Encounters x323 - The Hat Man

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Two Girls One Ghost

Ep. Encounters x323 – The Hat Man

Date: March 19, 2026
Hosts: Corinne Vien & Sabrina Deana-Roga

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Episode Overview

This chilling "Encounters" episode delves into the legendary paranormal figure known as The Hat Man. Drawing from listener-submitted stories across the globe, Corinne and Sabrina examine various manifestations of this mysterious shadow entity. The Hat Man, a recurring supernatural presence reported for decades, manifests in numerous forms and intentions—sometimes protective, oftentimes malevolent, and always enigmatic. The ghostesses explore possible theories, challenge common perceptions, and leave listeners with more questions than answers.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Defining The Hat Man Phenomenon

[02:09–04:08]

• The Hat Man is a widely-reported paranormal entity appearing in different cultures, described as a tall figure in a hat, sometimes a shadow, other times more corporeal.
• Theories range from it being a generational spirit, to a grim reaper, to a psychic parasite.
• The hosts purposely selected submissions that show the diversity of experiences, further confusing any single explanation.

“We offer no answers in this podcast. This is less clarity walking away from this episode.” — Sabrina [04:01]

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2. Listener Submissions

A. "He Feeds on My Soul" – Alice from Brazil

[04:08–12:52]

• Alice describes being haunted since childhood by a pale man in a black suit and hat with a red tie and satin strand.
• Entity is both protective and possessive; she feels watched, drained, and physically ill, likening it to having her soul fed upon.
• A violent incident occurred when Alice insulted the entity: she experienced a spontaneous mouth injury and now has a scar that acts up whenever she speaks ill of him.
• The Hat Man appears in both dreams and during sleep paralysis.
• Various theories (ancestral spirit, Umbandista figures, a deceased family member) are considered but none fit exactly.
• The entity vanished when Alice lived in Spain, but she experienced other hauntings there.

“It's like he feeds on my soul, making me empty inside.” — Alice (read by Sabrina) [09:56]

Host Reflection

• The relationship is “mutualistic” but menacing, akin to having a supernatural parasite (cf. an old story about an entity named "Chaos").
• Recommendations include spiritual cleansing and reaching out to the Two Girls One Ghost “coven.”

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B. "Reoccurring Hatman" – Alicia

[14:27–17:53]

• As a child, Alicia experienced repeated nighttime visits in her grandmother’s 1951 house.
• Her mother, aware of the entity, would warn Alicia to hide under a blanket and directly argue with the Hat Man, who sought out children: “If I find any children, they will be mine and you will never see them again.”
• The mother adamantly denied there being children, and after moving out, the encounters ceased.
• Adult Alicia is left disturbed, musing on generational or location-based hauntings.

“My mom spoke to him. 'Please leave. There are no children here.' But he would argue…‘If I find any children, they will be mine and you will never see them again.’” — Alicia (read by Corinne) [16:40]

Host Reflection

• Discussion of potential ancestral bargains (“Rapunzel” myth), gaslighting, and the horror of child-targeting entities.

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C. "Hatman Ghost" (with Photos) – Arwen (England)

[22:00–28:53]

• Arwen’s family’s haunting began after her sister experienced phantom handprints repeatedly appearing on a train window; photo evidence provided.
• At home, encounters escalated: footsteps, objects moving, aggressive actions like someone being pushed off a bunk bed, locked doors with no locks.
• The family repeatedly saw a dark figure with a top hat, often at the top of the stairs or peeking at children.
• Paranormal “photo booth” app session captured a shadowy figure in the mirror, photo evidence included. The computer crashed every time it tried to display that particular frame.
• Even the skeptical father was shaken by a direct sighting; the phenomena ceased after the family moved.

“On the train window, these handprints kept appearing and reappearing… she was the only one in the train car.” — Arwen (read by Sabrina) [22:43]

Host Reflection

• Discussion on object attachment and “ghost trains” as paranormal conduits.
• Hosts remark on the disturbing realism of the handprint photo and the terror induced by mirror evidence.

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D. "Hatman Steals My Baby" – Lily

[31:08–44:19]

• A history of family addiction and trauma coincides with repeated hauntings (including photo evidence of a smoky apparition).
• In one frightening postpartum sleep paralysis episode, Lily witnesses a Hat Man enter her bedroom, take her infant from their bassinet, and disappear.
• After emailing the podcast, her son began experiencing disturbances, prompting Lily to cleanse his room.

“He slowly walks over, grabs my son out of the bassinet and walks back to the door… glances over his shoulder at me, and then disappears with my baby.” — Lily (read by Corinne) [42:09]

Host Reflection

• Numerous stories this episode depict entities pursuing children; Hat Man haunting linked to generational trauma or specific households.
• Updating and helping listeners with protective strategies is encouraged, especially where children are involved.

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E. "Followed by Something for Almost 10 Years" – Peanut

[48:30–62:13]

• Peanut describes persistent hauntings across multiple homes and apartments, beginning after a traumatic inpatient mental health experience and possibly intensified after a near-death incident.
• Recurring sleep paralysis includes seeing shadow figures—Hat Man with a top hat, along with an old hag-like entity and doppelganger “parents.” Full physical sensations (choking, bite marks), being shushed, and the paranormal opening of closet doors.
• As an adult, Peanut continues to experience paranormal torment no matter how many times or where they relocate.
• Bite mark photo enclosed, not resembling any normal human teeth.

“I stared at the door, and there it was, the shadow figure with the hat standing there… I tried to move, I tried to scream, but I was just frozen.” — Peanut (read by Sabrina) [57:57]

Host Reflection

• Theorizing triggers: trauma, “the veil thinning,” or entities feeding on personal distress.
• They note a pattern: “Your theme is being silenced physically—with grabbing mouth, making you bleed in your mouth.” — Corinne [59:28]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “We offer no answers in this podcast…enjoyment and entertainment and mystery.” — Sabrina [04:05]
• “Feed the Hat Man to the Creeper.” — Sabrina [14:05]
  (Prompting an in-episode running joke about sending Hat Man to Waverly Hills to be dealt with by another infamous ghost).
• “I don't think mine are that scary…” — Corinne [19:03],
  (later revisited as the stories escalate).
• “There are so many ridges on, like, you would assume it's the front four upper teeth.” — Corinne [61:02],
  (referring to the bizarre bite mark photo).
• Sweet distraction: Noemi, Sabrina’s niece, does character voice impressions from Mulan. [45:20]

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Patterns & Theories Emerged

• The Hat Man is frequently described as a top-hatted, sometimes featureless male entity appearing in sleep paralysis, haunting dreams, and physical reality.
• Motivations vary: sometimes protector, more often a soul-siphon, dominator, or kidnapper of children.
• Experiences often follow trauma, upheaval, or transgressive acts (e.g., theft from a cemetery).
• The entity may be attached to households, families, specific individuals, or even objects (as in the train story).
• Attempts to resist or expel the Hat Man are met with threats or physical phenomena (bleeding mouth, bite marks).
• Moving homes occasionally stops the haunting, but in some cases, the entity appears to follow the individual.

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Timestamps by Story

• Hat Man Concept, Listener Selection: 02:09–04:08
• Story 1: Alice ("He Feeds on My Soul"): 04:08–12:52
• Story 2: Alicia ("Reoccurring Hatman"): 14:27–17:53
• Story 3: Arwen (England, with photos): 22:00–28:53
• Story 4: Lily ("Hatman Steals My Baby"): 31:08–44:19
• Story 5: Peanut ("Followed by Something for Almost 10 Years"): 48:30–62:13

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Host Commentary: Final Thoughts

• Reiterate that the episode offers “less clarity” but more camaraderie in the shared bewilderment.
• Strong note: Many stories share themes of children in danger, direct confrontation, generational trauma, and the lingering question of the Hat Man’s intent.
• Highlight the importance of community and shared reflection for people experiencing such inexplicable events.

“We promised we would have no answers by the end of this…they do what they do.” — Sabrina [62:36]

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For Listeners

• The episode ends with encouragement to reach out for support and share further encounters.
• The hosts recommend spiritual cleansing and connecting with community resources for those troubled by similar experiences.
• Community engagement is fostered via Patreon and social platforms.

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Summary by: Two Girls One Ghost Podcast Summarizer

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Very spooky.

[A]

Bonjour.

[B]

I don't know where we're from, but

[A]

two girls, one ghost.

[B]

Two girls, one ghost. And we are your ghostesses. That is Corinne. Do you just like almost violently burp vomit?

[A]

It was like a weird mouth, like throat squeak and all that. Physically, that can't sound good in the. It was just my visceral reaction to

[B]

like, to what your body just said,

[A]

how gross it was.

[B]

Yeah, that's Corinne. I'm Sabrina and this is an Encounters episode. And I feel like when we bring out the red lighting, you know, it's gonna be fucking horrifying.

[A]

Oh, well, I don't think mine are as horrifying.

[B]

Oh, I don't know. Well, I guess that's fair because this is more of like a. What is this entity?

[A]

But it's an entity that has been talked about for years on this podcast and for years and years and years before this podcast ever existed. It's been on Reddit threads, it's been in little children's journals for decades, wondering, and what did I see? Am I the only one?

[B]

And sometimes it's in your bedroom. This is the hat man. We picked all Encounters from listeners of which we have, like thousands. Like, I even made a note. I was like, we need to revisit this topic of People like you. Real listeners of two girls and one ghost who have emailed us of their experiences with the hat man.

[A]

I liked that you defined real listeners of two girls and ghosts like, as if we have fake listeners.

[B]

I don't know. We might, we might, we might.

[A]

We also, all those bots out there consuming truth.

[B]

We love paranormal stories.

[A]

I don't have enough on this side of the AI World.

[B]

I also do think we have a lot of ghostly listeners who have not emailed us. So although they are real, too, that is besides the point. So I tried to pick, because I think one question that has always existed is, what exactly is a hat man besides someone who really cares about his wardrobe? Like, what is this entity?

[A]

Right.

[B]

Why does he show up?

[A]

And the weird thing is, like, this is an entity that so many people across countries, generations, cultures have seen, not realizing that they're not the only one who's seen it. Right. Some people have said that it is a generational spirit that is, like, haunted their mother and haunted their grandmother and then their great grandfather before then. Others have theorized this shadow figure, this, like, Hatman entity, is kind of like a grim reaper type.

[B]

Right? So I tried to pick stories that will confuse us even more because there's no real commonality between them. That's all different iterations of this entity.

[A]

I feel like mine are also going to just add to that as well.

[B]

So we offer no answers in this podcast.

[A]

This is less clarity walking away from this episode.

[B]

Enjoyment and entertainment and mystery. This is from our listener, Alice, and it is called He Feeds on My Soul. Yuck. Good start. Hi, my name is Alice, and I'm a listener from Brazil. English is not my first language, so apologies if it's not perfect. I started listening to your podcast today.

[A]

Oh. Oh, my God. That's the quickest turnaround that someone has ever sent us an email.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And for that, and I immediately called. You're our favorite.

[B]

This sentence makes me laugh. I. I immediately thought I was obligated to share how I have never had peace in my 16 years of life. Ooh. I'm very sorry.

[A]

Yikes.

[B]

I am telling you guys about one experience, but I have so many more. Let me know if you want to hear them as context. My grandpa on my mom's side is a medium, and he's the one to calm me down every time I experience something really scary. He always used to tell me that he had a lot of friends that only he could see and that those friends protected me everywhere and that I would never be alone, which Totally creeps me out. His great great grandma was a witch who performed black magic. The type to kill people and curse families.

[A]

Damn.

[B]

He used to tell me I always talked to someone only I could see and that I spent most of my childhood talking alone. The weird thing is, I only did that when it was just my grandpa and I home alone. But I don't remember any of it. As another piece of background, I lived most of my life in the house that my great grandma on my mom's side built. So most of the things I'm sharing in this email happened there onto my experiences. The person that bothers me the most is the man in the suit. He's very tall, extremely white, and wears a black suit with a red tie. And his face is half covered by his black hat that has a red satin strand. I have never seen his face. I do not know who he is. But the first time I saw him, I was in my great grandma's house. And I was around 8 or 9 years old. I was going to the yard to play with my cousins when I looked to my right and there he was standing, staring at me. Just standing there, completely frozen. I looked back at him. I wasn't afraid because he had this familiar comforting vibe, like he liked me or as if I knew him from somewhere. But since that day, he has never left me alone. Never ever. He appears in my dreams behind my door. I feel his breath on my neck.

[A]

Ew.

[B]

I have a weird sensation of being watched by him when I'm doing dishes. He's always accompanying me when I go out with my friends at night. And almost every time, he is the one who appears when I have sleep paralysis.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

He never leaves me alone. And I mean, even as I'm writing this, I feel him near me.

[A]

Oh, God, I hate that he also

[B]

doesn't present the way that we've. You know, most like hat man presentations are like the dark shadow that just looks like it's wearing a hat. But this is tall, extremely white, wears a black suit with a red tie. His face is half covered by his black hat with a red satin strand. So the weird thing is I've never been afraid of him. Or that was until the start of 2025, because that was when I became obsessed, like completely obsessed with knowing who the heck he was and is and why he's always lurking around. So one day I went to my friend's house to talk to her and have her help me find out who he was that day. I was really mad and I started cursing at him saying horrible things about the situation. When suddenly I felt a pinch inside of my mouth, in my cheeks. My mouth filled with blood.

[A]

No freaking way.

[B]

I went to the.

[A]

Oh my God. That was not what I was expecting. I thought it was like a. Like making her feel like a sour taste or something. To make her stop talking.

[B]

I went to the bathroom and the inside of my left cheek had been cut and it was bleeding so much. I still have a scar that itches and hurts every time I try to tell somebody bad things about this entity.

[A]

This is fucked up. I hate too that he presented, or whatever it is, Hatman presented himself as like something known to her, a friend. He liked her. It liked her.

[B]

Even after that, I still needed to know who he was. So I asked for the help of another friend who is Unbandista, which is a religion of African origin. She told me that the entity could be Ze Pretino or Ze Pilantra. I'll link a photo of what they look like here. The clothes are exactly the same, but the man I've always seen is like vampire white. And these representations that my friend shared with me is always a black man. So I don't think my man and these entities are the same, but they dress similarly. My mom has mentioned maybe it could be my great grandma's last husband, but I never knew him. And there are no photos of him.

[A]

Was he just a terrible guy trying to. This is like a flicked pain and

[B]

this is like an unearthly entity.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And no one seems to remember how my great grandma's last husband looked. Not even my uncles and aunts. My grandpa, on the other hand, says maybe it's one of his friends. But the way I describe him does not look like any of the spirits he knows. This entity seems to take care of me in a weird way, like a possessive way. Every single person who has done me wrong has had something horrible happen to them. I can walk freely in my very dangerous city at night because I know he's always there somewhere. But he drains me to the point where I feel like I'm a 60 year old lady instead of a teenager. I have constant pain. My back is destroyed to the point where sometimes I almost pass out. I'm always sick. I'm always tired. I'm always sleepy. My mom has taken me to the hospital so many times since I was a kid, trying to figure out why I've never been healthy. Doctors have never found anything. I wasn't anemic. I didn't have chronic illness. Nothing. It's like he Feeds on my soul, making me empty inside.

[A]

You need, like, serious cleansing to the

[B]

point where I don't know how much more I have to feed him till I collapse. It gets worse every year. Writing this made me remember the only time in my life since I first saw him that he left me alone when I went to Spain for two years. But with all the crazy supernatural stuff,

[A]

he doesn't know Spanish. Why is that?

[B]

Is it the main language of Brazil? Portuguese. So, like, they're very similar. Maybe he can't go to Spain.

[A]

I've always heard that Portuguese speakers can understand Spanish speakers, but Spanish speakers can't totally understand Portuguese speakers.

[B]

Interesting. There's also, like, so many different dialects of all languages. But there was other crazy, supernatural stuff that happened there when I was in Spain. And I kind of wish he would have been there because he would have protected me from the other stuff I experienced. I really don't know who he is or what he is and what he wants from Alice.

[A]

Well, this makes me really upset for Alice. I want Alice to get, like, some real, like, go to, like, a shaman. Go to.

[B]

I know.

[A]

Go to someone who can, like, seriously try to cleanse the energy.

[B]

It does remind me that email we read so many years ago about, like, we read so many different iterations of this, but there was one about, like, chaos. And this, like, chaos, The. The entity that they called chaos, where it was, like, almost a quid pro quo relationship, where it was like, I'll protect you and take away some of, like, the terrible feelings you're feeling, but, like, you're also kind of gonna give me your energy.

[A]

Right. It was a mutualistic relationship because it fed off of one another, like the negative emotions and fears. But, like, that listener basically was like, I give that to them and then they consume it. Yeah, it's almost like feeding a pet, but that pet is tethered to you and you have no way to get rid of it.

[B]

Get rid of it. But this is also just. I don't know, it feels. It feels menacing.

[A]

It does.

[B]

It doesn't feel good, even though the

[A]

fact that it cut inside. And then anytime Alice is like, oh, let me try to, like, bring this up and. And get support from anyone else. There's, like, throbbing and itching as a reminder of, like, I will hurt you should you ever talk about me.

[B]

Well, it's specifically when you talk bad about me. Like, don't ever talk down about me or bad about me. I'm always here, and I will punish you. But then it's a weird relationship. Because in a way, Alice has grown accustomed to its presence. And whatever this is does keep her safe in situations.

[A]

I know it's hard because I keep thinking, like, okay, well, what if Alice tried to get something from it? Like, what if. What if she could feed off of him in some way, but then I'd

[B]

be too scared to, like, actually test that out, right?

[A]

And open the door, and then suddenly, like, you think you're doing something, and then you've become possessed? Or, like, that's what it wanted into its play, that you think you're in control until it's so deeply the opposite that there's no way to get out, so. Oh, my God.

[B]

One version of the Hat Man. There you go.

[A]

Should you move to Spain?

[B]

Yeah, maybe. Although it. From what it sounds like, a lot of other terrible haunting things happened in Spain.

[A]

Trying to think, is there anywhere that's not haunted in the world?

[B]

I don't know. I don't think so.

[A]

No.

[B]

Pig Island.

[A]

Yeah, but those pigs will bite your butt.

[B]

The, like, island in Greece where they'll pay you to go live with cats.

[A]

Oh, yeah, that one sounds nice.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Well, then you're cats are kind of demonic, too.

[B]

But I'd rather demonic cats than demonic entity unknown. Demonic cats.

[A]

Go somewhere with an entity that's known to be so incredibly horrifying.

[B]

Waverly Hills.

[A]

Bring him to Waverly Hills. The Creeper will eat your Hat Man. Genius.

[B]

But then what if the Creeper is like, alice, I'm gonna go home with you now.

[A]

No, no. Why would he want to go home with Alice? He gets to feast on souls all the time. There. Like, that is the perfect place for you. Go. That is the plan. You go to Waverly Hills.

[B]

Travel from Brazil to Kentucky.

[A]

Go to Waverly Hills. Say, creeper. Creeper.

[B]

I brought you a meal, Hat Man.

[A]

And then wait for the Creeper to come and eat your entity alive. Feed the hat or not? Feed the Hat Man. Feed the Hat man to the Creeper.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Feed the Creeper.

[B]

Feed the Creeper. The only time we'll ever encourage feeding the Creeper.

[A]

I mean, at this point, this is the only recommendation I can think of.

[B]

Or reach out to our coven, and maybe they can help you.

[A]

Yeah, I guess. That's another one. Okay, I have an email called Reoccurring Hatman from Alicia. First off, hi. I love you both so much. I'm so happy I found your podcast. Let's get into it.

[B]

Let's.

[A]

This is the most traumatic experience I have ever had. And my mother, although we no longer speak because she's a sucky person. Never acknowledged that this happened when I would bring it up as a teenager, but I very vividly remember.

[B]

I'm sorry. Nothing is worse than just being, like, gaslit by your own loved ones. Yeah.

[A]

I also feel like sometimes people who are the gaslighters or, like, doing the bad things, like, truly don't remember and truly, like, are unable to remember the, like, evilness in themselves. Not that in this story her mom appears evil, but it does make you wonder what her mom's relationship with Hat man is.

[B]

Interesting. Okay.

[A]

In 2004, my parents divorced and my mother moved my sister, who was 11 at the time and myself six at the time, 45 minutes away from my dad to live with our grandma until she could find us somewhere else to live. My grandma's house was built in 1951, and I have no knowledge of any deaths that occurred at this home or on the nearby land. However, my grandma did own an old grandfather clock which sat in the living room, which in my past research can be considered portals to the other side. The living room was connected to the kitchen and dining area, which was then connected to a larger area that we used for family dinners and holidays. At the time, my grandma did not have rooms ready for all of us, so my older sister took the guest room, and my mom and I slept together on an air mattress in the large family dining room. We lived here about six months, maybe almost a year. And there were multiple occurrences where the Hat man would pay us a visit.

[B]

Damn. Okay.

[A]

This always happened when everyone was asleep, although I can't tell you exactly what time. But my mother would somehow always know when he was about to show up. She would tell me, you need to stay quiet and hidden. Do not lift the blanket. Do not move until he's gone. And I would agree. My mom would hide me under a thin blanket like a flat sheet, and I would stay there until she said it was okay to come out. But of course, little six year old me had the curiosity of a cat. And I would peek ever so gently to see what would scar me for life. In the doorway, I saw an abnormally tall shadow. He did not have any facial features, but he did wear a top hat. My mom spoke to him. Please leave. There are no children here. But he would argue with her every single time. What? And as an adult, I still can't figure out if he was verbally speaking or maybe if he was speaking telepathically. But he would say, if I find any children, they will be mine and you will Never see them again. My mother would beg and plead with him to leave and would say, I do not have children here, please leave. Eventually he would basically disintegrate into thin air and my mom would come over, uncover me and tell me time for bed. But like how do you tell a six year old it's time for bed after the boogeyman just tried to kidnap them. But every time I would listen and try to go to bed after we moved out of that house, I never ever saw the Hat man again. Thank goodness.

[B]

What the heck.

[A]

Yeah. I now have an 8 year old son who's had his own spooky experiences, but thankfully none with the Hat Man. See you both on the other side.

[B]

Alicia, she her holy. I mean is it the Hat man that follows hereditary lines or is it a hat man or like some evil entity that specifically lives at the grandma's house? Because that is also where Alicia's place that's ever happened. Grew up and clearly has like had interactions with this entity and knows it wants children.

[A]

Right. Which also makes me wonder like was this always here in this house? Or did her mom play some little game Ouija board or something when she was a child, open something up and then has been like. Or like, you know, some paranormal game where you like make a deal with the devil or something where it's like a joke and then you realize it. So isn't it? And that's always been like her thing of being like afraid that this entity was going to come for her children and then it keeps coming to collect and she has to keep pretending that the kids aren't there.

[B]

What's the princess that like? Oh, Rapunzel. It's very Rapunzel. Like stealing from the neighbor's garden and then having to promise your firstborn child.

[A]

Right. Oh, so wild.

[B]

And you said that your stories weren't scary.

[A]

This one certainly was. But it's just interesting too because it's like I feel like in so many of them the Hat man is just like watching or like just presenting menacing energy. But this was a conversation like an argument back and forth with.

[B]

Right? Like a full on interaction. You know, sometimes things are like really scary and unknown that there's nothing to be said except for to move on and give you another scary thing to think about.

[A]

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[B]

Oh, it's spring is here. I just did a spring cleaning of my closet. I feel like the only pieces that are left in my closet are Quint's items because they're so high quality, they're effortlessly chic and they're so good for

[A]

like staple and capsule wardrobe.

[B]

They're great for layering, they transition through seasons. Also, I get so many compliments on my silk skirt from Quint's.

[A]

I know. Which you've had for years too. And it's held up last. As a born and raised New Englander from northern Vermont, I'm very particular about coats and warmth of coats. And I got a full length puffer from Quince and I, I promote it.

[B]

We love it. Plus they also have great house stuff like sheets, towels. We everything at Quince and Quince works directly with safe ethical factories, cutting out the middleman. So you're not paying for that brand markup or fancy retail stores. You're just paying for quality clothing right now.

[A]

Go to Quince.com TGOG for free shipping and 365 day returns. That's a full year to wear it and love it and you will now available in Canada too. Don't keep settling. For clothes that don't last. Go to Q U I n c e.com TGO for free shipping and 365 day returns.

[B]

Quince.com TGOG and this scary thing comes with a photo. This is from our listener Arwen, and it's called Hatman Ghost, with photos included. Hi, ghoul girls. My name is Arwin.

[A]

Hi.

[B]

I've been listening to the podcast for a couple of months and debated sending in my own story for a while and finally thought I'd share it. I'm from a small town in England, not too far away from Manchester, and I've always been spiritual. My mom always told me stories about how when I was younger, I would see people and talk to people that literally weren't there or that she couldn't see was there. And I have many spooky stories, but this one is by far the spookiest and even has photos. When I was around nine years old, my family and I moved into a new house. I have two older and two younger sisters. The first few months we were living in the house, nothing happened. The energy was very calm. My oldest sister was dating a boy at the time who moved from Manchester to Liverpool, so she would spend her weekends traveling to see him. She did this trip weekly and never experienced anything. One of the nights she was traveling back, she called my mom, panicking and freaking out on the train window. These handprints kept appearing and reappearing and she was the only one in the train car, she said. And the pictures. Terrifying. She took a picture of the handprints below, but she was the only one in the car and had no explanation for what was going on. I truly think that whatever was on the train that night attached itself to her and followed her back home. Because the energy in our house after that experience felt heavy. And I started hating being in the house, anywhere in the house while alone. So we'll look at the photo of the handprints. Yeah.

[A]

Oh my God. Those don't even look like handprints. They look like full on, like actual hands.

[B]

I know.

[A]

Because it's not. You see the forearm?

[B]

I know.

[A]

Ew. I hate this. This is so gross.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

No, thank you. Nope.

[B]

And they kept appearing and disappearing. Oh God, it's so unsettling. And also there's like. Like, I can't tell if this is paradoia, but like, oh yeah. Doesn't that kind of look like an evil face on the other Side.

[A]

Oh, yeah, like bulbous eyes.

[B]

Yeah, like a creepy, like, smile.

[A]

The hands are also, like the way that they're placed. Doesn't it almost look fake? Like, it's not like they're almost perfectly mirrored of each other. It almost looks like a glove.

[B]

Right. You know, they look too real that it looks fake.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But this photo was posted in 2012 on Instagram when it happened. Okay, so like Arwen said, ever since that night, it seems like whatever it was followed her sister home. So I shared a bedroom with my two younger sisters at the time, and we all started experiencing very similar things that still freak me out to this day. I'll try to summarize it to keep it short, but when we were laying in bed, we would hear footsteps in the hallway, as if someone was pacing back and forth. Things would move and end up in random places. And at first nothing major happened, but as we know, it eventually got worse. I. I still don't know what exactly was in the house, but I know that whatever it was was not friendly. It's hard to describe what exactly I saw, but it was like a dark black mass wearing a top hat. The first time I saw him, I woke up from a nightmare. And like any nine year old would, I wanted to go to my mom. As soon as I sat up and of course I slept on the top bunk, I saw this dark mass wearing a top hat standing at the bottom of my ladder. I freaked out and started screaming for my mom, who came running into my room. And by the time she got there, he was gone. I began to see him a lot after that. And then my younger sisters, particularly my youngest, who was four at the time, would always tell us that a scary man would peek around the bedroom door to look at her at nighttime. He would often stand in the bathroom watching a shower, and I always saw him standing at the top of the stairs. My older sisters also experienced things. One of them literally got pushed off her top bunk bed into a mirror.

[A]

That's so aggressive.

[B]

My older sisters both got locked in their bedroom, which had no lock on it. And when they tried to open it, it was as if someone was standing on the other side holding the door shut.

[A]

This is a horror house.

[B]

But all after this one train experience. My mom often had sleep paralysis and would see the same man in her paralysis, but in another photo. By far the creepiest thing that happened was when my older sister and her friend were home alone. They had this app on her computer. It was one of those apps that like, took 100 photos within a minute, and then turned it into a video. They were in her room playing on this app, taking pictures, and then they went to look back at the video, and it kept crashing every time it got to one image. In this photo, you can see my sister and her friend posing. And in the background, in the mirror's reflection, there is a black mass with what looks like a hand grabbing it. No one else was home when this was taken.

[A]

Oh. Why does it kind of remind me of, like a toddler?

[B]

Like, toddler, like our dear David?

[A]

Yeah, like a doll. A doll with like, maybe a bowl

[B]

cut, but you can see. I don't know who's her sister and her sister's friend. But, like, you can see in the mirror, like, the legs of the friend down, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then it almost looks like the entity's, like, reaching for where her hands are.

[A]

Oh, like in the mirror.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I don't know. This is all very confusing. And it's like the clothes are almost like. It almost looks like this is like a raincoat, like a trench coat or something.

[B]

Yeah. I don't know.

[A]

Like, you could see that there's a collar on it. You can see the. The ceiling light reflecting on the hair. Like, you can see the shine of the hair. I don't know. But that is so. Yeah, classic. I feel like all this stuff always came up and, like, that. The quality of that photo is such a good example of, like, so many of the ghost photos, like, from, like, the. It just reminds me of, like, using MacBook or, like, the photo booth or whatever it was.

[B]

Photo booth, Yeah.

[A]

I feel like there's some really creepy ones. Ooh, so creepy.

[B]

So unsettling. And the fact that it kept crashing on that photo, it's almost like it really needs you to see this specific photo.

[A]

Pay attention. Find me.

[B]

Find me, because I found you. Arwin said we lived in that house for another five months before moving out. And the day we moved, my dad, who was a non believer in the paranormal, had gone into the house to go get some boxes. He came out visibly shaken. He told my mom to leave whatever was in the house, to not go back. And when my mom asked why, he told her he'd gone upstairs and saw the man standing in my sister and I's bedroom. Even now, when we walk past the house, my dad will always say, that's the scary house. And thankfully, whatever was in that house didn't follow us. But unfortunately, my paranormal experiences did not end there. I have so many more with more photo and video evidence. If you'd like to hear them.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

From Arwen.

[A]

Wow, that's the scary house. Hey, at least the parents were totally aware. This is freaking creepy.

[B]

Well, the dad was like a skeptic and didn't believe in it. And then it's like on move out day.

[A]

Oh, hey. Oh. Oh, my God. I can't imagine the terror of, like. Like, if Noah was consistently truly scared and there was something happening.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And my. My wife was like, something's up and I have all this other stuff happening. I'd burn the house to the ground. I think you'd move metaphorically.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I would bring the entity to the ground.

[B]

Oh, for sure.

[A]

I'd go to Weaverly Hills and feed him.

[B]

Feed him to the creeper. No. It's also wild how they. They can directly tie it to the encounter on the train.

[A]

Don't like that at all.

[B]

And I also feel bad for whoever moved into that house. Like, what are they experiencing?

[A]

That's true. Because it came with the house, it seems. Well, I don't know. But it.

[B]

Because it stays the train. Yeah, but it got stuck in the house. They never saw it again after they moved out.

[A]

True. I wonder if it stayed in the house, though, or if it just was like, back to the train, stuck in the general vicinity and, like, had its own area that it likes, and then it went somewhere else to find someone else.

[B]

Well, it's also interesting because, I mean, another topic we can probably talk about is like, trains, like, do a paranormal encounters about trains. Because there's, like, those dreams that people have that are often very similar of, like, the train station and, like, all the spirits kind of like passing through

[A]

and there's ghost trains. There's so many different things.

[B]

But, like, it does make me wonder if trains actually do serve as, like, some type of transport for the spirits between realms. And because Arwen sister was alone in that train car, like, an entity popped in and then followed her.

[A]

I hate it so much because that image, like, in the train car also reminds me of Talk to me and just like, being tormented by all of these entities that are just, like, appearing the deeper you get into it, like, the more you don't even have to play the game. It just, like, finds you. Yeah.

[B]

Every day I feel like the more you're in there, the more violent it gets too.

[A]

Okay, well, my next email is called Hatman Steals my Baby. So maybe I did have a little bit of a theme with a couple of mine.

[B]

And again, can we just call out Corinne for in the beginning of this episode, being like, I Don't think mine are that scary. We've become desensitized.

[A]

Hello, ladies. My name is Lily, and I've been watching your podcast for about a year now. You keep me company while I do my makeup. And after the kids have gone to sleep, my husband overhears the podcast so much that he now sings your intro with a lot of emphasis on very spooky.

[B]

Wait. Someone sent us a video on, I think on Instagram of their dog howling with the intro, and I was like, that is the most magical thing.

[A]

So good. I'm not much of a writer, so please bear with me. And before I start, I would like to know that my mom struggled heavily with addiction, and I truly believe that is why she had so much activity around her.

[B]

I'm sorry.

[A]

Let's start with my youngest memory. My mom's boyfriend owned a cabin, and I believe it was built by his great grandfather and sat between a church and a power plant. It was really odd. I spent a lot of my younger years there. The stairs in the house had a wooden hatch at the top that we would lock every time we left. And every time we came back, the hatch would be wide open.

[B]

That would make me so concerned that, like a human being.

[A]

Someone living there. Yeah, frogging. Someone's in the house. Now, I can't even try to explain the layout of this entire place because it's just far too confusing and also too small. But the upstairs was the scariest. When you open the hatch, you're looking at a wall, and then to the left is one big room. On the left wall is a cubby the size of a king size bed. And that is basically what filled the space. Across in the middle of the room was a sheer white sheet to give some privacy to the matching twin beds at the end of that space. And that is where my sister and I slept. Behind that sheer white curtain, we fell asleep to the sound of the stairs creaking. While everyone in the house was cuddled up in their beds. Those stairs creaked all night long.

[B]

Oh, how unsettling.

[A]

My grandma was so afraid of the place that she actually refused to visit. But we begged and begged and begged, and one night she finally agreed. We insisted that she stay and that we would take her home first thing in the next morning. She told us that she woke up to the sounds of chains rattling. And when she opened her eyes, at the foot of her bed stood a woman covered in the chains, just completely wrapped in chains.

[B]

What in the Ebenezer Scrooge?

[A]

She was so afraid. She didn't move. She just laid there staring at this woman until she finally fell back to sleep and she never returned to that cabin again. She won't even talk about it anymore, honestly.

[B]

Fair.

[A]

Yeah. And this house is where the ghost photo I included came from. My brother took the photo out on the front deck. It was just him and I out there together. And I was definitely just a kid posing for every photo dramatically, like a little diva. And I don't know what this thing is, but it's like, surrounding me. And I get chills every time I look at it.

[B]

What?

[A]

You're more than welcome to share. Okay, so let's look at the photo. It's like coming out from her body.

[B]

Whoa.

[A]

It's so weird. It's like a distortion of light. It's almost like a smoke, in a way, dancing around her.

[B]

But it almost like looks like. Like, if you like, is this like a larger face and then like almost tentacles or arms, like, grabbing her.

[A]

Oh. Oh. I can kind of see the face now that you're talking about. It almost looks like it's like the elbows out and it's like reaching down,

[B]

reaching down for her.

[A]

Ooh, creepy, creepy, creepy.

[B]

Wild.

[A]

Okay, Fast forward. I'm 14 or 15. My mom is deep in her addiction and battling stage four breast cancer. She lives in a small one bedroom, one bath apartment with my two sisters. I lived with my dad, and I visited her whenever she would remember that I existed. This apartment complex was really small. It only had like five units, and the owner's house was on the property. At the time, it just felt like my mom and my sisters were occupying the place. It was very much giving Bates Motel. Anyways, it was gated, and we would always shut and lock the gate at night so that we would feel safer. Across the street was this huge property with a family cemetery, some small sheds that were made to look like old buildings, such as school houses and a Merc mercantile. I feel like I always butchered that word when I tried to say, why

[B]

do I feel like this is like the town of House of Wax?

[A]

Truly, it sounds like that. And then there was this huge red barn, but no house. I really don't know what that thing was used for. We never saw anyone go in or out of it. Eventually, the curiosity got the best of us, and my mom took us to hop the fence and go explore.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

It creeped us the hell out, but we loved it, so we kept going back. It took me a while to realize that my mom was actually stealing things from there and taking them to Be pond. I believe that is what started it all. She was taking from them and they didn't like it. One night, my mom and I were hanging out in the backyard when we heard my little sister and my nephew, who was staying the night, both wake up at the same time screaming. They were both pointing out the window saying that a man was watching them. My mom was probably high off of her ass. She refused to go look, and seeing her scared freaked me out. So I obviously didn't want to go look either and didn't go.

[B]

So scary.

[A]

We finally got them back to bed and we went to bed with them. We were so done. Nope, not doing this tonight. A few days go by and my mom tells me that the trash needs to go out. And so, of course, in that moment, it's nighttime and it's dark as fuck, and the dumpster is quite a ways away from the house, but it's in view of the front door. And I'm joking and I'm quoting spongebob, trying to hype myself up repeating, I'm taking out the trash at night, thinking about the hash slinging slasher and whatnot. Whatever. I have to go. I open up the door and I kid you not, there is this man, flesh, pedestrian looking.

[B]

What?

[A]

Standing on the dumpster, bent over like he's digging through it. Stop. I can't do this. Hell no. He's looking at me now, just staring into my fucking soul. Okay, wait. The fact that you pointed out the like figure and it looks like the. Like, it looks pedestrian.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And like the gangly arms and stuff.

[B]

Ew.

[A]

I wonder if this is kind of the same thing. I slammed the door shut. I couldn't even say anything. I just stood there looking at the front door for God knows how long. I eventually opened the door again and it's still there. It's watching me. Nope, I slammed that door again. And I lock it. I made sure that the windows were locked, the back door, all the walls. At this point, just a hard. Nope. Was this the man that my sister and my cousin saw through the window?

[B]

Probably.

[A]

I don't know. But the trash was definitely not going out tonight. So I run, I tell my mom, and she just laughed at me. She was laughing at me like, what is wrong with you? Okay. Okay. So many days have passed and my mom went to the gas station and I'm at the house waiting for her with my sisters when she comes flying through the door crying. She said she pulled into a property, got out of her car, shut the gate, and when she Turned to go back. The car door slammed and shut and locked, and all the doors were locked. And you know what? It's night. So I reluctantly go out there with her to check the doors again. But now the passenger door is unlocked. So I climb over and I open the driver door for her, and we drive up to the front of our apartment. And my little sister's big wheel trike is facing the apartment door in front of our car. So we park, and the thing whips out around now facing us, this, like, empty little kid's bike. Oh, it's very screaming. We're running into the house past the big wheel, freaking out. I am so done. I want to go home to my dad. I do not want to be here. So the next morning, I do get to go home. So more time passes, and I get sent a video of my mom pouring salt on the front door of her apartment. She said a woman came by asking to see the apartment and see what it looked like because she was interested in renting one of the ones in the apartment complex. My mom let her in to look, and as soon as the woman enters, my mom has this not so good feeling. The woman has a gash on her chin and is telling my mom about how this area had Native American burial grounds and all this stuff. And so my mom is rushing this tour at this point, and she's just still getting horrible vibes from this woman. She takes her to the backyard, she shuts the door behind them, and now this woman is saying serpents were eating her chin and the door won't open.

[B]

This reminds me of the last book club book we read. We used to live here.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

Yeah, spooky.

[A]

My mom is banging on the door and kicking it and not budging. She turns around to look at this lady, but the lady is now gone and the door is open. Now, I know I said my mom was an active addiction, but we witnessed so much in this apartment together and the fear in her eyes. I know for a fact 100% that this did happen to her. A while after this, she did get evicted from this place and moved back in with an old boyfriend from the previous story's house. So, the haunted cabin. And to make a sad story short, she quickly got really sick with pneumonia and passed away. Well, now she haunts me. Years go by, and I met a girl named Emily. We become super close, and I basically live with our family. I opened up to them about my mom and how I wish that she would give me a sign. And Emily's mom Laughed and finally gave in and said that she could communicate with those who had passed. She explained to me how it's a gift, but it's also a curse, all in one. She never gets a break from the noise. She doesn't like to channel people. But my mother had been bugging her for months now. She laughed and explained how overbearing my mom had been, that she'd been in her face, begging to hug me and tell me that she's here. She went into great detail on all of these things. Things that no one would ever know about my relationship with her but me.

[B]

I also do like that the mom was like, I'm going to wait for

[A]

Lily to express interest.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And, yeah.

[B]

Because maybe she doesn't want this. Yeah.

[A]

And now she gives me signs that she's there. She turns things on. She messes with my electronics. And whenever I walked into Emily's mom's room, her printer would turn on and the lights would flicker. Oh. Now that I've had kids, she messes with their things, their toys, thermometers, monitors. And like clockwork, 30 minutes after my son is asleep, I leave the room. And then there's a loud tap coming from the monitor. Like she's tapping dead center of the camera every night.

[B]

Like, hello, I'm here.

[A]

I'm watching him. Lastly, sleep paralysis with a hat. Man stealing my baby. I'm freshly postpartum, maybe two weeks postpartum. My husband and I hear that red lights help your baby sleep. I don't know.

[B]

We were desperate pick red lights in our studio.

[A]

I have a red light in Noah's room. I haven't heard. It doesn't help, so I don't.

[B]

It's like the hatch alarms. Like those have red lights, too.

[A]

Yeah, I have the red hatch, baby hatch on and then his actual lamp. I just put a red light bulb in.

[B]

I heard it's supposed to be calming for you.

[A]

Yeah, well, it doesn't, like, wake you up as much. Yeah, we got a red light bulb, and we screwed that thing asap. We had a bedside bassinet, and my son was finally asleep. Our bedroom door is wide open, and I'm delusional. I'm drifting to sleep to the sound of my husband's snores. I don't know how much time has passed, but suddenly I wake up to a man with a tall hat standing in my doorway. I can't move. I can't scream. I'm freaking out, trying to get my baby. But I weigh a million pounds, and I can't even move a finger. He slowly walks over, grabs my son out of the bassinet and walks back to the door. What? He stops in the doorway, glances over his shoulder at me, and then disappears with my baby. I finally wake up and I jump up to find my son is in his bed. I'm shaking my husband to get up, go check the house. And he's reassuring me that everything was locked. It was just a bad dream. He got up, he got his pocket knife anyway and went to go check the house for me. I do not think I went back to sleep after that. I was so scared. I had so much adrenaline going through me. I don't remember the rest of the night at all. And all I know is that I was a first time mom and I was fucking panicking. I thought he was coming back for him. I thought he was coming for my baby. I thought that this was a warning. And I still feel sick thinking about it.

[B]

You. I mean, pegged really, the Hat man entity that just wants to steal children.

[A]

I know. I have so many more stories that I plan to share, but my phone is glitching so bad, it keeps autocorrecting and deleting whole sentences that I type.

[B]

Weird.

[A]

She said my phone never does this to me. Maybe I just woke up the spirits. Well, thank you ghouls for creating this community. I hope to see you on the other side. Lily.

[B]

Damn.

[A]

Lily. And then Lily followed up and said I wanted to send a little update. After I sent this email, my son started waking up around 4am screaming for me to come in his room. Definitely not his normal behavior at all. Two nights in a row he was saying that he was scared and something about something in his chair, in the room, the rocker that we used for him and our daughter. So I cleansed the shit out of his room and I put crystals in his door frame. I'm hoping that helps him. I don't know what's been going on, but these ghosts cannot be fucking with my babies.

[B]

I feel like we need another update. When was that sent?

[A]

Oh, this was recent. This was December of 2025.

[B]

Okay. I hope that the cleansing has helped.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And be gone.

[A]

Be gone. Child stealing hat.

[B]

Stealing Hat Man. What is with all these Hat Men that want children?

[A]

Oh, yeah. I don't know.

[B]

I really don't like that. Well, because another theory about the Hat man is like that. It. It's almost like generational trauma.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it's like following a traumatic line. I don't know. Because even my next story, like there was a Lot of trauma in their life and then they start seeing this entity.

[A]

I hate that, like, the hat man is going for infants. It's like they don't even get a chance for like the generational curses to be broken.

[B]

If anyone has any understanding of this type of hat man and how to defeat it, let us know. Wait. Just a little side note that might make people smile. Noemi loves Mulan right now.

[A]

So cute.

[B]

And there is a song called A Girl Worth Fighting For. And one of the characters is like this like, short, stout, like, really deep voiced man. I don't remember his name, but Noemi, like, she just in general has an amazing ear for music. And like, she knows every tune. She can sing everything on, on key, like, remembers every word.

[A]

Well, I remember like, like a year ago you said Noemi will just like lay in bed at night. She doesn't want anyone in her room when she's going to sleep. Like, she's alone, just singing to herself.

[B]

Well, she like, needs you to put her to bed and she likes to have you sing to her. But then, yes, she'll like and to sing. But the song, A Girl Worth Fighting For. There's like the wine character who has a really deep, like, girl Worth fighting for. Noemi will sing the song normally and then for his lines, she'll go and do the. The raspy.

[A]

Oh my God, I want to see

[B]

a video of this. It is so cute. I'll have my sister send a video.

[A]

Take a video.

[B]

It's. At first when she did it, I. Because I had. I hadn't seen Mulan in so long that I didn't remember that song. Cause she was singing it without the music playing and I was like, what voice are you making? And then I heard the song and she sang it again with it and I was like, damn actress.

[A]

Yeah, she needs, she needs an accurate rendition of she's so good. I think one thing I wasn't prepared for when entering my 30s was the change in my skin and texture and how I was going to have to find an entirely new makeup routine from the products I'd been using for 10 years straight.

[B]

Enter Jones Road Beauty.

[A]

Oh my gosh.

[B]

We love their miracle balm. It is like a one stop shop. I use it as a blush, but then I also use it as eyeshadow.

[A]

I'm wearing it as a highlighter right now.

[B]

You are glowing.

[A]

Try to move my cheek.

[B]

Can you see the shine? It like goes on so smoothly and gives you that like, dewy fresh look that we are all craving and all of Jones Road formulas are clean and high performing and they've built a full

[A]

lineup of effortless skin first staples like their Just Enough Tinted moisturizer and they

[B]

also just launched a new product, the Shadow Stick that comes in eight universal matte neutral shades that are complementary and layer effortlessly together so you can use multiple at once. If you want makeup that brings out your natural glow instead of hiding it, Jones Road is the way to go. For a limited time, our listeners are getting a free Shimmer Face oil on their first purchase when they use Code Ghost at checkout. Just head to dronesroadbeauty.com and use code Ghost at checkout and after you purchase they'll ask where you heard about them. Please support our show and tell them we sent you. I'm James Buckley. And I'm Joe Thomas.

[A]

Jo had to look look at the

[B]

script around names and on our weekly

[A]

show Joe and James Fact up, we

[B]

bring each other a fact that we think is fascinating. Our only rule Go on.

[A]

The more interesting it is, the more true it is.

[B]

We dive into the weird and wonderful. Like whether you could survive on nothing but beans or if Shrek deserves a Nobel Prize for discovering the first fourth dimension. You might learn something new. Probably something useless, but definitely something interesting. Listen or watch Joe and James Fat up every Tuesday.

[A]

Wherever you get your podcasts.

[B]

I have a story from our listener, Peanut. It's called Followed by something for almost 10 years. Hi ghoulish girlies. I'm censoring the names of everyone involved in this saga for the sake of letting the dead lie. For the purposes of privacy, you can call me Peanut. Content Warning. I do briefly mention mental health issues. This all began when I was about 14 years old and ended this year when I'm 23. I went to inpatient for mental health my freshman year of high school and I endured a lot of traumatic events while in this facility. Years later, the facility was shut down for abusive patients. So if that gives you any idea, after I got back from this facility, I began experiencing a lot at once. That makes me so sad because that's not like when you're seeking help for being like in the lowest place of your life and you get more trauma from it. That's the most heartbreaking thing in the world.

[A]

I know.

[B]

I genuinely wish every single trauma treatment program was like Trauma and Beyond, which I did in California. It's like literally I don't know any other program like it. And it was the most healing experience,

[A]

which is like, thank God that happened for you.

[B]

I know. So this is what Peanut experienced and Peanut writes. After getting back from this facility, I began experiencing a lot all at once. It was like my coming home awakened something. Despite having lived in that Same House for 10 years prior with nothing happening, I would stay awake through the night watching YouTube. And every night at 3am things became active. My bedroom shared a wall with our stairs. And right when that clock hit 3:00am, something would start knocking on that wall in bursts of three knock, knock, knock. Very slowly, it would move along the wall. Knock, knock, knock all the way until it got to my door, which was parallel to the top stair. Like you get up to the stairs, take a sharp 180 degree turn, and there's my door. It would knock on my door and my door would slowly open and then nothing. It would take whatever this was about 15 to 20 minutes to get from the base of the stairs up to my door. Oh, the like, that's so long.

[A]

That reminds me so much of the guy who charged me in my.

[B]

And you watched him so slowly move up the stairs ever.

[A]

Oh, I hate that.

[B]

I was a devout Christian teen, so I would pray each night and I slept with the Bible under my pillow. But it still happened. I shared this with a friend and they offered to have their grandpa, who was a pastor, come to bless the house. But I was too scared to tell my parents what was going on. After a while, it stopped. Weird things would happen. Every now and then I'd come home from school, the front door would be open. I had a neighbor friend who would come in with his knife and clear the house for me, but nothing was ever there. My bathtub would start running randomly when I was home alone. That's so weird.

[A]

Yeah, I hate that.

[B]

And I would hear someone banging around in the garage when I was the only one home. About a year after the first event, I had a surgery where I flatlined on the table for several minutes, which made things a lot worse. I began to experience intense sleep paralysis, and the first time was really traumatizing. It's been almost 10 years and the situation still scares me. And I'm writing this at 3pm on a Saturday because bringing it up after dark gives me the heebie jeebies. But I was laying in bed watching Friends. I was finally starting to drift off right as an episode was ending. And shortly after, I wake up as a new episode is starting to. Because I heard my closet creaking, I was unable to move. I darted my eyes to the left to see three figures emerge from my closet. I didn't have A walk in closet. When I would play hide and seek as a child, I couldn't even fit in the closet. But three full size adults just walked out of it and they closed the door behind them. There was a man and a woman that looked like decrepit virgin. Decrepit virgin.

[A]

Decrepit Virginia. Oh please. Some high school band use that as

[B]

their the decrepit virgins. You can steal it. There was a man and a woman that looked like decrepit versions of my parents. Like the other mom, other dad, Coraline. They had white skin, almost like it was glowing. They went and stood by the door to the hallway while a tall skinny woman figure with long dark hair moved toward my bed. She climbed onto my bed and crawled up to straddle me.

[A]

That's so old hag. And I just hate but the fact

[B]

that it's like accompanied by these two others that look like her parents. Ew.

[A]

Ew. At this point, I was like trying to keep her calm at first before the attack.

[B]

At this point, I can hear the friend's theme song in the background. Clap clap, clap clap. And the woman puts her rotting hands around my neck and begins to strangle me.

[A]

What?

[B]

I tried to move. I tried to scream, but I was just frozen. I could feel my vision getting darker, my breath getting shorter. And then she just got up, walked towards the door, opened it for the other two and all three of them disappeared into the hallway. But as she was leaving, she turned back around, put her finger up to her lips to shush me before leaving and closing the door. After a few minutes, I could move again. I shot up in bed. My dad came into my room and asked if I had gotten up because he heard my door click. So it's not like this is like a happening in the paranormal realm. This is in reality. And Peanut dad heard the door. I started sobbing. My neck and throat were sore for days after this. Afterwards I had minor incidents, but I learned to keep my eyes closed until I could move. When I was 17, we moved to a new house in a different town and I thought that meant all of it would be over. But I was wrong. During the lockdown of 2020, I was almost 18 and I stayed home most of the time. My dad had a job where he had to leave during the day and was usually about 10 minutes away from us. One day my mom is upstairs in my room talking to me. When we heard the back door open and close, I quickly and quietly pushed my bedroom door closed and locked my mom, our dog, and myself in the room. I passed my mom a can of Raid, arming her. And I armed myself with a rainbow pinata stick, which I lovingly referred to as my disco stick. And I kept till I was 22. I looked out my bedroom window and saw neighbors outside across the street. I was waving my arms trying to get their attention to have them call the cops. But they couldn't see me. We start hearing footsteps moving around the house. My mom starts texting my dad to come home. I had a boyfriend who worked across town, but he was a half hour away. Suddenly the footsteps start climbing the stairs. Luckily, in this house, my room had a walk in closet that locked. So I quietly pushed a long ottoman in front of the bedroom door and got all of us into the closet. But we keep hearing the footsteps, walking around the landing into different rooms, just pacing the hallway. At this point, we're crying. I was sending texts to my grandma and close friends telling them how much I love them because we genuinely believed we were going to be victims of a home invasion and be on the news tomorrow.

[A]

This is so horrifying.

[B]

I love my dog, but he's tiny and he was old. He only really had eight teeth. Suddenly we got the notification on Life360 that my dad arrived and the footsteps went downstairs. But I was afraid to ask for my dad. We heard the garage door open and then we heard more footsteps coming up the stairs. He knocks and says, it's me, come out. My mom gets up to go open the door, but I stop her. I'm suspicious. I want to make sure it's my dad. So I call out, what movie did we watch together last summer from my film class? If it wasn't him, or if it was my dad and someone had him, he would lie to keep us safely in the bedroom. But he answered correctly. My mom, dog and I all left the room and we were out of breath, in tears. Later we learned that nobody entered the house. There was no one there at any point in time besides my family.

[A]

What the fuck? That is so creepy. Especially given that like when dad is coming home, that presence is just like, oh, I gotta go. Like goes downstairs. Yes.

[B]

Heard the footsteps. That fall, I moved to college and all is well for the most part. I still had some bouts of sleep paralysis, but nothing too extreme. I thought it was all over. That winter, I began to date a man and I moved into his studio apartment with him. From the placement of the bed, I could see into the bathroom and had a clear view of the mirror. We did not have a healthy relationship and I would repeatedly wake up in the middle of the night, usually around 3:45 to 4:30am and I would see a man with a top hat standing at the sink, staring into the mirror at me. That's so interesting. It's like in the bathroom watching her, but through the mirror.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I would always say, you're not allowed to stay here. I command you to leave. And I would just close my eyes until the room felt safe. One night, I had sleep paralysis and I saw this man leave the bathroom, walk past the bed, stare at me for what felt like hours before moving through the front door. When I was 19, that boyfriend and I moved into an apartment that was old. When we moved in, I found children's toys stuffed down the drain of the bathtub.

[A]

Oh, what the.

[B]

And behind the washer in my closet, which would make sense, maybe, like, there was no plug on the drain. Like a little toy went down.

[A]

Oh, okay. But creepy.

[B]

It is creepy. But I then started having an onslaught of sleep paralysis with me waking up and just staring at a shadow man wearing a top hat in the corner of my room by the closet.

[A]

Oh, my God. Could she not get a break? It's like no matter where she goes, no matter who she's with.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Just riddled with ghosts.

[B]

We also had this issue with the flickering lights in the bathroom. One day when I was home alone, I was able to communicate with something when I was the bathroom and learned that there was a spirit of a little boy that lived in my bathroom. He flickered the lights to say hello, but he was harmless. And when the energy got really dark in my bedroom, I would often go hide in the bathroom where it felt lighter. There were several issues in my personal life that came to a head while living in this apartment. And I never felt like I was me while living there. Like I was making choices that weren't mine. They were out of character. I became a shell of myself while living there and had an intense flare of all my medical and mental health issues. After a year, I ended up moving until I landed at the last apartment and I continued to have sleep paralysis. Here are the worst cases. I awoke from a dream and attempted to tell my husband, then boyfriend that I heard someone in our living room. I was frantic trying to tell him, when all of a sudden, I felt a presence behind me. My head was yanked back and I heard a cacophony of guttural screams and thunder and pleas for help and chains moving. It felt like I was falling through space and time and. And I landed in my bed. Frozen, I stared at the door, and there it was, the shadow figure with the hat standing there. I shut my eyes. I focused all of my energy into screaming. Finally, it worked, and my husband woke up, startled. A few months ago, I had a dream that I was in my office at work with my coworker and expressed that I wanted to pray. In my dream, I felt my jaw begin to hurt. And then a hand came from behind me, clamped my mouth shut. I woke up in sleep paralysis.

[A]

Okay, your theme is being silenced physically

[B]

with grabbing mouth making you bleed in your mouth. I shut my eyes again, tried to wake myself up. I tried to move, and finally it stopped. Then it happened. A few weeks ago, I just begun to fall asleep while watching your podcast, which might not be a good idea for you, Peanut. And I started to feel that beginning feeling of sleep paralysis, like someone was watching me. I refused to open my eyes, and again focused all of my energy into moving my hand over to wake up my husband and into screaming. But then I felt someone crawl onto the bed. I started praying. I was finally able to smack my husband into being awake, and he helped me out of the paralysis. He has never seen what I see when I'm in these states. My first instinct when I feel like someone is watching me while I'm half asleep is to wiggle my toes. I know something is sinister, and if I cannot wiggle my toes. Interesting. I have no idea what has been following me, but it's been two houses, four apartments, and five dorm rooms later, and I'm still experiencing it. I may be crazy, I may be wrong, I don't know. But there were hints of things before, but I think when I died during surgery, for those couple of minutes, it really opened me up to something. It's not all bad, but the bad is bad.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Thanks, ladies, for all that you do. And this is from Peanut. And there's an image attached. It was a photo of bite marks that were found on Peanut's leg after waking up from sleep paralysis.

[A]

Wait, what the heck?

[B]

But it doesn't look like normal teeth.

[A]

I know. I just had to touch my own teeth. There are so many ridges on, like, you would assume it's the front four upper four teeth.

[B]

Yeah, but there's one that's like two perfect circle thick.

[A]

Yeah, it's like a circle. And then the ones next to them are. Have big ridges.

[B]

Yeah, I don't know. Ugh, Sorry, Peanut. That sounds horrible.

[A]

I know.

[B]

Especially the, like, the first experience of the other mother, other dad, and the entity in the middle, like, What? Why'd they travel as three? And is there a hierarchy? Like, were these other two watching the third to see how they like what they're supposed to do? Was it, like, training that.

[A]

I don't. I don't know.

[B]

This reminds me of that one story where the hat man was good and he said goodbye because he. He had kids or, like, an alien.

[A]

Whatever it was, it wasn't a hat man. It was like, a little, like, weird gremlin.

[B]

Yeah. And he was like, I'm retiring.

[A]

Yeah. Like, after being so evil for so long was like, brought the kids to be, like, I had children and I have to say goodbye. It's been so great. Thank you for having me.

[B]

And then never saw him again. It was very Monsters, Inc.

[A]

It was very Monsters, Inc. Oh, my God. Well, Peanut is experiencing so much. I feel so bad.

[B]

I know.

[A]

Oh. But at least, you know there are some witnesses to some of it.

[B]

Yes. And after experiencing my own bout of sleep paralysis, like, the entity is 100% there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I. Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

Well, that's fun.

[A]

Cheery. Cheery, good fun.

[B]

Like, we promised we would have no answers by the end of this. We don't know what hot mans are or.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Why they do what they do, but they do what they do.

[A]

And, like, I personally promised, none of mine were scary. Right?

[B]

None.

[A]

None.

[B]

Hat man stealing children is totally fine. Two for two, Desensitized.

[A]

That's where my mind is at. Demons coming for your kids.

[B]

Horrifying. Yeah. Sleep well.

[A]

Join us on Patreon.

[B]

Yes, please. Yes. If you want episodes one week early and ad free, plus bonus content like campfire stories where you can come share your ghost stories live. That's all available on Patreon, so join us there. Rate and review us on itunes and Spotify and like and subscribe on YouTube if you're watching. And keep telling your friends and family and strangers about our podcast.

[A]

We love you and we love everyone on the two girls and ghost team. Thank you, team. Shout out Jamie, who edits the audio and the video that you're hearing, and we will see you on the other side.

[B]

Very spooky.

[A]

Thanks for listening.

[B]

We love to hear your stories and your feedback. So we have a little survey for you. Please visit two GOG fans to take our listener survey. That's the number two, the letter G. O, G Fans to take our listener survey.