Episode 119: Cat Nap

Summary

Otherworld Episode 119: "Cat Nap" – Detailed Summary

Release Date: April 21, 2025

Introduction

In Episode 119 of Otherworld, titled "Cat Nap," host Jack Wagner delves into a perplexing and unexplained event experienced by Lee, a Florida resident facing the daunting task of moving her family to Atlanta. This episode explores themes of disappearance, unexplained time lapses, and the lingering questions that surround such mysterious incidents.

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Background and Setup

[01:07] Jack Wagner introduces the story by setting the scene: Lee and her family are in the midst of relocating to Atlanta due to her husband's new job. As they prepare to leave their old home in Pensacola, Florida, Lee faces one last mission—retrieving her missing cat, John Malkovich, from their neighbor, Peggy.

Lee's Personal Life and Relationship with the Paranormal

[02:28] Lee shares her background, highlighting her upbringing in the Panhandle of Florida and her openness to paranormal experiences. She recounts seeing her deceased grandfather and a friend after their passing, experiences that have kept her open-minded about unexplained phenomena.

"Since this happened, there's nothing that's not possible. Anything's possible at this point." [12:45]

The Missing Cat and Rising Tensions

Lee explains the deteriorating relationship with Peggy, their eccentric neighbor, over the custody of their cats. Despite having a cooperative system to monitor their pets’ safety, Peggy’s refusal to return John Malkovich intensifies Lee's determination to retrieve her cat before moving.

"I knew that I had no other diplomacy had failed. It was time for drastic guerrilla warfare." [07:30]

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The Night of the Incident

Preparation and Departure

After closing on their house, Lee joins her family for dinner and discusses her plan to retrieve her cat one last time. Post-dinner, she ensures her children are settled at her mother's house before embarking on her mission alone.

[15:20] Lee describes her subsequent actions:

"I went and sat at a bar in the proximity of my neighborhood... I knew the bartenders well enough and they knew what I was doing." [16:10]

She consumes three beers over a few hours, maintaining sobriety sufficient to drive but acknowledging her fatigue.

The Unexplained Sleep

Driving back to her mother's house, Lee becomes overwhelmingly sleepy and decides to pull over at a familiar gas station to rest, expecting only a brief nap.

"I definitely expected to just have a little dode... It was a nap." [18:45]

Upon waking, she returns home without any memory of the intervening time. Her family greets her with confusion and concern, revealing that she has been missing for three days—a stark contrast to her perceived three-hour nap.

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Revelations and Emotional Impact

Family's Search Efforts

[20:30] Lee details the frantic search undertaken by her husband, Sean, and family members. Utilizing a GPS tracker, Sean navigates to the gas station location indicated but finds no sign of Lee or her car.

"The gas tank was totally empty. I didn’t notice this. My husband actually noticed it once I was back." [26:18]

Lack of Physical Evidence

Upon returning, Lee finds no physical evidence of her disappearance. Her clothes remain unchanged, her phone was left plugged in and recharged, and there are no signs of struggle or injury.

"There was nothing to show that anything had happened to me." [31:50]

Psychological Aftermath

Lee grapples with the psychological toll of the incident, experiencing depression and questioning her own reality and identity.

"I felt like I was defective somehow, that there was something wrong with me." [34:10]

She seeks professional help, receiving diagnoses of PTSD unrelated to the event but finding no concrete explanations for her disappearance.

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Theories and Unanswered Questions

Lee's Exploration of Possible Explanations

Lee explores various theories, from dissociative episodes to paranormal interventions, yet finds none satisfactorily explaining her three-day absence with no memories or physical evidence.

"There is no blip, no memory, no fraction. I didn't remember shifting my weight... it was a black hole." [39:20]

[50:07] Sean, Lee’s husband, adds his perspective on the situation, expressing confusion over the GPS data and the impossibility of Lee being asleep for three days without any physical signs of time passage.

"Logically you could think like if you did fall asleep, I don't think you’d stay asleep and unaware of your surroundings for 72 hours." [50:15]

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Conclusion and Reflection

Jack Wagner's Closing Thoughts

In wrapping up the episode, Jack Wagner reflects on the enigmatic nature of Lee’s experience. He acknowledges the limitations of mental health explanations like dissociative fugues in addressing the totality of Lee's disappearance.

"Maybe something paranormal did happen to Lee. Maybe there's a logical explanation, like memory loss or a dissociative fugue. Or maybe something paranormal happened to her that induced the fugue. I'm not sure." [54:10]

Wagner highlights the unresolved aspects of the case, emphasizing the lingering mysteries:

• Where was Lee during the three days?
• Why was there no physical evidence or signs of her absence?
• How did the GPS tracker persistently indicate her presence at the gas station?

[55:00] Jack Wagner concludes with a bittersweet note about Lee not retrieving her original cat, John Malkovich, but finding solace in a new companion, Alastor Miaowley.

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Afterword

Episode 119 of Otherworld presents a chilling narrative that blurs the lines between reality and the unexplained. Lee’s story serves as a haunting reminder of the mysteries that still evade understanding, leaving both her and listeners to ponder the possibilities beyond the known.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• "Since this happened, there's nothing that's not possible. Anything's possible at this point."
  — Lee [12:45]

• "I knew that I had no other diplomacy had failed. It was time for drastic guerrilla warfare."
  — Lee [07:30]

• "I definitely expected to just have a little dode... It was a nap."
  — Lee [18:45]

• "There was nothing to show that anything had happened to me."
  — Lee [31:50]

• "I felt like I was defective somehow, that there was something wrong with me."
  — Lee [34:10]

• "There is no blip, no memory, no fraction. I didn't remember shifting my weight... it was a black hole."
  — Lee [39:20]

• "Logically you could think like if you did fall asleep, I don't think you’d stay asleep and unaware of your surroundings for 72 hours."
  — Sean [50:15]

• "Maybe something paranormal did happen to Lee. Maybe there's a logical explanation, like memory loss or a dissociative fugue. Or maybe something paranormal happened to her that induced the fugue. I'm not sure."
  — Jack Wagner [54:10]

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Final Thoughts

"Cat Nap" is a compelling episode that invites listeners to explore the boundaries between the paranormal and the unexplained. Through Lee's harrowing experience, Otherworld challenges us to consider what lies beyond our current understanding and how such mysteries impact those who experience them.

Transcript

[Lee]

24 chefs 24 culinary showdowns for 24 hours straight.

[Sean]

Which chef will out cook, outpace, outlast the competition?

[Lee]

No chef escapes the clock. Season premiere 24 and 24 Last Chef Standing Sunday, April 27th at 8. See it first on Food Network stream next day on Max.

[Jack Wagner]

This episode is brought to you by State Farm. You might say all kinds of stuff when things go wrong, but these are the words you really need to remember. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. They've got options to fit your unique insurance needs, meaning you can talk to your agent to choose the coverage you need, have coverage options to protect the things you value most, file a claim right on the State Farm mobile app, and even reach a real person when you need to talk to someone. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

[Lee]

Welcome to Other World. I'm your host, Jack Wagner. This story comes from a woman named Lee who lives in the panhandle of Florida. And it's about something very strange that happened to her on a night when she was out late on a mission to find her missing cat. She'll explain this a lot better than me, but at the time, her and her family were in the process of moving to Atlanta for her husband's work. He was already up there preparing the new house while Lee and the kids were staying at her mother's house, who lives not far away from their old house in Florida, which they had just sold. Lee was pretty much ready to move, except she had one thing left to do before leaving, which was hopefully get back this missing cat, which, by the way, has a very unique name that you will never guess even if I gave you 1000 tries. I started laughing in the interview when she told me it. Lee has a really amazing personality and adds so much to this already strange story for me. I'll let her take it from here. This is episode 119. The title is Catnap, and you're listening to Otherworld. Hello, is this Bobby?

[Sean]

Yes, it is.

[Lee]

At its core, the science. You can't argue with us all of.

[Sean]

A sudden is up in the sky.

[Lee]

It's almost frustrating that it's happening.

I'm literally, I'm gonna die.

Its limbs were just like, wrong.

Everybody moves back into the night, even if it takes them a. Hi, I'm Lee. I am a Floridian, born and raised in the Panhandle near Pensacola, what is affectionately known as the Redneck Riviera. We are in the very far west corner of the Panhandle in the nook of Alabama. So an hour north is Alabama state line. And our west is an Alabama state line. And just south of us are the most beautiful beaches in the world. And a mostly well kept secret. But it is obviously a big tourist attraction. And as us locals know, we don't get our beach pack until after Labor Day. And once spring break starts, we just don't go. And I'm currently a stay at home mom. I've had a lot of different jobs for all the years and I don't think I quite know what I want to be when I grow up. But as of right now, I'm just Mom. Before all this happened, I didn't really think about things in terms of being paranormal or not. Honestly, I didn't think about it all that much. I just knew that I had had experiences and I didn't put it towards a belief or not a belief. I wasn't skeptical at all. I guess you could call me open minded. I can very clearly remember seeing my grandfather after he passed away in the hallway when I was a kid. And the same thing happened with a very, very dear friend of mine who was killed in a car accident. Both times they just had this kind of peaceful, gentle smile on their face and they had like light around them. And if you had asked me before all of this, I would have been much more skeptical. Since this happened, there's nothing that's not possible. Anything's possible at this point. Because the day leading up to this event which occurred overnight, we were closing on our house here in Pensacola because my husband had gotten a job in Atlanta and we had moved up there. Our house was in a perfect neighborhood and I loved that house and I was so sorry to see it go. But I knew that the day that we closed was the last chance that I was going to have to steal back my cat from the neighbor. Peggy was her name and she was the kind of eccentric where if you had told me that she was an art teacher, I wouldn't have been surprised at all. This neighbor and I were friends when we were neighbors. And the stealing of the cat is where the falling out occurred. And we both had a system because our cats would come and go and we both used our system of the garage door, letting the other know if the cats were inside and they were like safe for the night, or if there was still a cat out somewhere on garage doors, we would leave them cracked so that they could come in and go as they pleased. So when my husband got the job, he went first ahead of the family because I needed to sell the house and I Needed to do a little remodel to get it ready to go on the market. And I stayed behind for that. The work that they were doing scared the cat enough to where he pretty much started hanging out at Peggy's. And when it was finished and I was ready to leave town, she refused to help me get him back. And I don't know if he was inside, I don't know if he was outside, but I didn't have him, and she didn't help me. And I was like, are you really doing this right now? And she was like, it's best for him to just stay here anyway. And so that's when it went from, you know, thanks, neighbor, to, are you kidding me? And I was mad. Oh, so mad. And I tried repeatedly to talk her into letting, you know, give me my cat back. And she wasn't having it, and she stood her ground. And so that's how the mission was born. Because I knew that I had no other diplomacy had failed. It was time for drastic guerrilla warfare. So I had closed that afternoon and went out to dinner with my husband and my kids. And we talked about it at dinner. I said, I've got one more chance to go get back John Malkovich. And so I need to. I gotta try. I have to try. And that's what led up to when it got weird. After I put my kids to bed, which was at my mother's house because we didn't have our house anymore, obviously. And so after the kids went to bed, I left again. And I went and sat at a bar in the proximity of my neighborhood. I knew the bartenders well enough for them to walk me to my car at the end of the night. But not that we ever spent time socially, but I did frequent it enough for them to know who I was and they knew what I was doing. I think I had three beers. And that was over a couple of hours. So it was about a drink an hour. And like I said, the people that were the bartenders that night knew me well enough and knew what I was doing. And so everybody was aware that we were on a cat nap back mission and that I was going to be going and, you know, driving and all that kind of jazz. And I was by myself. Like, they all knew that. So there wasn't any kind of, you know, I was. I wasn't, you know, on top of the bar taking shots or anything. So when they closed, which is 2am here, I finished up. I probably piddled because I'm just that kind of person. I don't always drive off right away. And it was not, not even five minutes until I was on my street. I was hoping against hope that the garage would be cracked and that my cat would be outside and that I would be able to get him back. And that was not the case. But that was what I was doing in my old neighborhood in the middle of the night and I saw the garage door was closed. And I knew that that was what I was hoping it wasn't. But I think I probably circled a couple times just trying to think of anything else, even though I'd already exhausted all other options. And I did that a few times, but I never got out of the neighborhood. Eventually, I had to give up. I left the neighborhood to head back to my mom's house. And I turned towards the main road and there is a gas station right on the corner. And it was a hop, skip and a jump away from my house for years. So I was very familiar with the people who ran that place. And they were just wonderful people. They were great. And they knew me well enough to order me a case of Peace Tea every week because I would. I would come for it every week. And so they ordered a nice case just for me. So we had that kind of relationship. And as I'm driving, I became so sleepy. I could not keep my eyes open. And I have been on road trips, I have driven overnights, I have been out late, and I've never actually had to stop before. You know, you turn the music up a little, you're sort of like, you know, take a drink, just sit up straight, you shift a little, you don't actually stop. But I had to. I absolutely had to. I was so sleepy. I was fine one minute and I was losing consciousness the next, it seemed. And I had to stop. I absolutely had to stop. I was so tired. I was. I was driving towards Olive Road from north to south, and I was coming up on the gas station. It was on my right. And it was no more than 3am it was somewhere between, say, 2:30 and 3, probably. I did. I pulled over and I do remember having the thought of trying to be considerate to the. The store owners because they were such great people. And I did know them so well. And I didn't want to detract or cause any kind of confusion if I didn't wake up and get out of there and in time for them to open. And I thought that I would be less of a nuisance if I was in the back. And I was familiar enough with their deliveries to know that they didn't have any kind of loading dock in the back or anything. I wouldn't be in the way there. And I did. I pulled in behind the gas station. I left the car on, and I leaned my chair back a little bit, and I went to sleep. I definitely expected to just have a little dode, as my Cajun aunt would say, which is a nap. It was. I just. I would have taken a little power nap, probably, is what I'm more likely, you know, assuming than I expected. And the next thing I know, I was asleep. And that's the last thing I remember. When I woke up, I was still kind of sleepy, but I was okay to drive. And it was around dawn. It had been a couple of hours, and the store wasn't open yet, and the sun was about to come up, and I knew I could get back before the kids woke up and not disturb my mother or my kids. And so it was kind of like the perfect nap. It was just a couple of hours. I felt fine. I knew I'd be able to get back, and nobody would, you know, have to be inconvenienced, and it was time to go home. So I did that. I drugged down Olive, and I took the normal route to my mom's house. And when I got there, and there was nothing remarkable about the drive, I just went home. I still felt tired. And when I got there and the whole house was quiet and everyone was still asleep, I just climbed into bed and I went right back to sleep. The whole house was asleep. So I just was like, okay, great. I'm going back to sleep. And the next thing that I recall was the sheet being lifted off of me and my mother standing there holding the sheet up, looking down at me, and she was sort of studying me, and I was a little groggy. And I remember kind of cracking one eye and looking up at her like, what are you doing? And she put the sheet down, and she walked out of the room. And I thought that was weird, but, okay, whatever. I don't know. And I just sort of laid there, and I was never really back asleep, but I didn't get up physically at that point. So I was just kind of laying in that, you know, comfy zone after you wake up. After a few minutes, I sort of became more aware of what was going on in the house in further and further distances. So when I first woke up, just waking up, you're still groggy. You're still sleepy. My mom was there looking at me under the sheet, which was weird. And I didn't understand it. And a few more minutes after that, I was able to recognize the sounds of the pitter patters, and the kids were playing, and that was fine, and they were okay. And after that, I noticed the multiple voices, which was unexpected. And I'm pretty sure I remember hearing something being cooked. And so that sort of checked off that list of, go feed the kids. Well, somebody's feeding the kids. All right, I'm going to, you know, take another moment to wake up a little more. And then I heard my sister. Wait, what? Why in the world is Sarah here? Is that even right? Yeah, that's Sarah. Why is Sarah here? That's weird. And then the hushed voices, multiple. Weren't so hushed anymore. And they sounded urgent. They sounded panicked, they sounded upset. And I remember thinking, what's happened? And that I was feeling somewhat of some anticipation about going out there and finding out, because something must have happened, because Sarah's here. Why would she be here if she wasn't? Sarah was my pseudo sister. Her mom and my mom were best friends, and we grew up like sisters and would call each other sisters before we realized we weren't actually sisters. And she lived in Navarre, neighboring town, but there's no reason she would have been at my mom's house. So that sort of really woke me up. There was no lounging after that. So I kind of sat up, and I was like, okay, that's something. You know, something's up. And when I walked out to the living room, I see my husband, I see my sister, I see my mother, and my babies are sort of running around wherever, all, you know, somewhere in the background, but they were there, too. And they all had this look on their face. And I knew something definitely happened. And for Sarah to be there, I thought that it was her mom, but they were all staring at me. And as soon as I walked out, everybody stopped talking. And that's. That's never good. And eventually, the awkward silence had to break, and I said, what? And I don't know if it was Sarah or my mom or all three of them at once, but the next words that hit my ears were, where have you been? And it wasn't nice, and I was confused. What? I don't. What do you mean? I was here. I was here before you got up. What are you talking about? I was only on a couple hours. It was just. I just got sleepy. I took a nap. That's a safe thing to do, right? Like, what? Are you mad? I don't get this. They looked at me like I had some kind of answer for them and I didn't, because I didn't even know what they were talking about. I didn't understand at all in that moment. And I also think I said something like, this is some kind of weird joke. And I don't get it. And what made me realize that this was not a joke was when my mother said what she said next. And she said, I have been preparing myself for the cops to come and tell me that they have found your body. And she was terrified. I. And I realized that something was very wrong and I did not know what happened. And that was, I think, when it was sort of became a cacophony of information. At that point, my mom, Sarah, Sean, all of them were just, where have you been? We've been looking everywhere for you. We went here, we went there, we called this one, we called that person, this person came here and this person put on Facebook and all of the things that had happened. And I think at some point somebody said, it's Monday. And I went, what? What? That's not possible. I took a three hour nap. And they were like, no, you've been gone for three days. And I think that they must have had the same kind of oh shit moment that I did when I realized that they weren't around when I. When they realized that I wasn't either. And to me, I just took a power nap a few hours. But apparently I had been missing for almost three days. They tried to tell me everything that they had done and they did, you know, and they had called the police, they had reported me missing and, and the first day that I wasn't there, my mom and my husband thought that I was with the other and so they didn't miss me. My husband said he tried to text me several times throughout that time and I never replied. And he figured I was just mad about the house. I said, yeah, but I wouldn't have just not answered you. Like, when have I ever not told you if I'm mad at you? I have no problem with that. I will tell you what I think. And that he had tried to call after I didn't respond and that it went straight to voicemail. That was weird. And I'm not somebody that's glued to my phone 24 7, but it's not off. Going straight to voicemail is bizarre. So when he thought that I was just mad at him, but then it was, the phone is off. And then it was, okay, well, you can be mad at me and give me the silent treatment all you want to, but you're going to talk to me about my babies. And that was when he contacted my mom. And when she told him I thought she was with you, that's when they knew they had a problem. But that wasn't until Sunday.

All right, we'll be right back after this quick break. This show is brought to you by Rocket Money. The start of the new year is the perfect time to get organized, especially with your finance. Rocket Money is a great way to do that. If you have not tried it, and if you think maybe you're a person who's not quite paying attention to your finances as much as you should, I would highly recommend giving Rocket Money a try. Let it dive in and see if it could find anything that you're overpaying on or maybe some subscriptions you forgot to cancel. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps you find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and even helps lower your bills so you could grow your savings. You just link your various accounts. Rocket Money lays everything out super nicely and instantly identifies the stuff you're signed up for. And I'm telling you, if you do this, the results might shock you. You might find some very strange things in there that you forgot you signed up for. It's happened to me. It's happened to people I know. I'm always a little horrified, but then very grateful to finally be able to cancel it. And additionally, maybe the coolest thing on Rocket Money is the fact that they can negotiate to lower some of your bills. For instance, your Internet bill, you can click a single button and Rocket Money will call up your Internet service provider and negotiate a lower price for you. I didn't know that was possible until they did it for me. Apparently you can just ask to have these bills lowered. I'm not sure what they're saying, but it definitely worked. I've done it a couple times myself and I'm so grateful for it. If you have not tried Rocket Money before, definitely give it a try. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of 5,500 million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year. When using all of the app's premium features, cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to Rocket Money.com OtherWorld today. That's RocketMoney.com OtherWorld do you know what.

[Jake Brennan]

Went down at the Viper Room the night River Phoenix died? Or how about the mysterious death of Brittany Murphy? Are you aware of how Steve McQueen escaped murder at the hands of the Manson family, the obsessive killing of Dorothy Stratton, the real life murder that inspired David Lynch's Twin Peaks, the three conspiracies surrounding Marilyn Monroe's death. These stories and more are told in the new podcast Hollywoodland, where true crime and Tinseltown collide. Hollywoodland is hosted by me, Jake Brennan, creator of the award winning music and true crime podcast Disgraceland. Follow and listen to Hollywoodland wherever you get your podcasts.

[Lee]

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[N/A]

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[Lee]

Thunderbolts will take the world by store.

[Sean]

There's some big bread out there and you're gonna help me stop it us why? You got some place to be on.

[Lee]

May 2nd Avengers, you're gone. No one's coming to save the day their time.

[Sean]

I think we could be the people.

[Lee]

That are coming as soon calm being the hero. There is no higher calling. Let's do this. Marvel Studios Thunderbolts only theaters May 2 get tickets now. Rated PG13 some material may be inappropriate for children under 13. My husband was staying with his parents that night and he thought that I was at my mom's and my mom thought that I was with him and so when they realized that I was missing, he immediately went out looking for me. So they started calling my best friend Andrea, who is the one that organized the Facebook posts of me being missing. They made an effort to drive around and look for me first. Sean had a tracker on our car for T Mobile as a hotspot so that the kids could play with tablets before they were old enough to have phones. It also provided roadside assistance and in the app you could pull up the GPS of wherever this tracker was. And so he drove to my neighborhood because the tracker said I was sitting right there, and that's where I was. So I was like, okay. Except for he says he didn't see me. And if he was looking at the tracker, knowing what it looks like from the app, it is not Google Maps. And so it's not as precise down to feet or anything, but it gave him the crossroads, which is what a tow truck would ask for, basically. So he went to that location, quote unquote, which was the store. But he says he drove by, and he didn't see me. He didn't see the car. And I think that's the same thing that Sarah and Andrea had done when they went out to the beach looking for me. They were looking for my car. They were looking for my car. So they were looking for a white.

SUV with your car. Was anything different in it when you woke up? Like, was the gas tank full? Was it empty? Did it make sense to you at the time?

So the gas tank was total, like, empty. Like, I. And I didn't notice this. My husband actually noticed it once I was back. He said, the gas is empty. And I said, well, I didn't go anywhere. Like, I couldn't. I mean, and then it's like, okay, well, if the car had been running the entire time, maybe. But I had. Oh. And that was another thing that he told me is that he knew the last time that I had gotten gas, and he's like, I mean, maybe if it had been running the whole time and the air was blowing and da, da, da, da. But I had just filled up. So for it to be empty, he. He said that. That just didn't really make sense, and it would have had to have been driven and everything else in the car was just normal. When I drove home, the phone to me was totally fine. There was nothing on it, and there was no reason for there to be anything on it. And it was plugged in in the car, and so the battery was charged. And when I got home and I set it on my nightstand and went back to sleep, the next time that I woke up and I went and checked it, it had a million notifications. I had text messages. I had voicemails. I had Facebook notifications. I had Instagram messages. I had everything there that wasn't there before. And that's confusing, but I thought maybe it just didn't register until it picked up the WI FI at my mom's house. But they were there eventually. But they weren't there when I woke up and drove home, because I would have been aware of that many, that that influx would have caught my attention. And there was nothing remarkable at all. Until I got to my mom's house and found out what happened. There was no reason for me to feel any alarm at all. One of the friends of mine who saw the Facebook post is the one that went to the bar, and he spoke with the same bartender that had walked me out to my car, and he found a girl that I had spoken with earlier that night. And we had just sort of kind of buddied up just for a few minutes, and, oh, hey, this, that, the other. We didn't really know each other, but he found this girl, and he even got her description of how I was that night, and she told him that I was fine. There wasn't any indication that I was in any kind of distress or that I was in intoxicated or that I was out of my mind in any way or that there was anything wrong at all. He spoke with the bartender that walked me out, and he confirmed that I had just had a couple beers and that I wasn't drunk when I left, and that they knew what I was doing. Going to get the cat, and so they were all sort of rooting for me to try to save the cat. And he told my family all of this. And my best friend and my sister went to the beach because that's my jam. And the beach is my therapist. That's. I've said that for years and years, that it's always open and it never overcharges. And if you know me, you know the beach is a safe bet that's more likely than not where I'm going to be. And they went through every parking lot along the national seashore, even the parts that are protected. They even checked all of that. They went into Fort Pickens, which was a national park that you have to pay to get into, and they did. They went to every single place that they could have thought of, that. We had a childhood memory. Andrea, I've known my entire life. We call, we say that we're besties since babies. We have memories of this one day at the beach when this happened. Those are all the places they checked. They went to everywhere that might have ever mattered. And I wasn't there, and my car wasn't there, and my phone was off the entire time. And in the true crime world, if the phone's off, somebody's probably dead. That's the worst sign. And so everybody Was really, really scared. And I saw the Facebook post with my own eyes, and there it is. I'm a missing person. Holy shit. And so, finally, after my friends and my family did an amazing job, you know, caring about me and trying to find me, my husband finally contacted the police on Sunday night. They took the report, and that was that for the night. It was time to, like, just call it a day. Put the babies to bed and try to get some sleep, because God only knows what tomorrow's gonna bring. And when the sun came up, I came home. The first thing that I was sort of aware of once I was at my mom's house was her lifting the sheet up. And I thought that was weird. And so after I found out that they had been desperately searching for me, I realized that she had been checking my body for injuries to see if I had been hurt somehow. And there was nothing. There's not a scratch on me. I was totally fine. I had no injuries. I had no scratches. I had no bruises. I had, obviously no blood. If I don't have a scratch or a bruise, there was nothing wrong with me. I was totally fine. I wasn't hurt at all. I didn't feel sore. I didn't feel any kind of foreboding for the potential of a nefarious reason that I had been missing or, like, if I had been drugged or assaulted, I would have felt some kind of way. And I didn't. I didn't feel anything like that. And I. Not to overshare, but I've been through an assault, and I know what that feels like, and I didn't have that at all. I didn't feel as though anything had happened to me. I didn't feel hungry. I didn't feel like I hadn't been to the bathroom in that whole time. I felt completely normal.

What about your clothes? Did they feel like you've been wearing them for three days? Like, did you feel like your hair. Did it seem dirty? You know how. You know how clothes start to feel after you've worn them too long?

Not that anybody ever mentioned, but you're the first person that's ever thought of that. No, I don't. And there was nothing on my clothes. There was nothing that looked dirty or. Or stinky or anything that would have identified that I had been sitting somewhere for days or that it had been any kind of, like, event. There. There was no physical evidence of any kind on my person, on my body, in my clothing, in. On my phone. There was nothing to show that anything had happened to me. So we had no clues really, of what could have possibly explained how this could have happened and what it even was. What did happen? We. We still don't know. It's still unanswered. It took a while to sink in. It. It really did. It was just like that. I. Wow. Okay, I'm gonna need some. Wow. I'm gonna need some time to sort of, you know, absorb all this. It was too much to really take in in one day. And slowly but surely I realized that this didn't really happen to me. It happened to them. To me. I took a nap. It was three hours, the end. But to them it was trauma. And it was a big T trauma. And I, to this day, still feel like beholden, responsible for not having an answer. But I don't. I have. And, and, and the missing time, I can't describe it because it's not in my vernacular. I can tell you when I've had too much to drink and I have blackout spots because there are bits and pieces and I usually know where I was and what I was doing. I just had a little too much and I don't remember everything. That's not what this was. This was some thing other. It was a black hole. It was a void. There is no blip, no memory, no fraction. No. I didn't remember shifting my weight, being uncomfortable. I didn't remember feeling temperature. I don't have any perceptions whatsoever during that missing time. And the only reason that I was able to say the three hours was because I know what time I left the barn. I know what time I got home. That's the only way that I can even put time on it. And that's how bizarre this really was, is that I could not have possibly been asleep for three days. And that's what my sister says. She goes, well, even if you were asleep, like, there's no way you didn't pee, you didn't eat, you didn't drink, nothing, you didn't check your phone, you didn't turn it on, you did nothing. And I'm like, yeah, nope, there's no way. You're right. You're absolutely right. There's no way that I just slept the whole time. If I wasn't there, where the hell was I? And that for me is the scariest thing, because if I wasn't there, where. Where could I have been? I chose. So during all this, we were in the process of moving, so by that time we should have left. And he was late to this new job and we had to haul ass Back to Atlanta, he had to go to work. And so we just resumed our routine because we have to. When you have little ones, you don't have a choice. You resume your routine. And the more time passed, the more unwell I became. I have always been a really hyper but happy person. And I really found myself facing depression. And the way that I phrased it by the time I left Atlanta is that I was dangerously depressed, I was not okay. And that sort of embarked. A very distinct before and after in my life was that weekend that, that missing time, the before that ever happened to me. I was me. And after, not so much. I think the most recurring thought was if I wasn't there, where was I? If I wasn't aware, who was there? Was this some kind of split personality? Did I have some kind of fracture in not be aware? Is that what we're talking about? Is that even possible? I felt like I was defective somehow, that there was something wrong with me. For me to be able to have even gone through something like that. And it was just what happened? Where was I? Did anybody see me? Did nobody see me? I've always been afraid, I guess, to be invisible, which is probably why I'm so loud. But I felt like I could just evaporate and nobody would notice. And that's, I guess the main thing that I felt afterwards when I was alone was afraid. I had never really been scared of anything really, but I was afraid of pretty much anything because I. It could have been anything. I don't even know what to be afraid of, but I'm just afraid. I did what a lot of people try to do and I would try to self medicate. And I remember drinking, which really isn't my thing. I'm not a big drinker, even now I rarely do. But I remember drinking because I just didn't know what to do. And I felt very alone and I was just. I would just stay in bed and I was unmotivated. And the normal me was always so go, go, go, go, go. You couldn't stop me if you tried. And I wasn't that anymore. And I would take my kids to school and I go right back to bed until it's time to pick them up. And then I'd pick them up. And then I do what I had to do, bare minimum, dialing it in. And then I just wait to go back to bed again. It was terrible. It was awful. It was not any kind of way to live. And I had two little ones to take care of. I did not have time for this. So I did seek assistance, and I needed it.

Did you ever receive any kind of diagnosis over this?

No, I. I've had ptsd, but not from this.

And you've been fully examined and checked?

Yeah, that's like I said. I went to, like, see, I sought help because I was like this. No, this is weird. And so, yeah, I've been thoroughly checked physically and psychoanalyzed, etc. And I still see my cancer. But even the last time I saw her, she's like, you know that this comes to an end at some point, and, you know, I'm good, I'm stable, I'm happy, I'm healthy. There's nothing to really justify it anymore. But, yeah, I mean, I went to them. I was like, I don't. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to process this. So I'm okay now. But, yeah, this is just. This is a very bizarre, unexplained event that didn't just happen to me. It happened to my family, too. And I've looked into other missing people or missing time or whatever, and there's some stories there, here and there. There was a guy who was at a ski lodge and then ended up on the other side of the country with no idea how he got there, but he had a new iPhone. I think the clinical answer was a dissociative episode, but that doesn't really explain where I was physically. Why did he not see the car? Why didn't anybody at the store knock on my window and say, what are you doing? And there's no way I was asleep that long anyway. So I don't know what this is, but according to the limited amount that mental health professionals know, it was a dissociative episode. But, no, nothing like this has happened since. I haven't lost any more time, especially not in that large a chunk.

Did you sustain any injuries before this? Like, did you get hit on the head or. No. Was there any kind of, like, extreme mental stress on you?

No, no, no, there was nothing. I had been surrounded by people and my family, and there was no injury. There was no fall, there was no wreck. There was no damage to the vehicle. The vehicle was totally intact. There was nothing out of place with that. There was no headlight missing. There was no tail light broken. There was no bump, scratch, nothing. Car was totally fine except for being out of gas. I don't know. I. All I know is that I don't know. And when I was growing up, and still now I believe in God, I believe that. I want to believe that it's a benevolent God and that it's not all for nothing. And even if I'm wrong, I'm still glad that I get to live my life with the hope that I'm going to see my grandparents again and that it's for a greater purpose. And I choose to live my life that way. And I have had moments where I thought, there's no way God's not real. Like, some things are just too magnificent. And that was kind of the extent of it. I didn't ever really get past that or go farther than that. But since this has happened, I feel like there's so many things that could be now and that I don't know what it is, but I know that we don't know. I know that it's something. Okay, let me tell you the story, too, because this just happened. A friend of mine resigned from life, and her service was going to be on a Thursday. Wednesday, I take a nap, and I wake up from a dream that wasn't a dream. And I was very upset because I had seen the entire death. I see her in her closet, and she's hanging. And then she's standing next to me. And I'm looking at the scene that is now. First responders, and I'm looking at EMTs. They take her down. They see if there's anything to resuscitate. There's not. The whole time she's standing next to me and she's looking at me with a shrug. Look where her face said, sorry. But like I said, she never said anything. It was just sort of the look on her face. And she stood there for a moment, and then the dream ended. And it was so visceral. It didn't feel like a dream. It didn't have any missing pieces. There was none of that. It was a very visiony kind of thing. And afterwards, we went to lunch, and that was when my friends told me that my dream was correct and that is how she died. And that just. So when weird things happen to me now, I can't help but sort of react in, like, a panic, like, okay, well, okay, it's weird, it's weird, it's weird, it's weird. And now it's just. I don't know, it's sort of like a. An intangible. Like, I respect the unknown more. I can. I'm more aware that it exists now. And it's like, okay, I know you're there. I don't understand you. I don't know what you are. I just know that there's something there. I don't know. I have some kind of weird connection to it now and again. It's nothing tangible. It's not like it's an actual strain, but there's a tether. There's some kind of tether. And I can't explain anything that I have described today, but I wish I could. Like I said, all I know is that we don't know.

So what were you thinking when you first realized Lee was missing?

[Sean]

I. I don't know. I mean, at the time I was thinking like, you know, as any guy, your wife just someone have kidnapped her or. Or drugged her or something, you know, and. Or. Or, you know, a whole bunch of different scenarios or she just could have just left you. You know, I mean, I joked. I joke around as I said that you got. You got. You got abducted in the MK Ultra, dude. Joking around. But, you know, but honestly, trying. I. I don't know. I don't know what. What happened in that time. Spanish with her. So me and my son was living with. With my. With. With my dad, and she was staying at her mom's with my daughter because of space. Then I didn't hear anything Saturday, so I just figured, all right, she's asleep or whatever. And I guess her mom was saying she was probably with me. But then when. Then when I called Sunday, called her mom said, hey, is Lee there? She's like, no, she. I thought she was with you. And I'm like, no. And that's when all we started searching and looking and trying to get her friends involved to search the. The beach that. And didn't realize until over 24 hours later that she was gone. I had to like, call to do a missing person report on this.

[Lee]

What was this tracker that you had on the car that you were using to look for her?

[Sean]

I have one of those. I had a. It's a. It's like. It's like an OBD connector that goes in your car that. That does codes and stuff, diagnostics, but also has a GPS on it. And the last place I saw was. Was I saw like a. Like a driving through. Like. Like we had an old neighborhood that we used to live in. After we closed, driving through there, and there was no stop. So I kind of. Kind of drove around that area, but I couldn't find her. And the way that device will work, if the engine was off in the car or something like that, it would. It would say a lot. It would give a timeline, and it will Stop that timeline. But if there's something still moving, wouldn't give like a clear indication where. Where it was last stopped. So. And we couldn't. And I couldn't find a car or anything. It was. It was weird. I couldn't find a car. I mean, she said she was in a parking lot, but I didn't see it there.

[Lee]

Wait, so the gps, you explained that, like, if it turns off the gps.

[Sean]

Yeah. It'll give you a timeline of location.

[Lee]

So what it. Seeing the gps, what did it indicate to you?

[Sean]

It just. It looked like she just drove around the old neighborhood. And then after that, it was just. It was like it was nothing. I couldn't. It didn't give me a precise location after that. I don't know, like. Like for instance, it said it was like disconnected. I don't know if. If she could have kicked it off in the car or something because it's like right at the bottom of where you feed at. But last known location. I checked and she wasn't there. But like I said, a lot of this stuff was. Was a blur to me because, I mean, I was sitting there just panicking. Couldn't find her one thing. We had dinner, and after that she left and didn't see her till Monday. She didn't come home till Monday. You know, she drove up. It's like, where were you? And she thought in her head that she was asleep for a couple hours and it turned out to be the whole weekend.

[Lee]

Did you check it after? Was it working once she got back?

[Sean]

It did seem like it, yeah.

[Lee]

That's interesting. The GPS is really interesting because it's like if she parked and turned the car off, it would have.

[Sean]

Yeah, it would give a notification that. That. Yeah, it would give a notification of the, of the last place if it turned to car off. So. But what I found was, what I do remember was when she left, she had almost a full tank of gas. When she, When I got her back, the. The tank was almost empty.

[Lee]

Huh.

[Sean]

So in my mind, if she did. If she was sitting somewhere, the car was still running, like idling.

[Lee]

I wonder. Yeah. That's so weird. I wonder how long it would take to idle a tank of gas.

[Sean]

Yeah. Idle tank of gas. Yeah. Or. Yeah, because. Because it was, it was. It was. It was about a half or a little over a half a tank, if I remember. But I. I do clearly remember. It was like, like the, the. It was. It was almost empty. It was like the, the check fuel light was on because. Because the way the device would Work. It'll give you a notification of when you stopped and then it'll give you a notification if a trip started. Interesting, but I don't. Yeah, it's.

[Lee]

What model car was it?

[Sean]

Dodge Journey.

[Lee]

Dodge, yeah, Dodge Journey. Okay. When she got back, was she wearing the same clothes?

[Sean]

Yeah, yeah. If I remember correctly. Yeah, I don't. Yeah, that's something I probably would have noticed. Like when she left, everything was normal. She wasn't acting weird or anything like that. It was like a totally normal. I'll see you later. See you tomorrow. The last place that, the first place I checked that I knew she was over at this restaurant called Goat Lips and asked around there and then the guy said that that was closed and said yeah, she walked out and drove off. Didn't know where she went. I asked if she went with anyone or anything. They didn't say. He. He said no. I think I even went through the phone records. Yeah, I did go through the phone records that night to see if she was calling people and I didn't see any, any. Anything. I do remember that. I did remember going into to my T mobile app to see if there was any calls and I don't remember seeing any text messages or calls out.

[Lee]

I guess lastly, I want to know, do you have any theories about this? Like, what do you make of this whole thing now?

[Sean]

I don't. It's like, like logically you could think like if you did fall asleep, I don't think, you know, you'd stay asleep and unaware of your surroundings for, you know, 72 hours. You know, from, from Friday night all the way till Monday morning. I, I can't imagine that. Yeah, I'll joke around with like, like, like little theories and stuff. I was like, like, like you're joking around. Like maybe you got abducted by aliens or something. I don't know. I mean there is a lot of military bases and stuff around my area too. So we have like NAS Pensacola, there's another base, Corey Field, where they conduct cyber operation training. Then you have the Air Force base over in Fort Wall which is about a 40 minute drive east. But she even said she kind of feels like a different person after the fact, you know, so that's just weird for me too to think about that. Yeah, I don't know what's going on there. It was, it was, it was, it was concerning because I'd never, she never did anything like that.

[Lee]

Okay, thank you so much to Lee for sharing this story. This is just a really strange one off event that happened to them. During a very busy time when they were moving. You know, in the description of Otherworld, it says that we cover stories about the paranormal, supernatural and unexplained. This one certainly falls into the unexplained category. And with so many mysteries like this, you could kind of slap a label on them and move on. You could be like, oh, it was probably a fugue state or a dissociative episode as a best guess. But it really doesn't answer any of the big questions like, where could she have been that entire time? How did nobody at the gas station see her? Why wasn't she there when her husband came and looked for her at the gas station? Why did the GPS tracker show her at the gas station the entire time? Three days is a very long time. Dissociative fugues are used so often as a plot device in movies and TV shows. I'm sure you've seen a movie where somebody wakes up not knowing who they are, how they got there, etc. In reality, these are extremely rare events. There are probably more instances of this happening in fiction than in real life. And when they do occur in real life, the person often wakes up, so to speak, and clearly sees evidence of the time they had just spent in the fugue. The time they can't remember. They're often somewhere new. They bought things, they did things. People saw them. The strangest part about what happened to Lee is that she woke up right where she was before, at a time that made perfect sense. And nothing seemed to be changed or out of place, despite the fact that it was apparently three days later. So maybe something paranormal did happen to Lee. Maybe there's a logical explanation, like memory loss or a dissociative fugue. Or maybe something paranormal happened to her that induced the fugue, Something that she can't remember. I'm not sure. And neither is she. Lastly, I hate to report this, but Lee told me she was never able to steal back her cat, John Miukovich. I was really hoping for a happy ending with that. I thought it would be a good way to wrap up this episode, but apparently he's still living with a neighbor. However, she did get a new cat, and that cat's name is Alastor Miaowley. Thank you once again to Lee and her husband. This has been episode 119. The title is Catnap and you've been listening to Otherworld. Otherworld is executive produced and hosted by myself, Jack Wagner. Our theme song is by Cobra Man. The soundtrack of this episode is by Juice Jackal. And North Americans. This episode was edited by myself and engineered by Theo Schaeffer. Our artwork is by Cul de Sac Studios. Our associate producers are Nikki Kate Delgado and Hayley Pearson. Please show us your support by subscribing, leaving a five star review, and telling your friends about Otherworld. If you want to hear bonus episodes, you can become a [e-mail] Otherworld Our social media is Otherworldpod. Thank you to the team at Odyssey. JD Crowley, Jenna Weiss Berman, Leah Rhys Dennis, Rob Mirandi, Eric Donnelly, Matt Casey, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, and Hilary Schuff. Follow and listen to Otherworld now for free on the Odysee app or wherever you get your podcasts. And finally, if you or somebody you know has experienced something paranormal, supernatural, or unexplained, you could send us your [e-mail].

SA.