Ghost Stories & Paranormal Encounters

I had always sort of been able to see ghosts, or spirits, whatever you want to call them. I have many stories, and a tendency to write a lot, so I will try to fit as many as I can into this!

I remember when I was little I used to have nightmares about a girl, maybe 8 or around that age, and she either was pale (like me) or looked like a patchwork doll of sorts. It never really signified anything to me; at that age I was afraid of everything and was more worried about monsters and skeletons than serious business type ghosts.

So, everything was normal, I got a few years older and we moved around a bit. It was just me and my mom, we had always been sort of spiritually challenged, if that makes any sense. We had never belonged to a religion and were very open to the supernatural, although, frankly, I had always been a super chicken compared to her.

And then, we ended up in Oregon. We moved to Portland and her and her boyfriend bought a house (I was about 11 at this time). It was just a little bit rural, but the house was very large and pretty cheap for it’s size, although we would have to do a lot to make it livable again.

Since I was 11, I had my mind on other things, like playing and school and friends. At first I liked the house, but there was a little forest behind it that I could see from my bedroom, and it bothered me sometimes. I also started having nightmares again, about the girl and other strange things.

Then, one night, I woke up because my TV was too bright (I was scared so often I had to sleep with a TV on…) and my closet was open. I may have let my imagination wander a bit with this, but I saw a young girl, looking kind of wet, standing in my closet. Then she was gone. Now, I can see why I was scared, and I know for a fact that in my mind, I saw the girl from The Grudge (the horror movie) but there’s no doubt something was there.

And, soon enough, my mom broke up with her boyfriend, (things hadn’t been going well) and we were alone in this huge, four bedroom house.

Now, even stranger things started to happen. Like, foot steps coming from the garage and up the stairs. There were three bathrooms, but one had no windows. I hated that one. I remember my friend came over and had to go to the restroom, and when she went in that one, she heard giggling from the closet. I heard it once or twice too.

Well, there was this one huge conflict within the house, an energy in the bonus room that made no one want to go down there. So my mom and a friend of hers (another oddball spiritual lady like us) decided to cleanse it. Once they had finished, the blinds in the backroom shot up and were crinkled in that position as if someone quickly jumped out the window! It was nicer down there, except for the fact that sometimes the clocks would turn backwards. I know how stupid that must sound, but it scared me badly.

Now, onto the girl. She would change the channel on my TV, turn the radio station, or turn the radio up. She even opened the CD player if she didn’t like what was playing.

One day I was sitting in the living room, home alone, watching TV. My cat was meowing from my room. I decided I would go up there in a moment, but he just kept meowing. Finally, my door swung open, I heard a little meow, and the door slammed shut and my cat came running down to me. I was so scared, I called my friend and had her pick me up.

Now, I am nearly finished, but, I must bring this back to the girl. I have no clue if the girl from this house I am writing about and the girl from my nightmares are the same. They looked the same, but I still don’t know. Well, one night, I was half asleep watching TV, when I sort of heard something, very odd, a voice. All it said was a name, and I jolted and noticed that I was asleep. It really freaked me out. So I told my mom.

A while later, I went with a friend to an old cemetery by my house, and wandered around. I decided to look for the name, but was only half expecting something. I looked and looked, and then, I found something odd. It was a grave, an older woman who died in her forties I think, and then another marker next to it, but without any name or info. The thing is, the marked grave was the name I had dreamt, and, with further examination, the marker with no name’s dates indicated that they had died at the age of eight, just like the girl from my house. I am still rather skeptical about that, but it does make sense. And there were more than one spirit in my old house, so…

But, what scared me the most was the male spirit there. He walked down the hallways sometimes, and sat in the dining room. At first he opened and shut my door once or twice, but then it lessened to just him talking quietly. Another ghost would sit at my bed some nights, very rarely, and smoke. He smiled, and then vanished. Because it happened at night I was usually half asleep, but when I told my mom and drew a picture, she said that it looked (and sounded) just like an old friend of ours that died when I was 3. She said that he always watched out for us, and probably still did.

Well, as a closing statement, I would like to mention that this all occurred about 4 years ago, and I have since moved. But, some friends had gone into the house while it was on the market, and heard so many voices that an invisible party could have been going on.

One friend even heard someone come in, and say, “Where are they?” she then replied, “I’m up here!” but the chatter stopped, and she realized after she had gone downstairs that no one was there.

It is possible that some ghosties followed us from one of our many escapades to cemeteries, some were friends that had passed, and some were just downright freaky! But, since moving away, truthfully it is like a burden has been lifted, and I haven’t had any ordeals like that since.

Now that I have re-read this whole thing, I feel a bit silly, but, I assure you, it did happen. The whole ordeal scared me out of my mind as a kid, and I truly don’t want to go back there!

Sent in by Poppy Brown, Copyright 2009