To start the spooky stories thread?

[SurpriseItsMeHorseyNeighNeigh]

Of course I'm not, it's Halloween, let's get scared.

So what is the spookiest/most unexplainable experience you had? We're talking paranormal here.

Can somebody please debunk these for me I hate them 😭

My mum used to work as a cleaner in our local primary school before she retired. It was the school I went to when I was little and was a tiny building with an old school house attached built in 1858. I'm 40 now and my mum only retired a few years back so she had worked there for years as the only cleaner and always would work until around 7pm.
The school was unaltered when I was little but over the years has expanded with a new sports hall and canteen area and has been modernised throughout.
My mum is the most no nonsense, tough character out. She is rarely scared of anything or anyone. The school has always been a bit spooky. I could be here all day describing things that have gone on, but it would always be fairly mild. Books would fall off of shelves when my mum left the room -shelves that were slanted upwards so books couldn't fall off. She would see shadows of people walking up the stairs and along the landing of the old school house and hear whispering and footsteps. Doors would be open when they should be shut.
Mum would just put up with it. She said it never felt bad; I can back this up as I would often wait with her while she cleaned after school and would sit in the library area and read. It used to freak my dad out a bit if he came to see how she was doing, but nothing worried mum. She'd been there so long it was just normal.
Anyway, years went on and the school expanded like I mentioned earlier. The sports hall area was a big addition and more work for mum so she would often be late and working well after dark. It's hard to describe, but the hall felt bad. It had a weird energy despite being brand new and modern and mum often felt really uncomfortable there. There was a corridor part towards the glass entry and exit doors -you would round a corner and then walk along the corridor. Mum started to have a real problem with the corner. She absolutely swears that someone or something would stick their head around the corner as she was in the corridor. Just a quick glance and then back in, she would catch it from the corner of her eye. This is the first time I've ever seen my mum scared -she hated it, but carried on for a while. Then one night she absolutely swears that a man stepped fully from around the corner for just a second and made a noise at her. She said it felt awful, ominous and angry. She left immediately. She retired not long afterwards. She isn't someone who typically believes in the paranormal, she isn't religious or someone who would make things up. I wonder if the new building works upset someone or something at the school or if it was all just a trick of the light or fear. Who knows.

Once, I woke up in the middle of the night to use the toilet. The house was in darkness. As I walked out of my bedroom, I could see what looked like glow in the dark writing on the walls but it wasn’t English. (I don’t speak or read any other languages). It looked like some sort of hieroglyphics. I blinked a couple of times and it was still there. I turned the light on and off, still there. It faded after about 5 minutes. I tried explaining what I saw to my family and they just looked at me like I was crazy. I googled it and several others have had this experience. I still can’t explain it several years later but remember it vividly.

Every summer holiday when I was 17-20 my family would go on holiday for the six weeks and I would stay in the house to look after the dogs and chickens.
I used to pick the fruit from the orchard and make jam. One night, I ran out of jar lids, so left it and before I went to bed I fastened all the lids I did have, onto empty jars, so I wouldn't misplace them in the morning.

Next day nobody but me and two dogs had been in the house.
Every jam jar that I had "lidded" now contained a big and very dead black house spider.

Absolutely were not there when I left them because I'm terrified of spiders.

Following with great interest.

Sure. None of them have any grounding in fact or reality at all. The experiences are no doubt true (except maybe anything second-hand, third-hand etc) but what the experiences show is that coincidence and the human mind can be very misleading.

Woo is poo.

Is there a rational way my phone call from my mum’s could have happened?

My grandad passed away on the landing/top of the stairs outside my bedroom when I was 7 (he was staying with us and sleeping in my room as he was poorly, I was topping and tailing with my brothers).

A few years later, I woke one night to see him standing on the landing/top of the stairs - it was just a black silhouette but it was unmistakably my grandad. I didn't feel frightened and just went back to sleep.

Years later, my brothers and I were talking and my eldest brother told us about him seeing grandad's silhouette at the top of the stairs one evening when he was a teenager, he'd glanced up the stairs on his way out of the house and saw the same silhouette I saw all those years ago.

Neither of us had mentioned our encounters at the time but we both knew it was grandad and felt comforted by his presence

Shameless place marking, love these threads

Can’t say. I don’t know all the details. Though I looked back and did read your post.

Your experience reminds me of a story from the US. A much-loved grandmother died and was buried with her mobile phone. The family thought it would be comforting to be able to send her texts, even if they knew she was dead.

After a few months of ‘hope you’re well on the other side’ and ‘how is heaven? we all really miss you’ messages, granny started replying: ‘oh it’s lovely here, don’t worry about me’ etc.

Turned out the phone company had recycled the number and whoever was getting the family’s texts to granny had twigged what had happened and made some mischief.

@Time40 I love Danny Robins with one B 🤣. Cannot wait till the 13th when the series starts.

I have a few, from my mum or Grandmother (I've never seen anything..)

My Grandmother lived in terraced housing. Apparently an exorcism (or similar?) was held in the house next door. My Grandmother, one evening, ran upstairs (her staircase curves round at the top) and in the gloom she ran into something totally solid (and pitch black amongst the gloom) that was figure-shaped. It disappeared a split second later. She doesn't like to talk about it!

Aren't skinwalkers only found in the US in Navajo culture? They are supposed to be people who practice witchcraft which enables them to take the shape of an animal.

IIRC they are only in certain states. Arizona and Utah among them. They only tend to go after people with Native American culture. That's what the lore around them says anyway.

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Either way, try not to think about them too much. Someone else has stated "the more you think or talk about them, the closer they get." So either way, no use..

I had a simikar experience as well, i e. Unlucky place where nothing seemed to go well.

I love these threads, but have also never really understood why everyone is so frightened of the Savernake Forest story - it wasn't scary at all because it was clearly made up. The more subtle stuff is spookier. My personal favourite was the alcove story, as it went in a different direction to what I was expecting. It was probably made up too, but it was better than Savernake Forest. Off to look for the alcove story now!

Here - alcove - better than Savernake!

I've told this on here before but it is still something that we can't explain!

When DH and I first moved in together we moved in to a church/monastery that had been demolished apart from the outside and then nice apartments had been built in like the shell of this old building.

We had seen a few apartments up for rent in this building and always missed out on getting one, so when one came up on Rightmove we jumped at the chance to move in and just called the agent and said we'd rent it without viewing first. I know that wasn't a very smart move but this building was beautiful and but he apartments were all similar and we'd seen 5 before now.

We move in and everything is great. It was a duplex apartment with the bedroom and a bathroom upstairs. The downstairs was an open plan area with a big island in the middle with the oven and hob built in to it. At the back of the kitchen was a small alcove/corridor. Maybe about ten steps from the end of the kitchen to the end of this little part. There were two stone steps leading down to it and the floor was stone with old brick walls. We assumed it was just a bit of character left in from the refurbishment of the old building and loved it.

When friends came over we used to use the alcove bit to hang up coats. There wasn't a light there during the day the light from the big windows lit it up but of a night it would get quite dark. After a few weeks I started to feel uneasy being home alone, especially if I was standing in the kitchen part. The end of the island was where the hob and oven was and the alcove started directly opposite the end of the island. So if I was cooking it was behind me to the left. I had my back to it. I mentioned this to a few friends and they said that they always felt scared going to get coats and bags but just thought that was because it was dark. Another thing too, in front of hob was a sort of half wall that went from the island counter top all the way up to the ceiling so say if you were stood in certain parts of living room area you couldn't see the oven or see the alcove part.

One day, DH was sat on the couch and I was cooking. I could see him from where I was standing. I was looking at the pan and then suddenly felt someone grab my left shoulder. I thought it was DH so I turned but no one was there. I turned again and DH was still sat down. There was no way he could have done it. I told him what had happened and he said that had happened to him a few times while he had been stood there.

Our 6 month contract ended and we decided to move as I had a new job. The agents were showing someone around and we were on our way out when we bumped in to them in the corridor. They were showing a friend of a friend around so we had a little chat and they later rented it out.

We bumped in to them a few months later and asked how they were enjoying it there and they said they loved it but asked if we found the kitchen drafty. I said no but always thought the alcove bit was a bit chilly. They looked a bit puzzled and asked me when I meant. I explained where I meant and they said "There's just a wall there. There's always just been a wall there." I asked if it had been put up perhaps after we moved and they said that it wasn't there when they looked around and that they would absolutely remember seeing that.

We went home and looked back through photos and in the six months we'd lived there all the photos we'd taken hadn't included that part. There were photos where the wall by the oven had covered where it had been. Nobody else seemed to have captured this mysterious corner of the apartment apart from one who had taken a photo from the front of the island but half of the photo where it would have been was just black.

I went on this persons Facebook to see photos and there was one of them sat on the island with their keys with the entire back wall of the kitchen behind them- no alcove at all. They moved in the day after we left so there wouldn't have been time to put up a new wall.

DH and I were so confused but then we thought about it more and realised that the entire inside of the building had been removed so why would there be an old brick and stone part?

We looked back at the pictures the estate agent had put on and there weren't any that included that area so couldn't tell if it was there or not.

I honestly don't know what it was or if we all imagined it. There is just no explanation for it at all but I'm just glad that my friends and DH had at least seen it too!

Ahh I remember you posting this before! Fucking terrifying!

This was just over 20 years ago in my late teens. It was August and I was staying at my then boyfriend's house; he worked on the family farm and had a cottage next to the farm house. It was harvest and due to weather, he was working through the night. The combining had been done in field 9 and was up there alone baling the straw alone (while I was snuggled in bed!). It was around 2am and I he came bursting in calling my name. Obviously panicked and expecting an accident I come rushing and he tells me to put a jumper and shoes on and follow him. I keep saying why, why, why but he just shakes his head and paces in the kitchen until I do as I'm told.

I follow him out to the tractor in the lane, get in and we set off. He starts giggling and says he has seen legs. You can imagine me - what legs, where, an accident, blood, ae they ok, a mannequin, are you winding me up, this isn't funny, I'm tired etc. Then he explains...

He was in the top-ish corner of the field, lights on, following the straight line of cut straw when he's seen something in the field. As he gets closer he says it looks exactly like a pair of legs and boots but cut at the waist (never mentioned any gore) and they were stood up but moving, like they were doing the twist but slowly and with no fucking torso or head. And he needs me to see it too. After about 10 mins we get to the field but I can hardly fucking breath by this point and start saying to go back, go back (I'm a lot braver now!). We're both in hysterics and he does turn round. On the way back, we ring his uncle who is in the main farm house (think we just needed an adult!) and he says he is on his way and meets us in his pickup halfway back to the farm. I get in the pick up and the two of them go back to the field. I drove back to the cottage and got inside and locked the door shaking. Only about 10 mins later the tractor comes roaring in at full speed both hop out and run into their own houses. He says it was still there but he doesn't want to talk about it and they didn't get out but got closer and could not see it as anything other than someone stood there doing the twist without anything above the belly button. I knew it was serious because the baler was left in the field and the tractor was left out and that was a big no no.

He's up a couple of hours later - he slept but i bloody couldn't and went back to finish up and said there was nothing there in the light of day. We broke up not long after (well, we already had broken up but I was still in love so hanging around in hope - remember I was very young!). And neither he nor Ed would talk about it, just brushed it off as a laugh with one of those 'shut up now' expressions. So I don't know if they ever investigated another night or the following harvest.

I hadn't heard any ghost stories about the place but I don't think there's any farm that doesn't have a history of accidents/ warning stories to stop kids playing around dangerous things. Maybe there was an old farmer who had been scythed in half in field nine. Maybe it was prank with an old scarecrow. Maybe it was a feed bag trapped on a stick in a funny spot. I did find the whole place scary after dark and heard some weird noises but that's pretty normal in an old house in the middle of nowhere. I really wish I had gone and seen for myself because I haven't seen anything else, ever.

The scariest part of this story though, is that 20 years ago was early 00s, not the 80s 😱

I get this thing when I'm asleep sometimes where it feels like someone is clinging onto me from the back. I can feel their hands clinging to me. It feels so realistic and I'm screaming and wake up my kids. I never see the person but one time they were making an evil snarling noise. I think it's happened since dh died 5 years ago.

@Vebrithien i have seen a similar human shaped black ‘thing’ in the woods about 20 years ago. It was just an absence of light in the shape of a human, blacker than any black ought to be. It was about five foot in front of my face and was emanating evil. I’ve still not been back in those woods

I used to live in york

One night,many years ago (about 11/11:30pm) I was walking up micklegate-towards micklegate bar with my then boyfriend

If you don't know york,it has what's called 'the bar walls' which used to be the original york

Anyway,it has massive gaps in the wall where traffic can pass through (I'm guessing for people travelling to 'old york' on foot/horse and cart/horse and carriage but now cars and other forms of traffic)

Above the 'gap' is old glass windows (it is clear it used to be like a flat but is now not accessible to the public) and this night,I happened to just glance up

There was a little blonde girl in the window,crying her eyes out

I saw her-my ex saw her too but before we could do anything,she vanished

Being teens we just put it down to a trick of the light/beer we'd drank and walked on

Earlier this year I was scrolling YouTube and came across a video of 'ghosts of york' so clicked on it

The first story that came up was a tale of a gatekeeper of the walls who lived there with his family

They'd thrown a birthday party for their dd and somehow the dad had lost the set of keys he used to lock the walls on a night

The family where thrown out onto the streets and they staved to death

A picture of the dd came on the screen

I swear it was the little girl we'd saw that night-same clothing,hair style/colour and age

My dad and i where once walking past an old building near the minster

We both saw a little girl,sat in a window,again sobbing her eyes out

Dad waited with then baby dd while I knocked on the door to let the owners know their dd was sat at the window,clearly upset

They answered and when I told them,they said 'oh,you've seen her then?'

Turns out,a lot of people have seen her-she was locked in the room when the plague was rife-i think she caught it and was locked in to help stop it spreading-an old form of self shelding I guess

She's often seen,sobbing away while watching people walk past

I was once in the golden fleece-you walk into the first bar and down a corridor to the second

I was about 3 steps into the corridor,when someone grabbed the back of my top and threw me down it-I landed in a heap

Nobody at all behind me

We where once in the black bouy pub in Hull

My exs mum used to work there so we'd rocked up before opening to give her some money

My kids where waiting with me for her when ds asked who the 'Mr in the corner was'

Looked up and there was what looked like a pirate stood looking at us-he slowly faded away and we got the hell out if there!

We all saw him-and exs mum didn't seem surprised when we told her-just shrugged it off as a trick of the light/vivid imaginations

A few days later we went shopping in the prospect centre

My boys needed the toilet and where just old enough to go in without me-i was just outside

They went in and shot out about a minute later-both white as sheets

They both swore up and down they'd seen a 'Mr in army uniform but was missing a leg and on old crutches' as they'd turned to leave

Still bloody spooked about the pub,I googled the place

It used to be a hospital in either ww1 or ww2 (I can't remember) for soldiers who where injured in action

Moved away and not seen anything since!

I used to live in York too but never had any experiences. I even lived inside the walls for a year and was only haunted by hen parties 😂Favourite city ever, though. I think you can 'feel' history without it being paranormal - especially in places like Coppergate. But can't explain the little girl you saw :(

My XMIL lives just outside the walls and says she woke on the sofa to see Romans marching through with their knees at ground level to reflect the change in pavement height. This is a really common type of citing but does that means it happens a lot or inspires a lot of dreams/hallucinations? And why do they respect the pavement heights but no other laws of physics?!

I'm local too and now I'm too scared to go out after dark 😬