Aliens? Gnomes? Boogeymen? Night Terrors?
I’ve been reluctant to share the following story. Although I created this blog about the paranormal, it’s been easier to be the objective outsider than to write about one’s own experiences. And like many with tales of bizarre experiences, the thought of being labeled a crackpot, nutcase or liar is disconcerting.
However, in the interest of laying everything out on the table to my readers — many of whom have been kind enough to have shared their own weird experiences with me — I’m going to relate the story of my early childhood experiences. It’s my belief that these experiences are at the heart of my lifelong interest in the paranormal and tales of high strangeness. So, here it is:
John Henry Fuseli's "The Nightmare"
I was born on Long Island, New York, where my family lived from 1961 to 1968. My father was a salesman for a large paper company, and Long Island was one of the many places my family lived due to the periodic transfers that my father’s employer required of him. Prior to Long Island, my family lived in Baltimore, MD and Brooklyn, NY (both my parents were born and raised in Brooklyn).
On my fourth birthday, August 27, 1968, our family moved out of our Long Island home in Baldwin, NY and relocated to Wellesley, Massachusetts where we resided for almost five years before finally settling in Ridgewood, New Jersey.
When we moved to the house in Massachusetts my sister was in high school and my brother just entering his freshman year at Boston College. Being that I was only four years old and the youngest by far, I was given the smallest bedroom, which was located on the second floor, as were the other three bedrooms. It was in fact a very small room, with the bed actually taking about half its width. However, the room had a relatively large walk-in closet with a window at the back of it. The closet was almost as big as the bedroom itself, and I recall that I’d often play on the floor inside of it. It was out of that closet which the nightmarish figures of my childhood issued.
Shortly after moving into the house in Wellesley, I began to have startlingly vivid and absolutely terrifying “dreams” — if dreams they were, for they were as real as any memory I’ve ever had in my life. These dreams always followed a similar scenario: at some point during the middle of the night I’d awaken to find several small figures walking through my closet and into my room. At first sight of these beings my horror was so intense that I simply could not move. My mouth would move wordlessly as I tried to scream, but no sound would escape my throat.
These creatures would proceed to gather around at the side of my bed and peer intensely at me, often reaching out and touching me lightly as if they were giving me some kind of examination. I don’t recall the examination as being invasive or painful, only terrifying. They would often touch my head and face as well, communicating with me without words. What they were saying to me I cannot recall, although I believe they were often words of comfort in an attempt to alleviate my fear. I always felt that these visits had a purpose, to tell me or teach me something, but my fear was so great that I think it prevented me from comprehending the meaning of their message.
The beings would either gather around me as I lay in bed and then depart (or I’d lose consciousness and have no further memory), or at other times when they put their hands on me, I would rise off of my covers and float from my bed. Walking beside me and continuing to lay their hands lightly on my body, they would float me along into the large, walk-in closet and through the window at the back end. As I passed through the window to the outside of the house (remember, I was on the second floor) I’d have the sensation of floating and I’d feel the wind and the night air around me. At this point in the experience my memory would always fail.
It was also around this time that I recall getting up in the middle of the night and walking to the bathroom in our upstairs hallway that was near the top of the stairs. After coming out of the bathroom and returning to my bedroom, I bumped straight into one the creatures and saw a look of surprise on his face, as if I’d startled him as much as he did to me. He quickly skirted around me and disappeared down the stairs. The clarity of this experience was so powerful that for years I insisted to my parents that it had actually happened.
The details of the entities physical appearance were always somewhat vague to me, although certain impressions remained clear and consistent each time. One physical attribute that stood out was their height. They were short, not more than my height at a the age of four or five years old, and stockily built with thick necks — if they even had necks. I had the impression that they were physically powerful, despite their stature.
The other prominent feature was their eyes. I recall their eyes seeming to be like those of animals, in that they glittered in the dark and were reflective and shiny. They also were either dark-skinned or covered in dark fur or hair, although I generally felt that it was the latter. And while I had the impression that these beings were very intelligent, I always sensed an “animal-like” quality about them. They also had squat noses, almost more like apelike nares. In retrospect, they were perhaps a bit like the creature sitting atop the sleeping maiden in John Henry Fuseli’s The Nightmare. Although the beasts that haunted my nightmares were darker, blacker and just different than the furry, gnome-ish entity in Fuseli’s painting.
These episodes happened frequently, at least several times every month from the ages of four to seven. After the age of seven they occurred less often, but continued until we moved out of Massachusetts in July of 1973, about six weeks before my ninth birthday. Some time after moving from Massachusetts to New Jersey, I had another of these nighttime visitations (or nightmares, if you prefer), about a six months or a year later at around the age of nine-and-half or ten. The experience was very similar, and interestingly, my bedroom also contained a closet with a window at the back of it. The entities came forth from this closet, just as they had done at our home in Wellesley, MA. That was the final visitation that I can recollect, and the message I believe they were conveying to me was “we can find you anywhere”. No other incident that I’d call strange or paranormal happened to me until my missing time episode several years later in 1978 when I was in my early teens.
I fully realize that most people will point out that “night terrors” and sleep paralysis are common among both children and adults, and that is probably what I’d experienced. I myself am not discounting this possibility, and I’m not suggesting anything as exotic as alien abduction. To the contrary, the creatures that visited me were distinctly unlike reports of the typical gray alien beings that are usually described in association with alien abduction phenomena. I suppose I’ll have to chalk this up to simply one more of my strange, unresolved childhood experiences. Yet, despite the fact that many years have passed, to this day I recall the absolute naked terror and clarity of these nightmares. If nightmares they were.
John Carlson has had a long-standing interests in all things strange and spiritual and has interviewed many noted writers and lecturers of the paranormal and in the field of cryptozoology. John also runs a professional web site design and consulting company, Carlson Web Design, LLC, and resides with his wife and two sons in the great state of New Jersey. When not working on web sites or being being a dad and husband, he tries to write as often as he can on this blog.
John Carlson is a husband, father, and business owner. He’s worked as a self–employed Web developer for over ten years. John was raised in New Jersey USA where he currently resides with his wife and two sons.
You may be surprised to know that others have had encounters with beings quite like the ones you described. In fact, you can find a couple of paintings in Farrah Yurdozu’s book Love in an Alien Purgatory: The Life and Fantastic Art of David Huggins. If you email me, I’ll send you a couple of scans from the book. But they fit your general description — short, no neck, hairy, dark, with shiny eyes.
Blogsquatcher,
Thanks so much. I’d love to see the images you described. Just emailed and look forward to hearing from you.
I’m sure I would be surprised to hear about these encounters, because I really haven’t heard of these creatures being described in conjunction with the missing time or abduction phenomena. Feel free to pass along any links to articles about the subject. I’d very much like to learn more about it.
John
Actually VERY reminiscent of typical alien abduction, because you should remember that holographs and screen images were always used by the grays as ways of alleviating fears of the subjects. Also the forms you describe are also good descriptions of their helper race (often described as biological robots) bluish gnome-like qualities. In addition, that you were floated out through walls is also very common in their taking of subjects for examination.
All in All I think you’re remembering abductions.
Ross,
Not something that I’m ready to discount, but I’ve always been hesitant to jump to the “I’ve been abducted by aliens” mindset. Maybe because that’s on the extreme end of the spectrum, which doesn’t suit my personality. But you make a good point, and I suppose I should consider the possibility. However, I think the whole abduction phenomena is much more complex than the idea that extraterrestrials are coming here to perform experiments on people. That’s a whole other discussion, though.
Thanks for the input.
I don’t really know why I am about to tell you this story…but I would love any input. Just trying to fugure our what happened to me and my parents. OK, here goes…My parents have an alien abduction story as far as I am concerned. They were camping out East of San Diego in the desert, about a 3 hour drive from home, which was Hunington Beach in Southern California. They were pulled over in a dry creek bed, and were attempting to set up camp for the night when they saw a light on the horizon…hundreds of miles away on the far side of a mountain range. The light suddenly moved over to another mountain range in a fraction af a second. The light then moved straight at them, and hid behind a small hill on the other side of their camp. It was small and round like the size of a basketball, and it was totaly silent. The UFO moved around the side of the hill and stopped. It basically “looked” right at them from a distance of about 50 feet. It was continuously changing color, first at a rapid rate, then very slowly, almost as if it was speaking to them with color.
At this point, my mother was terrified. But my father was very intersested. He wanted to go over to it and check it out. But my mom grabbed his hand and they made a run for it. They began driving home and my mom remembers noticing that a little cafe was still open in some small town they passed through, so it was early evening.
Here is where it gets odd…they were in the desert, East of San Diego, and it was summer. A very hot, dry region. Suddenly they run into very thick fog and have to pull over. When they pull over the truck gets stuck in deep mud off the side of the raod. They both got out of the car to lock the hubs, then got back in and drove off. By the time they got to my grandmothers home, it was about 2 or 3am. They knocked on the door, and my grandma answered it. She says she has never seen such a look of terror on anyones face before or after, like she saw that night.
So, it would seem that they lost about 4 hours that night, and were presumably abducted in the “fog”. I asked my mom the other day where I was in this story. Had I been born yet? She tells me I was concieved right afterwards, like within the next month.
OK, so I have been having some strange things happen to me lately. I have seen astral projection (I think?) take place in my bedroom. One night, about 2:30am I am lying in bed wide awake for some reason. I lived alone at the time and felt afterwards that this would not have happened if anyone else would have been in the house with me. So, I begin to see an electric blue light in the corner of my room. As I stare into it, male figures come out, one at a time, and hover over my bed. It goes on for about an hour. I was NOT asleep. I was NOT on drugs. I believe in myself 100%. As soon as I would take my attention off of the single figure that was hovering over me…as soon as I lost interest in him…he would do a 180 degree turn and dissapear at the same time as another male figure would come out of the portal. They were all dressed in modern clothes exept one. One guy was in some sort of a costume and was obviously trying to scare me. Didn’t work though. I was not one bit scared…I sat up, talked to them, drank water, etc. They couldn’t speak back…it was completely silent on their part. But I could see through them like aparitions.
Next freaky thing that happened to me was quite recently. I have a close friend who is dying rapidly of terminal cancer. He’s only 36 years old. It’s very sad. For some reason I have been very close to his situation. I am his moms new best friend, and she has no one else to comfort her but one other son who is also a close friend of mine. I put a benefit concert on recently for Murph (the one that’s dying) and this happened in the middle of trying to put the whole thing together….OK, so I had 12 days to put a show together with 3 bands, beer, a raffle. I had to get a venue, advertise, hand draw a poster, and advertise. I have never been so psychoticly busy in my life. I have a 1 year old and 4 year old too, both boys. So halfway through this, I go and visit Murph, and he looks closer to death than I have ever seen anyone. I instantly get this hiddeous anxiety in my gut…like I am dragging his life out another week so that all his friends can see him like that? I realy felt like I was responsible for keeping him alive and in severe pain just so he could attend his own concert. See, his dying wish was to see his friends again and to see live music one last time. But that day he was so close to the end that he wasn’t really there. I couldn’t talk to my friend. He could barely speak in a faint whisper and his eyes were rolling back in his head…he was just barely there. So that night I am at home, couldn’t sleep, drank some whisky to relieve the anxiety but was NOT drunk. I go to lay in bed (same exact spot as the last story) and suddenly feel Murphs presence in the room. I won’t go into details cause it gets wierd. Basically, about an hour into this, he begins to prepare to leave. I don’t want him to go because I think he may be leaving for good. Like he had died and was stopping by to say goodbye. Before he goes, he asks me to tell Julie, the love of his life, that he loves her. I agree of course, and he leaves. This time I couldn’t see his spirit…it was more like I was reading his mind. Like we were speaking telepathicaly or something. Once again I was NOT asleep when this went down, nor could I sleep the rest of the night. I just lay there awake wondering what the hell just happened. When I got up the anziety was hellish. I thought he had passed in the night. Couldn’t get a hold of his mom on the phone, and was pacing. Couldn’t sit, stand, eat, breathe, sleep. Then I talked to his mom. She had a cheerfulness in her voice and I new he was still with us. Later that day I drive the 40 min. drive to their house because they want me to meet up with Julie (who had called the prior day, after I spoke with her). She needed to follow me to their house cause she’d never been there before. I go over to Murphs first just to see how he’s doing. I walk in, look at him sitting in the hospital bed in his living room, and instantly the anxiety goes draining out of me. He’s sitting srtaight up, wide eyed, whites aroud his eyes VERY white, voice as clear as a bell, smile on his face, color in his skin. Lookin damn good, just skinny. I asked his mom what happened. She says he started getting better as soon as he got Julie’s phone call. I also asked Murph if he remembered coming into my room that night…he looked at me after a bit of strange introspection and said “No, I wasn’t at your house the other day”. Like he thought he may have driven over there to visit, like the good old days. I said “I know YOU weren’t there Murph, you haven’t gone anywhere for 6 weeks…” Then I told him the story. He basicaly thinks I am crazy as a loon. Many people may think the same thing, but I believe in myself. I tell these wierd stories all the time.
One more thing. I have crazy dreams too. One very realistic one where I was hovering over the ocean in Southern Cal where I was born. There were about 20 of us and we saw alien script in/on the surface of the water in elecrtic blue/green light. Suddenly I could understand the words and they told me the meaning of life. I understood everything suddenly and so did the others. It was amazing and I flew off. When I woke up I had no idea what the meaning of life was. I was pissed. I have one more dream that used to reaccur before the age of 18 or so. It was like I was awake, and it used to scare the hell out of me, until it ended up becoming interesting through the years. I would wake up (I thought) and walk out of my room into pitch blackness. In the blackness were beings not from this earth. The only way I could tell was their tone of voice and their alien type speech. It was the tone that used to scare me. I have never heard this type of sound before. I can’t explain or reproduce it in any way because it isn’t the ABCDEFG scale of notes form Earth. Very eerie indeed. One more dream before I go…also VERY realistic. It was the end of the world and everyone new it. The earth was going to be destroyed tomorow somehow and I was not going to wait around to see the pain and suffering. So I decided to take my own life there and then, one day before the end. Nobody else would do it with me, so I said goodbye and killed myself. I can’t remember how exactly…but it didn’t hurt. So I die in my dream. I go up and out of my body and get this feeling like nothing I’ve ever experienced. It was amazing. Better than sex, drugs, surfing, snowboarding in powder…some of my favorite things to do. It was complete freedom and extacy…sooo amazing I got back in my body and jumped up to tell all my friends that their was nothing to be afraid of. Just the opposite in fact…something to look forward to. Ever since the dream I have really had no fear of dying at all. I don’t want it to some too soon, but I don’t really care if it does.
So that’s about all the wierdness I can write about for now. You think the aliens snatched up my dad and messed with his sperm (me)? Have you heard of anything like this happening? Maybe I just have an unusually strong mind…the mind’s a powerful thing. Thanks for listening to my rantings…Melissa
Hi Melissa,
Seems that many of the blog comments and emails that I receive are from people like you who have had a wide range of different types of encounters and experiences. This supports my theory that, as much as we might want to compartmentalize these supposedly “different” type of phenomena, there seems to be a thread that holds them all together. I frequently have people tell me that they’ve had psychic and out-of-body experiences as well as poltergeist and/or ghost encounters, UFO sightings, etc. I think some people are just more perceptive and open to these phenomena, although why they are is still a mystery. My mom used to dream about things that would often come true. She was a nice, normal person with no particular belief in the paranormal, but somehow she was able to tap into something that is unavailable to most people. She also occasionally saw dead relatives. Now, whether or not people (like yourself) have been somehow been genetically manipulated before birth is an interesting question. There have been researchers that have suggested this has been going on for quite some time, perhaps to modify or prepare human beings for an evolutionary or spiritual leap forward — although some researchers don’t think the reasons are quite so benevolent. It’s an idea worth considering, but I don’t know if it’s something that can be proven.
Thanks again for checking in with that comment.
John
Facinating experiences. Thanks for sharing. I believe you, and don’t think your crazy. I haven’t a clue as to what ‘it really was’ that you experienced. Like you I think multiple things are possible. ie. sleep paralyisis, aliens, lower level spirits presenting themselves to someone who at the time could see them/hear them, ultra dimentional species, crypto-related speices, lucid dreaming while sleep walking….. Who knows. A recent quote I heard I like is, “It’s not the shape of the clouds that matter, but the meaning you take from their shapes”. If these experiences have influenced your life in good way, or even if they just opened your mind to other experiences, this is a good thing. — Thanks for sharing!
Thanks, Paul. I don’t think I’ve been traumatized by the experiences, although I do believe this has a lot to do with why I’ve had such a longstanding interest in the paranormal. Like the missing time incident that I had (don’t know if they’re necessarily connected or not) I’ve always felt there was some deeper meaning or purpose to these experiences.
I agree, John, the deeper meaning that seems to elude us is there waiting and maybe begging for us to discover it. And I agree with Paul, too, that they could be beings, possibly from another dimension/parallel universe? I don’t think you’re crazy at all — hope not, because I ran into the same thing in another High Strangeness in Britain episode, this time in Scotland. My hubby and I were staying in an old inn on the banks of the River Ness that flows into the (in)famous loch. We were fortunate, we thought, to get a room overlooking the river. Flinging open the windows to the black quiet around us, I drifted off into a sound sleep, — only to awaken a couple of hours later with a horrific shock to see orbs of red, orange, and yellow light bouncing bouncing around the room! And that, I assure you, was the longest night of my life. I seemed to keep drifting in and out of sleep involuntarily. They must have materialized while I was sleeping, because the orbs were gone the next time I woke up. I couldn’t see what they looked like, but I could feel them handling my body — again, every time I would feel on the verge of discovering something, I would mysteriously drift off. Eventually, however, one looked directly at me and I was shocked to find him extremely youthful with a pointed face but otherwise with quite normal features. At no time, however, did I find any of them at all threatening. and I was certainly never really frightened — just puzzled. When we were traveling the next day, I mentioned to my group of five that I thought we had ghosts around. I could have wept with gratitude when my husband said, “Oh, you mean those weird lights in the night? I got up and went to the window to see what was happening but there were no reflections or anything at all, everything just dark and silent…” . At least it wasn’t just my crazy imagination! And if it all keeps our minds open and our curiosity – combined with critical thinking – alive and well, it should be all for the good. Many thanks for sharing; it takes courage, I know.
Wow, another good one Linda! I’m going to write a book about you! I liked that you received confirmation from a third party. I know it would be easy to dismiss this as a dream if not for the outside corroboration. Very strange, and it makes me wonder why these things appear in so many forms. Thanks for sharing that!
Funny thing is, when i was young, i used to stack every single stuffed animal i had around me when i went to sleep. And believe me I had many. I believed that they would protect me from beings that would visit. I infused them with my energy so they would be like a huge wall barrier. I cannot remember what they looked like back then.
But I have seen shadow beings a few times in my apartment recently. However, i did not know exactly what they were called until i researched on the web. I do not know why i cannot remember the visitors when i was younger…but whatever they were–they were there.
Blanca — That sounds familiar. I used to have to pull my blankets way up to my chin, and I wouldn’t let any part of me out from under the covers.
People who experience these types of things often have other strange incidents occur in their lives. It’s generally not isolated, and it’s hard to talk about because people generally look at you like you’re a crazy person if you do bring up these things. These experiences are not easy to endure, but I think they’re much more common than we know. I’ve really come to this realization since starting this blog.
I have had similiar experiences, to me the little dark ones were hooded and their features always in shadow.But they were very squat and seemd to not be able to move their heads. I have experienced the night paralysis, the levatation, the passing through walls and telepathy. Though typically what they said was not so much a comfort as a warning, basically stating that I would not want to be conscious for this. I believe these experiences are not physically real but a product of something going on within the mind. frontal cortex epilepsy or some such thing. My daughter who is now four has night terrors she wakes up, but she is not awake and she is very upset and says things like, don’t take me, stop hurting me, leave me alone, and then doesn’t remember any of it. Whatever it is that I have, she has it too.
I certainly don’t rule out some sort of brain dysfunction/abnormality being at the heart of these experiences. If it is, I wonder though if this is something that one grows out of with age? I really have not had these intense night terrors or have seen these entities since I was a child, although I had several other strange experiences that would, at least on the surface, appear to be unrelated to these nighttime visitations or dreams. Maybe certain people are more sensitive and can perceive these entities that other may not be aware of. I’m really not sure, but I do know that these experiences felt real to me. However, I know the mind can make hallucinations seem as completely real and solid and tangible as anything we’ve experienced in normal, waking consciousness. Whatever its nature, I’m sorry for you and for your daughter (although it’s fortunate that your daughter doesn’t seem to remember these things). It was very frightening when I went through it, and I don’t envy anyone else who has.
I am very familiar with both your typical sleep paralysis, where your mind has fully awakened, but your body has not, & also the presence of something else during sleep paralysis. I know when it’s just normal paralysis, but when there is a presence, that is when it is frightening.
I do not recall, but according to my mother, between the ages of 2 to 4, I suffered night terrors. They seemed to go away, but I started having experiences with sleep paralysis in my mid teens right through to my twenties. I still have them on occasion now in my early thirties, but rarely. They were particularly bad between the ages of 22 to 26, when I was married, & they peaked around the end of my marriage. My then husband was a witness to at least two of these experiences, & one in particular that was very intense & frightening happened while we were on vacation.
Now where I live is the Pacific Northwest, where we have temperate rainforest. We were vacationing in a lovely little cabin in Tofino, on the West Coast of Vancouver Island. Now the cabin we were staying in was quite private, secluded & surrounded by dense rain forest & pine. There was no need for curtains on any of the windows.
In the middle of the night, I awoke, but paralyzed & was aware of a presence around the cabin. I consciously kept my eyes closed, for fear of seeing something I didn’t want to see, but could still “see” what was happening in our room. My back was turned to the window as well as my sleeping husband, but I could see against the wall what appeared to be the shadow of someone peering in through the window. Behind them, what was casting the shadow, was what I can best describe as flickering flashlights that danced behind whomever was looking in. The shape of the head was not quite human. During all this, I heard the tv turn on, however the volume was low, & I heard all the dishes rattling in their cabinets. I knew I was experiencing sleep paralysis, but it wasn’t normal. I eventually ended up drifting back to sleep.
The next morning I asked my husband if he heard or saw anything or was awoken by anything. He told me that he thought he heard the tv go on & what he thought were raccoons on the front porch, but was too groggy to investigate.
Now with regular sleep paralysis, I tend to wait for my body to catch up to my already awakened mind, or I just end up going back to sleep, but with the addition of a presence, it is usually accompanied by the feeling of something weighing or pushing me into the bed. When I regain the ability to move, I’m usually sweating, anxious & physically tired, as if I had been putting up a big struggle.
I do believe in unseen intelligent entities, or spirits or whatever you want to call them & I sometimes wonder if there is some kind of “barrier” between sleep & wake that is weakened, or open to them, because quite often I feel as if I am trying to keep something out when this is happening. Who knows, but I do know that these types of experiences are quite common & I’ve spoken to lots of folks that have had them.
Thanks for sharing yours, it compelled my to share mine.
Hi John,
Thank you so much for sharing your experience. I have been hunting all over the web again tonight looking for info that might relate to an experience I had when I was 22 years old. (I am now 39.) I heard about sleep paralysis years ago, and I looked into it a bit in curiosity, but no one seemed to have the same details to their experience as me. Namely, the telepathic voice that comforted me in the midst of my utter terror. I can’t tell you how shocking it was to read your account- believe me, I’ve read many- and feel such a strong feeling of identification and familiarity. I actually gasped outloud and had to turn away from the computer for a moment, I was so overwhelmed.
In the fall of 1994, I was not into aliens, supernatural phenomena, succubi, ghosts, nothing. I was a typical recent college grad living at home, partying with friends, and thinking about nothing but myself and my little dramatic life. One night I was up very late crying and looking out the second floor window at the sky. I was at that window crying, feeling such angst, when I began feeling very very uneasy. So uneasy that I broke free of my self absorbed melancholy on a dime. Music was playing on the stereo- The Counting Crows, if I remember correctly-and there was this sense of being watched, of something out there in the darkness. It just hit me out of nowhere, startling me to my core. I climbed off the window seat and lay down on the bed, almost laughing at myself. I just gave myself the creeps, I remember thinking. I must have fallen asleep after that, because I remember nothing until I woke- or half woke, if the researchers are correct- and saw the things at the foot of my bed. There were four of them, and they were very small. I remember thinking, initially, groggily, “Where did these little kids come from? What the h*ll are little kids doing in my room?” I tried to sit up, to move, all the while becoming more and more alert, but nothing happened. My arms and legs were frozen. That’s when my terror began. I tried to scream for my father, whose home I was lving in, but my voice wouldn’t work. I can’t even begin to describe the extent of my fear and panic; judging from your own account of your childhood incidents, you understand only too well. Then the voices began in my head. “It’s alright. We are not here to hurt you. Everything is going to be okay.” It said the same type of things over and over, in this bizarre monotone that was not- I stress- was not, my own voice. It was more of a male voice. At least that’s what I remember thinking. I knew then that it wasn’t children at the foot of my bed. My panic continued as a thing that reminded me of a pen light was run from the top of my head and down the length of my body again and again, all the while that voice, soothing. “Everything is going to be okay..”
Here’s the embarrassing part of this story; every part of my body that the light passed over began to feel intense pleasure, a pleasure I had never felt. I’d venture to say it was orgasmic pleasure, but that wouldn’t be correct, as it wasn’t touching me in a sexual manner, just travelling from forehead to toes and back again. But it was blissful, that light, wonderful, rapturous, like nothing I have ever experienced before or since. I was still very afraid in the midst of all of this, despite the light and the voice. I remember struggling to kind of splinter away from myself, to step back as part of me was succombing to the calming voice in my head and the light. I told myself, “Remember this. They want you to forget this. Remember this tomorrow. Remember this.” This became a mantra that co-mingled in my head with the soothing voice. I felt like I was in no physical danger, but I did have a very strong sense that I was being manipulated, like I was in a battle with these things to retain a part of myself. Whether that part was my memory, my body, what have you, I can’t say.
I remember nothing more. I woke the next morning with a start and it was the very first thing I thought of. I immediately alerted my parents, telling them that something awful had happened in my bedroom. I had no fear or shame, in telling them, as I thought they would certainly believe me. I was a solid, intelligent, stable kid. They didn’t beleive me, however. They thought I was having some sort of sudden breakdown, and tried to get me to see a psychiatrist. I refused, moved across the state within a month, and never told another soul until the day I finally told my husband-to- be one night thirteen years later.
Here’s the best part; Matthew had the very same experience as me. Soothing voice, small figures near the bed-everything except the “penlight.” We had only been dating a month when I began telling him about all this late one night, and I can still remember my shock when he finished my sentence about the voice in my head and said, “And the voice told you that everything was going to be alright.” The strangest part is that he and I went through it the same year, perhaps within a month of each other. I think my experience was in Mid-October of 94, or so. he thinks his was perhaps September, just before my own.
Neither of us know what any of this means, as we are not the type of people to tell others and brainstorm about it. But deep in my heart I have always rejected the sleep paralysis explanation as bunk when it applies to what I experienced. I remember feeling as though I was being brainwashed in those moments, as though a part of me was being simultaeneously healed and erased at once. To me, it was real, it happened, and my strong will kept me from letting “them”- whatever “they” were, convince me otherwise.
I often consider hypnosis, but honestly, I’m afraid that the hypnotist will think I’m tapped. I imagine that there may be many, many people that have been through the same thing but never come forward.
What was it? I’d like to find out someday. Especially now that I am waking up at night hearing my three year old son talking in bedroom in the dark. I can’t get myself to go in there and look, on those nights. Isn’t that kind of hilarious? I’m afriad of what I’ll see. He sounds like he’s having very heated conversations with someone at times. “Stop. Give it back. It’s mine.” I heard this the other night, amid other random, garbled nonsense. Scares me to death.
Hi Lori – Thanks for letting me know about your experience. You make a good point when you wondered how many other people have gone through this and haven’t come forward. And I can understand it, because it does sound pretty crazy. I was very reluctant to share my story just because of how it sounds and for fear of how others might perceive me. For the record, I’m not really buying the “sleep paralysis/night terrors” explanation either. I felt that these were real, solid, physical presences that were interacting with me. For what purpose though, I still don’t know. Seems to somehow fit in with some of the other strange incidents later on in my life.
Also very interesting how you and your husband shared this same experience. Where you meant to come together at some point? It begs up some pretty heavy questions.
Thanks again for checking in and sharing your story.
John
Hi John,
i first want to say i believe what you have stated, i have suffered night terrors and sleep paralysis all my life, and there has always been this uneasy feeling that my mind was blocking out something, which in turn was perpetuating the other symptoms, I am 39 and i am a teacher, i have told hardly anybody what i believe for obvious reasons. However after reading your page i felt compelled to share this with you, for the longest time i believed i had been abused. Until i began to be obsessed with the sky i watched every night for about 3 yrs then finally had a encounter with the biggest fireballs i have ever seen came right past me and my brother at our house in Australia, they were huge and they danced around the sky with purpose, i believe these things to be the equivalent to our probes or scouts. I reported the encounter only to find out i wasn’t the only person to see them, furthermore i have woken up with scratches all over my back or legs, i had a strange triangular mark appear on my stomach although i never had a birthmark, blood noses for no reason and i wake up screaming nearly at least once a fortnight. i have always been to scared to go under hypnotic regression because i don’t want to know what happened to me. However here is the really bizarre thing my girlfriend looked up sleep paralysis and found the pic at the top of the page and said i have seen this by you at night. It freaked both of us out, and just added to my insomnia. The things you remembered are more than likely to be real. As was mentioned earlier , what are the odds that other people would see the same thing, there are so many reports. I still have to stop myself from looking at the sky, but i have because it tends to make people think your nuts. I am not crazy, its just that life experiences shape you in a profound way, and once you open your mind you don’t stop seeing things differently. I will say this look up in the sky iff you see stars that a perfectly spaced apart, with one big one small that is them, i have watched and documented for years they are in the sky every night , you just have to know what you are looking for, and there is always more than one.
Hi Daniel — Reading this, I feel fortunate that my experiences subsided in my childhood. I really wouldn’t want to be dealing something like this throughout my whole life. It must be very disconcerting and upsetting. The only close-up UFO encounter that I can remember also happened to me as a young childhood, and I’m not even sure if it was real or just a dream (something I might write of one of these days). I have had a couple of long-distance sightings. Just points of light that, as I was watching the night sky, I initially took to be stars. But then they suddenly traveled across the sky, accelerating rapidly, then stopping and changing direction several times. Not the behavior of normal aircraft, and these were certainly not shooting stars or other naturally occurring celestial phenomena.
I know what you mean about being reluctant to do the hypnosis thing. I feel the same way. Partially, I don’t think I want to fully remember all this, and also I feel that I’ve read to much about the abduction phenomena over the years and I’m afraid my memories my be false, having been tainted by reading too much Whitley Strieber and Budd Hopkins.
All I can say is, try to hang in there. I’m sure this is all very difficult to deal with, but if it’s really weighing heavily on your mind, then seek some kind of help or find someone you can talk to about this. It can be difficult to bear this burden alone. By the way – just to clarify, you meant the your friend saw the creature with you in the photo I posted of Fuseli’s The Nightmare? If so, very interesting. I haven’t heard many accounts of that type of creature being involved in these “night terrors” or whatever they are, but mine were definitely along these lines — short, squat, furry, rather animal-like, yet humanoid. Strange.
Hey John, Thanks for responding so quickly, to clarify i have accepted my experiences for what they are, i didn’t start reading about this sorta stuff till i decided that in my truth there is much more out there, but i do take in consideration that the mind is a complex machine that can project thoughts in a Psycho sematic nature. Which gives affirmation to your theory on reading the books. However my brother was sceptical when i told him about the things in the sky until the night of the fireballs, i was hiding from them while he was chasing them down the road.
I thank god that he was there with me to see and witness, otherwise i feel i might have lost the plot. I am sure you can relate with your own experiences the things we see change our truths, it is our deviation from the norms of society. What you described you saw in the sky is the same things i have seen, they have erratic movement, and can shoot of in an instant at rapid speeds. My advice to you is to take it on board, because whether you know it or not, if you are posting it online your experiences have some kind of correlation to shaping your own truths. Ok now i have got that said, moving on to the small beings, my girlfriend saw it beside me when she woke up, she decide to research it and came up with the pic on this page, according to some books the little creature is the demon known as incubus and is said to be a dream demon, which leads me to my theory i think the small greys and others are beings from a parrallel universe which is why they can appear and leave in an instant, i do believe they are what we would call demons they fit the bill. Everything i have read leads me to believe this which is also why they havn’t taken us over , they are not allowed yet. I know i sound nuts , but i don’t go around telling people this stuff randomly, i just feel that you have an open mind to take this in and look at the big picture, i am not religious, in saying this i mean i don’t believe in religion, i think the bible was a tool to control society, however there are some strong messages in it. Pertaining to the bit where it talks about the Nephalim and them taking human women as mates and god was angry with them for doing soo, wtf. The wise men followed a star , did they really, was it a star you yourself pointed out how easy it is to mistake them in the sky and there are countless sightings of flying scrolls and what not in the old testament. Im sorry i have said too much, i just hope maybe i have given you another perspective too look at it from.
Daniel, I agree with the parallel dimension theory. Frankly, I think that’s the origin of much paranormal activity: entities interacting with us through their plane of reality into ours.
John, Absolutely and i believe it is the reason people that have felt something has happened to them are more connected with that plane, i dont see ghosts as the previous lady discussed on your page, however i can with no question feel a presence in a house or building and it is quite strong , what happens is i feel like someone has walked over my grave about ten times over and over, until it feels uncomfortable.There are many haunted places in my area, but i will not go to these places. It is funny because i have convinced many people of my ability, i am often now asked to come and check out apartments for unwanted guests lol.
Their use to be a time long ago where I felt people were full of shit on alien abduction and were making up amazing stories about the matter. At one point in my life I started thinking about things in my life that as a kid would just pass me by with ease. Then it hit me, why would I go to sleep in one room and wake up in another, but as a child it goes out the window. Me and my brother would ask each other everynight did grandma move us around, but this was highly unlikely. The more I think about the events from my child hood, the more I realized that almost everyone at some point in their lives have been abducted by aliens. Some of our thoughts are repressed so well that we hust dont remember. For instance, I have memories of me and my family living in certain places that we actually lived but don’t remember my sister in my memories at those places, keep in mind she was indeed around but what happened to that memory of her? ……I realize that those individuals who are in the asylums wre not born crazy, they were the victoms of constabt mind tampering and memory repression to the point that the brain could not fix it self. No one just gets schizophrenia or alzeimers or other mind illiness wothout injury or malpractice. We are just luckyt that our minds made it through. Most of us have implants in us and dont know it…..here is proof on how to find iot on your body. take a working cordless phone with dail tone, not cell phone and place it on parts of your body without cloths on or simply put it on your skin. make sure the volume is all the way up. when contract is made, there will be a weird chirp like ringing,no bullshit. We have never been alone on this planet…I realize that all presidents are from the same bloodline which is draco that is the same as the royal famalies…keep in mind draco is from another star system……Do the math aand wake up.
John, I just have to share this one little incident with you. Hopefully it will bring a smile to your face and perhaps a little enlightenment too. A friend was staying with us and as he came down the hallway one afternoon he literally jumped to the side to keep from tripping over a little feller (boogeyman, goblin, ghost) who knows. It scared him so bad he turned white. He said when he turned back it wasn’t there. He described pretty much what you did. Thinking of me as the in-house expert he asked what it was.
Knowing how afraid he truly is of even the mention of ghosts or demons (he was 17 at the time) and such I told him this. I said somewhere in another time and place there’s a little guy right this minute scared and crying to his mother that he was innocently walking along and nearly got run over by a very large, very white demon. I wonder what his mom and his friends are telling him.
Although I said this to help lighten his thoughts I also meant it as something to think about. I do not believe we humans are the only ones who are wondering what is going on. All too often I have seen entities, for lack of a better word, who are just as startled as I have been.
Yes Daniel, the stars do move, you are not alone in seeing that.
John, those creatures you describe seem to be pretty curious, I’ve heard a number of tales about them. I wonder if they are not a part of us, does that make sense?
On another note, sleep paralysis is one thing but forced or induced paralysis is quite another.
I used to have a recurring dream of a gray that included paralysis. I remember once when the dream began, thinking “oh no, not again”. In the dream I knew the gray knew my every thought, so anything I was thinking to try to get away was pointless. Finally in one dream I kept telling myself “I must move my arms, I must move my arms.” It was difficult, but I did break my arms free. The image of the gray dissipated like a mist. I have never had the dream since. I am going to contend that we’ve been influenced by the media, and we carry a fear, and it shows up as very real dreams and nightmares, and that is all it is.
Jim — I don’t doubt that the media has influenced us to the point where it’s almost impossible to separate dreams from what may be real, physical experiences (if there are any). For myself, the beings that I kept seeing where short, stocky, dark and fur-covered — definitely not anything like grays. Also, this began in 1968 when I was four years old. The whole thing about gray aliens and abductions hadn’t really entered the public consciousness and I was too young to know anything about the subject anyway. Regardless, it may very well all be a product of the human brain. It’s probably not something that can ever be scientifically measured or proven.
When I was young, probably ages 4-7 I had a reoccurring nightmare every Christmas Eve. It started as ostrich-like aliens with brown feathers and no eyes came to a family Christmas party and would peck someone, then that person was infected and they would bite someone else. I would look through these glass tiles while hiding under the dining room table and see a vertical ship in the distance, then all of a sudden I’m on a bus with other escapees looking out the window. We stop and run into a house. Everyone is scrambling to get all the doors/windows locked. We succeed but just as these pink-fleshy creatures start banging on the glass…. then I wake up.
Most notably I wanted to talk of a dream I had when I was 20, concerning these creatures you speak of. I had a dream where I’m on some ship in space, and all of a sudden I’m descending at a downward angle towards the Earth. These gnomish creatures were surrounding me and we were all floating to the earth. It felt so real. We finally land at a gas station and they want me to buy them hotdogs, so I do, then they touch my hand… an image flashes… this cybernetic body on the ship… female in make. Like a white porcelain metal. I come back to them and they are eating their hot dogs. I disappear again but I’m walking in my old neighborhood towards my grandparents house… I see my grandfather walking parallel to me, about 20 ft to my left, walking through the yards of the trailer park. I know he’s already dead. It unnerves me. Then he looks at me with a somber face and I get a chill… I flash forward to their screened in porch. My grandmother approaches the glass door… the main door is open. She peers at me through the glass with a sad expression. We know my grandfather has been dead and she misses him… then my grandfather appears behind her… he slowly walks through the glass and looks at me… I flash to an image of my father… drowning… coiled in some kind of tubing. He is a maintenance man and got called in to find a leak, and I can see his demise… my grandfather is warning me of this. I think to the body in the spaceship and wonder if the little people can help me transfer a dying soul to the body they have. Is this something they were warning me of… teaching me?
All of this was the day before fathers day… and to date, one of the most vivid dreams I have ever had. I dream often enough, but this one just hit me in a way no other has. I just did a search for similar words and found your article. Goosebumps ran up and down me the whole time I read it… it struck me to my core. This was my experience with the little people…. and my dad is still ok to this day.
Joshua – Very interesting dreams, especially that you saw gnomish-looking creatures. I had an idea recently that we might inhabit two or more different worlds, and that each of these separate selves are normally unaware of the existence of the others, but occasionally they intersect or cross over into each others reality. I know that sounds really “out there”, but its been on my mind lately. I’m sure someone has already proposed the same idea at some point, although I haven’t read of that theory before. It seems to play into the quantum view of the multiverse. I have no idea if it’s a true, and it admittedly sounds nutty, but I’ve had that feeling many times in my life and I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately.
Thanks for telling me about your experience.
John
I’m amazed to finally find something on the internet that describes something similar to my own experience – though I KNEW I had memories of an abduction experience, I couldn’t find much in terms of alien races that described what I experienced.
To make a long story really short, the best way I could describe them (that part of it being fuzzy in my memory) was something like an Ewok from Star Wars. Short, stocky, strong, thick neck, furry, NOT the typical grey large eyes but something more animal-like, and maybe (?) wearing a type of hood.
In my experience, these beings took control of my partner and myself in bed, and then what I would recognize as being greys performed excruciating medical tests on me while my partner was paralyzed.
I’m excited to realize that others out there may know what I’m talking about. Please email if you have sketches…I’m on a real quest here. Thanks so much.
Hi Meg — Thank you. It’s good to hear of someone who has had a similar experience as well. I’ve never made any sketches, but I certainly can. When I first posted this article I received a comment from a guy known as the blogsquatcher (he used to have a very popular blog himself). You can see what he had to say if you look at the top of the Comments section on this page. He sent me an illustration from a book where someone describes being visited by these types of creatures. I’ll email it to you. I’ve never made any sketches of these beings, but I certainly can and will. I’ll do that and email them to you as well. I never did see any grays associated with these incidents, at least none that I can recall. I’d love to hear more about your experiences if you’d care to elaborate on them. If you’d prefer to email me, my address is [email protected]. Thanks for sharing your story. — John
I came across this thread since I continually have entities working around me and my bed at night and wonder what it means. I just assume it happens nightly but I am really only aware of them once or twice a month. As a child I saw grays or shadow people, I guess, based on reading other’s experiences. So when I have the sensation, it is during a type of sleep paralysis. I now am aware enough to mentally ask who are you, why are you here, what do you want, etc. I then receive the answer as a knowing feeling. Sometimes I have flashes of mental images as a response. So it’s up to me to interpret. Anyway, over time I have come to know that these are benign alien entities doing their job. They are dark, usually hooded, with metallic glowing/flashing eyes, usually doing their thing with machines and or cables usually up in a corner of the bedroom. For the most part they leave me alone while they work but sometimes they stare or gently touch me–again I am a little freaked and i am immobile–but their message is relax let us work. My opinion is that it is a healing or curious helpful gesture, a break from their work. I would appreciate to hear from you (u have my email) just to let me know if I am having a common or uncommon experience. And any insight to what it means. Thx so much . . .
Great thread. There are many others like me I see. Heightened ESP, precognitive dreams, astral travel, talking with the dead, alien encounters, downloaded information from star beings and on and on. So many “weird” things have happened/do happen to me that I begin to wonder about my sanity. Not like everyone else that’s for sure. I have come to accept this about myself and revel in the fact that I “see” more than most. Thank you for posting.
So it happened last night again. This is amazing that I found this thread (so easily btw, synchronistic). My cuz and i got into a deep conversation of the understanding of the situation. A couple of weeks ago We had both been “attacked” by the entities. He had fallen asleep in my room after watching a movie, and we both had an occurring “dream” of these entities in our presence, We both woke up kicking and screaming. He immediately fell back asleep and I was so shakin (because of the probing that I believed had occurred in the past) and i kept repeating “they want me to forget, but I wont forget.” I texted my friend to ease myself, “I remember, there is a thing they always want us to forget, but I remember, and its an unwritten rule”.
I was shady in recalling initially, until last night when they “found me” in my sisters room. I remember their black shining eyes, and dark skin. Natural looking, earthy creatures. Small, found at the foot of my bed and around, paralyzing communication. I kick and scream and am freed of the paralysis. My mom and stepdad heard me and spoke out to me. I was yelling “NO!!!” I knew it had happened again.
I have memories of grey presence, and forgetting, the sickening feeling of remembering and submitting. That has happened many times.
My cousin and i came to the conclusion that this is part of this game’s “refs”. We are here to learn how to play this game of life, figuring out people, personality traits, how to excel, and sometimes when you get too close too major points of enlightenment your mind gets erased.
Our consciousness is expanding, and soon they will have a harder time making us forget. I am wondering if they delete internet blogs as well.. we shall see, but I want to say
THANK YOU EVERYONE!!
who shared their stories, it was nice to use collective experiences to validate and illuminate the background play in this story we are all a part of.
I am a 23 year old girl and have had what I think is night terrors since I was a child.
The earliest one was when I was about 6 years old and I woke up and I saw someone green sitting in front of my dressing table. I could not move or scream. I think I was trying to say “Mum’ but the words weren’t coming out.
The next one wasn’t until I was a teenager. I was sharing a bed with my boyfriend that night at my Mum’s house. I woke up to find a “being” laying on top of me. I can’t remember exactly what it looked like but it was about my size and it was looking at my face. I remember it being very scary and I had the feeling I was being attacked. I screamed, rolled out of bed and ran away from it, still screaming. i proceeded to jump on top of my boyfriend screaming with sheer terror “HELP ME, HELP ME, HELP ME!” I had woken the entire house up and everyone ran to see what was the matter.
The next one happened a few months later. I woke up at a relatives house and saw a massive animal laying on the ground next to my bed looking at me. I jumped out of bed and ran out of the room screaming.
After this incident I continued to see strange things in my bedroom. Spiders looking at me on the wall, balls of light or fire in front of me, the wall collapsing on me and strange lines forming themselves on the walls of my bedroom.
The very latest incident happened about two months after my twin daughters were born, (they were born 4th July 2011). I woke up and saw a squat being sitting beside me looking at me and my twins. As soon as this “being” (I got the feeling it was a “she”) became aware that I was looking at her, she rolled off the bed and disappeared between the bed and the wall space, dropping something on the bed as she went. She reached her arm over the bed and grabbed what ever she dropped. As she did this she looked at me and said with her finger up to her nose “ssshhh, don’t tell your mother.”
I of course told my mother about this, as I was very frightened. This was the last time I have had an incident like this (I was a couple of months ago). These dreams or night terrors or whatever they are scare me so much. I wondert why this happens to me. Does anyone know?