Name the worst time you had the bejebus scared out of you.

[Nostalgiascape]

Scared ****less is the theme. But it didnt have to occure in October or on Halloween. Just something terribly frightning that scared your hair straight up.

[NeverMore]

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Every time I see my roommate without her make-up on. Hee! Hee! She'd kill me if she saw this.

Honestly don't remember ever being truly scared. Been startled many times, usually during a movie, but that's always been a momentary thing. Didn't dwell on it for any length of time.

[oboingo76]

I have a very creepy story and I love creepy story threads. I'd love to hear other people's stories!

I still can't believe the way this happened. I've watched horror films my entire life and even while it was happening I couldn't believe how similar it was.
It was 1992, I was 15 (I'm female). The house we lived in was a house built in the 30's with a detached garage in the back yard where the washer and dryer were (a lot like what we see in Halloween when Annie walks across the yard to do her laundry). It was CA so the entire back yard was fenced in with a privacy fence, but the back fence/gate lead to the alley.

It was early evening - not completely dark out but the sun was starting to set. We had a family room right inside the back french doors where my father was sleeping on the couch at the moment. I tried NEVER to do laundry at night, so I was walking out to the garage to take some of my clothes out of the dryer.

When you went into the garage, there was a window right over the washer/dryer facing the portion of our yard where there was a woodshed and the gate that lead out to the alley.

I went in, bent down to take my clothes out of the dryer. When I stood up, a man was standing on the outside of the window looking in at me. He started to say something to me and all I thought was "I have to get OUT of this garage before he comes around to the door and traps me in here." So I ran out of the garage back into the back yard toward the house. He began to walk toward me and the only thing that kept me from going in the house was being afraid he'd get in behind me before I could slam and lock the back door behind me and he'd trap me in THERE (forgetting my 6'3" father was sleeping on the sofa, but he worked odd hours and was an extremely heavy sleeper so many times when he was sleeping it was like being alone). My plan was to run around the side of the house toward the front - stay outside and run so I could go screaming down the street where people could hear me and it would make a scene.

Before I could do that our little terrier ran outside and started barking at the guy ferociously, so he stopped walking toward me. My father shortly followed and said "Hey, who the FK are you?". Then he looked at me and said "What the FK are you doing standing there without a G'dam weapon????!".

The guy became flustered and told him he had seen some garbage cans knocked over in the alley so he stopped to see if they were ours. My Dad followed him out to the alley where there were NO garbage cans knocked over and his car was parked a few houses down. He basically chased him out of the neighborhood. We didn't call police which, in hidsight was a huge mistake. Who knows what he did and to whom after this. I still feel incredibly guilty about that.

[Spookymufu]

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Every time I see my roommate without her make-up on. Hee! Hee! She'd kill me if she saw this.

Honestly don't remember ever being truly scared. Been startled many times, usually during a movie, but that's always been a momentary thing. Didn't dwell on it for any length of time.

thats pretty much me with one exception...

When my daughter was about 2 she was walking all over the place. My wife and I have always had "Hotel locks" on our doors to keep the kids in when they were little but the one time we forgot to set the lock my daughter went out. I noticed it was really quiet in her room (you know the saying, when it's too quiet they're up to something) so I went to look and saw that my 2yr old daughter wasnt in her room playing, so my wife and I went on the hunt to find her.
She wasnt in the house anywhere, we looked everywhere including the backyard....nothing. My wife ran out the front door after we saw the lock was not closed. We both ran down the street calling her name and frantically looking all over. I was looking for suspicious cars and she was looking in yards and windows....About 7 houses down we heard some crying, my daughter was in someones closed yard trying to climb the fence to get to use but couldnt and was crying.
After talking to the only person on the street at the time it turned out my daughter had made it down the street and the person walking thought she belonged in that yard and put her in it and closed the gate so she couldnt get back out. I guess the person thought she was doing the right thing but it scared the hell out of us.
After that, the door was ALWAYS checked and locked and the kids were checked on what seemed like every 5 min.
That was really the only time I was truly scared to my core.

[oboingo76]

Spooky that is a truly HORRIFYING few minutes.

[jadewik]

There's this ghost walk in downtown Tucson, Arizona that I absolutely love. The group has a methodology that relies heavily on science, but also has some basis using psychics and mediums. (I think it's a great mish-mash because it has the skeptics and the believers all working together.)

Anyway, one of the haunted stops on the tour is an older hotel whose ballroom is supposed to be haunted by what is most likely a Papago Indian fellow (downtown Tucson is built over an old Papago Indian Burial ground). There's some history about a well and some sort of murder having occurred on the site (though I may be mixing up stories with the Santa Rita...) One of the more frightening aspects of this haunting is a story about two security guards who were working the night shift. One of the guards went to check the ballroom area out. While the other guard manned the monitors. When the ballroom guard called for "backup" and the second guard went to go get him, he was pushed down the stairs by an invisible force. He wasn't badly injured, but when he went into the ballroom he found the other guard, huddled in the corner mumbling strange things about an oppressive, evil black shadow with glowing red eyes. Both guards, if I remember correctly, quit that night.

While that's a good enough story right there, this is about personal experience.... and while I have seen some peculiar things that defy explanation, there is one instance that scared the bejeebers outa me.

I had recently graduated college, so I was still able to stay up late. It was about 2am and I decided to take a friend of mine on a ghost walk of downtown Tucson to point out some of the more haunted areas. Now, for the record, downtown has quite the "night life"-- it doesn't really get quiet until late, late. So, 2am was about when the nightclubs were starting to close their doors. Also, I will say I don't know if this guy I was guiding around downtown was trying to scare me or not... he kept making comments and messing around, which mostly got glares except at the particular hotel mentioned above.

For some reason, when we got to the hotel, I was feeling particularly agitated. I told my friend that it didn't feel right going inside the hotel this time. See.... the hotel is open late at night and anyone can walk through the lobby area. The ballroom is just inside some sliding doors that lead to the staircase (where the night guard was pushed) that leads up to the lobby. But, he wanted to go see the ballroom, so I told the story and in we went. I sat on the stairs, adamantly refusing to peer through the glass windows into the ballroom, which was closed. My friend, pressed his face up to the glass making silly comments. Seconds later, he was back-pedaling to the stairs with a shocked expression on his face. His skin was pallid as he turned to me and said, "Let's go!"

So, up the stairs we went, through the lobby, exiting out another door.

"What did you see?" I kept harassing him to tell.

"I'll tell you when we get away from here," he answered.

When we finally got outside and away from the hotel, he finally told me what he'd seen-- which, of course, I cannot verify because I was sitting on the stairs at the time... so he could have been making it up to get a rise out of me, but his reaction suggests otherwise. He claims to have seen a blue-collar fellow in over-alls who carried something, possibly a sledge hammer. My friend says this man just appeared out of nowhere at the back of the ballroom and started walking towards the door where my friend was. My friend blinked and the man was instantly more than half-way across the ballroom, still headed towards the door where my friend was. His gut reaction was to get out of there, which is why our leave-taking was so abrupt.

Now, to be completely honest, I thought his experience was cool once we'd gotten away from the hotel. I've been to that hotel several times in the past, but I've never had my hair stand on end the whole time, before that night... and that, in conjunction with the ghost-white face of my friend as he freaked out was enough to make me say that I was actually and honestly a little scared myself. Not for my life or anything... but just real honest to goodness scared.

[Hallowed Eve]

I have one. Happened about 4 years ago when I was driving home from a friends house at night. We lived about 30 minutes apart, so it was a bit of a drive.

This friend and I had been discussing the paranormal, something that usually makes me uncomfortable in the first place, so I was jittery to begin with. When I was about halfway home, I SWORE I saw some kind of hooded figure on the side of the road. I did a double take, and it was gone. (We had been talking about Shadow People, so I told myself I was just jittery and seeing things.)

I tried to brush it off, but I couldn't shake the feeling. I finally got home, ran up to my front door, and sprinted inside to turn the lights on. I let my cat out of his room and as soon as I had the front door locked again, something banged on it. Like a "let me in!" banging. Jack (the cat) heard it too because he whirled and looked at the door with his ears back. I looked through the peephole and there was no one there.

I turned on every light I could find and sat down on the couch, literally rocking myself and in tears. I said all kinds of prayers and told whatever "it" was to get the h*ll away from my house. It must've worked because nothing else happened. I didn't mention it to my then fiance, I just wanted to forget it.

Weird, huh? I bet you all think I'm crazy now.

[Pumpkin_Man]

This happened the very first December after my father died. I was involved in a discussion group earlier that week about satan and how he often takes the shape of a goat.

It was snowing, and there was about 6 inches. I was in a 1988 Chefy Cheyyene pick up at the time, and I was haviing engine troubles. The main lead from the igniter to the distributor kept comming luse. I was way out in the middle of no where on my way to a photo shoot in Bolingbrook when the engine quite on me. There was not another car to be seen anywhere. I tried to pull over to the side as best I could without going intot he ditch,but there was so much snow on the ground, I couldn't really see. I put my hazzards on, and reached for the door handle after popping the hood.

Just as I was about to open the door, this huge goat, and I am not kidding, this animals face came right up to the window of my truck. beard and all, came right up to me and stared right in my face. His eyes actualy glistened a very creepy looking red in what little light there was. That animal stood there for about 5 solid minutes, and I DIDN'T DARE get out of that truck. Finaly it walked away.

Well the quandry was I had to do something. That wire was not going to recconect itself, so my 'adult pragmatic' mind had to take over. I decided that it had to be some farmers goat, so I got out of the truck, lifted the hood, reconnected the lead and got on my way with no further problems. I was even on time for the photo shoot, all though slightly shaken up.

The following weekend, I bought a replacment for that ignition lead.

Mike

[ScarecrowJack]

Weird, huh? I bet you all think I'm crazy now.

But we love you anyway. Seriously, I don't find it strange at all. I've heard a lot of similar stories. But haven't really had that many experiences myself. Though this one house I lived in, my roommate and I rented the third floor apartment, which was a converted attic. And when we came home she would make me go up the back stairs first. She insisted the spirits in the stairway got out of my way when they would harass her. We would randomly loose electricity in rooms (which could be attributable to it being an older house). The 2 stories that stand out in my mind from that house where 1) I ran into a friend of mine at an SCA meeting and he apologized for knocking and then leaving the previous night. I asked him what he meant and he told me he'd come over to visit and the house was dark. The apartment had a balcony off the front and you could look through the windows, shot gun style, but the bathroom and bedrooms were off to the side. He knocked, thinking I might be another room, and saw this light start from the back of the apartment and slowly make it's way forward. He said he got spooked and ran from the balcony before it reached the door. He said he felt bad cause he knew it was me. Problem was, I wasn't home that night. I was visiting my mother.

Another time, as I was coming in through the front door my down stairs neighbor was coming in my back door with a sword (he is also in the SCA). Since the house is shot gun style we saw each other at about the same time. He said, Oh good, it's just you. He had heard someone walking around in my apartment and thought I wasn't home. He had a key so he let himself in, weapon in hand, to address it and was glad it was me. Problem was, I had just gotten home myself and hadn't been there for hours. But again, I never had experiences there, just stuff related to me. I did eventually move.

Though the very next place I lived at some stories. It was a modern apartment complex, the box kind with identical apartments if a 4 unit quad. We would get knocking on the doors and windows constantly and never find anyone there. One time, as my roommates and I were returning from grocery shopping and unlocking the door, we heard the knocking on the same side of the door we were on. But my favorite story is one afternoon, it heard the door knocking on the unit across the hall. I heard the door open and close. This repeated about 4 or 5 times and I thought, they must be having a party. Then the last time the door opened I heard my neighbor yell "f*cking poltergiest!" and slam the door. I was tempted to go over and ask him about that, but had never met him and wasn't sure it would be appreciated.

However, I wasn't really afraid at any of these times, so I guess this really doesn't fit. Sorry.

[Jack Skellington]

I had an incident in school once. This was a few years ago now.

It was during lunch break. A few friends & myself decided to do a Ouiji Board. Nothing happened while doing it - we wasn't really doing it properly.

However on the way back into the school I saw a bolt of fork lightning above the school - it was a clear summers day!

That's the only time I remember being really scared & have never tried anything like that since.

[Hallowed Eve]

Weird, huh? I bet you all think I'm crazy now.

But we love you anyway. Seriously, I don't find it strange at all. I've heard a lot of similar stories. But haven't really had that many experiences myself. Though this one house I lived in, my roommate and I rented the third floor apartment, which was a converted attic. And when we came home she would make me go up the back stairs first. She insisted the spirits in the stairway got out of my way when they would harass her. We would randomly loose electricity in rooms (which could be attributable to it being an older house). The 2 stories that stand out in my mind from that house where 1) I ran into a friend of mine at an SCA meeting and he apologized for knocking and then leaving the previous night. I asked him what he meant and he told me he'd come over to visit and the house was dark. The apartment had a balcony off the front and you could look through the windows, shot gun style, but the bathroom and bedrooms were off to the side. He knocked, thinking I might be another room, and saw this light start from the back of the apartment and slowly make it's way forward. He said he got spooked and ran from the balcony before it reached the door. He said he felt bad cause he knew it was me. Problem was, I wasn't home that night. I was visiting my mother.

Another time, as I was coming in through the front door my down stairs neighbor was coming in my back door with a sword (he is also in the SCA). Since the house is shot gun style we saw each other at about the same time. He said, Oh good, it's just you. He had heard someone walking around in my apartment and thought I wasn't home. He had a key so he let himself in, weapon in hand, to address it and was glad it was me. Problem was, I had just gotten home myself and hadn't been there for hours. But again, I never had experiences there, just stuff related to me. I did eventually move.

Though the very next place I lived at some stories. It was a modern apartment complex, the box kind with identical apartments if a 4 unit quad. We would get knocking on the doors and windows constantly and never find anyone there. One time, as my roommates and I were returning from grocery shopping and unlocking the door, we heard the knocking on the same side of the door we were on. But my favorite story is one afternoon, it heard the door knocking on the unit across the hall. I heard the door open and close. This repeated about 4 or 5 times and I thought, they must be having a party. Then the last time the door opened I heard my neighbor yell "f*cking poltergiest!" and slam the door. I was tempted to go over and ask him about that, but had never met him and wasn't sure it would be appreciated.

However, I wasn't really afraid at any of these times, so I guess this really doesn't fit. Sorry.

Haha, thanks Scarecrow! Those are some really interesting stories!

[NeverMore]

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I wonder how many people living on the east cost got the bejebers scared out of them this morning? Anybody on this board feel it? A 5.8 mag earthquake here isn't even worth a passing thought.

[Rising Dead Man]

Thanks to a huge anxiety disorder I'm cr a pping bricks all the freakin time. But here's an interesting one from when I was little, at least it's interesting to me. I was in bed, in the dark. I suddenly hear this weird kind of laugh. I don't know if I can describe it. It's not like a real laugh but, I don't know. Anyways I was the the kind of little kid that ran out of the room crying. Of course it was a paranoid imagination but just remember the terror I'm sure everyone had a time like this.

[Jack Skellington]

Some really interesting stories from everyone. Some eerie ones too that have given me the chills!

[Midnight Witch]

I've experienced a few weird things. It's pretty frightening and makes me jittery.