Paranormal Experiences As A Child

I have a few stories of small encounters that I thought I would share. All of these happened when I was a child, and some I remember as young as 4 or 5.

When I was little, I would often see, hear, and even do things I cannot explain. There were times I would hear my name being called, sometimes it was from a voice I did not recognize; other times it was the voice of my parents. When I went to see what my parents wanted, they would say they never called me then returned to what they were doing. I was too young to understand what was happening, so I was rarely frightened. One day I realized something odd was going on when I was watching cartoons during the day. I heard my dad's voice in a WHISPER call my name in my ear. When I turned, there was no one there. My dad was on the other side of the house, so I knew that if he whispered my name I wouldn't have been able to hear it. Even as a small child, I knew this was odd.

On several occasions I would hear scratching under my bed. My ear would be pressed against my mattress, and I would hear a single finger (or claw, or whatever ghosts have) scratching at the bottom of my bed. I was a few years older at this point, so I was old enough to be frightened. I tried to convince myself that maybe it was a mouse under my bed, but it was a very loud, slow scratching so I knew it couldn't have been a mouse... It sounded very firm, like it was trying to get my attention.

One night, I was a bit older, about eight or so. I remember seeing someone who I thought was my brother go into my mother's room. I had to ask him something for whatever reason so I quickly followed it and walked into my mother's room where I saw the figure turn into the master bathroom. I waited for the light to turn on and the door to close so that I knew my brother was "busy" but nothing happened. I turned to my mother (who was on her bed watching TV) and asked, "Did Matt just come in here?" She answered no, and I quickly walked in and looked into her bathroom. Nobody. Not even the window was open.

Another occurrence I remember was during the day. I had gotten home from school and I had let the outside dogs in the house to cool off. I had crawled under the table to where one of my dogs was laying down so that I could play with them. I was sitting on the ground, under the table, and not even a minute passed when all of a sudden I saw in the corner of my eye something move. When I looked, I noticed the long cord of the wall phone was stretched out in mid-air. It was as if somebody literally had the cord by two fingers and was stretching it out. It only happened for a second or two and then the unknown force let go and left me wide eyed. I sheepishly called out, "Hello?" but no response.

Now the next thing I am about to tell you, I am not sure if it has anything to do with the paranormal, but looking back at it, I am not sure why I did those things. Going back to when I was a small child, I remember I used to hurt myself. I don't know why, and I remember feeling pain but not being bothered by it. I remember one incident where I was sitting alone in my room in the middle of the night and using a pair of sharp scissors to snip off pieces of my skin on the top of my hand. I still have a little scar on my knuckle to remind me of what I did. When I was slightly older, I remember I had used a fork to dig into my leg until it was deep and bleeding. Again, I don't know why. And again, I know I felt pain, but I didn't cry or seemed bothered by it.

As I grew older into my teens, my experiences stopped, and it took me awhile to realize what I had experienced as a child was paranormal. As I didn't really know what to think of it at the time. I was to young. I haven't had another experience since.

Although my question is, why is it that children are more sensitive to the unknown and then most of us lose it as we grow? And why did I hurt myself like that when I was little?

Any comments or questions are appreciated.