Close Encounters of the ghostly kind?

[JohnW]

OK, seeing we have a thread about ghosts, how about some related first hand experiences. How many of our posters actually believe in ghosts? Which of us will say there is no such thing and it's all imagination?

I personally am the biggest sceptic on the planet when it comes to things like this. I have great trouble believing in things I can't see and have no evidence of. Many people throughout my life, people for whom I had great respect told me of their ghostly encounters and, although I listened politely, and didn't consider they were actually lying, I did not believe that they had seen what they considered they had seen.

However, whilst on holiday in Ibiza with my former spouse around 17 years ago that changed somewhat! The last night of the holiday dawned. We knew we were travelling the next day and I hate to travel hung over so I did not have a lot to drink and I think we probably hit the sack before midnight. I awoke just as dawn had broken, so it was light in the room but not bright sunlight. The room had twin beds. I looked over at my wife's bed and there she was stood at the side of it and I had the impression that she was packing her suitcase. I was just about to ask her why she was up so early to pack, as we were not due to leave the hotel until around 11 am., when I noticed that she was actually still in the bed. The '"woman" was stood over her looking down at her lying in the bed. I looked at the woman and she glanced up towards me and then started to fade away. She had totally faded within about 3 seconds. The whole incident lasted no more than 20 or 30 seconds. I actually lay there in disbelief and I did not tell my wife until years later in case she thought I had gone completely barmy. I did not go back to sleep so this was not a dream. As I said, I had very little to drink the previous night so I wasn't loaded. To this day I am unsure about what I saw. I am still not certain I believe in ghosts even though I suppose people who do believe will tell me I have seen one. Strange, very, very, strange.

The only other type of experience I have had which I cannot fully explain is as follows.
My mother preceded my father in death by about two and a half years. About three days after his funeral (1995) I went to bed as usual around midnight. I turned out the light, lay down and closed my eyes. As soon as I closed them this television type screen appeared. Bright, vivid and sharp. My father was on screen and he had just met my mother. They were surrounded by darkness but were clearly visible. In life, my mother had relied heavily upon my father and was a bit of a pessimist really. My father was looking back, and the impression I had was that he was looking at the earth. He asked my mother, "Will they be alright?" to which my mother replied, "Of course they will, they're coming here." For her to be reassuring my father was a total role reversal. The "TV" went blank and I opened my eyes, turned on the light and looked at the clock. I had been in bed less than 2 minutes. I most certainly had not been asleep.

I have had the "TV" effect four or five times since, but never seen anyone who was known to me, just figures I did not recognise. The screen appears instantly when I close my eyes and can last for 1 or 2 minutes.

OK, now, nobody send for the big yellow taxi and do not use these things against me at my insanity hearing.

Actually, this may be on the wrong thread category, maybe a moderator could move it to somewhere more appropriate.

[janet]

I am a big believer in the spirit world, always have been. I too have had wierd things happen. Does not worry me about when i die, just so long as it's not painfull.Because i'm sure life goes on.

[WillowTheWhisp]

Like you Janet I am sure life goes on and I have no worries at all about being dead ........... the actual dying bit I'm not so sure about. I'd like it to be as painless as possible. I've had one or two experiences. The most recent one was the photograph I posted of the strange glow on my daughter's bed in the B&B where we stayed at half term.

In 1986 my late husband and I stayed in a cottage near Weston-super-Mare. We had originally booked a holiday flat but the owner phoned us and asked if we would swap as the people booked into the cottage had changed their minds and would prefer the flat. The cottage was dearer but he said we could have it at the same price because of the inconvenience. We didn't really mind the inconvenience because it looked a much better choice than the flat.

It had been two small cottages (one up one down) which had been knocked through into one and a kitchen extension added. So downstairs we had a sitting room, dining room and kitchen and upstairs two bedrooms and a bathroom. The only apparent oddity was that you couldn't get from bedroom two to the bathroom without coming down a very narrow steep open stairs into the dining room, going through the sitting room and up the other stairs by the kitchen to a small landing which led to bedroom 1 and the bathroom. We didn't really mind that because we weren't using that room anyway.

The dining room was up a couple of steps and the door between that and the sitting room was on a sneck. It didn't matter how carefully we made sure it was closed before we went out (on the sneck) it was always open when we came back in. The first evening we had a meal in there, but after that we used the sitting room and a small table because the dining room was too cold, even though this was midsummer.

One evening my husband went upstairs for a bath and I was watching TV. I went into the dining room to get some cutlery and as I was standing at the dresser I heard footsteps overhead and creaking boards. I thought nothing of it, imagining it was Peter walking from bathroom to bedroom. It wasn't until I got back in the sitting room that I realised he couldn't have walked from the bathroom across that floor because there was no upstairs access to that room. As I went into the kitchen I could hear him singing in the bath!

When he came down I told him about the footsteps and he suggested maybe it had been a sound from the neighbours (we lived in a terraed house so hearing sounds from the neighbours was quite common) but I pointed out that the cottage was detatched.

I never went up into that room again. I sent him up to get something I'd left in there.

One day one of the villagers asked us if we were staying in "the haunted cottage" and asked if she could come inside. She didn't want to go into the "haunted side" though - just the sitting room and kitchen. We asked her who or what was supposed to haunt the place and she said she was hoping we could tell her because nobody had ever seen it. All they'd ever experienced was the cold and the sounds of footsteps in the bedroom.

[janet]

I once lived in the flat above the hairdressers on within grove,huncoat.I could always feel as i was being watched when entering and going up the stairs. The kitchen cupboards would be open when i returned from work even the ones that i could not reach unless stood on a stool, you had to really pull on them to open because they were that stiff.I had a bag of food moved from the kitchen stool, and found the bag on the toilet floor. The cat i had at the time used to get very spooked, it would look into thin air arch it's back and spit then would run down the stairs, believe me it used to scare the hell out of me.My sister lived with me there for a few months and always said she felt someone had died in the bath room,she would not have a bath unless i was in the flat, she did not tell me about that till years later. I also used to hear a old fashioned clock striking on the hour but only heard it during the night, it was coming from the living room which was next to my bedroom.I ended up very bad with my nerves and lost most of my hair, but the thing was when i told people about the flat they just thought i was barmy. I lived there for two years think that was in 1977

[jelly baby]

I too had strange experience. In August 1980 I was rushed into hospital for a serious operation. My neighbour kindly looked after my 2 yr old son as my husband was on shifts. When I came home we decided to take neighbour & her husband Kevin for a meal to say thanks, and chose to go to the Red Pump at Bashall Eaves. After an excellent meal, we set off home asking Kev to drive carefully as I was still experiencing quite a lot of post - op pain. We were driving along steadily, when all of a sudden Kev braked hard throwing all of us forward. He jumped out of the car and began looking round, my husband followed asking what the hell was he doing as he knew I still wasn't 100%, Kev said he thought he'd run over someone, that he'd seen a woman walking at the side of the road and she stepped right out in front of him and he'd hit her. Well, they searched all round the car and at the side of the road and there was nothing. There was nothing reported in the papers either.
Now Kev is not a man to make things up, he is the type that believes after death is like before birth - nothing. We have never been able to find out what it was he saw, but he remains convinced, even after all this time, that he did see a woman in front of his car that night.

[rockrabbit]

i definately believe in ghosts my works is right next to the old kearns allen mill which freaks me out every morning walking down past it in the dark get the feeling at times of being watched .Spoke to quite a few mediums online and going to see derek acorah at the blackpool grand theatre this saturday

[JohnW]

Where do you work Rockrabbit? I had two grandmothers who worked at Kearns Allen's when I was a kid and I regularly popped in to see them after school when I attended St. John's.

[Margaret Pilkington]

I beleive in spirits......my husband and I were staying in Torremolinos and I woke up very early one morning and couldn't get back to sleep so I thought I would go and sit on the balcony and watch the sun come up.......I was sat there quietly gazing out to sea when the smell of cigarette smoke drifted my way (neither my husband or I smoke) I turned around and in the half light I could see the glow of a cigarette and the silhoutte of my Dad (who had died some 3 years earlier) he looked at me and said
'Your Mum is here' and then faded away.
The following day there was a knock on our hotel room door and there stood my Mother......she had booked a flight out without telling me and decided to call on us and surprise us.......I was gobsmacked...... but I didn't tell my Mum that my dad had told me she was here. I did tell her a few years later though

[rockrabbit]

i work for g odonnells stone masons which is on turkey red industrial estate right next to the old mill just a bit lower down than the lodges dont think the mill will stand much longer the side wall is moving further away at the top

[g78]

I too am a believer. Throughout my childhood and teenage years a lot of unexplained and strange things happened to me that made me a confirmed believer. Some people would try and rationalise them into 'normal' explanations, and thats cool.. but for me it was all definately paranormal.

[Busman747]

At my previous address in Bedfordshire, I lived with my wife (now deceased) and two daughters and they regularly told me of "strange events" that happened in the house.

Things got so bad a medium was called to "clear the house" of ghoulies!
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So there I was, on the internet.........and the phone rings!!! Nothing strange about that except that I got strange noises when I answered and the fact that I was on "dial up" so any phone calls could not get through!! Just 30 seconds later, the "ghost hunter" arrives.

He told me that occurences like that often happens when he is about..........creepy!!

So he does the business, reports that some fellow is haunting the house and that he has now left.......... As a "non-believer", I leave him to it and continue to browse the web. Just a few seconds after he leaves the house, the phone rings........... while I am still on the net!!! I am not a coward but suddenly I felt the urge to visit my brother rather than stay in that house!

I was on dial-up for two years and that was the only time that the phone rang (twice) while being connected to the internet!

The ladies of the house (wife and daughters) were far more receptive than myself but a couple of incidents which I won't bore you with convinced me that the idea of "ghosts" is not beyond the realms of possibility and convinced me that they do in fact exist.

The girls (wife and daughters) informed me that they no longer felt a presence in the house and neither they nor I have had weird experiences since................

[JohnW]

Originally Posted by rockrabbit

i work for g odonnells stone masons which is on turkey red industrial estate right next to the old mill just a bit lower down than the lodges dont think the mill will stand much longer the side wall is moving further away at the top

I haven't been down that way for years and didn't even know that there was an industrial estate there now. I seem to remember the last time I went to have a look around that area that there was a big lock and chain on the old mill. I wonder who owns it? What a damn shame to see all these great old businesses around the area in ruins. I can still remember the early morning 'mill whistle' waking up the whole village. I think the first one went off at 5am to wake everyone up and the second one at maybe 6am to let you know you were late if you were not in work. My father was a foreman at Broad Oak and the last time I went round there it was just a clutter of small businesses occupying the premises of what was probably one of the biggest calico printworks in the world. No wonder the area is depressed. Where is the innovation now? That is what is needed, people with new ideas for new industries and government, both local and central, to create a climate which will encourage such things.

[JaeSwift]

I never believe things unless I see it, I've never encountered anything whatsoever.. I still believe it's in the mind; Lots of people tell me they saw things, I never believe... This Derek Acorah guy makes me cry with laughter, how stupid.. lmao, lets all act like we're choking and a ghost is goin' inside us.. lol.. Anybody could do that..

[WillowTheWhisp]

So how does something that's all in the mind open doors that you can't reach when no-one is there?

[Tinkerbelle]

What a fantastic thread, what a shame it died a death so quick (excuse the pun )

I'd like to believe there's something else after we've gone. I can't report anything too untoward that's happened to me except one night in the kitchen I was washing up and I turned around and set off quickly to the pick the dishes up from the other side of the kitchen but felt like I'd bumped into someone a lot taller and bigger built than me and though nothing was there it felt like a physical person! I can tell you it freaked me no end and I sat down for ages trying to rationalise what had just happened.