Pushy Robert

I was visiting a friend who lives in Sheffield, UK. She rents a row house, which was probably built around 1900 for steel workers, like all the other houses in the neighborhood. The garden shed was originally an outdoor toilet, so that gives you some idea of the date of construction.

My friend and I are Americans, and since she was being so hospitable to let me stay with her I asked if there was anything from the States that I could bring her. She asked for some white sage.

Now I don't know if my friend is a pagan or a believer in the "paranormal," but I suspect at least one of those is the case, because I know we both used to frequent the same metaphysical store. Plus, she's a bit of a hippie, so I think she would be open minded about such things.

Anyway, I really didn't think much about it. I didn't ask her what she wanted the sage for, figuring it wasn't really my business.

In general I found her house to be a very cozy and good-feeling place and really enjoyed staying there. But there was one morning when something weird happened. I had woken up, but I was so comfy in my bed that I wanted to lie there as long as I could. So I was very relaxed, in that state where you are not asleep but not really fully conscious either.

I come from a family with many psychic and intuitive/sensitive people, but I'm an empath, not a medium. I sometimes feel emotions from dead people, but I don't see them--usually. On this morning though, I saw--but bear in mind this was a seeing in my mind's eye, but not imagination and not a dream--if you've experienced this you know what I'm talking about--I saw a man about late 50s-early 60s in age. He was totally bald, with a somewhat beaky nose, and he was naked. The way he presented himself was what he looked like in death, like what he would look like on the coroner's slab. I'm not sure, but I think his head might have been shaved. He was a working-class guy, tall and thin. I kind of got the impression he may have died from cancer.

At the same time, he told me his name was Robert, and that he wanted to enter my body so he could show me how he died. I could feel as if he was pressing down on me as I lay there.

I have had sleep paralysis twice, once before Robert and once after, and this was not the same thing. At first I thought it was, but when I had sleep paralysis I never thought there was a human spirit there and I never communicated with anything. I felt a vague sense of fear and like there was something "evil," but as soon as I realized "hey, this is just sleep paralysis" the fear went away. The Robert experience was different. I really had to argue with him because he was very pushy about wanting to show me how he died.

I told him that he could tell me how he died in words, he could show me in images, that I was very willing to listen to his story, but he could not under any circumstances use my body. Finally he went away, frustrated. Since then I've felt sort of bad because it was obviously so important to him to tell his story. Perhaps the reason he wanted to use my body was because I'm better at feeling things than at seeing or hearing them. But I don't let strange ghosts into my body!

I don't know if Robert is attached to my friend's house, but in retrospect it occurs to me that this might be why she wanted the sage.