Weird Things Used To Happen In My Childhood House — I Honestly Believe It Was Haunted
By Sarah Reyes
Producer’s note: Someone on Quora asked: What are some ghost stories that you have experienced firsthand? Here is one of the best answers that’s been pulled from the thread.
My childhood home was “haunted” and I have lots of interesting stories to tell. Here’s a few quickies:
We would frequently hear kitchen cabinets open and close.
The upstairs hall door that led to the bedrooms would jiggle and turn.
Footsteps could be heard on the steps.
In fact, in one of the first few nights my parents stayed there after my grandparents moved next door, they called the police because of the footsteps on the stairs and the door jiggling. The police asked my grandparents if my parents did drugs or drank. (They did not.)
Often, any one of us would feel something depress the bed as though sitting on it.
Frequently had a feeling of being watched.
My cat and dog would follow invisible things through the hall and up the stairs. My dog would stand in the corner and bark as though at someone. (We’ve since moved, and they no longer do this.)
My grandparents told my parents that they would frequently “lose” items like small amounts of money, coins, and funnily enough, pantyhose. It would always turn up later in a random place. like pantyhose on the kitchen counter. Or coins in the bathroom.
As an extreme example, my dad had one belt he’d always wear each day to work. Always hung up in the hall closet each evening. One day, he went to find the belt, and it was not there. Months passed. I acquired a goldfish as a pet. My grandfather used to keep fish, so in the back of the same hall closet were tanks, supplies, lots of their old junk. So there were a set of three tanks, in different sizes all nested together. My mom found my dad’s belt inside the middle fishtank.
We would hear clothes hangers scraping back and forth on the racks in the closet.
And my scariest experience, My brother and father were upstairs in bed sleeping. My mom was on the computer downstairs and I was in the bathroom flossing my teeth. I suddenly was overcome with fear – out of nowhere. I got such a chill. My hairs stood up on end. I heard my father call out my name. I ran to the entrance of the living room and looked wide-eyed at my mother who had turned her chair looking to get up. I said to her, “did dad just call out to me?” and she said “Dougie (my brother) just called out to me..!” so we went upstairs. They were both sleeping.
I don’t believe in ghosts as this, like, dead person walking around. I make sense of it as this: energy never “dies.” therefore, the old energies someone has put out of looking through cabinets or walking upstairs can sometimes be caught repeating themselves. I don’t know though. In my mind that makes the most sense rather than it was just my imagination. If so, why don’t these things happen in the new house. I don’t know- I just know that I really appreciate a good “real” ghost story.