Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think children may see things we can’t?

298 replies

Opal93 · 02/08/2021 23:26

My son is autistic and his language is disordered so it’s very hard to ask him what he actually means when he tells us something, but lately there have been a few instances where he has said things that have spooked us out a bit! Tonight he was at my mums, and he said “goodnight nana Marlene” (my mums mum who died when he was one) and started singing her favourite Doris Day song, word for word which he has never heard before and I didn’t know of the song until my mum told me today he started singing it and she has no idea how he knew it. My dad died when I was 16 and my son knows his photo. We were in a park the other week and my son pointed behind me and said “it’s grandad Stephen!” And I looked behind me thinking he probably saw a man that looked like the photo but there was nobody there. Another time, he started talking to my husbands dad about “nanny Margaret.” I didn’t realise he even had a nanny Margaret but apparently it was my husbands dads mums name. Then he said nanny Margaret has a big belly, and my FIL looked freaked out then and said she had a massive hernia that ruptured and killed her. I wouldn’t say I’m a believer in ghosts or life after death but it does make me wonder. Any other experiences of kids sensing things?

OP posts:
81Byerley · 03/08/2021 18:10

@FlyingFancy

We don't really understand anything about the world or where we came from or what else is out there

We do though.

Very arrogant to think that we know or understand everything about the world or what else is out there!
Thatsjustwhatithink · 03/08/2021 18:13

Just because you can't explain it, doesn't mean it doesn't have an explanation. It's more likely that your child overhead something or saw a photo or whatever rather than ghosts.

Thatsjustwhatithink · 03/08/2021 18:14

@muffindays

I believe this OP! Although MN is one of the more skeptic places on the internet so you are unlikely to get too many people accepting it.

Children's brain states are different to adults. They are usually in an Alpha or Theta state vs adults who are in a more active, logical mindstate. This allows them to be constantly learning. Their brains are also taken up with learning the ways of the world vs adults who have to remember and carry out a million different daily "work" tasks, so I believe that they have the capacity to use their brain and perception in a different way. Their brains are not filled up with all the stuff adults think about every day in the same way. So it makes sense that if there is another dimension of reality, ghosts or whatever, they might be able to perceive it more easily.

And I think the person who said why can't they do XXX if they have these superpowers has missed the point. We are talking about different mind states rather than different "learned" skills and social skills or dexterity tasks that take years to learn.

This is complete nonsense.
ProfYaffle · 03/08/2021 18:14

Well I had to get my teens to read the tiny print on a menu in a dimly lit pub the other week so - yes - they absolutely can see things I can't.

81Byerley · 03/08/2021 18:15

@BunnytheFriendlyDragon

I believe this. I think maybe because they are not conditioned like most adults to believe that ghosts don't exist and you'll be considered mad if you say you've seen something. I've seen things but as an adult.

My younger sibling had a phase of crying and saying "I want to go home" when we were at home together as a family.

I notice my young baby often seems to focus on something above or being me but I realise hoping this is likely just because he hasn't learned to focus properly yet

We all watched my two grandbabies lying next to each other at a wedding wriggling and giggling as if being tickled. And when my brother was a baby, and being breast fed, he would stop and keep smiling, clearly looking at something that my Mum couldn't see.
FlyingFancy · 03/08/2021 18:20

Very arrogant to think that we know or understand everything about the world or what else is out there!

We don't know or understand EVERYTHING about the world, but we certainly know where we came from.

beastlyslumber · 03/08/2021 18:45

What I take from this is that kids are basically tripping out of their gourds for the first few years.

FrangipaniDeLaSqueegeeMop · 03/08/2021 19:00

@ProfYaffle

Well I had to get my teens to read the tiny print on a menu in a dimly lit pub the other week so - yes - they absolutely can see things I can't.
GrinGrinGrinGrin
spoomum · 03/08/2021 19:26

yes. As a young child in Ireland, I had a incident that has never left me (I am in my mid 50s now) My Nanny and Nanda ( maternal grandparents came for lunch....then stayed and watched myself and my sister who was 3.. i was 6. It was ODD because my parents had never left us with anyone including my grandparents. My dads mum was dead and we rarely saw my paternal grandfather (not a nice person really). I remember being confused because my normally fun loving daddy was really quiet. They left... Nanny hated the meal that my mother had prepped for our dinner and took it to the car in a bag to give to the pigs (farmers). She let us have icecream for dinner (god i loved that woman) Bath and bedtime just as my parents arrived home. I have NO IDEA how much later, but i looked up at my door... and my paternal grandfather was standing there staring at me. He had a horrible look on his face and i was terrified...went under my bedsheet with my tamborine ( it was pink... with a white drum bit with a little lamb on it) YES IT IS STILL THIS VIVID. when i looked again he was gone. I assumed he had come home with my parents. Never spoke of it. When i was in my early forties my auntie came from Ireland to visit my daddy. We were all in my livingroom after a nice meal having some tea. They got onto WOO stuff talking about ghosts ...ireland being the most haunted place etc. I laughed and told them about my sighting of my grandda. They scoffed. Then I told my dad that he was not in his usual clothes... he normally wore old pants...shirt and a cardigan. I said he had a brown suit on...with a green shirt with big collar and a massive brown tie. My dad and auntie both blanched. Yup...it was the day that they buried him ( i did not know he was dead) only day my other grandparents ever babysat me in my whole life at our home.. and it was the exact description of the suit my father bought for his fathers burial. It had never been in our home. So yes. I believe (nothing has ever happened wooooo to me since)

gardeninggirl68 · 03/08/2021 19:28

@MyriadeOfThings

There are actually researchers trying to study that. As far as I know they haven't been able to understand the why or how. But they now have a long list of 'incidents' when children ahve been decsribing vefy specific things that the couldn't possibly have known about. Especially when it comes to things that their parents for example didn't know anything about etc...

dc2 used to say he could see ghosts. I have no idea of he could and what he saw but he was adamant.

oh where is the article about this? who is funding it?
NoLeafClover · 03/08/2021 19:30

No, I honestly don't believe that children see ghosts or spirits or whatever. It's a lovely idea, I'd love to believe in it.

My Granda died a few years ago. He and I were very close, we talked about anything and everything, went on days out together, I saw him almost every day for my whole life. He really was my very best friend. A week after he died, I remember saying to DH 'I've just had this sense of peace, like Granda was here with me, with his arm around me, telling me everything will be okay'. Obviously that was nonsense. I was exhausted, grief-stricken, and had had a couple of glasses of wine.

But if it was real, if he could really pop back for a visit, wouldn't he have done so again? Wouldn't he keep doing so? If ghosts were real, wouldn't they visit their loved ones instead of a strangers house, wouldn't they actually talk to their loved ones rather than just opening doors, or turning on taps, or moving hairbrushes around like the people with 'ghost stories' always claim they do?

Dead is dead. I really believe that people love on in our hearts and minds and memories. Granda is with me every single day, when I remember all the advice he gave me, everything he taught me, and I try to live my life in a way that would make him proud. So I definitely believe that our deceased live on in what they've taught us, but they're not floating around over your child's cot

Qwerty789 · 03/08/2021 19:31

No, your children cannot see ghosts and spirits, its just self indulgent woo nonsense.

TableFlowerss · 03/08/2021 20:14

If you’re suggesting anything supernatural then absolutely not. It’s as likely as me seeing fairies and unicorns at the end of my garden….

TableFlowerss · 03/08/2021 20:16

I’m astounded with scientific advances in 2021 that nearby half the voters agree with you.

Confused
TableFlowerss · 03/08/2021 20:16

nearly

Hissysnake · 03/08/2021 20:20

I definitely think children are more observant, less focused on what's in front of them etc. I've lived near Chester over 30s years, been shopping there so many times and my DS have noticed so many things I never had, like statues of people on the rows etc. Just because they're happy to let their eyes and minds wander.

I don't believe they can see or speak to the deceased anymore than adults can. I do believe adults can I they are willing to have an open mind.

secretintrovert · 03/08/2021 20:21

I agree OP! There is a house we walk past on our daily walks and every single time without fail my two year old stops points at the house and says "sad" and makes a sad face EVERY SINGLE TIME regardless of who is taking her for a walk. She then stares at the house for a long time and refuses to walk on. It's so weird because it's totally out of character for me she is normally happy cheerful chirpy and there are about 45 different houses we walk by on our walks but she seems obsessed with this one! Freaks me out.

TheVolturi · 03/08/2021 20:42

Well I think that there is far more to our existence than what we know. For example dogs sense of smell is far far stronger than ours, they can literally smell things that we never could, they can sense things, such as they will know that someone is going to arrive soon. We don't give this much thought, but how do they know these things? I think humans had much greater senses way back, in order to survive, but as we have evolved we've lost them because we don't need them now in the world we live today, not having to hunt wild animals for food etc. So who's to say that we don't still have the ability to see/smell/feel things that we can't usually see, and we maybe just need to tap into it somehow? Or some people just naturally have the gift.

TheVolturi · 03/08/2021 20:43

And I was in a 900 year old priory church a few weeks ago, and felt a hand on my arm 😱 😂

Kanaloa · 03/08/2021 20:45

I don’t think kids see stuff we don’t, they just talk more rubbish than we do. They have bigger imaginations, to them a shadow might seem like a figure - as adults we logically know that shadow in the room is caused by the dressing gown on the back of the door.

Kanaloa · 03/08/2021 20:46

And recognising/talking about dead family members is usually because they have heard adults doing so. It doesn’t mean the family member is visiting them - surely if you died you’d come back and visit someone you knew, not a child who hadn’t even been born when you died.

AngryWhompingWillow · 03/08/2021 20:52

@Opal93 100% agree!

Thanks for posting this thread. Smile I love stuff like this.

FastFood · 03/08/2021 20:58

If a baby crawls in my flat, they will probably be able to see under my sofa, and that won't be pretty.

FrangipaniDeLaSqueegeeMop · 03/08/2021 20:59

@TheVolturi

And I was in a 900 year old priory church a few weeks ago, and felt a hand on my arm 😱 😂
That was me. Sorry Wink
TheVolturi · 03/08/2021 21:03

Thank goodness for that 🤣🤣