, but DH's Aunt saw it as such and for that I am very grateful.

As far as ancient monuments go, I also like to visit stone circles and the like, but the only 'vibe' I've ever had was a strong feeling of peace when I visited Avebury whilst pregnant with dd1. I went again some years later but didn't feel it again. Less pleasantly, dh and I were in the old graveyard on Boa Island, County Fermanagh at the fall of the light one evening, to see the carved figures that were there. Suddenly both of us at the same time got such a feeling of malice and what I can only describe as mischief. Without pausing for discussion we both turned and ran back to the car. Afterwards we agreed that it had felt as if something wanted us gone. I would explain it as a combination of suggestion and something in the light, perhaps. Again, we went back a few years later - just this past summer - and I didn't feel it again. But dh (usually very logical) says he got a very bad feeling around the thorn tree that is there.