To think ghost stories are BS, but my experience was a bit odd?

[BigMoan]

I moved into a 1950’s house previously occupied by a couple. They were the sole occupants since it was built. The husband died, and a few years later the wife moved to a care home. The house was then put on the market.

Our first night in the house, we’d put a car seat centrally on a table. It fell off.
Few days later, I heard our piano being played - I went in the room and no one was there.
Then a week or so later - daughter went to the bathroom, froze and said there’s someone in there. She described the person as a male, like a shadow and wearing a suit. I hadn’t mentioned anything about ghosts to her, and told her it was just a shadow - perhaps Daddy had walked past when she was about to go in. For a few weeks after she was scared of the bathroom, wanted an adult with her. And now - if ghosts come up in a book/on TV - she always refers back to this experience.

A few other weird things happened. And then nothing else. The house felt ‘creepy’ for a while. Absolutely nothing creepy about it now.

If course it’s ridiculous to think it was a ghost, but what was I experiencing? Was it just the strangeness of moving somewhere new? Just wondered if anyone else had had a similar experience?

As a teen we stayed in a holiday cottage in Cornwall. Absolutely beautiful and secluded.

Me and a friend shared a twin room with a fantastic view over a small field then the sea. No trees anywhere near. One night/early morn whilst it was pitch black outside there was a persistent tapping at the window. It was loud and urgent. We were both sound asleep but it woke us, and being in a deep sleep I thought it was my friend and told her to shut up. She said it's not me, then I was properly awake! She jumped out of bed, walked to the window and pulled the curtains back. Silence, and nothing was there.
We've couldn't explain it then, and I still can't.

@DinosApple

As a teen we stayed in a holiday cottage in Cornwall. Absolutely beautiful and secluded.

Me and a friend shared a twin room with a fantastic view over a small field then the sea. No trees anywhere near. One night/early morn whilst it was pitch black outside there was a persistent tapping at the window. It was loud and urgent. We were both sound asleep but it woke us, and being in a deep sleep I thought it was my friend and told her to shut up. She said it's not me, then I was properly awake! She jumped out of bed, walked to the window and pulled the curtains back. Silence, and nothing was there.
We've couldn't explain it then, and I still can't.

Could it have been a nocturnal bird tapping on the window with its beak? Maybe trying to catch an insect? Can understand why it would have been scary though.

One night/early morn whilst it was pitch black outside there was a persistent tapping at the window. It was loud and urgent. We were both sound asleep but it woke us, and being in a deep sleep I thought it was my friend and told her to shut up. She said it's not me, then I was properly awake! She jumped out of bed, walked to the window and pulled the curtains back. Silence, and nothing was there.
We've couldn't explain it then, and I still can't.

That happened to me a lot when I was working night shifts in a 16th century manor house. Freaky, no? It was a raven. There was something in the resin used to seal the window panes into the frames and he was pecking at that. Tended to do it just before dawn, when it was still dark. Ravens are intelligent and there's something a bit malevolent about them, so perhaps he was trying to freak me out.

[quote BobbieT1999]@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER
I’ve often wondered how birds just know how to build a nest, even quite intricate ones, like weaver birds make. It’s not as if they go to classes or can ask YouTube

No, they use Twitter![/quote]
😂

Re animals dreaming, though, anyone who’s had a dog must have experienced the same as we did with our last. It was so funny to watch - she’d be fast asleep but her paws were going as if she was running, and she was making little barking noises. We often wondered whether she was dreaming of chasing something, or being chased.

In the old Disney Cinderella film, there’s a sequence of the dog Bruno, doing exactly the same.

@BertramLacey

One night/early morn whilst it was pitch black outside there was a persistent tapping at the window. It was loud and urgent. We were both sound asleep but it woke us, and being in a deep sleep I thought it was my friend and told her to shut up. She said it's not me, then I was properly awake! She jumped out of bed, walked to the window and pulled the curtains back. Silence, and nothing was there. We've couldn't explain it then, and I still can't.

That happened to me a lot when I was working night shifts in a 16th century manor house. Freaky, no? It was a raven. There was something in the resin used to seal the window panes into the frames and he was pecking at that. Tended to do it just before dawn, when it was still dark. Ravens are intelligent and there's something a bit malevolent about them, so perhaps he was trying to freak me out.

I remember I was waiting in my DH’s office for him when a seagull started tapping on the window. DH came and we started walking down the corridor towards the lift and we could see through open doors the seagull following us on the ledge outside the window tapping all the time. Bit Hitchcockian!

@Kanaloa It was infrasound caused by a ceiling fan. Infrasound is well known to cause visual disturbances and feelings of unease.

I'm another who believes in something, but don't think we'll ever fully understand what it is. I used to think it could be like a visual echo of the past.

I'm saying this as someone who hasn't had much experience with "ghostly" goings on, but I know too many people who have and one in particular who I trust 100% and actually doesn't like talking about their experiences in case it gets in peoples heads and scares them. It's their partner who tries to bring out the stories. All happened in one very old house. Everyone I know who has stayed there has had some kind of unexplained experience. I have never stayed.

The only sort of personal experience I have had, was with dd when she was a toddler. She kept seeing a man at the bottom of my in laws garden, with white hair and....white eyes she said his name. It wasn't an imaginary friend thing. She just saw him occasionally. Wasn't talking to or playing with him. Then a few months later, fil said that there was a man who lived there before them with white hair (obviously very common!) who died in the house and his name was the same. He didn't know what dd had been saying. It just came up when he said a single or widowed man had died in the house, which then led me to ask more questions.

My personal opinion is that the feeling of a "cold" or an "uncomfortable presence" in a specific location is due to an emotional residue. Where a person has suffered a physically or emotionally painful event that has left behind an atmosphere or feeling to that location, much like a physical residue if they have scratched their initials into the woodwork. Over time this fades however the ghost story or story of a bad event continues (and gets embellished- ( headless horseman stories etc).

The sightings of a deceased person or in OPs case a non existent bleeping alarm clock is due to a time residue or time blip associated with a specific location where events from the past are momentarily replayed in the present. Sometimes people can get a vague feel of a time residue or blip involving themselves which is explained as a deja vue.

In the case of seeing deceased people, they rarely interact with the present day person because it's a simple replay of a past event - just like watching an old movie. Again these events fade over time although the stories may persist. However there are claimed cases of children talking or interacting to these time blip people although that is much more unclear and unexplained.

I grew up with my grandparents, in a house built in the late 1800s.

They purchased it in the 70s and they knew within days something was there.

My Grandad (a very practical, rational, business man) was tapped on the shoulder when nobody else was in often, coins he put on their bedroom windowsill would fly off when they were in bed and hit them.

He was sat up late one night watching TV when he saw a black figure sat in the rocking chair by the back door, he turned to look at it face on and the figure moved very fast across the living room, the chair was rocking and he could not explain it.

My Grandmother also heard and felt things.

When I was a little girl I told them, and I remember it vividly, that a kind lady had sat on the end of my bed to read me a story. They told me I was dreaming and I didn't find out any of these stories until I was in my teens.

After my Great Grandmother died, it got very bad, I was 17 and home from college eating lunch when all the doors in the hallway were opening and closing (not quietly, banging as if forced) all of them at the same time. I was so scared, I went and sat in the garden (back doors were in the lounge at the back of the house, hallway was at the front) and stayed there until my Grandmother come home.

My aunt and I were in the office at the front of the house when we both saw a school photo of my cousin come off the wall in the hall, and lane by the front door (about 3 foot away). When we went into the hall, it was actually down the opposite end (we had both seen it go the opposite way).

My Grandparwnts called a priest in to bless the house and again it got worse, the kettle tipping over with boiling water in it etc.

My Grandad passed away of cancer and I moved out and got married. One night, my Grandmother called me gone 11pm in tears asking me to go and pick her up because the hallway doors were banging loudly, repeatedly just like they'd done to me all those years before.

My Husband and I went to pick her up and I let myself in with my key, all of the doors were wide open, paper was all over the floor of the hall and the toiletries in the bathroom were all in the bath.

My Grandmother never went back, she couldn't cope with it on her own, she stayed with me until an annexe was built on my Aunts home and the house was put up for sale.

I often drive past and wonder what the new owners have experienced.

DS was in intensive care on a ventilator. Had loose stool so transfered to a room. Once in the room his heart rate dropped very low and he started misbehaving on the ventilator. Physio came in cold wet hands on his chest..... all resolved. Alarms went off outside the room.... I was left for maybe a minute.... stood looking at DS and then I noticed a small blond boy stood next to me with a brown striped long sleeve t shirt and some cords. He was looking at DS with me....looked again and the kid was gone!! I'd had a stressful 2 weeks in PICU...just put it down to that! I spoke to one of the nurses I had become friendly with... she knew the boy snd had worked on him.....he died in this room.

DM died snd some of her jewelry was missing.....I had two dreams were DM has told me were noth items of jewelry were....one was In her car and another was in a suitcase in the spare room !

@1dayatatime

I agree that there are different types.

I find this difficult because despite my post up thread I don’t really believe in ghosts.

I believe I have had 3 possible ghost sightings/ hallucinations in my life though.

I saw a ghost many years ago on a bright August day. A black figure in heavy coat walking very slowly. I was preparing to step in if he needed help, but he vanished. In hindsight he was a bit blurry around the edges and I couldn’t really make out any features.

The second was a young girl at a Travelodge in the North West. Small fair haired dirty faced girl in very dirty clothes. I remember thinking her filthy apron/pinny was unbleached cotton. She was very very clear.Then she disappeared. I felt at the time she was interested in my electrical items which were on the table next to me.

The last one was a couple of years ago, shortly after my step father died. In that case it was a sort of disembodied head. Not scary like someone beheaded. More like sort of melted into the surroundings. This was on a clear autumn morning.

I also felt my dead cat run down the stairs after me and whoosh past. Even heard the stairs creak. It was so real I thought it was my new cat but he was asleep.

Perhaps these are all hallucinations. I don’t know.

My husband has night terrors occasionally, i tell him there’s nothing there and to go back to sleep. It must be frightening because he thinks what he sees is real at the time.

Once though he insisted there was a black shape moving on the ceiling. I looked up expecting to tell him there was nothing there and to go to sleep. But I could see it too! It was a blob a foot across moving from left to right. I didn’t tell him though. So maybe a joint hallucination.

@OldTinHat

Yes that was it! Forgive me I’m not the scientific type as you can obviously tell 😂 it stuck with me and I found it so interesting. So often we try to ascribe these things to the supernatural without really taking into account the wonder of what our minds can do!

@BigMoan

I’d say after a few months of living here, all the strange experiences stopped. Which - when I reflect on them now - makes me feel a bit ridiculous for thinking anything about ghosts.

He stayed behind to check that you were nice pezople. He was happy after a little while that you were and so he has gone. Or he was waiting for his wife to die in the care home. Once she did he could collect her and go. Do you know whether she has died and when .

Very, very many people experience seeing and / or hearing people just before, or just after they die. Often this is short-lived. But my neighbour still sees his mother in the house, after twenty-two years. Not only this, but his wife, who did not know her, sees her too.

I've experienced super natural phenomena all my life and have come to accept it. I've noticed that my daughters also have this ability. I don't know what the point of it is and wish I did know. I'm in a career that is very evidence based so I'm no stranger to logic and reason. Mostly I just ignore it and don't tell people but I have had countless experiences over the years.

As a child I was woken by a rhythmical scrapping noise, there was a picture on the wall swinging back & forth. I sat up and watched it then it slowly stopped. I reached up to push it, it made the same noise but didn’t swing. (Definitely wasn’t a dream)

I lived in a flat in Cheltenham with my first husband. The flat had a funny feel, as if you would see something if you walked around a corner too quickly.I always shut the bathroom door if I had a bath , even though we were the only people there, as I felt someone was watching me. Three particularly odd things happened. First. I woke up one morning and an old woman in modern clothes stood up at the end of the bed, stood for a moment and then faded away.
Second one. My husband worked until about 9 some nights. I was sitting on the sofa one evening with my back to the window and the path to our basement flat. Out if the corner of my eye I saw him walk down the last bit of the path and into our porch area. I turned to look at the door and shouted "Hello". There was nobody there.
Third. We were having an argument one evening about something and nothing. All of a sudden a book leapt off the shelf and hit the floor. It didn't fall, it flew.
We had a cat whilst we were there. She used to sit and watch something walk across the floor many times. I couldn't see anything , she certainly could.

@BigMoan

I moved into a 1950’s house previously occupied by a couple. They were the sole occupants since it was built. The husband died, and a few years later the wife moved to a care home. The house was then put on the market. Our first night in the house, we’d put a car seat centrally on a table. It fell off. Few days later, I heard our piano being played - I went in the room and no one was there. Then a week or so later - daughter went to the bathroom, froze and said there’s someone in there. She described the person as a male, like a shadow and wearing a suit. I hadn’t mentioned anything about ghosts to her, and told her it was just a shadow - perhaps Daddy had walked past when she was about to go in. For a few weeks after she was scared of the bathroom, wanted an adult with her. And now - if ghosts come up in a book/on TV - she always refers back to this experience.

A few other weird things happened. And then nothing else. The house felt ‘creepy’ for a while. Absolutely nothing creepy about it now.

If course it’s ridiculous to think it was a ghost, but what was I experiencing? Was it just the strangeness of moving somewhere new? Just wondered if anyone else had had a similar experience?

Why is it ridiculous to think it may have been a ghost? How else do you explain it?

It’s ridiculous to think it was a ghost because most adults don’t really believe in ghosts and there’s never been any evidence that they exist?

And as for how to explain it if not a supernatural occurrence - you move into a house where you know the previous occupant died, you admit it felt ‘creepy.’ Your mind knows someone died there and it’s creepy so it plays tricks on you and makes you feel nervy and scared. Something falls and you think ‘but I’m sure I put it in the middle of the table, how did it fall?’ You hear a noise and convince yourself you didn’t doze off and imagine it because the house already feels scary/creepy.

As for a child saying they saw a ghost - kids say stuff. They have huge imaginations and a new house could easily stir up spooky feelings and maybe have them imagining things.

@SmellyOldOwls That’s so odd, my 2yo did the exact same thing a few months ago. Would be tracking something moving around the room/ceiling, then wave her hand in front of her face as if it was coming towards her and she was batting it away. 100% wasn’t a fly or anything like that, I tried to keep looking where she was looking but nothing was there. If I was giving her a bottle, she’d point behind me. Only lasted a week or so, but really unnerved me!

I'm on the fence on whether our brains are creating things or if there is something else (like timeslips etc)

I had a lot of strange experiences towards the end of my mums life, that I cannot explain, but I will never forget seeing her driving as I was on the way to her funeral.
I was in the front passenger seat and saw clear as day my mum join the roundabout in a white cleo (she drove one about 15 years ago), heading in the direction of her old house. It was her- the same hunched close the steering wheel peering through her glasses, nervously trying to join the traffic. I couldn't take my eyes off her, just absolutely gobsmacked.

I lived in a haunted house for over 10 years as a child. Lots of things happened, including flying shirts. My father wouldn't admit what was happening until several years after we moved house.

@DrCoconut
I'm so glad you told the story of your cat 🐱 visitation as a very similar thing happened to me at Christmas.
I was curled up I'll in bed with Omicron. I felt my cat jump on my bed and he proceeded to walk up and down behind my back occasionally clawing the blankets. I kept telling him to settle down! In the end I sat up to cuddle him and no one was there.
My actual cat had been downstairs with my son asleep on the sofa.
This had to my beautiful Beau that died 8 years ago. I felt so blessed. I now know with all my heart that they never stop loving us.

I don't really hold any beliefs; just more open-minded and accepting I don't really have any answers.
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My dad was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer 2 days after I found out I was pregnant with my second child. When she was born we named her his nickname. 6 weeks after she was born, we were told he was deteriorating rapidly and I should come over. I took my daughter with me and spent the day there before I took her home for the night. At about 10pm, for the first time, she looked at me and smiled. 3 minutes later my sister called me to say he had passed away a few minutes before.

Probably coincidence, but it did give me a little comfort that maybe his energy was communicating something.

Half of me things it might be something supernatural, the other half that it is all in our heads. I listened to a podcast in which this lady in the US was talking about a sleep-related hallucination disorder she had (parasomnia?) which made her hallucinate apparitions that were complex and startlingly real, such as an old ‘colonial’ woman. She said that whenever she heard about people seeing ghosts she automatically believed it to be down to sleep hallucination and she didn’t believe in ghosts. I feel that our minds are much more powerful than we realise!