Heart Starts Pounding: Horrors, Hauntings, and Mysteries - 163. Reddit Scary Stories: Djinn, Doppelgängers, and Imaginary Friends (feat. Two Girls One Ghost)

Episode Date: February 11, 2026

Our listeners get 15% off plus free shipping when they buy two or more pairs of prescription glasses at WarbyParker.com/HSP — Using our link helps support the show. #WarbyParker #ad A face drawn in the fog of a bathroom mirror that looks exactly like you. A husband standing in the doorway who doesn't speak, doesn't move — and swears he was never there. From djinn that fall in love through reflections to entities that mimic the people you trust most, these Reddit stories blur the line between what's familiar and what's something else entirely. Find Two Girls One Ghost Here!YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtIdIQPeFulME3T_28ipIYwSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4aFNuODLKP1NvhQb7P3Kbn Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt. You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts . Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome back to another episode of Heart's Arts Pounding. It's me. Hello, your host, Kaelin Moore. Today, I have a treat for you guys because I had some friends come join me here at the RDS headquarters. The last time I hung out with Sabrina and Corinne, we stayed at the most haunted Airbnb in Salem, Massachusetts. I hope you guys have watched that episode.

I'm going to link it in the description. But today, we wanted to read through some of the scariest ghost stories that we've found recently during our research for some of our other episodes. You can check out Sabrina and Corinne on their podcast, Two Girls, One Ghost, or on the new Crime House show, Crimes of. And quickly, before we get back into it, if you're interested in joining in on our book club chat to talk about Riley Sager's the only one left, we're going to be meeting on February 27th at 12 p.m. Pacific.

To join, you can sign up for any tier on Patreon that's including the free tier and join our live chat. This book is awesome. You guys, I can tell you right now I'm really enjoying this book. I'm so glad this was the pick. What happens when an end-of-life caregiver works with a woman who is ready to tell the real story of what happened to her family, who everyone believes she killed all those years ago? Our dear listener, Samantha, is going to help us out with the chat, so a huge thanks to her. But all right, for now, let's get into these stories with Sabrina and Corinne.

Sabrina and Corinne, welcome back to Hearts Pounding. Thank you. We're so excited to be here. I know, this is the best. I am a little bummed that we're not doing it inside of a haunted house. this time. I don't know. Everyone listening last year when we did our collaboration episode, we rented like truly the most haunted Airbnb in all of Salem, Massachusetts. And had a ghost and had a ghost and made contact with a ghost. And solved a mystery. And solved a mystery. Yes,

that was so fun. That was probably the most fun I had recording an episode last year. I know. That was wild. I think about that all the time. I truly could go do investigations all day, every day. It's my favorite thing in the world. We've gone back to the mansion a few times. since then. That's right. Nothing like what we experienced with you. Yeah. Have you done any other haunted locations for episodes this year?

We went to the witchboard museum. This year? That was right after. I think that was right after we did the investigation with you, Caitlin. What's that one? The Witchboard? Yeah. So it's in Salem.

It's a shop that you can go into, but it's really a museum. But it's this guy who has collected like thousands of wichie boards. And this is just like a portion. of his collection. Like his personal collection. Yeah. They're all on display. You can walk in.

There's a community Ouija board there. Which we used. We did. We went overnight. We were the very first people to ever do an investigation there. Whoa. We used the community Ouija board that everyone else has touched. And it was just, yeah, it was kind of spooky.

It's like in the heart of Salem, it was pretty quiet. Like, I feel like none of the boards themselves, if they were haunted, the entities didn't communicate with us. I feel like whatever was there, it was something passing through. I do know of one one haunted board that he has at that museum, the one where did you hear the story? I can't remember what the girl's name was. This was back in maybe the 1920s where the mom and the daughter were playing. The board said to kill their dad. And so the mom convinced the daughter that she should kill her dad. And it was like this big legal question of like, was there something communicating with them telling them to do it, or was the mom planting that idea?

I don't remember which one this was. There is a little framed placard about it, but he even said that that board has never caused him any problems. Okay, so it sounds like mom was just planting the seed of an idea in the daughter's head to do it. Or like sometimes people are haunted or like what they experience projects hauntings onto things. Like we learned this from our time with Dana and Greg Newkirk, who are some of someone. of the biggest researchers and collectors of haunted objects. And they said the majority of things that gets sent to them, nothing ever happens at all. But put it back with the original owner,

stuff starts happening. So it's, a lot of the hauntings can be just like projections of someone's own fears and energy and kind of like the spirit world's reaction to that. But you take the same haunted doll that's been walking around with a knife in the middle of the night and give it to someone else and that doll is super quiet. That kind of is a good transition into our stories because I think some of these stories that I have for us today borderline on is the person haunted, is the place haunted? What is the origin of this scary thing that's happening? So we all have stories that we're going to read to each other. They're all very ghosty. Some of them are kind of rabbit holes. Like I have a story that I'm going to read that kind of led me down this really spooky rabbit hole

that I'm excited to share with you both. But I think we can just dive right in. Sabrina, do you want to start? I totally do. Thank you. I love Reddit stories. Okay. This one is called I'm worried about my daughter's imaginary friend.

It was originally posted by Hidden Under a Rock 34 in Paranormal Encounters on March 5th, 2021. Hello. I couldn't sleep, so I thought now would be a good time to post this. So I have an eight-year-old daughter who I will be calling Leanna for the sake of my child's privacy. I'm a single father, and it hasn't always been easy, but we've managed. Before the start of COVID, we had moved into a new house in northern Germany, which is close to my parents. Soon after we settled in, Leanna started to tell me about her new... ...friend, quickly telling me only she could see him.

I brushed it off as she has always been creative, and since we were under lockdown, I thought, this is normal, especially since one of my friend's sons also had an imaginary friend. But over the next few months, she would continue to tell me about him, how he would play with her once I put her to bed, and how he knew magic, and how his favorite color was blue. I started to get a little worried, as she seemed to know a lot about this friend. And at first I thought maybe she just was missing her real friends and my parents, so I started to spend even more time with her, even doing my work hours beforehand so I could spend the rest of the day with her. But she still kept talking about this friend. And everything changed two nights back.

I had randomly woken up around 3 a.m. and I could just feel something wasn't right. So I got up and I went to check on my daughter Leanna. She was sleeping in her bed. But her blanket was a little different than how I had left her. I figured she had just moved. But as I was leaving, just in the corner of my eye I saw a figure in the window that looks out into the woods outside of our home. I stared at it for a good two minutes before it simply just disappeared. I really couldn't figure out what it was and some part of me was just thinking it was my eyes playing tricks on me. So the next day I asked her to draw me a picture of her friend. I don't know what came over me but I really wanted to see if it was similar to what I saw. After 20 minutes or so, she gave me this drawing. I don't know. I don't know.

even know what to make of it to be real with you. I sent it to my mom and the single dad group I'm in, and they all said, it was scary as hell. I really don't know what to do at this point. I'm becoming worried from my child. I am just hoping this is really in her mind, but I don't know anymore. Any suggestions or tips would be helpful, as I am also worried I'm overreacting. You want to look at the picture now or after? Yeah, so I'm going to put the picture on the hearts responding Instagram for anyone who's just listening to the audio, but why don't you guys open the photo because I have it here

and describe what you're seeing? It is a... Leanna, in a cute little green dress and green little heels, holding the hands, if you can even call them that, they look like a rake. Each hand looks like a full garden rake.

Okay, let's... Okay, yeah, hands aside. Let's look at those red eyes. It's red eyes, like jagged sharp teeth with a red... shirt, a yellow bandana, and purple pants. Kind of giving a little bit David Bowie. A little bit, yeah.

David Bowie with claws. With claws. I don't love it. No. Oh, my gosh. What would you do if you came home and Noah had drawn that? I was like, look at my new friend. Honestly, I might be delighted.

I have a creepy kid. He can see ghosts. Like, creepy kid. Asked some really questions. If he was scared, I think I'd be, I'd be, like, very defensive and, like, gather all of my objects and things to banish this crystals. Creature. But, well, this user does continue to share more information about the imaginary friend, which, once you hear it, you'll change your mind about Noah drawing this. Spoke too soon.

Okay. So Hidden Under a Rock 34 says, He only comes to play with Leanna at night once I put her to bed. And he comes into her room, according to her. So I had a very serious conversation with her today as I'm very worried, as I fully believe I saw something outside of her window. I just want some help from my daughter. She said his name is Witig.

I did a little digging, and it's an extremely old German name, which makes a little sense as we are from and live in northern Germany. But she has never been exposed to a name like that before, and I know no one in my family has that name. All of this started after we moved into our current home, so if anyone could help me, I would deeply appreciate it. I have been told my child might be sensitive to herself, but I don't know much on these things.

Also, he plays games with her. From what I can understand, it varies from playing with her toys to going outside and playing a game called Hidden. When I asked her what that was, she said it was a secret game and that I can't play it or it wouldn't be secret anymore.

No, that is not okay. That's like the number one thing as a parent. Like, other adults can never tell you a secret. You have to tell mom and dad. Yep. Yes, it is never appropriate for someone to say that they have a secret for you if you're a child. Never.

Mm-mm. Oh my gosh. And what is hidden? Well, and they're playing games outside, but he only comes to her at night. So she's leaving her room at night? Oh, that's a good point. Yeah. She's sneaking out in the middle of the night to go see this Whittig character who lives in the German forest.

Oh. Like is hidden, like the imaginary friend, in quotes, taking her somewhere else? Oh, like it's like a world where. hide and seek like we we go we're hidden yeah like daddy can't find you it's fay it sounds like all the like some kind of fairy tale that book it sounds a lot like that honestly or even mr what's it and stranger things like it's kind of giving oh it does have that experience yeah where it's like i'm your trusted friends but are they a friend because it sounds like they're doing things and this is what i this is what's so tough about stories that involve children

and some spirit that seems to the child like it's a friend. Because it's like what's the difference between a spirit that maybe is more of a protective spirit that is hanging out with your kid? And it's like, could this be a relative from however many generations ago or someone who once lived in the house and they mean well? Or is this something that is doing the work now to gain the trust of your child to separate your child from you without you even knowing? I mean, a lot of German folklore and fairy tales do have entities stealing kids away.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. We were just talking about in an episode, Der Schwatzmann, the boogeyman, the German booge. It's just basically the German boogeyman. And how he comes into your house with a sack in the dead of night, hides in the shadows, and just waits to put naughty children in the sack and take them away. Like, that is, like, deeply entrenched in German folklore, the idea of these spirits, like, taking children.

And now you have Whittig showing up to your daughter's window at night. And playing a secret game. Taking her away and playing a secret game. Yes. I hate it. Yeah. And there are a lot of responses. And then the original user does have a follow-up as well.

Oh, wow. Yes. Oh, okay. Okay. So the first response is from a child therapist. Yeah. Child therapist here. Good. This has red flags all over it.

Get a bunch of flower. I love how this is. is a child therapist slash like witch. Yeah. Not for the psyche of the child, but like you're in danger girl, man, spiritually. Yeah. Get a bunch of flour and pour it all over by the, and pour it all over the ground by her window. See if you can catch footprints. Imaginary friends are more common for younger kids, but by eight, she should be moving on to more age-appropriate peer play. I am a believer in the afterworld, but we need to rule out all physical causes too. I would highly recommend finding a trauma therapist who specializes in play therapy to do an assessment.

Meet with a therapist alone first to explain what is going on. I've worked on cases like this before where we never found physical cause. I determined and agreed that this was a spiritual form. I worked with the kiddo on expressing feelings about the figure and setting boundaries, but not every therapist has an open mind. And then we have another response, the final update from the original poster. Okay. This was posted March 9th, 2021, so what, four days after the original post?

This morning, after my daughter woke up and ate breakfast, I decided to sit her down and ask her about her friend, mostly asking simple questions. And these were the main ones. What is his name? Has he ever asked you to do bad things like hurt yourself or me? And then I asked if she was scared of him. She told me that he told her to call him Whittig, which is truly a name I have never heard in my life. And she told me that he had never told her to do anything bad or to hurt herself or to hurt me. She said she's only ever been scared of him once.

Of course, I asked why, and she proceeded to tell me the story of when he started to come over to play. She said it was a few hours after I put her to bed. She was having a hard time falling asleep, but she noticed something outside. So she got up to investigate. And apparently, he slowly started to move to work. towards the window, closer and closer, until he was right in front of it. And then, he just stared at her, like he was, in her words, very sad and upset. So, of course, being the sweetheart child she is, she wrote a small note and pressed it to the window asking if he was okay.

Oh, creepy. Jeez. Apparently, he shook his head, no. She somehow managed to open the window a little bit and then asked why. She was told it was because he was very scared of the dark and had no one to play with. So of course, my sweet, eight-year-old daughter, Liana, offered to play with him.

He told her he would like that, but before he could, she had to invite him inside, which she did. And this is when I start getting scared. She said after she invited him in, he smiled and pushed the window open, and crawled inside on all fours, which made her very scared and she started to cry. Uh-huh.

But apparently he comforted her, and then he did a magic trick. I, of course, had to ask her what the trick was, and she said he made all the lights turn on in her room. To show her, he wasn't scary. I started to ask more and what other magic tricks he had done, and they ranged from making flowers appear to taking both of them, outside. Apparently, he also likes to show her the stars and moons, which is why the star and moons, multiple moons, are in the drawing.

Okay. I'm starting to believe that this is not just an imaginary friend, the amount of detail she went into, constantly referring to him being real and so many other things. I'm just so glad she is out of the house until Thursday. I think whatever this is is very pissed off with me, because starting a night ago, I woke up with huge scratches on my arms and horrific headaches which I had never had before,

as well as very strange issues while even trying to translate this here for all of you. I've had a bunch of random ones, like the number, scattered through my writing. I was informed by a medium that this is a demon ghost or whatever you want to call it that is known to steal children. I didn't leave my daughter's side until she left today. She was supposed to leave on Monday from my parents' house, but something came up and we had to wait until today. Without saying I collapsed shortly after she left because I haven't slept for more than 40 minutes every night, I'm going to get the house completely cleansed by a Catholic priest.

He's coming over tomorrow, and then I plan to have the place cleared out with Sage. I'm basically doing everything I've been told to do, even planning to get Rose Quartz gem to place outside of her window. She is very much aware that something is wrong at this point, as I have had her sleep in my room for the last few days, and she could definitely tell I was getting paranoid at night. but I told her that there were just a few burglaries in our area and was worried. But I'm also planning to get a nanny cam for her room just as extra security,

just in case it doesn't leave after all of this. So he moved her into his room, and now he's waking up a scratches all over himself? Yeah, this is definitely not something benevolent. This is bad. The second it said, he said that this thing crawled through the window. I was like, all right, all my hope that this was something. descent is out the window now. And the second it had to be invited in. Yeah, has to be invited in.

Also, the reference to the two moons, like you nailed it with maybe this is a different dimension or the hidden game is like taking her to yes, other mommy. Yeah, you're being taken to another place. Yeah. And there's no updates. There have been zero updates since.

So we're just left with this cliffhanger. This was years ago. 2021. Come on. This episode is brought to you by Merit Beauty. These days, I don't really have more than five minutes to do my makeup in the morning, so I need a minimalist routine that will leave me looking put together. That's why I'm excited to tell you about our sponsor today, Merit Beauty, because that's exactly what they do best. My Merit Beauty routine looks like this. I start with their great skin serum to give me a little bit of a glow and hydrate my skin. Then I use the minimalist, which doubles as a concealer and a foundation to cover up some of my red spots. And then I top it off with my mascara and some flush balm, which is actually their most popular product. And boom, I look composed, I look glowy, I don't look like I've been up with a baby since 5 a.m. Their flush balm is actually so popular that one was sold every 30 seconds in 2024. I mean, that is how good it is. Right now, Merritt Beauty is offering our listeners, their signature makeup bag with your first order at Meritbeautcom. That's

M-E-R-I-T-Beautcom to get your free signature makeup bag with your first order, meritbeauty.com. Hi, I'm Katie Ring and welcome to Crimehouse 24-7. Throughout the day, we bring you up-to-the-minute crime coverage as stories break, with daytime episodes hosted by Vanessa Richardson, keeping you informed on the cases unfolding right now. And at night, I take you deeper with night watch episodes, examining the facts, the evidence, the people at the center of today's biggest cases.

New episodes of Crimehouse 24-7 drop every weekday. Listen to and follow Crimehouse 24-7, available now, where you get your podcast. This episode is brought to you by Alma. A year from today, who do you want to be? More patient, maybe less reactive. I always think about these things around the new year, and I know I want to work on managing my anxiety, personally. Well, you deserve to feel like the future version of yourself, and the right therapist can really help. With a network where 99% of therapists accept insurance, Alma helps connect people to in-network care that aligns with their preferences and coverage. People who use Alma to find a therapist who accepts their insurance save an average of 80% on the cost of sessions and 99% of Alma's therapists accept insurance making it easy to get affordable care.

I've used therapy before and I know that when you want support, the last thing you need is to hear that someone is not in your network. Alma really helps make that part easier. The year from today isn't that far away. Get started now at helloalma.com slash heart starts. That's helloalma.com slash H-E-A-R-T-S-T-A-R-T-S. That's H-E-L-L-O-A-L-M-A dot com slash heart starts. Okay, I have another story for you guys that I want to read. Okay, I'm excited because I don't know anyone else's stories.

Oh, good. Okay, great. This one was posted in Glitchin the Matrix seven months ago by user Buggie 77, and it led me down a little bit of a rabbit hole that I'm going to tell you about. But this one is called, what was pretending to be my husband? The story starts. We're going to go there. Okay.

The story starts. This happened this past weekend. I was in the kitchen with my kids and my husband was outside working on his truck. I heard a knock on the garage door, which leads into the house. And I looked over and saw that the door was locked. I naturally assumed it was my husband who was trying to get in. So I opened the door for him, and he was standing there smiling at me and holding some tools in his hands. but this is where it gets weird.

I expected him to walk in or say something, but he just stood there. I was in the middle of doing something, so I said, are you coming in? He didn't answer. He just stood there smiling at me. A few seconds passed, so I shut the door and walked away because I thought he was trying to joke with me.

About a minute later, he opens up the door and walks in, so I said to him, what the hell was that? Why didn't you just stand there and not say anything? or try to come in before. He claims he never knocked. He never stood at the door with the tools in his hand, wasn't there smiling at me.

I told him to stop kidding around that he was starting to scare me, but he swore he did not knock, nor did he stand there smiling in the doorway like that. I was now getting really upset, and I told him if he was messing with me, it wasn't funny. But again, he swore that that was not him.

He thinks that I hallucinated, but I'm not so sure. Nothing like this has ever happened before. Could it have been a time glitch, a dream maybe? Even though it was the middle of the day and I was up and walking around, could he have somehow blacked out and then walked over and knocked but didn't remember?

Not sure how to explain it, but this is freaking me out. So that's the story, which that's really scary because I hear stories like that from listeners a lot. It does tend to be spouses a lot of the time where their spouse will come home or they'll like roll over in bed and see their spouse and then they're actually in the bathroom like what have you but I did notice that so on this thread there was a comment someone had made about basically saying like oh that's weird because we have this

um I'm Scandinavian and we have this spirit in Scandinavia or like this thing that happens in Scandinavia that this reminds me of and so I looked this up more and I found another thread that someone posted. And this is coming from someone who writes, so in Scandinavia we have a concept called Verdugar. It's a bit hard to explain, but basically, it's when you hear someone coming home a while before they actually do. For instance, you can be in your kitchen and hear your spouse or your parent, your children, whatever, opening and closing the front door. Maybe they even come and greet you from the hallway, so you expect them to come into the kitchen, but then they never do. then 30 minutes pass

and you hear the same exact noises only this time they actually arrive and they actually come into the kitchen as expected and then this person asks I'm wondering if this happens to people who aren't familiar with the concept of a verdugur or if this is something that only happens to us who have grown up knowing what they are

so has anyone who's not Scandinavian experienced this phenomena and a lot of people have so one of the first comments is from someone who's who just goes by It's Fish 20, and they write, I was upstairs in my room playing Skyrim or something, and I heard the front door unlock,

and my girlfriend walk in and say, hey, babe, just like she does every time she comes home after me. But when I went up to say, hey, I couldn't find anyone at the door and it was still locked. I was confused, but I chalked it up to maybe I had just been playing games for too long. Well, like 20 or so minutes later, she actually came home, and everything I heard the first time happened exactly again.

Except this time, she was really there. And then another person writes, this actually happened to me when I was maybe 14 or 15. I was sitting at the computer in our kitchen, and my mother was in the shower. Her boyfriend came home, opened the door, made eye contact with me, but said nothing. I said, did you have a bad day at work?

And he stopped walking, turned to look at me, smiled, and then walked into the bedroom. My mom came out and asked me who I was talking to, and I said, J.P. just got home. He's in the bedroom. And she gave me this weird look. She went into the room and nobody was there. She thought I was pulling her leg. Yet I was able to accurately describe what he was wearing, despite the fact that I was asleep when he left in the morning. About 30 minutes later, he came home through the door, wearing exactly what I had described. But he actually talked this time. Also, I'm born and raised in Canada. I've never heard of this Verdukeur concept. It's another thing that happens to people all over the world. I have so many thoughts of because I feel like the first story and the last story are slightly different than the other ones. Oh, explain.

The other ones I could see as like a glitch in time, right? Where like time happens and then it's like, oh, wait a second. Like that wasn't supposed to happen yet. I don't know. I don't know the science or logistics behind it. Or like a different dimension bleeding through a little early or whatever. But the first story and the last story, there's something a little off about them in the sense that both the partner and then the like mom's boyfriend, stop, stare and smile and then go on. Yeah, interact.

Yes, the smiling. And that feels menacing. And it's not like they're just heard going through the motions or saying hello. Like they're seen wearing the execs and clothes. person is about to come home in. Like that one feels more menacing. Yeah, it feels more like that doppelganger concept, the mimic concept of someone or something pretending to be someone else and now interacting with you in some way. Yeah. Yeah. But it's interesting because it's like the thing with mimics and doppelgangers is they're supposed to look slightly off, right? But neither of these people

said that there was something weird about it other than their behavior. Because normally it's like they'd look just a little bit different. Yeah, but if it happens quick enough. Well, maybe that's what it is with the smiling. Yeah, it's like quick enough and it's the smiling. Like, it's the expression and the behavior that's just off enough rather than the uncanny valley appearance of them. Kaelan, did we ever tell you that I had like maybe a mimic or doppelganger of myself

in this house? No, in the house you live in now. Yeah. No, you didn't tell me this. It was like a few months postpartum. There was so much activity when Noah was born. I wonder what you'll be. experience after you give birth. Oh my gosh. But we, so it's creepy. Yeah. I was breastfeeding Noah at the

time. So I wouldn't go downstairs at night. And there had been a lot of activity and I won't get into all of the different things that happened. But I, after 9 p.m., like, I was not downstairs. I was upstairs. If Noah woke up, I just went in the room. A couple months after Noah was born, I'm outside. and my neighbor's like, who's a very no-nonsense guy. He's in his 70s. He spends all his time, like, gardening and going out with his friends and his wife or whatever. And he calls me over and he's like, oh, my gosh, I need to show you this picture of what I was doing the other night. And he had, he has a peach tree in his backyard. And there had been some sort of animal eating all of his peaches. So he was staking out the peach tree overnight. And around like 11 or 11.30 at night, he finds a possum eating his peach.

And he's like, I just had to show you the picture so that you knew what I was doing because I saw you in your kitchen, like at the sink watching me from the window. And you probably thought I was crazy. And I was like, oh, because he doesn't believe in the paranormal or anything. So it's like, oh, my gosh. Like, that's so funny. But I was like, what the f I was not outside? Or I was not downstairs in the kitchen. Like, I haven't been in the kitchen past 9 p.m. for months now.

The same week, my mom comes into town to visit. She's staying in the guest room. And the first night that she's here, when she wakes up in the morning, she doesn't tell me anything happened. But I decided to tell her what my neighborhood experienced. And she goes, oh my God, I was not going to say anything to you because I didn't want to freak you out. Last night, I woke up and there was a girl who looked a lot like you, but just different enough, standing over me next to the bed. No, you're kidding. She was like, I just told it to go away.

and I closed my eyes and went back to sleep, because my mom has had a million experiences as well. She's like, I'm not with that right now. She's used to telling things to be gone. I fully believe that a part of Corinne's soul did kind of tip off with all of like the postpartum and changes in life that you were dealing with. Very severe postpartum depression and anxiety.

So we do think like the trauma piece of it was lingering. Well, I was going to ask, that's what I was going to ask. Like, do you think that there's specific parts of people's lives or times of people's lives where it's more likely for this to happen, maybe because of, I don't know, like the postpartum depression or whatever someone's going through. Like, your soul does kind of chip off in a way. Yeah. Well, because it wasn't like this, like the way my mom was describing this person. It was like it looks like me, but it was like kind of like mean and like anguished. And it wasn't like this kind being or just like passive being. Like it looks like. It looks like.

like it was in pain or that it like meant malice. And I think that does make sense for what I was going through. Like there was a lot of confusion and anxiety and anger and resentment and fear. And like that might have just bundled itself up and created this version of me that walked around and I haunted my own house. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Like a projection of you. Yeah. The only time I've ever experienced anything like this was I was staying at an Airbnb once.

and we were like on a mountain. We were in Breckenridge. So just because the altitude difference, I couldn't sleep at all. So I would just come downstairs and watch TV. And Matt, my husband would wake up in the mornings and like work out in the guest bed. And then we would like shower and come back downstairs and we would have breakfast. And so one morning I was up at like four in the morning and I heard him working out in the guest bedroom. And I was like, it's so early.

Why is he awake right now? And then, so I was like, whatever. And then I keep hearing him working out in the guest bed. So I went up to like make a comment like, why are you up so early? Oh my gosh. And there's no one in the guest bedroom. Completely empty. And I could hear him like stomping around and like doing all the same movements.

So I was like, oh, that's weird. Let me ignore that. And then my friend came for a weekend and visited while we just had this Airbnb. And she stays in the guest bedroom for one night. And the next morning she's like, oh, that guest bedroom is haunted. I was like, what are you talking about? She was like, I woke up in the middle of the night and there was just something walking at the foot of my bed. I didn't see anything, but I could hear the little shuffling happening on the carpet.

I hate that. And I was like, there's just something. And it was only that room and you walk in, like, it was just the guest bedroom. I have no idea. And it wasn't that old of a place too. So the idea that like, oh, my God, someone died here, blah, blah, blah. That's where the haunting's coming from. But maybe it is that like residual energy of something that just hangs out.

there. Is it residual or like was that spirit actively trying on people's different actions and personalities? Like, let me see what it feels like to work out and do this routine. That's also yes. I know to do this like P90X or whatever. Although that does give me hope for like when we are spirits that like it's not you're not stuck in a loop you can you can try out a new workout like you can you can still get your routine. Yeah. You can still get a workout. Still get swoll. When you finally have time to take care of yourself. When you're dead. Okay, Corinne, do you want to read your story?

Yes. My story is called What Scary Stories from the Woods do you know from Grandpa and Grandma? 27 days ago, this is recent, submitted by any position 72. Okay. They write, I'm talking about real stories that get passed down from one generation to the next. I know a few of them. A little about me. My family's from West Virginia, but I was born in Germany because my dad moved there. So I grew up split between Germany and West Virginia, spending time with my grandpa, grandma, and the rest of the family, kind of like a 50-50 mix. That's why I'm

pretty familiar with the Appalachian stories and all of those from the woods. So my grandpa always had a certain respect for darkness. One night, I was trying to bring their old dog Teddy inside. It was probably around 7 p.m. just when it was starting to get dark. They were starting to get dark. I was wondering if you had a little accent there. I'm reading it verbatim. Learn from Appalachia. Yep. A normal late summer evening. But my grandpa didn't want me to go outside then. He'd always say, after 6 p.m., we don't leave the house alone. And once it gets dark, we don't leave at all. I used to think he was just saying that because there were animals outside or something. Later I asked him why I couldn't go outside, and my grandma said,

you don't talk about that, or it brings bad luck. Grandpa just said that there are folks around here who went out and never came back, but when I asked why, he would just change the subject. It wasn't until I got older and started helping with hunting and wood cutting, and the woods became more a part of my everyday life, that my grandpa finally started opening up a little more. He told me the danger wasn't the woods themselves, But the things, he always called them things, that watch you and want you to stay.

Most of them won't hurt you, but they make sure you get lost. Back then, I thought it was hard to believe. Well, mostly hard to believe. And I still do, to some extent, but I figured if an 80-year-old man is saying this stuff, it can't all be made up. A few months later, I asked again, since he always shuts me down. And he said, boy, sometimes it's better not to know. everything, but you really want to know, don't you? And that's when he started telling me a few stories. He mentioned that there was a family in the 20s that had immigrated from Belgium, and they

did not follow the rules. He said they would go out at night, unprotected, just by themselves, and some of them started to not come back. He told me a bunch of stories about people who went into the woods and never returned. He also said you should never whistle in the woods. If you do, everything goes quiet. No animal sounds, nothing. And when that happens, you've got yourself a problem. You'll feel watched. You'll get chills.

And you'll start thinking there's something behind every tree. He said that when you whistle, you wake up things in the woods that should have stayed asleep. And if they hear you, they'll wait for you. Another rule we had was no music, no playing music, no listening to music while you. worked while you hunted nothing. Not because of the animals or anything, but because the forest has its own rules. Break those and you won't make it back home very easily. He said too much artificial noise, whether it's whistling, music, chainsaws, or motors can invite these things to come after you. They'll get mad. They'll stalk you. And the noise just makes him angrier. Another story,

there's these old abandoned cabins that people avoid. The cabins are empty, but something waits there. If you walk by, you'll start hearing things, sometimes a footstep, sometimes a whisper, but you won't see nothing. He said that's when you walk into a trap, because the woods want something from you. I'm not entirely sure what to make of these things. Ironically, he says that Hollywood monsters like Bigfoot are made up nonsense, but his own stories, he stands by him. The reason I believe him, at least a little, is because sometimes you will find footprints in the backyard, especially at our woodcutting site. And then these wooden symbols, like a W in the woods,

I've only seen them once and then never again. Like Grandpa set them up or something, but I got to admit, I do have a mix of respect and fear, even if I'm not fully convinced. In Germany, they just laugh at stories like this. Gosh damn Appalachia. Oh my gosh.

Germany has so many horrifying tales, but they hear of the creatures in the woods in Appalachia, And they're like, pocus, pocus. Hosh, posh. Or they laugh because they're like, that's nothing compared to what we have. Yeah, you've heard of crampus? Oh, you think that's scary? We got creatures waiting with sacks.

Literally. I mean, there's a huge tie between, like, a lot of Appalachia was settled by Germans. So a lot of the, there's like two schools of thought, right? Like the folklore that came from the German woods just made its way over to Appalachia as people were immigrating. And then there's also. also people that are like, know a lot of those creatures made their way onto the boats and then came over here. So there's a lot of, like, the Appalachian lore of dog creatures that live in the woods is very, like, rooted in old German folklore. Oh, it's almost like, that's even more terrifying.

It's like old German folklore and this idea of these creatures getting on the boats coming over here mixed with, like, the Native American, like, tribal, like, superstitions. Oh, because there are so many spirits and creatures. Yeah. The Appalachian Mountains are like the oldest. They're older than Pangaea. So. Yeah, they're freaking old. They are ancient and with ancient mountains comes ancient beings.

I do believe. Yeah, I mean, you guys have covered so many Appalachian stories. They're addicting. They are. Addicted to Appalachia. I'll tattoo it on my head. We have a couple of comments. Should I read them?

Oh, yeah. Okay. One person wrote, this story is from my very religious grandmother and has since become somewhat of a legend in our family at this point. Decades ago, she and my grandfather were living in the woods of Northern California on a secluded ranch house. One particular night, she was awoken suddenly by my grandfather who was muttering something under his breath.

As she recalled, he was seated upright in bed next to her and just staring ahead unwaveringly, calmly repeating, I rebuke you in the name of Jesus Christ. She turned to see who he was speaking to and to her shock and unlawful. surprise, instead saw a thick green cloud of smoke hovering just beyond the foot of her bed, and not like an airy mist, but rather a condensed, undulating storm cloud. Obviously startled by the sight. She said my grandfather calmly said, it's okay, dear, I'm taking care of it. Go back to sleep.

And as far as she recalls, the cloud gradually dissipated and they both eventually slept soundly the rest of the night despite the disturbance. Both of them experienced it and remembered it vividly up until their passing. Well, hell yeah, grandpa for handling it. I'm like, is this something grandpa sees a lot? Like, he was so calm, cool, and collected. Maybe it was like Laura in his family too, right? Like the green mist that comes?

The green storm. Oh, yeah. Okay, but now we have a comment from Roanoke, Virginia. My grandma grew up in a holler near Roanoke, Virginia with no indoor plumbing or electricity. When they were teens, she and her sister would sneak out to this old abandoned mining town on the ridge to smoke and play cards. The town at this point had been empty for 50 years and consisted of a few bare foundations around a collapsing wooden church. The locals avoided it, so it was the perfect place for teens to go hang out and get up to stuff that their parents wouldn't approve of. Well, one day, as they were cresting the ridge, a man with head of a goat stepped out of the doorway of the ruined church.

and stared at them, then gestured for them to come closer. They ran all the way back off the ridge and didn't visit anymore. Like, was it a man wearing a goat's head or like his head was replaced by a goat's head? I've gotten a few stories from listeners in India that referenced this goat-headed character. Oh, interesting. Like, I wonder if that's also another thing that just kind of shows up in different places. But, yeah, it's like body of a human head of a goat. It does feel very...

Bad intentions. Like devilish. Yes. Especially in Roanoke. Well, also just like the fact that it was abandoned and where it is, it did make me question. Like, was this someone who just maybe wasn't completely okay at that point and was like just a human wearing a goat head? And which one is worse? I think a human wearing a goat head is worse.

I would much rather encounter a demon being who has a goat head. They can't help that. That's just how they look. Right. Right, right. To actively choose to put it on,

ooh, ooh. It also is kind of reminding me of the, I can't remember the name of like the being, but an American horror story coven when Queenie is attacked by that guy who's like, he has like the head of like a goat with the big long horns,

but the body of a man. Even the season of American Horror Story Roanoke where Lady Gaga has like the goat horns. Yeah. There's a lot of demonic imagery across the board here. Yeah. Scary.

Whoa. Stay away from the woods. I guess so. Yeah, geez. I talk about this in an episode, but my grandpa's from Appalachia. He's from Tennessee. And he was also always told

to not go in the woods. Don't whistle in the woods. Don't look at the trees in the woods. trees in the woods. And he and his friend have these stories of when they would go to the tree line at the woods when they were little because they wanted to break the rules because everyone was telling them not to do this thing. So they wanted to do it. They would hear a woman scream every time they would get to the tree line and they would freak out and they would run away. And what they eventually found out was there was like this really big moonshining operation in the

woods in their backyard. And so all the adults were telling the kids like don't go back there because you just don't want to mess with what's going on. You don't want to know what happens when a bunch of illegal moonshiners see kids. Yeah, catch you basically and think that you're maybe going to turn them in. So a lot of the folklore had kind of been rebranded to, I guess,

protect kids from the stuff that was actually happening in the woods. Interesting. But still so scary. Also, that doesn't explain the woman screaming. Like, to me, that almost makes me think that there is an entity in the woods who's trying to protect the children from the bad people in the woods. And it's screaming to scare them all, which I like. I mean, it's sad that she's screaming, but if it scares them away from the wood.

I love protector spirits. Yeah. Yes. Me too. I love a good protector spirit. This episode is brought to you by Warby Parker. I am so excited to talk about our sponsor, Warby Parker, today, because I have been a Warby Parker customer for 13 years.

My first ever pair of glasses were Warby Parker's. Back when I was in college and I realized I could no longer read the whiteboard. from the back of the class. I love Warby Parker because they have a huge selection of frames, both trendy and classic. And it's so easy to figure out what looks best because I can use their virtual try-on tool on my computer. Not to mention, their prescription glasses start at just $95. And if you want to go in person, they actually have over 300 retail stores across the United States. One time I actually went to a store, did an eye exam in the back, and then was able to buy glasses with my new prescription up front. It was so incredibly easy. Warby Parker gives you quality

quality and better looking prescription I wear at a fraction of the going price. Our listeners get 15% off in free shipping when you buy two or more pairs of prescription glasses at Warbyparker.com slash HSP. That's 15% off when you buy two pairs of glasses at W-A-R-B-Y Parker.com slash HSP. After you purchase, they'll ask where you heard about them, and please support our show and tell them that we sent you. I'm Heidi Wong, an artist, poet, and creator. And if you've seen my TikTok, YouTube, or Instagram, you'll know,

I'm obsessed with horror movies. And every Monday on my new podcast from Crime House, Twisted Tales, I'll take you deep into the real-life events that inspired the world's most terrifying blockbusters and the ones too twisted to make it to screen. Twisted Tales is a crime house original podcast powered by Pave Studios. Watch every Monday on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, actually I think you'll like the next story. I love it.

Okay. I'm really excited. Okay. This is called A Jin Fell in Love With Me. I love a ghost love story. Wow. I've never heard of a gin falling in love with someone. And it's from Legitimate Bug in 1931, was posted four years ago in ghost stories.

Okay. So, I was showering last night and sometimes the light flicker. But this time, when they flickered, it was different. I thought nothing of it until I popped my head out of the shower to change the music. And I look forward, and there is a face drawn on the mirror. in the fog. Not only that, but it looks exactly like me. I was so terrified I didn't know what to do. I was frozen and shaking. So eventually I called my friend to calm me down. I was just telling that same friend some paranormal experiences I had had about an hour before my shower. So maybe that triggered

something? I was looking in the same mirror prior to getting in the shower and I think maybe something might be making fun of me in a way. I took so many photos of the drawing, but this looks like the best angle to me. My whole family sees it, so I know I'm not the only one. And there is a photo. And then there's some more updates. But let's look at the photo. Yeah, look at the photo. And again, if anyone's listening just on audio, I will have it on the heart size pounding Instagram that you can go check it out. On Reddit, you have to click to see it because it says it's not safe for one. Yeah. It kind of looks like a Picasso rendering. It does. Like Guernica. A little cubism there.

Yeah. But you can see the like eyebrow, the hair, the nose, the mouth. Yeah, it looks like someone took their finger and drew it onto the mirror. And with that, you might be like, okay, that's, maybe that's like a weird thing that happens with like fog in the mirror. But maybe naturally it draws images of people. You know, like, it could just be like paradoia where your eyes to create patterns that aren't necessarily there. But we have updates from the original poster. I don't enjoy speaking on this topic.

It causes more activity in my experience, but I did gain insight that really spooked me. Since this portrait was done, I love like I had a portrait done by a spirit. I've had more experiences where I will leave the shower to find messages written in the fog. It looks like a different language or inverted like it was written from the other side of the mirror. I have found ways to cope like I only shower with the door open so it doesn't. doesn't fog up the mirror, or I only shower with the sun's out, etc. But ultimately, it still happens, and every time I step out of the shower, I have a queasy feeling. I researched and researched,

but nothing was similar to my situation, only learning that mirrors can be portals. That's about it. Every year, my very religious grandmother who lives in Alexandria, Egypt, comes to the U.S. to stay with my family. So I decided to tell her my story to hopefully get answers. And boy, did I? So, gins are a specific type of entity in Islam in the Middle East, so there's not much information on them in the U.S. They are good gins and bad gins. It is said that some people have gins as slaves to clean the house and complete other tasks. And it is said that gins have fallen in love with humans and also marry them. And now this is local information and lore that has been passed down through generations. But here's the interesting part. My grandma told me

that she is from the same region as my original ancient Jins, which I believe is my answer to all of the paranormal activity me and my family have encountered. My dad grew up in Egypt and had an experience in his childhood that he still has never told anyone, and we all know not to ask, my uncle as well, all on that side of the family. But immediately my grandma and cousin provided me an explanation

for this haunting I was experiencing. They said that Jins can live in mirrors that act as portals. There must have been one inside my mirror, and it fell in love with me, and the drawing was its way of showing its flattery towards me. My grandma also told me that I am beautiful just like her ancestor, who had the same thing happened to her. Now, Jins, they can fall in love with you for many reasons, such as if you spend too long in front of the mirror and look at yourself in the mirror for too long and too often. Basically, they'll fall in love with you because of that. Or, if you stand naked in front of a mirror, etc. My cousin told me a story that freaked me out so much.

It's a little bit of reach, but stay with me here. Not too long ago, maybe 20 years ago, everyone there had heard of a man who admired himself naked in front of a mirror so often that a gin woman fell in love with him. Apparently, she took him to the underworld and had babies with him. He went missing for years, but eventually came back, which is how we now know what happened. I mean, I have mirrors all over my room, even across from my bed.

It's hard to go around that. So my grandma gave me a chapter of the Quran to read and some rituals to do, such as only stepping into the bathroom with my left foot and exiting with my right and to never sleep naked. Anyway, that's about it. I thought it was an interesting story to tell, and hopefully I don't get sucked to see the underworld and have a gin's baby. Man, imagine that being your sort of like familial curse, where it's like, you're just so pretty. the people that are pretty in our family end up getting taken by jins to be married. Yeah, all these gins keep falling in love with them.

It's wild. I love a story of ghost romance. I love ghost romance and I love mirrors too. Like the mirror element of it is so interesting to me. Now I want to know that guy's story. Like what happened to him for decades? Did it feel like decades that he was gone? Right.

How many kids did he have? We did an episode on the Patreon about Siren and Mermaid lore and that's actually something that's really common in a lot of siren and mermaid lore around the world, especially in different regions of Africa and in Haiti, where the mermaid will see someone on the beach or on a rock, usually a man, will take the man with them down to the bottom of the ocean, only feed him like chicken and rice for like years and have babies with him and then we'll like spit him back out. What's interesting about that too is in parts of Africa, the mermaids will start trying to contact you through dreams.

Whoa. That's how you like start knowing that a mermaid is interested in you. It's like, I guess kind of like the mirror element, but in this case it's dreams. Right. And they did a study and they found that I forget which region it is. But psychologists that were seeing male patients found that 10% of male patients had these visitation dreams from mermaids. I love that. Holy cow mermaids.

I don't know why I'm so... It's scary, but... Get your man. Yeah. That is wild. Yeah, it is really scary. But, yeah, the idea of being taken to this other world... And not having people of it at all.

Yeah, being, like, imprisoned. There's, like, some sort of lust element to it also that, you know, you have to be mindful of that there could be this entity lusting after you that's going to kidnap you. Yeah. Well, now I'm so curious where it's, like, do the mermaids in this... lore do they need human men to reproduce? Like are all mermaids? Half mermaid

half man? But I guess then it would keep diluting. Then are there just little like tadpoles of human mermaids where like suddenly the next one doesn't have a tail because they're a little too human. Yeah, what's the genetic pool of mermaids looking like these days? That's my question. Yeah, yeah.

Because you have like the different iterations of them through media where it's like some of them are like the sirens, like stunning, beautiful. Then there's the other, like, really scary, horrific-looking mermaid. My aunt used to tell me when we even go to the beach, she used to tell me that seafone was dead mermaids. Oh, wow. Okay.

And I believed it for years. What a weird thing to say. I don't know what's wrong with my aunt Diane. Huh. That is really scary. No, I think this, I think seafone is like, like, ocean sludge. Like, it's not good. I know it's not great to play in in general.

so maybe she was trying to protect you from that. Well, the ocean is the world's largest cemetery. So just think about that the next time you go swimming. Yeah. Yeah. Yikes. Yikes. Yikes.

Have you guys covered a lot of mirror stories? Not as many as I think we would expect to. I think we have a lot of listener stories of people who have had like encounters like related to a mirror or a portal being open up. But to my dad grew up in, he was born in and. grew up in Pakistan, where jinns are like a very commonly talked about entity. And they're said to be attached specifically to Banyan trees. And my dad, like, always told me the story that he grew up on a street that was like, he had to walk this one long street that on either side was covered with

banyan trees. And he had to walk it to school. And he said he had, it was like the scariest street. Like, didn't matter. It could be broad daylight. It was always so scary. And it would always feel like was the only person on that street and that like the spirits would mess with him. And like there were multiple times where he'd be walking under the banyan trees because you can't avoid them. And like a spirit would push him or like whisper or make like little remarks. Sounds terrifying. Yeah. That is horrifying.

And they were all gins. That was the lore. Yeah. There's a lore that like that gin spirits live in banyan trees. Wow. Mm-hmm. This is like the wildest like back in my day I used to have to walk five miles to school. Back in my day, I battled gin in the banyan trees on my way to school.

Jeez. Oh my goodness. Yeah. That is really scary. Have you ever had anything happen with a mirror? No, not necessarily. I mean, I always, again, kind of the relating it to when you hear something from different cultures, it's like what's going on. I know mirrors are really big in feng shui.

Like there is something about. the energy of where you place mirrors that can affect the energy of your living space. So even in cultures that don't necessarily believe that there's entities or ghosts hidden in these mirrors, it's like, well, you still don't want to put one over your bed or you don't want to have two that face each other because the energy might be off. The two facing each other is like, doesn't matter where you are. It just gives me bad vibes. Yeah.

One, I don't want to see myself that many times repeating. And then two, like, I don't want to know what's like hide. in there. I thought about that when we were at the Henry Derby house last year because a lot of the stories were that you would look in the mirrors and you would see something behind you. So I kept looking at all the mirrors to see if I could, once you guys left, I was like, well, maybe I could find some more evidence or whatever. So, yeah, temped fate. I was looking at all these mirrors and so many of them were facing each other. So you'd look in on one side and it would just be that long, warped portal effect that happens. The new conjuring movie. And I was like, no wonder all of the

stories. Oh, yeah, in the new conjuring movie. That one scene. Oh, I don't even know it. She's trying on a wedding, like, on wedding dresses and she's in this, in this like mirrored, filled, mirrored, locked dressing room. It's scary. Oh, God. You can imagine. And you can't tell which one of her is the actual one, and which is a reflection. Oh, hell no. That's very fun house. Very scary. Yeah. We did look in a scrying mirror in the basement of the actual conjuring house. We did do that. What's a scrying mirror for those who might not know? It's a dark mirror, so they're created and they're supposed to be some sort of like portal essentially. It's a form of divination.

Yeah. So you look into the mirror and you kind of try to defocus your eyes and people will experience different things. Like some people will see spirits in them or see scary demons and some people will see their worst fears or themselves smiling or making different expressions that they aren't actually making or like they're doplicing or peeking out from behind. them. Like sometimes people have wonderful experiences, very like Harry Potter, you know, like he sees his parents in the reflection or whatever. And then others have horrifying experiences, which really scare them. So I thought I saw like Corinne's reflection making really scary faces, but it was just Corinne doing that. I didn't want to actually look into the scrying mirror because I was terrified of it, but I felt peer pressure to do so by me together. And I crossed my eyes. So

she thought like she was seeing my eyes do like weird things. But it was me trying so hard to not actually focus enough to actually make out anything. To actually see anything. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't know if I would be brave enough to do something like that, especially in the basement of the conjuring house. I know that you would. You would. I know. I would do her before. I did. You would. I know I would get there and be like, let's go. Let's do what we see. I think you'd be the one to pitch it. I'd be like in the basement. by the time we even arrived. Like, where you guys? Okay, I'm going to be done here.

I already scoped out the basement. I tested out the mirror. I think we should sleep in the darkest, scariest room. Is the country house still open? I don't actually know because it sold. It did. It sold. It changed.

I'm not sure. I have to look into that. I have to look into that because I know that they were, like maybe had closed recently. Temporarily closed. You know what? It's such a bummer because they had just launched all these new experiences. Like you could camp in a tent. outside, like on the property where

under where like people see spaceships and there's supposedly dead bodies buried and stuff. So it was it could have been quite interesting. I don't know if they're going to keep those experiences or not. Well now Matt Rife is in charge of the whole museum, right, the Warren Museum.

Everything. I forgot about that. I blocked that went out of my memory. He'll save us. I know. I know. Like he had never mentioned the paranormal before. But that's like, I think that proves how many people who don't don't like outwardly make their entire lives and businesses, the personality of paranormal, who like, there are just so many people out there who like it as much as we do. They just don't

talk about it all the time. Yeah, I was shocked. Yes, it's like when Kasha had that go show. I was like, oh, Kesh is really into this stuff. That's awesome. Yeah. All right. Well, I have one more Reddit story to share. This last story is called Does Pregnancy Increase Supernatural Activity? I can at least say postpartum did. Okay, this is from seven years ago submitted by Smarty Cat 77. They write, this happened more than 18 years ago. I'm sure it randomly here and there, but just now got onto Reddit, and I figured this was a good place to talk about it.

I've been wanting to hear others take on it forever. My now husband and I were dating at work secretly. I'm sure some of our coworkers knew or suspected. But one day, I encountered a man who was not a coworker. We worked at a conference center and he was an event planner slash coordinator at one of the events there. My boyfriend slash soon to be husband and I accidentally got pregnant. We were still in the process of figuring things out and no one at the office knew yet. I estimate I was probably between four and six weeks pregnant at this point.

I was filling in as receptionist and this was not my normal post and I generally worked on a different floor of this conference center doing something else entirely. This event planner came in to start setting up for his event. I greeted him when he introduced himself and shook my hand. He then paused immediately upon grabbing my hand and said, You're pregnant. Luckily, we were in a semi-private front office. I demurred very quietly, telling him that no one knew yet. He said something to the effect of,

OK, but it's a girl, by the way. And he was correct. My daughter is now 18, and she's at university. I never saw this man again. As his event was on the weekend, and this was a Friday, and I didn't work weekends. And by the way, my boyfriend now husband could not have told him as he worked in a back office. He was much more invested in keeping this a secret as he was in a career job where I was a university student, kind of just passing time through this job.

And we were both more worried about the effect on his position than on mine. He did not have contact with any of the clients directly. he was an accountant. Plus, obviously, he told me that he didn't want to tell anyone. This was the only paranormal thing that has ever happened to me directly or that I've witnessed myself. Any thoughts? And by the way, I don't know if this matters much, but I was about to be 21 at the time. Damn.

Bricky Nick responded, I don't have an explanation for this, but I do have a similar story where I was the one who knew someone was pregnant. When I was in college, I belonged to a club that was sponsored by a local nonprofit. One of the women who worked for the nonprofit would attend our meetings, and at the end of one of these meetings, I watched her stand up, took one look at her stomach, and I just knew she was pregnant with a girl. She was really thin. She did not look pregnant at all. About two weeks later, we were both attending a club event, and she broke the news to me that she was pregnant. I told her about my weird experience of having known already, and she was stunned. She didn't even know she was pregnant at that original meeting. This baby was also a girl.

I have no explanation for it. It's not something I can control. From time to time, I will have these experiences of knowing things before being told. And sometimes I'll have these experiences and it'll just be slightly off. For example, I was going to go meet a potential roommate when another roommate and I were looking for another person to live with us. And the potential roommate said he had a dog. On our way to meet him, I kept asking if his dog's name was Cody. Turns out it was Coda, so not quite right, but really close.

enough to be weird. This reminds me so much of, so we love going to get our aura photos taken at this place in Sam called House Witch. Which you did too. Yeah. Yes. Per your recommendation.

Yeah. Love them, obsessed with them. But we were asking them about, like, cool things that have happened when people take aura photos. And they took this photo of this girl and there was this like, green light in her stomach. And keep in mind, like, this is a stranger. So the girl reading

the aura was like, this is like a lot of growth energy. And the girl starts bawling because, and I'm going to get emotional, she had been trying to get pregnant for a really long time. And she was like a day away from like the time where she was going to take a pregnancy test to find out if she was pregnant. She was like crying because she was like, I, Does that mean I'm pregnant or like, does that mean whatever? That I will be pregnant? Yeah. The girl goes home, takes a pregnancy test and sure enough is pregnant, like messages house witch

to let them know. And I was like, that is the most. Oh, my gosh. Beautiful, magical aura photo story. I have like goosebumps from that. Yeah. Oh. Yeah.

I mean, I had been told, I wanted you to get to this story because there are so many supernatural things I feel like that happened surrounding pregnancy. And I'd been told that like when I found. that I was pregnant. And like also apparently in the postpartum phase two, which is crazy. Yeah. Have you experienced anything so far? Yeah, I've experienced some really weird things, actually. What? My, so I had two dreams. I had a dream a year to the day before I did the gender reveal that I was pregnant with a boy. And so obviously I wasn't pregnant then. Right. And so I had that and I like kept that in my mind. That was very strange. And then the night before

we did the gender reveal. I also had another dream that it was a boy. It was like reinforcing it because I started being like, well, I started overthinking the dream being like, what if I interpreted it wrong? Like maybe it's not a boy. Like that would be really awkward if it like wasn't. And then I had a dream. Yeah, that night that was like, no, it's a boy.

Like I'm here to tell you it's a boy. And then I had called my grandma to tell her I was pregnant. And my grandma has Alzheimer's. So she kind of goes in and out of clarity a little bit. but I called her, I facetimed her, and I was like, oh, I have something to tell you. And she goes, oh, you're pregnant. And I was like, did my mom already tell you? Like, how do you already know?

And she's like, no, I had a dream. And I was like, oh, are you kidding? And she's like, yeah, I had a dream the other night that you were pregnant. And so I'm so happy to hear that. And then she said, I was like, oh, that's so crazy. Like, what was the dream? And she's like, in my dream, you were 50. And I kept telling you that you were running out of time.

time. And then she was like, after that shit. She was gone again. And I was like, God damn it. But that's hilarious. But there is something like when people have Alzheimer's or dementia, I like truly do believe they're so tapped into the spirit world that like they probably do know a lot of what's going on with their relatives before anyone else does. Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah. She's like tapped into some radio frequency that we're just not a part of. Right. And sometimes really spooky stuff like that does happen. wild. My gosh, it's amazing. But yeah, that was all really scary. And then when I worked for James Juan, he always would say, because people at the company would have kids and he would always say, like, you have to tell me if they see anything because babies are always the first to see the ghosts. Like, once they're conscious, like your baby's going to start seeing things in your house.

Yeah. You have to just pay attention to that. And I loved that. So Noah has seen some ghosts. Yeah, he definitely has. It hasn't been frequent, but there's been like three separate occasions where, just completely out of context, he'll just like look up from what he's doing, clearly see something and just scream with terror and be so hard to calm down. Whoa. But then also there have been like some positive ones too where like when he's sleeping. But like the light going off and then the footsteps. But it's like because of Noah.

It's like spirits going to check on Noah. I think it was checking on me and my mental health or that too. Yeah. So he's seen that. Then, like, I did have multiple things, like, when I was in his room having a hard time where, like, I'd walk in in in the middle of the night to go feed him and his light would turn on as I walk in. Or I saw footsteps walking outside of his door, just, like, kind of pacing back and forth, like, checking on me in the middle of the night. It was a lot of stuff in the middle of the night. And then when my Grammy, she passed from dementia, you're not from dementia, but she had dementia for a long time.

And then she passed a few months ago. but when she, the week that she was like very actively dying and was like everyone was going to see her, she had a moment where like, I think she kind of did die. Everyone went in and said goodbye and she wasn't breathing. I wasn't there. And then at that same moment, which we only made the connection a couple days later at her funeral when I told my aunt that and she was like, what was the day, what was the time? And then my aunt told me that this happened.

So from my perspective, it's the middle of the day. It's like 2 p.m. or something. And I'm with Noah in his room and I see footsteps underneath the crack of his door. And then the door handle turns and it opens. And there's no one there. Oh, my gosh. And I was like, what in the heck was that? Then a couple days later, my Grammy passes.

At her funeral, I'm telling my aunt this a couple days before she actually passed on that exact day, around that exact time. everyone said goodbye because she stopped breathing for several minutes and they thought she had died. And then she came back and lived a couple more days. But she came to check on you and Noah before. Yeah. And she loved babies. So my aunt was like, oh my God, she went to go see the baby because she never got to meet Noah. Yeah. Oh my gosh. So that was her going and checking on him. Yeah. And she was such a little person. Like she was like I always said she was like four feet. She was like maybe five feet at her like tallest of tall. And I think like. in old age, she'd like probably shrunk down to like four foot seven. Like she was a little tiny person. And so like seeing the kind of like smaller footsteps like made sense outside of the

right too for her. Yeah, that she was just there checking in making sure she's able to see. So you have so many more hauntings to look forward to Kail. I know. I can't wait. We better. I don't want to say selfishly that's why I'm doing this. Right. That's the only reason. Oh yeah. People are already like like I'm just going to start taking my son to of Airbnb's and be like, what do you see? Yeah. Where's the energy? What do you feel? Tell me where to go. He's your divination tool.

Yeah. Oh my gosh. Yeah, I mean, I just had my aunt was a Lamas nurse for her entire career. She was in the room. She was my mom's like doula slash Lamas slash midwife when I was born. And she was my grandma who has Alzheimer's, they were best friends like in girlhood. They'd just known each other forever. And it's like opposite sides of the family, but they grew up across the street from each other. So it was just kind of this weird, like kismet.

She's just always been around my life, I guess. So she threw the baby shower for my mom, was in the room when I was born. She recently passed away, too, which was really sad because I had been texting her so many updates about, like, my baby. And it was, like, always fun to, like, share that with her. But ever, I don't know.

just I just feel her so much. Oh, for sure. Since that. And like, yeah, I just know. Like, I know she'll be there when I have my baby. It'll be interesting to see how she, yeah, how she manifests once he's here. Well, thank you both so much for coming back to Heart Southerstowning. Thanks for having us.

I really enjoyed the stories that we read. I think they're very spooky. I'm very curious now to hear from the audience what they think if anyone listening or watching has ever had a spooky, supernatural pregnancy story or has heard about these like verdongers verdugers i'm like very curious to hear more about these like mimic stories and just what people have experienced yes can never get sick of this imaginary friends i want them all yeah yes and of course if anyone wants to check out more from sabrina and karen you can check out two girls one ghosts wherever you get your podcasts and on youtube as well they'll be tagged in the video so that you can easily find them and

subscribe. Or we'll find you if you don't find us. Or they will find you. They will hunt you down. Polite threats. Yeah. All right. Well, thank you so much. And we will see everyone next week. Bye. Bye. Bye. Arts arts arts pounding is written and produced by me, Kaila Moore. Heart starts pounding is also produced by Matt Brown. Our associate producer is Juno Hobbs. Sound design and mix by Red Rum Creative. Special thanks to Travis Dunlop, Grayson, Jernigan, the team at WME. Have a heart pounding story or a case request. Check out hearts hearts, founding.com.