Let me begin by filling you in on my first house. The year was 1996 and I was pregnant with my first child, my ex husband and I had been living with his parents far too long and with a baby on the way we knew we simply had to get a place of our own. It had seemed that with the monthly income we made, this would be an almost impossible goal. That is until we were made aware of an old house that his grandmother had owned, that had just been sitting and unoccupied since the incident.
Story goes, my ex husband's grandma, uncle & aunt had purchased an older home inside the city limits; after the state had bought their home on the range in order to lay down the interstate and place a rest area back in the 1950's. So with their new lump of money, the three of them relocated to their new home.
All I was told was that, Ilene (the Aunt) had been attacked and sexually assaulted by three men one evening in the alleyway behind the house. This unfortunate event took a toll on her and she quickly lost her mind, being forced by the state to be placed into the local insane asylum. Basically her last days were spent in the house. Shortly after being admitted she took her own life.
Some time later the grandmother took a fall down the front steps and required around the clock nursing care, and so she was also admitted into a nursing home. Shortly after her admittance, she passed away.
In the end the only one left in the house was the uncle, who reportedly was already mentally unstable and I imagine that all of this was too much for him to bare; apparently he attempted to take his own life in this house by slashing his wrists. He was not successful and was also admitted into a facility for his own safety.
So here sat this house, with it's tragic history all shut up for years. When we (my ex husband & I) decided to try and talk the uncle into letting us live there dirt cheap. He seemed all to happy to have visitors and almost excited that someone wanted to live in his home, that at one point had meant so much to him and his family.
As I've said before, I have a rich past of dealing with the paranormal and unexplainable, so the history of the house didn't really affect my decision. I just knew that I was having a baby and desired to have my own place.
I felt the place just needed some sprucing up and thought that by having some young people and the arrival of a new baby inhabiting it, would be just what the house needed.
My ex husband worked the night shift at a local restaurant around that time, and would sleep during the days; which wouldn't leave much time to get the place ready for moving in. I figured that while he was at work, in order to kill two birds with one stone I would go and clean it up and give a fresh coat of paint. The first & last night I decided to head over there and paint, I remember there being a very unwelcoming feeling about the place when I pulled up. I didn't let it stop me and grabbed my gear and headed inside.
Once inside, I begin to wonder if we had made a bad decision about moving into the house. But I have always believed that once you start something you should finish it and stick it out, no matter what! So I took a couple of deep breaths, cleared my mind and started in on the painting.
I knew I was not alone, and that was fine. I kept hearing odd noises in different parts of the house. I was determined to get the painting done and wasn't going to let it deter me. That is until I begin to hear voices and hissing of sorts. I began to feel uneasy with that, but still I held true to the task. I was in the living room and on the other side of the wall was the bathroom, which still had one of those metal chairs in the shower used for people who cannot stand up and take a shower on their own. I heard some scuffling in the bathroom and then what sounded like the metal chair being sat in abruptly or moved, so I stop painting and listen some more. I hear the bathroom door shut and some more hissing.
Standing there not moving, still facing the wall with paint roller in hand I'm just kind of waiting to see what comes next. I refused to look away from the wall in fear of maybe seeing something, I would rather not see. I knew in that moment that the spirit or whatever was in the room with me, very near me. At that point I figured that if I showed no fear, it would not do much. The next thing I knew right next to my ear I hear a whisper saying ' Dawnelle '. It knew my name! I dropped that roller right in the paint pan and left that place as quick as I could; all the lights still on, doors unlocked and radio playing!
You would think I would have decided to revoke the decision to move in at that point, but the situation at my in laws was less than desirable and I was getting ready to have my first kid, I felt it just had to happen. Besides would could REALLY happen, how bad could it truly get?! On a comparative scale, I decided that dealing with this ' spirit's would be a cake walk compared to dealing with the whole situation at the in laws house, so I decided it would be best NOT to tell my ex husband of what had happened that night.
I simply told him that the pregnancy had me feeling exhausted and that I thought it would be best if we finished painting the house on his days off.
We lived a total of three years in the house with only a handful of occurrences.
One evening while my husband was at work, I was up late and very pregnant feeling the need to do some deep cleaning as the due date of the baby was very near. Us mothers refer to this as the nesting instinct. There I was standing in the kitchen, when I heard voices coming from the basement. It sounded strange; like that of a radio station that wasn't well tuned. But it just kept on talking and then stopped. I walked over to the door that led to the basement and locked it. I decided that it would be a good idea to just keep that door locked at all times. I would hear the voices in the basement often, but that was about it. I never mentioned it to my ex husband.
One morning while lying in bed I happened to notice a set of faint handprints on the ceiling above me.
I just thought huh, that's an odd spot for handprints; considering that the ceilings were so tall. But didn't think too much about it.
On another occasion we were heading to bed and had made it to the bedroom when the television turned on all by itself. My ex husband and I just looked at eachother and he walked over and shut it off.
One night I was awakened by yelling coming from the living room. As I laid there listening, it was obvious to me that the television had once again turned itself on and seemed like the volume was all the way up.
I found myself once again laying in bed and staring at the ceiling and happened to notice that there were now a few sets of handprints. It seemed like, each time I would look at that ceiling there would always be more sets of handprints.
In the dining room, there was always this big stain that no matter what I did, what company I hired to clean the carpet; the stain would always reappear. I found it rather peculiar. So I went and asked the uncle where exactly in the house did he cut his wrists and he told me the dining room. After repeated attempts at getting rid of the stain, it became apparent that the sting was there to stay. I placed a throw rug over it as a solution to the problem.
Voices in the basement, the television randomly turning on by itself and unexplainable handprints; were all that we had to deal with. Not so intolerable, right.
Well some time after our first child was born, the Uncle in the middle of the night called me up desperately asking me to get him out of the nursing home was in. So he came to live with us in his house. We had been living there for over a year at that point. The paranormal activity, seemed to cease once he was living with us.
I became pregnant with our second child when our first born was a year old. The pregnancy went accordingly, but around the time I was 7 months along I had an accident.
It was winter time and the front steps were covered in ice. I had pleaded with my ex husband to make the stairs ice free several times, but he neglected to do so. We were going somewhere and I was heading down the stairs, when suddenly my feet slipped! In hopes of protecting the baby I grabbed a hold of the stair rail and sort of aimed my body in a way to land on my back. Mind you these were the very stairs that his grandmother had met her demise. I was rushed to the hospital and the baby and I were placed on 24 hour observation. Thankfully we were alright, according to the ER doctors. However the remainder of my pregnancy became extremely difficult. I had planned a natural birth, but turned out as an emergency C- section.
When our second baby was merely 2 months old, my ex husband's Uncle decided to kick us out and take everything from us. We ended up moving out of that house then and never returned. However when my second child was about 10 months old, I started getting very sick; not being able to hold down any food or any liquids and a very drawn out sickness that no one could pinpoint engulfed my life. After the whole run around with numerous visits to the ER, specialists and painful suffering; 2 years later the problem was finally found. Turned out that when I fell on those stairs during my second pregnancy, the jolt of the baby's body had crammed my spleen up against my pancreas and up against my spine; in results killed my spleen, 60% of my pancreas and severely damaged my spine. I nearly died because of that one fall and it has ultimately stole my physical health since I was 22 years of age, it caused a sort of spiral affect and since then I have known nothing other than surgeries and great physical pain. Looking back I wish that I would just stayed at my in laws instead of moving into that house, at least I would still have had my health.