I Iive in Henderson Nevada it's about 12 miles from the strip. I was using the bathroom in my master bath. I was the only one home when I heard something whisper my full name Dusin Brown, followed by a sound that sounded like an old school computer turning off or on. I only have one laptop and it was downstairs. I was so freaked out that I went to my friend's house until my boyfriend got home.
The next night I was trying to sleep when I started to itch intensely all over my body. I woke my boyfriend up thinking there was something on the sheets. He said he felt fine but he was just dreaming about someone standing over me. I was trying not to over react so I took a shower and tried to sleep. The next day I called my friend over who is into the super natural stuff. She told me just to ask it to leave and to ignore it. I did but wanted to make sure that it was gone so I used my phone to make sure it didn't respond through EVP. My boyfriend asked "was it you who made Dustin itch last night" and you could easily make out that something said yessss in the same voice that said my name. So I ran to wholefoods to get sage burnt it and said the Lord's Prayer. After that I felt safe.
Later that week I went to gay pride and there were the god people ranting on about gays going to hell. Out of anger I told them that god was not real. After that I had insomnia for 4 days I don't know if it's connected but I never had problems sleeping before. My cat was also acting really weird like it looked really evil. My cat is the sweetest cat and is always mauling me for attention but when this started he just stayed in one of the spare bedrooms walking around also don't know if that was connected to it just thought it was weird.
Your friend gave you very good advice, try and say it out loud that the spirit is not welcome in your house, and of course the sage as I understand is suppose to be a great idea.
On the cat thing though - I think that our pets behavior always is a reflection of our own mental state. They imitate our behavior for instance they are social to people that we are social with (friends,family) and then they are impersonal to the ones that we are impersonal (acquaintances). They even react to people's fear, they can sense it and use it to their advantage, which is natural considering they are animals. Your cat may have been feeding on your worries with everything that is happening. Just my thoughts.