I thought I would share this story in a subreddit of open minded individuals.

Backstory; I have an uncle who committed suicide nearly 15 years ago. I also have a 3.5 year old little dude who obviously never met his great uncle. We are very open with him ( age appropriate of course ) of passing\death due to him having an older sister that had passed prior to him being born.

On August 7th, the small town I live in had an explosive fire that tore up the back country and many people lost their homes in the fire. It was so bad that our entire town had to be evacuated for nearly 2 weeks to ensure safety of everyone's return as the fire was still active. The day of the fire, around 6 pm ( we got the emergency order around midnight to leave immediately), my son randomly said, " Uncle ____ is crying. " He's never spoken of him before so I thought it was extremely eerie and random, as at this point in the evening we weren't thinking we would have to leave our town. I asked him to repeat himself and he basically acted like nothing happened. Very strange and in hindsight now after we are settled back home, it feels as though my uncle was coming through warning us of what was to come.

"Third man syndrome" or "third man factor" is the phenomenon where an individual in extreme distress or a life-threatening situation feels the presence of an unseen companion who provides comfort, guidance, or a sense of intervention. This "third man" is described as a benevolent presence that can offer encouragement, give practical advice, or even physically assist the person.

I'll go first. I had a really interesting experience that I still am not sure if it’s the third man syndrome or something else.

It was a freezing day in mid-February last year. I left school earlier than expected because we had been told that a blizzard would be on the way, and they thought it was best to send us home. My classmates had already rushed outside, and I had fallen a little behind. To gain ground, I quickened my pace in the hallway. That's when I heard that voice that wasn't mine and/or a familiar one, "Watch out for the filthy floor, with that coltish walk of yours! You're going to fall!" I looked around; there was no one there. The astounding thing, though, was that I really was about to slip, because people assigned to cleaning duties that day hadn't done a good job, and to risk spraining my ankle, or worse.

I’ve never been a believer in ghosts or supernatural things, but something happened to me recently that I still can’t explain.
Earlier this year, I had gone to Ahmedabad to watch the final. On our way back to Delhi, we were driving from Ahmedabad toward Rajasthan. About an hour after leaving Ahmedabad, we were still in Gujarat, somewhere around the Gujarat–Rajasthan border. It was late at night, and the highway was almost completely deserted. There were areas around us that looked more like jungle/isolated land than a populated area.
I was sitting in the car when, for a split second, I noticed an extremely old woman—I’d estimate 90+ years old—squatting right beside/on the highway.
She had completely white hair and was wearing a saree. When our headlights hit her, her white hair and clothes looked extremely bright.
She wasn’t walking or trying to cross the road. She was simply squatting there, looking down, almost as if she was doing something on the road. She was facing toward the Ahmedabad side while we were travelling toward Delhi.
We were going pretty fast, so I only had a few seconds to process what I was seeing. My reflex was to turn my head toward her, and my friends noticed me turning and also looked in that direction—but they didn’t see her clearly.
Then something happened that made the whole thing much creepier.
Our driver suddenly laughed and asked, “Did you guys see her?”
I hadn’t told him what I’d seen.
I asked him, “Who?”
He said he was talking about the old woman.
Our driver regularly travelled that highway. He told us that accidents were quite common on that stretch, partly because people from Gujarat sometimes travel toward the Rajasthan border to drink due to Gujarat’s alcohol prohibition, and some drive back drunk.
Then he told us something even stranger.
He said that he and several other drivers had seen strange/supernatural figures on that stretch multiple times, including figures that appeared to be people on or near the road. He didn’t claim to understand what they were, though. He basically said he didn’t like talking too much about it because he didn’t know either—but according to him, they had never harmed him or anyone he knew.
I asked him how an extremely old woman could possibly be sitting there at that hour, in such an isolated area, with no obvious village nearby.
He just said that this was one of the things people had seen there before.
I’m still not someone who normally believes in ghosts. Maybe there was a perfectly normal explanation. Maybe it was a real person who somehow ended up there. Maybe it was an optical illusion.
But I know what I saw, and the fact that the driver independently asked us whether we’d seen her before I described what I’d seen is what really bothers me.
For literally a second or two, I saw an old woman with long white hair and a saree, squatting on an almost empty highway in the middle of nowhere at night.
I’ve never experienced anything like it before.
Has anyone travelled this stretch of highway or experienced something similar around the Gujarat–Rajasthan border?

I am 25M so last night i was studying for my exams in my room it was 1:30 AM at night i was feeling little sleepy and my room has big balcony attached to it and it is covered with hard plastic transparent sheet. So at night when i was feeling sleepy i decided to go walk in balcony with my iPad in hand as i kept my leg out in balcony i felt something ran above me on the hard sheet it was a clear sound and i was shaken with the sound i increased my screen brightness to full(white page of pdf) and saw above i found shoe prints of soil particles on the sheet i ran inside turned on balcony lights to check clearly and it was a proper shoe print formed by soil particles, like someone walked on soil then walked on sheet i was completely shaken and their is no way anyone can climb on that plastic sheet. I ran inside turned off the balcony lights closed the balcony gate and went to sleep in morning i went to see them again and the marks where not their. I don’t know what it is really but to calm myself i am thinking that the soil particles formed that shape randomly and sound of running on sheet must be a cat.

Ok, so long story short: i have this remote property that i have to check from time to time, it's not middle of nowhere remote but pretty secluded. Last time i had to go there was a few weeks ago, i got there at about 11 PM, nothing eventful so after i got settled in, i grab a beer and a smoke and go to sit on the steps of a front porch.

On my way out i check on my gf, she's watching some dumb tv show and i catch a glimpse of a wall mounted clock showing 11:30 something PM and then i sit my a*s down on the porch steps and finish my smoke. I notice like a small dot of bright light just below the light post at the edge of the property.

I donno why but it catches my attention, there was something weird or uncanny about the way it moved. I first thought it was like a flying bug or something that just caught the light in a weird way with its wings and made it seem freakishly bright but the way it moved seemed like too smooth or uniform, if that makes any sense, it was almost mechanical or if it was following a predetermined path, not the random pattern a flying insect has under a street light. I just remember staring at it for a few minutes trying to figure out what tf it could be.

Next thing i know, i hear a "dude, you've been here all night!?" from behind, while she sleeply makes her way to the outdoor bathroom and i just sit there confused like "what do you even mean all night, i just went out like 15 minutes ago"... it was 5:30 in the morning, i somehow lost 6 fu**ing hours and i have zero recollection of what tf might have happened!

I tried to play it cool but honestly i'm still freaking out about the whole situation. What's even weirder is that my circadian rhythm is still out of whack, i went to bed that morning at about 6 am, what in my mind felt like 1 AM and i've been having problems trying to re-allign my sleep for the past few weeks, it's like i'm out of phase or something, i've never had anything like this ever happen to me, the though about what could have happened in those hours literally terrifies the f**k out of me!

I'm kinda lost for words here, until this happened i didn't even know there was a name for this "phenomenon" or whatever this was, i'm literally scratching my balding head trying to come up with theories about what this actually was but whenever i try to force myself to try to remember anything, it's like this black hole gap that i just can't access in any way...

I’m not adamantly opposed to believing in the paranormal, but also know a lot of this may have explanations.

I stay in a 1830s farm house part of the year and have always had some mixed feelings. When I used to sleep upstairs, I was never comfortable in one of the rooms. Then, I hung a rosary on the attic door handle and crucifix near the bed and felt way better sleeping up there. Not as many of us travel, so the door to the upstairs stays locked most of the time.

Now I sleep downstairs in what used to be the parlor. Every now and then I feel watched, not in a scary way but like someone watches when they’re just like…mildly annoyed. Sometimes out loud, I just explain what I’m doing and it almost feels like it stops. I also apologize for loud noises and try not to run window units or anything 😂

I thought it was just me, but I was talking with the person that takes care of the house and it’s definitely not just me. She was closing a window one time and swears she heard someone ask her to please leave it open. She feels emotions around the place. Someone else was in the basement and heard someone walk through the kitchen when they were there alone. She even thinks she picked up on a name. She shared the name and there are two women with the name buried in the family cemetery up the road. It’s also the name of someone buried elsewhere that was here a lot in the 60s and 70s. She said that whatever is here feels motherly and seems happy when the house is opened up and when people get near the piano.

When my partner and I are talking, there’s a light in the kitchen that dims and brightens and it seems an awful lot like it’s in agreement or disagreement sometimes. We even joke, “See, ghost agrees” or “Ghost said no.” The person that takes care of the house said the light’s never done that when she was over and my husband pointed out that it’s actually only when I’m talking.

The last thing, and this is my favorite, is that there’s a room that, if left closed for the day, smells like floral perfume when you open it again. I try to leave that one empty.

The house has a long history and, like most historic houses, people have passed here. There were some tragedies that stand out. The builder’s wife and children died in the log cabin that would have been behind the house if they didn’t burn it (edit: that’s not how they died, just how they got rid of the house after) and another person disappeared when there was a sinkhole.

I don’t feel threatened and haven’t for about 20 years now but just thought someone may find it interesting.

For about the past three weeks I’ve been having a lot of problems sleeping through the night. The usual waking in the middle of the night but also some disturbing dreams maybe. Though I can’t be sure they are dreams. I was fully prepared to accept this as just one more side effect of perimenopause. Medical cause. Nothing paranormal to see here. Maybe also my shitty AC is to blame. It just stops working around the same time a lot of nights and needs to be restarted.

I sleep near a window. Sometimes it feels like there is a presence between my bed and window but I don’t pay it much mind. This building was brand new when I moved in. I’ve lived year about 15 years. I feel at peace in my home.

However, two nights ago the “dreams” felt especially disturbing so last night I had an odd idea hit me out of nowhere. About a month ago after learning about St. Benedict medals, I had one blessed by my priest so I could wear it to a wedding (long story, I’ll spare you the details of why I felt the need for it). Anyway, last night on a hunch, I left the medal on my night stand. I had the best night of sleep in weeks. Not sure if it’s coincidence, placebo or something more sinister at work but I’m going to leave it there again tonight.

My grandmother and I were very close and she’s been gone since 1997. I have on a rare occasion smelled a tiny bit of her perfume for years not often but usually when I’m going through something. Well, no one is left that knew what her perfume of choice was and i just found a brand new bottle on my doorstep this evening. Not a single thing was on security cameras. I don’t know what to think as i didn’t think this was possible to this extent.

Hello! I was hoping my first post here would be more interesting but I was curious if anyone had any insight into these small things that have been happening to us. So my boyfriend (26M) and I (24F) moved into a new house late June. It was built in 1924 and seems to have been through a LOT of
rough work and building: used to be a single story home, was then a rental, then a second story was built and was an apartment building, then was converted into a multifamily home and rented out, then was “renovated” and empty for a few years and boom here we are. We bought the house and now own the entire property and are the only ones on the lot. Anyway, it doesn’t necessarily feel like there’s anyone here with us, and I’m here alone every day and don’t hear or feel anything. (I had a few experiences where I would come home after a long day and get the strange feeling that someone had been in the house but I also have OCD so.) But recently we’ve been sitting in the living room and we’ll have little reactions to things? The two most notable that happened very recently were one night we were sitting in our respective seats in the living room and I started tasting blood randomly. I’ve been sick so I assumed maybe it was from coughing and didn’t say anything about it. About two minutes later it happens again and it’s for just a few seconds each time. My boyfriend pipes up and says “why am I tasting blood??” to himself and I obviously sat up
and said “me too what the hell?” We have carbon monoxide detectors in the house that work and we have an air purifier right next to us that hasn’t changed color so we just write it off at the time. Tonight we’re sitting in our same seats, watching a tv show and we both smelled brewing coffee at the same time. No windows are open and even if they were our neighbors are pretty far away. Mind you, we have no coffee in the house because neither of us really drink it. Like the iron taste, it happened again just a moment later and again we both experienced it. It’s weird because it’s one of those things you experience by yourself like a random nostalgic smell or a strange taste or a weird small sound that you acknowledge and then ignore because you’re the only one in the room. But we’re both experiencing it! It may easily be nothing and this may also be the wrong place to bring it up but I was curious if anybody had any insight! It’s a 5 bedroom house with two stories and we’re currently only occupying the bottom floor and two bedrooms while we figure some things out about adding AC upstairs so we’re not really *experiencing* the full house if ya know what I mean, but yeah that’s our little background info and everything!

TL;DR: My boyfriend (26M) and I (24F) moved into a heavily renovated 1924 house in late June. We don't feel like anything is in the house, and I’m home alone most days without experiencing anything unusual. However, while sitting in the living room recently, we both independently started tasting blood/iron at the exact same time, and it happened again shortly afterward. Another night, while sitting in the same spots, we both suddenly smelled freshly brewed coffee despite having no coffee in the house and no obvious source nearby. Both experiences happened simultaneously and more than once. Our CO detectors work and we have an air purifier running, so we’re unsure what could be causing it. Probably nothing, but we’re curious if anyone has experienced something similar or has an explanation!

I've heard that in many cultures, if you wake up around these hours of the night, it means that you are not alone. Why specifically these hours? Has someone had weird experiences around these hours?

I'm a believer in the paranormal and it's true that I tend to wake up around these hours when I'm stressed/anxious, and I've heard that being stressed/anxious makes your more prone to sense spirits.

Grew up experiencing strange stuff my entire life every house we lived in had paranormal events, in 2015 I started picking up some of the gadgets and combined night vision cameras around my house with some of the other gadgets like the EMF detectors (the puck style), also a handheld EMF / temp detector that measures the actual level and air temp. In researching I understand that anything electrical is going potentially trigger EMF but it seems that my body itself is putting out EMF even when I don't have any electronics on me. If I go near them they trigger, step away (5ft) and they turn off, anyone else can go near them and they do not go off. Since there are so many people in this sub who also have these devices someone here might know the why or have experienced the same thing?

The last 3 days in early morning I have found random coins( nickels, pennies , quarters and dimes scattered but together. The coins are well worn, hard to read, covered with dirt and ruined with deep grooves. Our camera shows no activity at all. I found them twice leaving for mass and the last time right as we got home. The coins are closer to garage door than to the street and seemingly in a ragged line.

I (20F) work in a dog/cat grooming parlour and general store over my breaks from school. I've been working a lot over this summer, more than I have usually, and noticed some really odd things. I personally love all things paranormal, but don't personally believe in it. I'm not religious or spiritual so I believe there's an explanation for everything, but I just don't know right now.

I work with around four other people, excluding our dog groomer who's always in the back of the shop whilst I work front of house. I live in a fairly busy town just a half hour from the city, but recently it's been more empty with people going back to work and school etc. There's buses and cars that pass by regularly. There's also apartments above and next to us so I just chalk the noises up to that. The shop doesn't get that much traction apart from treats and stuff in a day for me to deal with so is usually empty. The other day I was alone at the front, going through stuff like I usually do, when I, clear as day, hear MY OWN NAME harshly whispered in my ear. Loud as hell. This unmistakably is my own name. Obviously I immediately look at the door, but i'm still the only one in the store. I go up to check and yep, only me. There's no buses, it's still morning so no cars driving outside. I try to chalk it up to the sound of a car driving by, but the difference between outside noises and BY MY EAR was so damn different it really confused me. It literally made my ear ring.

Another thing is that balls turn up right by me, all the time. So, we have a desk/counter area where I work, using the till and when owners are late picking up dogs I keep them back there with me, we have a doggy door too just incase so they don't run off. Yet I keep on finding tennis balls back there. All. The. Time. The dogs just keep on finding them.

We sell tennis balls of course, and the manager's son, who comes in a lot, usually plays with them, so I obviously just thought he was dropping them behind the counter. My manager has been away for a month now for holiday. I clean that area every single day and I never EVER see tennis balls back there, if I do I put them back. I think maybe it's my colleagues or dog groomer letting the dogs play, they've all said they haven't done that, but obviously I thought they were lying or forgot. Then the other day, I was working an open till close, the dog groomer was off that day so it was just me, just like the day with the whisper. I deep cleaned the store since it was a slow day, the counter area was the first one I cleaned. I get back there, sit down, and I accidentally kick something with my foot. It bounces out...IT WAS A TENNIS BALL. I just cleaned that area so I know damn well there wasn't one. Are we haunted by a dog?

Also not the mention the countless times i've heard people walk into the store, which is a very distinct sound since it's from concrete to wood, and see absolutely no one there. Things falling which really shouldn't be, like treat bags that were pushed to the back, or big heavy food bags. We don't have any ac and are based in the UK so there's been no wind as of late.

Is this all just coincidence? Am I just going crazy working on my own?

Before I start, I know this is 99% likely a technical glitch and not remotely paranormal. My husband is a complete sceptic, so I wanted to tell someone. 🙈

My Alexa chose to freak me out. My husband was at the cricket so was late home. I was watching a documentary on freak weather (self-proclaimed nerd).

All of a sudden I could hear really quiet voices that sounded like singing. I looked at my phone; it wasn't playing music. I muted the TV, could still hear the voices, opened the garden door, no difference and even looked in the other room to check our bluetooth stereo…. Nothing! The voices had gotten slightly louder; it was children singing some kind of nursery rhyme-type thing, in the way you'd hear in a horror movie.

I kept thinking, where the hell is it coming from? I happened to look at Alexa, and she had the music icon on her screen. I said Alexa off and the voices stopped! Looked in the app, and there was no command telling her to play. I sat there for a while questioning if I was a) crazy or b) if I happen to have a weird neighbour who’s good with technology. 😂

For context:I have two cats and often go to the bathroom for a quick pee during the night.

Last night I woke up, feeling unusually more awake than my usual half asleep state and checked the time. 5am. Went to the bathroom, left all lights off, and took a seat. Just past the bottom right corner of the doorway I spot a cat like shadow about a few steps into the room. I could vaguely make out two eyes and it was like the creature had paused once spotted. My two girls will often follow me to the bathroom during the day but not usually at night, and if they did they'd sit at the doorway or come greet me, not crawl/stalk about.

I had a strong thought of "you're not my cat" whilst staring down and making eye contact. Slowly it started stepping backwards, back around the door frame and then carried on reversing until it had gone around the corner of the door frame to another room just on the right until out of sight.

Feeling validated that oddly reversing wouldn't be a thing my cats would do I finished up and went back to bed. Don't know if anyone would find it interesting or believe it but thought I'd post anyway. ☺️

I am 25M so last night i was studying for my exams in my room it was 1:30 AM at night i was feeling little sleepy and my room has big balcony attached to it and it is covered with hard plastic transparent sheet. So at night when i was feeling sleepy i decided to go walk in balcony with my iPad in hand as i kept my leg out in balcony i felt something ran above me on the hard sheet it was a clear sound and i was shaken with the sound i increased my screen brightness to full(white page of pdf) and saw above i found shoe prints of soil particles(only left side shoe print) on the sheet i ran inside turned on balcony lights to check clearly and it was a proper shoe print formed by soil particles, like someone walked on soil then walked on sheet i was completely shaken and their is no was anyone can climb on that plastic sheet. I ran inside turned off the balcony lights closed the balcony gate and went to sleep in morning i went to see them again and the marks where not their. I don’t know what it is really but to calm myself i am thinking that the soil particles formed that shape randomly and sound of running on sheet must be a cat.

Years ago I worked in a small town library. I was at the service desk that was placed in front of the entrance. One day a slim young woman walked in the door. As I glanced up to see who was coming in, I saw a flash of light near her belly and mentally said “she is pregnant.” I did not know this young woman. She went to the dvd section to browse. She came to me to check out her selection and told me that it had been a while since she had a baby and thought she should look at a video on pregnancy because she was expecting again. I was shocked because I never had this happen before or since. I didn’t even know when both DILs were pregnant.

About a month ago, maybe more, I received a request from the universe. A task that I would rather not share here. However, I had failed to fulfill it. I had taken the request and bent it over and over again in all forms, being really general. I promised to fulfill it at any time, but I haven't. It appears the universe got angry. Recently, I started realising that strange things began happening. They're trying to warn me. Once during the night, they made the lights in a room darker, then proceeded to make it the status quo the next day. I started feeling faces looking me straight in the eye. You know how you sometimes used to imagine monsters when you get out of your bed in the middle of the night? I feel them. I still see them only in my imagination, but I feel their look into my soul. The universe is warning me. It is coming for me, and I don't know what to do.

Some months ago my beloved cat died. She died without pain and surrounded by her family, at the vet. During that week, it rained daily non-stop and it was really cold. The morning after, I wake up and the sun was shining and it was lighting up the spot she used to sit in: she loved the sun and laying during sunny days in that spot. I don’t know if this was a coincidence or not. During the following days I always had the impression that something black (my cat was black) was spinning in the corridor, or kitchen, or living room. It was always at the corner of my eye. The most significant episode was one day, I was laying on my back doing absolutely nothing, about to nap. Then I feel something on my face, like a gentle hit but made of warm air, a bit pinchy. I open my eyes and see nothing at all. Could it be her? Is it possible?

I spent 12 years working as a criminal investigator. I was trained to look at facts, question what I was told, consider alternative explanations, and avoid drawing conclusions without evidence. Because of that, I was always skeptical of paranormal claims. I'm fully aware that there may be ordinary explanations for some or even all of what happened. Maybe some of the people we encountered were simply strange. Maybe the other guests' experiences had perfectly reasonable explanations. Maybe the noises were caused by the building, the smells had environmental causes, and my own experiences were something psychological or physical that I don't understand. I've considered all of those possibilities. I'm not posting this because I think every strange thing that happened at the hotel was paranormal. I'm posting it because of the totality of what my wife and I experienced over the course of several days, and because some of it still has no explanation that makes sense to me. More importantly, I'm telling this because if you've experienced something you can't explain, I don't want you to automatically think you're crazy. I used to believe there had to be a rational explanation for everything. After what happened to us, I no longer believe that.

The first thing happened on the first night while I was completely awake, lying on the bed in our room. I felt the mattress depress behind me as though someone had actually sat down. Then I felt my hair being twirled, followed by pressure on the top of my head, almost like a finger touching me. I tried to rationalize it. Maybe it was static. Maybe I was imagining it. Then it happened again. The strange thing is, I wasn't immediately terrified. The second time, I actually joked to myself, "My wife doesn't give me this much attention. At least this feels good. Keep it up." Looking back, that thought makes what happened the following night much more disturbing. Then an intense wave of cold came over me, followed by profuse sweating. There was also a feeling that is difficult to put into words. I had an overwhelming sense that something was there and that it was evil. I wanted to get out of the room. I wanted to leave the hotel entirely. But at the same time, I felt an inexplicable urge to go back.

When I finally got outside the hotel, everyone around me seemed to be carrying on with their lives completely normally. People were walking around, talking, and going about their business. The world looked exactly as it should, but I didn't feel like I was part of it anymore. I felt separated from everything around me, almost as though I had stepped outside of normal reality. I felt like I was being targeted. Time didn't seem to have the same meaning. The building felt less like a place I had simply stayed and more like something that was trying to lure me back inside. The strangest part was that I didn't want to go back. It felt like going back to see a bully, someone I had absolutely no desire to encounter again. And yet, at the same time, I had this intense, almost inexplicable feeling that I wanted to keep it company. I wanted to stay with it. I can't explain that contradiction. I wanted to get away from whatever I felt was there, while another part of me desperately wanted to return.

The following night, my wife was lying beside me in that same bed when she suddenly experienced something of her own. She described feeling as though she were being pulled down into the mattress and becoming unable to move. She also experienced an intense cold, followed by profuse sweating. She eventually moved to the other bed, and the sensation stopped. Whatever I had experienced the night before, I had treated almost playfully. When it happened to my wife, it didn't feel playful anymore. It felt like an escalation.

There was another strange pattern during our stay. We kept waking up at around 2 a.m. It happened repeatedly during those nights. Neither of us normally has a habit of waking at that time, which made it particularly noticeable to us while we were there. We also heard strange sounds in the hotel, what sounded like people laughing mixed with pounding on the walls. Then there was the smell. At one point, I noticed an unmistakable antiseptic odor in the room. My wife, who normally has an exceptionally strong sense of smell, couldn't detect it. Later, however, we both independently smelled that same unmistakable antiseptic odor on a folder. Then it disappeared within seconds.

And then came the incident I still have the hardest time explaining. After leaving the hotel, I encountered a priest
standing near the hotel. Apparently, he hangs out in the area twice a month. I told him what had happened, and he gave me a prayer card (St. Michael) and some religious items. That night, we were at a restaurant attached to the same building complex. I silently read the prayer card out of curiosity because I had no idea what it said. Immediately afterward, my glasses were forcefully knocked from my head. They flew off and bounced against the nearby seat. The sound was loud enough to startle my wife. She caught a quick glimpse of the glasses as they were falling. I tried repeatedly to reproduce what happened afterward. I couldn't. I was seated with a wall behind me and no one could have done that.

There were other things, too. We later heard accounts from other people about experiences at the hotel. Someone described the sensation of something sitting on the bed while watching television. Another person said blankets had been pulled from his family. We also heard stories from staff about things such as faucets turning on by themselves. Those weren't stories I had read before staying there, and I wasn't looking for them. I wasn't trying to have a paranormal experience. To be fair, maybe those experiences had ordinary explanations.

Then there were the people actually staying at the hotel that we encountered. At one point, my wife and I were walking toward the hotel entrance from the second level of the parking garage. An older man entered the parking garage through the door ahead of us. A woman was standing near the entrance, staring at us through the glass with an unnervingly blank expression. Here's what bothered me. The door was wide open, yet she stopped, allowed it to close, and simply stood there looking through the window. She had no luggage and no obvious reason to stop. When I opened the door, she smiled and said, "Funny, the door sometimes refuses to open." I remember thinking, "Why did she let the door close when it was already open?" Maybe she was simply being weird. Maybe there was nothing to it at all. At the time, it was just strange. In hindsight, it gives me chills. Another person later interrupted us simply to say, "I didn't make that sound," even though we hadn't accused anyone of making anything. I still don't know why they felt the need to tell us that.

The history of the building only makes the experience harder for me to dismiss. The Kahler Grand opened in 1921 as a combination hotel and medical facility. The building had hospital functions that included patient rooms, operating rooms, laboratories, and a convalescent unit. So we weren't sleeping in an ordinary old hotel. We were staying in a building with a long history of medicine, hospitalization, surgery, recovery, and death.

I can't tell you exactly what we encountered. I can't tell you what it was called, why it seemed to interact with us, or why so many seemingly unrelated things happened during those few days. I also can't prove to you that what we experienced was paranormal. What I can tell you is that I know what I experienced. I know what my wife experienced. And I know how completely different I look at these things now. After 12 years of investigating crimes and relying on facts, I never expected a hotel stay to change my beliefs about something I had always been skeptical of. But it did. I believe the paranormal is real.

And if you've experienced something you can't explain, I want you to know that you're not necessarily crazy. You may have experienced something that we simply don't understand yet. I didn't believe in this stuff either. Until it happened to me.

Does anyone else experience a hypnic jerk like they just came back from somewhere?

I know what a hypnic jerk is. I know the standard explanation—you're falling asleep, your body suddenly jerks, sometimes you get the sensation of falling, blah blah blah.

But mine don't feel like that.

Every once in a while, right as I'm crossing that line between awake and asleep, something happens that is incredibly hard to describe. I suddenly slam back into awareness with this overwhelming certainty that, for a fraction of a second, I was gone.

Not asleep. Gone.

My first thought isn't “I almost fell asleep” or “I had a weird dream.” It's this primitive, immediate feeling of holy shit, I was dead and I just came back.

And here's the part that gets me: I instinctively grab whoever is sleeping next to me.

I don't decide to do it. I reach for them almost in a panic, like I'm grabbing an anchor to this world—something physical that proves I'm here, I'm alive, and everything is real again.

Within a few seconds my rational brain catches up. I know I'm in bed. I know about hypnic jerks. I know there's a perfectly reasonable neurological explanation for suddenly jolting awake.

But that doesn't explain why the subjective experience is so specific and so powerful. For those first few seconds, it doesn't feel like waking up.

It feels like returning.

I'm curious whether anyone here has experienced that exact sensation—not just falling, twitching, or waking suddenly, but the absolute conviction that you had ceased to exist for a moment and were suddenly dropped back into your body.

And if you have: where did you feel like you came back from?

for starters i’ve had a real rough month, at the start of this month it was great. i actually had the best week of my life beginning of august. went to ohio and met a friend, literally on the drive back to where im from my mom called me and let me know my grandma was in the hospital struggling.
two days after that, completely unrelated, my 30 year old cousin died. 2 days after THAT (also completely unrelated) a close family friend died as well. it was a really rough week and when i thought it was finally getting better my grandma that was in the hospital ended up dying yesterday.
i am 19 and severely struggle with my mental health so this is a lot to handle but luckily i had to be to work when i found out so i didn’t give myself too much time to think about how much everything sucks right now.
i ended up spending last night at my girlfriends house because i didn’t want to be alone. everything seemed fine until we started hearing tapping noises on her window.
she lives on the second story of her apartment building with her window facing the stairs. the taps were infrequent and loud enough to think it could be a person but not loud enough to be sure of it if that makes sense. me and her both originally thought it was cicadas but we never saw anything everytime it happened and eventually it happened enough where i got up out of bed and sat in front of the window waiting for it to happen but it didn’t.
when i got up to get back in bed i heard what sounded like her apartment door and got so freaked out that i closed her bedroom door and locked it and went to bed.
fast forward to this evening, her mom came in and just casually said she thought the house was haunted and we both immediately looked at each other.
apparently earlier that day she had been showering and she thought that my girlfriend had come in the bathroom to use it and was waiting for her to say something and when she turned she wasn’t there. she saw the silhouette of a younger man though.
i should probably mention that my girlfriend and her mom are both atheist, i am agnostic but not super spiritual, both of them are tho (ESPECIALLY her mom).
my girlfriend mentioned that the silhouette she saw could’ve been my grandma (who passed yesterday) and her mom immediately said “no i think it was your cousin”. she’s never seen or met him and she explained what he looked like to a T. i showed her a picture and she said it was him. she was so sure of it and she didn’t feeling alarmed at all by the presence but that she was encouraging me to try to figure out what message he was trying to get across because spirits don’t try that hard to reach out for no reason.
i guess i am coming on here because i have a lot of feelings and i want to know what these experiences might mean and if i should be worried at all.

I encountered something that to this day leaves me questioning about what I saw. I was young, maybe a few years old and I woke up and looked at the corner of my bedroom (the wardrobe was in the corner) and then I see two (or three I can’t remember how many) weird ghostly head things come from the corner and hover towards me, the best way I can describe is that they looked like space ships (the NASA space shuttle with its overall styling), i couldn’t scream nor did I say anything, I looked at the side of my bed to see one also come from under my bed in which I then hid under my blanket and then felt something touch my head. The weirdest thing is that I don’t remember what happened afterwards? My mum stated I apparently screamed but I do not ever remember doing it.

I’ve never really talked about it but it’s just something that leaves me wondering how I can even “imagine” something like it when I can picture every little detail of the apparitions.

I've never really had anything spooky happen to me. There was one time where I briefly had a moment with a ouija board, but that was about 20 years ago. Since then nothing but strange feelings here and there if I'm home alone and honestly I am probably just overthinking at that point.

Anyway, this weekend my partner and I attended a wedding out of town. After returning home I set to the task of getting all my hair supplies, makeup and jewelry put away that I had taken with. I take the bag of jewelry directly out of my bag and set it on top of my dresser so I can open my jewelry box. The jewelry box is made so that you must open the lid and both side compartments before you can pull out the storage drawers (this is important for later). I also had to move some things from in front of the box and pull it out to be able to do that.

Here is where it gets weird. I pull open a drawer and there sitting in the middle of a set of bangles is the ring I wore to the wedding. I'm confused at this point because the jewelry bag is not even open yet... how did it get in here? I start gas lighting myself and say, "maybe I didn't have it on like I thought". My bf gets home and I ask him if he remembers me wearing it there and he says yes. So then I start questioning if I just put it away in my rush to straighten up things, but all the stuff I had to move to get it in there wouldn't of been there... the rest of the jewelry would of also been put away... and also if I was going to put the ring away why did I not just put it in the top where it goes?

I tried not to acknowledge it too much and I almost didnt tell my bf because I didnt want him thinking I was insane. We sat for a while trying to run through all the possibilities... was it the same ring? Do we have pictures of me wearing it there? I just can not come up with any other logical reason that it would be where it was or how it got there without some kind of paranormal undertone.

This ring does have some sentimental backstory for me... it was one given to me by my grandmother on my father's side when I was in 6th grade. It was after my grandfather passed from his long battle with cancer to help to remember him. I no longer have contact with that side of my family and I almost wonder if something happened to her... or maybe it was my grandfather checking in on me and giving me a sign. This wedding opened up my bf and I talking a lot more about marriage and our future together... maybe it was just his way of getting my attention and giving his blessing to that.

Either way, it is 1am and I can't sleep with this mystery flooding my mind. I'm also a little worried this is just the beginning and acknowledging it was not a great idea.