Is our house haunted?

[mommyjam]

I have only had one strange experience. My daughter is named for my best friend that died when we were in high school. I always liked to think that my "friend" was watching over my daughter. When DD was 3 I was visiting my parents, they live in a split level house so you enter the front foyer then go up 3 stairs to the living room. My daughter sat down at the top of the stairs in the living room to take off her shoes. When she pulled it off, she pulled too hard and fell backwards. I panicked, but before I could get to her she just stopped in mid air, she was sitting still but laying straight back over the edge of the stairs. She kind of hovered there and then sat right back up like it was nothing. My mom and SIL and I just stared at each other, there was no way she could have laid that far back and sat back up without falling. We asked her how she did it and she said she felt someone push her back up.

 

[starwood]

Our house is over 70 years old and we have lived here for over 30 years. When we first moved in we had a lamp that was on a timer. The lamp didn't come on one day and I thought the bulb was burnt so I replaced it. It still didn't work. Turns out the lamp was shut off at the switch. DH swears he didn't do it. Then the radiators would be shut off for no reason. But the best was a few years ago when DS and DH were visiting DH's mother. It was just me, the 3 cats and the dog. DH never closes the doors on his armoire. I was in bed watching TV and I glanced over at the armoire. I watched the top right door slowly swing shut. There were no open windows or cars going by. It has never done it since.

 

[Clio]

I don't have any ghosts in my house but the store I work in has two. One is the man who owned the property the store is located on. He just wanders around and doesn't do anything most of the time. The other one likes to play with the paint mixer and the photo processor. One of them did pull one of my friends away from a falling shelf in her office. We've just gotten used to them being around.
Liz

 

[ebtbmom]

I do not think your house is haunted. I love spooky/creepy stories but I have never seen anything that's made me believe in ghosts. I've even been ghost hunting, and nothing!

 

[LuLuO]

We have a fan/light combo that turns off and on by itself every now and then. My brother is an electrician and checked the wiring and the wall switch and everything is fine. We thought it was the remote so I took the batteries out one day and it still did it that night. If DH and I talk about it, the light either comes on or turns off or the fan turns on. It is very strange so we just stopped talking about it.

I am not saying that it is a ghost but I am one of those people that believes anything is possible.

 

[palmtreegirl]

No

 

[Dwight]

I have a spirit that follows me. I picked it up a few years ago when I was out of the country visiting family friends. They practiced witchcraft and read tarot cards. I stayed away from their practice, but slept in their house. One night, my friend and I woke up to a spirit standing in their living room. We both saw it, and his mother saw the glow under her door. It was terrifying, a very mean spirit!

It has since followed me back to the states and to each of the 5 states I've since lived. Sometimes I physically see it, sometimes it grabs me in the night. Other times it'll shake me awake and not show itself, but I can feel its presence. I used to be very scared, but I've learned to take control and cast it away.. for a few months at a time.

Once you've seen a spirit, you HAVE to believe. It's really something crazy

I believe you are on to something with the witchcraft and tarot card reference. These are demonic forces. Please understand I am not calling the FIL in pp a demon. I just believe demons can take on all kinds of forms. IMHO.

 

[stargazer2892]

Sounds haunted to me. I personaly have never lived in a haunted house however my mom lived in one for 4 years so I grew up hearing stories (all the same from different family members). The house they lived in had to have been at least a 100 years old (there was a news story about 10 years ago about the current owners "Finding a secret room" that my mom knew existed, and knew why it was "hidden".
Since they lived in Maine in the 70's the house was still primarily heated by wood, one storm they came home to have a perfectly warm house with the wood stove lit. The only family member who wasn't with them who had a key worked 30 min (in good weather) away and his lunch was only 30 min so he didn't start it. My aunt was having a temper tantrum standing the the middle of a rarely used room screaming (she was 12) and a huge mirror that was on the mantle few off and smashed against the other side of the room, she didn't have full blown tantrums after that. A few times the ghost would smack my Nana's bottom in a very friendly way. And the one that I will never forget is he would lock my moms bedroom door (the door didn't have a lock) when her father would try to come into her room and do inappropriate things.
One day a few years after they moved out my Nana ran into an older lady who used to own the house and it turns out that the ghost was her son who died in WW2. He was a pilot who was shot down and she knew he was dead before she was told, the room that was "hidden" was his room and he kept pushing furniture in front of it and not wanting her to go in so she boarded it up and wallpapered over it. I'm not sure if he is still there or not hopefully he has finally moved on.

 

[Kies99]

No, not haunted.

I'm another one who doesn't believe in ghosts or the supernatural. In fact, if you invite me over and say your house is haunted, prepare for me to call out the "spirit". I've done it before in places that are supposedly haunted and not once has anything ever happened.

 

[WMorganS]

In the past year, we have a touch lamp upstairs that turns on by itself.

I'd worry more about the lamp than a ghost. Seriously... attributing oddities to supernatural causes can lead you to ignore an important physical cause. Fact: there is some kind of electrical problem with that light.

To put it another way, flickering lights on an off is how ghosts say, "you have an electrical problem" ;-)

 

[snarlingcoyote]

No, not haunted.

I'm another one who doesn't believe in ghosts or the supernatural. In fact, if you invite me over and say your house is haunted, prepare for me to call out the "spirit". I've done it before in places that are supposedly haunted and not once has anything ever happened.

I doubt even a dog would come if you called it like that. . .what makes you think a spirit would respond?

 

[Turn the Page]

I forgot to mention another incident. Have you every heard that Jeff Foxworthy joke if you mow your lawn and find a car you might be a redneck? Well, I have never mowed my lawn and found a car but i did find a headstone one day. It was a granite headstone, not flat but it was raised about 4 inches or so I guess and the surface was parallel to the ground. The name on it was Buddy. I assumed it was for a dog or cat or something because there was no last name. Granted I did live across the street from a small cemetery so I guess it is possible somebody swiped a headstone from there and stuck it in my yard for a joke. Though that would be a pretty sick joke and people down south tend to be pretty respectful of the dead. Anyway, I had been living in the house for over a year when I found it and I looked for it several times after that day and never found it again. Strange.

 

[RainbowBrite]

Ask him to leave. Tell him it bothers you.

It not really something I talk about, but I had some incidents I believed to be a relative who died suddenly. I asked her stop when one thing really freaked me. It was actually a nice comforting thing, kind of like the deck of cards, but I was still scared. It never happened again like that. I kind of hope she still hangs around, just a little more subtle.

This reminds me of something that happened in my family. My nana died a few years ago, she lived in an apartment with my uncle. After she died he couldn't stand to walk past her bedroom and see all her things so he started keeping the door shut. Well, when she was alive my nana never closed her bedroom door, she liked it open because it would stick whenever it shut and would be really hard to open again. So he would close the door and go down the hall to the living room or leave the apartment or whatever he was doing and the next time he passed her room the door would always be wide open again. No one else lived there.

So one day the family came over to his house for dinner and me, my mom and my cousin went into my nana's bedroom and told her that if she was the one opening the door all the time it was really freaking my uncle out and asked her to stop and it never happened again.

 

[MissManda]

My Mom insists that she has a ghost in her house. Actually her ghost sounds pretty similar to the OP's ghost.

She has a lamp beside her reading chair that will randomly turn itself off and on. And no, its not an electrical problem or short with the lamp...she has used multiple lamps by that chair (table, floor, touch, switch) and it always happens. She even had the outlet checked to make sure it was okay. There is no explanation for what goes on with that lamp.

Also, she had random items disappear from the house. These are every day items- a piece of clothing, a tool, a dish. Something that is used on a regular basis and it just vanishes. Then months later, it turns up in a very obvious spot (most of the times, the kitchen table).

Another odd thing that happened is when my parents were on vacation one year, my aunt was looking after the house and feeding my parents bird and cat. She said that she came into the house through the front door and she heard speaking in the basement. It freaked her out because the house was supposed to be empty. The neighbor was home so she asked him to come inside with her. They went downstairs and the tv was on. She called my parents to ask if they had left the tv on for some reason. They of course had not. The remote was sitting on top of a computer desk (which is too high for the cat to jump on due to her arthritis). They also checked the back door to make sure it was locked and it was. No evidence at all that anyone had been in the house. She turned off the tv, fed the animals and left. The next time she came back, the house was quiet and then as she was feeding the cat in the basement the tv suddenly turned intself on. Needless to say she hightailed it out of there. The tv hasn't done that since.

My Mom thinks that its my sister haunting the house (she died in 2008). But, we aren't quite sure why she went through so much trouble to scare the crap out of my aunt!

I do believe in ghosts and I do believe that I'm visited by them. However, most of mine are in my sleep. I have had very vivid and real dreams about my sister and grandfather. These dreams are so much different that any normal dreams that I have and I really do feel like I'm "communicating" with them. Most recently I dreamed of my sister. I told her how much I loved her and missed her. She looked so beautiful (like she did before her illness took its toll on her). In this "dream" she hugged me and I know that I physically felt it. I actually woke up startled at that point and thought that my husband was trying to wake me up. There was no one in the room, but I know that someone was touching me. When I dream of her or my grandfather, they never actually speak to me (although I do speak to them) but I know through their presence what they are wanting to communicate. I wake from those dreams with so much peace and comfort. I know a lot of people will say that they are just dreams but I know in my heart that its so much more. You will never convince me otherwise.

 

[MagicallyDelicious]

I have a lamp that you touch the base to turn on, and a slight power surge - one so slight the lights barely flicker, will turn it on.

I can't speak for the other stuff, but I bet you anything, the lamp is being turned on by surges.

 

[StitchesGr8Fan]

I am petrified of ghosts. When I was younger I used to feel like someone was watching me and I thought it was a ghost. Turns out it was my neighbor who was a window peeper, but I am still more afraid of ghosts than window peepers. You can arrest a window peeper, but how do you get a ghost to stop? I also used to feel like something was following me down the hall.

On Saturday we just picked up a beautiful dresser set from my MIL's co-worker' sister's condo. The sister died of cancer in the hospital. But now I'm afraid she attached her spirit to one of the dressers. The dressers are in our garage until we can move them to our room. I felt no spirits when I was in the condo, it was actually a very pleasant place. I felt nothing when touching the dressers. But now I'm terrified to bring the dressers indoors for fear she is there. But it is probably fine, right?

 

[Feralpeg]

I do believe in ghosts, but I wouldn't put much stock into the touch lamp turning on. I used to have one. Static electricity in the house would cause it to come on. It was pretty unnerving when it happened in the middle of the night. It tended to do it more in the winter months when the house was very dry and there was a lot of static. It also came on during thunderstorms on occasion.

 

[kimmar067]

You sould read Mary Ann Winkowski's book "When Ghosts Speak". She was the inspiration for Jennifer Love Hewitt's character on the Ghost Whisperer.

....James Van Praagh is also a consultant for the show....

 

[timmac]

IWell, I have never mowed my lawn and found a car but i did find a headstone one day. It was a granite headstone, not flat but it was raised about 4 inches or so I guess and the surface was parallel to the ground. The name on it was Buddy. I assumed it was for a dog or cat or something because there was no last name. Granted I did live across the street from a small cemetery so I guess it is possible somebody swiped a headstone from there and stuck it in my yard for a joke. Though that would be a pretty sick joke and people down south tend to be pretty respectful of the dead. Anyway, I had been living in the house for over a year when I found it and I looked for it several times after that day and never found it again. Strange.

A place I used to rent had a very old chicken-coop or storage shed type structure in the back, which was falling apart and mostly just junk. With the owner's permission, I pulled it down to use as firewood. In the course of clearing out the various junk that had accumulated in that area, I found a headstone marked "Baby 1919-". Not exactly a haunting (which I don't believe in), but certainly more than a bit creepy.

 

[Bella the Ball 360]

I very kindly prefer to think that people who don't believe in ghosts have never lived in a haunted house.

I lived in one for a couple of years. It was about 200 years old, so the house had every right to have picked up a spirit or two! I watched as the pull cord on our blinds started dancing as though someone was pulling on them. Pulling and letting go. Pulling and letting go. Over and over and over again. No vents or anything near it, and a vent wouldn't explain how the thing stretched tight then let go. . .

Once I watched in amazement as a dryer door swung out of the way of my head then swung back into place once I was out of the way (we had a stackable washer dryer in our downstairs bathroom).

Our dogs were allowed into the house once when it started raining and we weren't home.

It only got a little creepy when I started taking showers and when I washed my hair I would hear a hard knock in the shower stall. I thought it was the taps, but it was a little creepy so I started varying my routine. The rap always, no matter what I did, occurred when my eyes were closed and I was washing the shampoo out of my hair. Not before. Not after. No washing hair, no rap. I could shampoo then wash off or I could wash off then shampoo. It was always when I was rinsing the shampoo off.

The really creepy moment came when I got out of bed one frosty morning, pulled on my robe and went downstairs. I let the dogs out to do their morning necessities, then I went to do my morning necessities. As I sat down on the throne, my robe fell open and I looked to see two very dark handprints on my calves, positioned with the fingers pointing towards my torso. Fascinated, I put my hands against the handprints. They did not fit. The palms and the fingers were about my size but variant (I believe the palms were larger and the fingers smaller.) My DH's hands are much larger than mine, and we were the only living humans in the house.

A few other smaller things happened, but those are the big ones that convinced me that something was happening in the house. What, I do not know. I call it a haunting because that is the easiest way to describe it. All I know is what happened.

ITA ...the thing is skeptics have not had anything happen. I too was a skeptic but sooo many things happened in my house not to mention the footsteps in the attic and my son now 21 not forgetting the " lady " with the gray hair who used to come to him in the night when he was 2. For those who don't believe, they just need to experience it. For those who have had experiences (I have had MANY ) you know it is true. YOu cannot convince people because they all come from the "show me state" which IMHO is a good thing. What is frustrating is when things happen and you try to explain it people think you are a nut. I wish I could remember the thread we had going a few years ago which had tons of my experiences as well as others on the boards. I also think some people are more open to these experiences. I have had many psychic experiences which THANKFULLY I shared with others BEFORE they happened.