Saturday, April 23, 2022

A Desert Haunt Part 1 - Guest Blogger

We'd like to welcome new guest blogger, Rick!  He's sharing the terrifying story of his experiences in the desert.  Here's Part 1 of his story.

The purpose in sharing our story has been to help others; giving them strength and courage to get the help they need to live a normal life.  That purpose has turned into a mission.  

We don't shy away from our experience and neither should anyone else.  No one should suffer in silence out of fear of being judged or ridiculed.

If you'd like to be a guest blogger, click HERE for details.  We'd love to hear from you!

Thanks and enjoy Rick's story.

Lance

A Desert Haunt

So this story has been hard to write. I've made several starts but have never really been able to finish. Maybe it's because we're not truly done with it yet. But reading the Eberhardt's story when I was searching for my own answers helped me get through our experiences and to a place of more peace. I thought this could be one way to show my appreciation for them sharing their experiences and potentially contribute to their mission to help others dealing with strange and scary things in their homes. 

Our story starts in September 2017 when my long-time girlfriend, Sheri, and I moved to the Mojave Desert in California after I got out of the Army. This was a new chapter in our lives, leaving the military life behind and becoming civilians again. I had been hired on to a Federal job, so hopefully you'll understand my not disclosing our exact area. We moved to a place where we had no ties, no family, no friends; just the purpose of starting something new.  

We landed at a short-term rental we found before we left the military and then, in January 2018, we found a more permanent place to rent. This place, where we still live, gave us the opportunity to have our two horses on the same property with us instead of boarding them at another location. Our landlords had moved out of state and we've become caretakers of their property as well as renters. 

"I could never sleep here at night all by myself." 

That's what the wife half of our landlord duo said when my girlfriend told her she would be alone for two weeks while I went to Colorado Springs on my first business trip. Too bad we didn't have the foresight to ask why she would say something like that. Or why the husband, who usually lets nothing go without commentary, had nothing to add to his wife's statement. 

We wrote her remark off as referring to the isolation of the place. Nobody would hear you scream here since the closest neighbors had strategically put up fences and planted trees as visual reminders of their ideology on privacy. No worries. We had a shotgun, a rifle, and almost a 4-wheel drive. Taking inspiration from Hank Jr., we were both country folks; we could survive. 

The property had three structures. The main place was a drab, blue-gray mobile home that more resembled a modular house thanks to the wood panel siding and half-length covered porch. A small back yard with grass and two sweeping mulberry trees were a nice touch. A dead tree pointed like an ominous finger toward the west end of the house. Sheri hung a hummingbird feeder on it. 

Front of house as approach from driveway.

Front of house as approach from driveway. 

The other two structures were in a fenced off yard set off from the home place and surrounded by a dark brown sheet-metal fence taller than my 5 feet 9 inches by a head. An all-metal tan shop dominated the area. It was high as a two-story building and boasted two garage-style roll-up doors on the north side. Right next to it was a paint shop that, ironically, was unpainted. It's gray metal walls and decayed wood roof looked like a graveyard mausoleum compared to the nicely painted workshop. Talk about a stark contrast. 

There was only one rule - no painting the inside rooms of the house. All we were told was there was a tenant who painted a room (not sure which) black. The landlords said it took many coats of paint to get back to a light color. We were fine with that, especially since I don't like to paint. Anything. But it begs the question why anyone would paint a room black. In hindsight I can only think of it being a person or people with dark tendencies. No telling what was done in the dark of that room. 

Our interest in the place, however, was strictly for the horses. Right out the front door was a half-acre area that was enclosed on three sides. The owners gave us free reign to finish fencing this part off so Sheri could put the two horses there. For the first time in our 8 years together, we had finally found a place that we could have the horses with us instead of boarding them miles away. It was great! 

That first year our priority was turning our little place into a home for us and the horses. We bought corral fences and shelters, started watering the trees and the grass, and weeded the rose bed out front. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Even that couple of weeks Sheri stayed alone was uneventful. Our new life in California was taking on a sense of normal. 

Normal, that is, until Buddy showed up out of the desert in January 2019. Somewhere around a year to the day of our move-in date. I was at work when I got the first text from Sheri about him on January 22. Buddy is a rusty red colored dog about the size of a fox. He has a white patch on his chest and the most soulful brown eyes you can imagine. He found us during a cold spell that had temperatures dropping to the teens at night. I immediately knew I wanted to keep him, but we had to try and see if we could find an owner. We reported him to the local animal shelter's Facebook page and also on another lost and found page. Then we waited. 

First Buddy photo, January 22, 2019 

At first we set up a place for him to sleep on the front porch in a cooler with some towels because of the cold. We put a dish by the steps and bought some dog food. In just a day or two, we moved him inside and he's been inside with us ever since. Nobody ever claimed the little guy. So after waiting the required two weeks, Buddy joined our little family. The vet said he was about a year-and-a-half old. Nobody has been able to identify what type of dog he is. Speculation is mostly on a blend of chihuahua, Pomeranian, dachshund, and even terrier. Only his mom and dad really know. 

Up until that point, nothing was too unusual. I learned after the fact that Sheri would smell cigarette smoke on occasion, but it wasn't anything she felt worth mentioning at the time. 

The month after Buddy moved in, things took a dramatic turn. Not for the best. 

I got a text from Sheri on Wednesday, Feb 13, 2019. We had put a small basket with toys & treats on top of Buddy's kennel in the kitchen. One of them came off the kennel and crashed to the floor. Except it didn't just slide off, the way it landed it looked like it was flung off the crate. As I remember it, this was when we finally started thinking something paranormal was going on. Sheri had actually been having experiences before then, but had not said anything to me about them. 

So this was the start of a journey that, while not "run-out-of-the-house-screaming" level of scary, forced us to accept that something out of the ordinary was going on in our home. We started living in a state of constant dread and the fear slowly built until I started looking for answers which eventually led me to this blog. I am going to stop here for now, as one post is just not enough to tell this story. In future contributions I will highlight some of the experiences that came next as the activity ramped up, our reactions and struggles to deal with what was happening, and ultimately the story of a surprise visitor that shed a ton of light on what was going on.

Saturday, April 16, 2022

Dark Sun Rising

 A couple of house cleaning things before I get into this blog entry.  First, if you comment in the comment section of a blog entry, I do see it and I'll respond.  The problem I found out recently is that you may not get a notification of my reply.  You will have to check back for my response.  Second, I've neglected doing blog entries.  It doesn't mean I don't have any to write, because as you'll read in this blog entry, I certainly do.  It comes down to time.  I work full-time in what at times can be a stressful job, still have kiddos at home who are in activities, and still have to work the ranch/farm here.  Hopefully things will start settling down and I can commit to more time doing entries.  I still remain in awe of how many people still read the blog, for that I truly thank you. So, if that many people still are reading, I need to do my part and write!  Lastly, if you want to be a guest blogger we encourage you to do so.  The more people who share their experiences, the better it is for everyone.  Remember, our goal is to help others and give them strength to get the help.  Sharing your story could encourage them to do just that.  If you want to be a guest blogger, just click HERE

Now, back to our story.

Black Sun Rising

When things happen in your life that are traumatic, you tend to be on heightened alert afterwards.  As time passes, that heightened sense of anxiety starts to fade and you are not  as diligent as you once were.  You become laxed on doing the things that ensured that whatever happened wouldn't happened again.  It's just human nature.  You never fully close the door and that slight crack you left open is the only invitation it is needs to come back into your life to reek havoc.

We had recovered nicely from our experiences since we got help from The Dead Files back in 2016.  Things seemed to be normal for us.  We had only dealt with very minor issues and nothing truly malevolent.  We thought that the bad things were behind us, we thought we were safe.   The feelings of past anxiety had faded and we unintentionally let our guard down.  A classic case of "out of sight, out of mind".

The Pandemic changed our lives dramatically.  I was no longer traveling and began working from home 100% of the time.  Heidi and Emi changed to remote learning.   Eating out and any sort of outside entertainment had vanished.  Like many of you, we were stuck in our homes, prisoners somewhat.  It was nice having us all home and spending some time together but as days turned in weeks and weeks turned into months, the reality sunk in that this was not going to end anytime soon.  Needless to say, it began to take its toll and started wearing us down.

If you've been reading our blog, you remember that once you start getting worn down the door to things coming begins to open.  We knew that we still had the "path of dead people" that Amy talked about during out reveal of our Dead Files episode, but we had, up to this point, done a good job of keeping them out.

We started noticing changes in our behavior.  We were not sleeping well,  continuously arguing, depressed, and questioning our self worth.  These things seemed to affect Emi the most.

A quick little back story to provide some clarity for the rest of this story.  Emi had moved to the back bedroom.  It was Londyn's room when we first moved in and Heidi's room during our Dead Files episode.  This is the room where we feel all our problems started.  We have always thought that there was some sort of portal in the room's bathroom but we were fairly confident we had closed it.   However, as you'll read next, we apparently didn't lock it.  

Jennifer was the first to realize that Emi was not acting normal.  She knew that it was something malevolent and that it was attacking her.  She immediately took steps to try get rid of whatever was the source.  She Saged, burned Frankincense and Myrrh incense, and salted.  These steps only worked temporarily as whatever we were dealing with was able to overcome them.

Jennifer had become friends with a woman, Lisa, who had psychic abilities and was studying to become a Reiki.  She is an incredible gifted woman and we're very lucky to know her.  Jennifer asked her to do Reiki on Emi to see if she could see anything in her.  She noticed Emi was being attacked, taking her over and it had something to do with the back bedroom.  Her recommendation was perform Reiki in the back bedroom to determine what was there and to work on getting rid of it by a cleanse.

We decided this was what needed to be done and we needed to do it as soon as possible.  We felt if we didn't, it would it would only continue to feed on Emi and get stronger.  Jennifer didn't want Emi there when it was time to do it because she didn't want to scare her or allow it to jump into her for protection.  Jennifer arranged for Heidi to take Emi out to have some sister fun time.   This would buy us the time we needed.

The first step was preparing the room. Lisa had us draw crosses in all the mirror and light candles in specific locations in the room.  After the room was prepped, we called Lisa using FaceTime.  Lisa began working on finding out what was there.  

"Demon", she said

Our hearts sunk.

"Demon?  There's a Demon in here?", Jennifer asked

"Yes, there's a Demon but it's weak", Lisa answered

"Can we get rid of it?  What can we do?"  Jennifer responded

"We can try but we all need to work together", Lisa said

Now, I'm not a Demonologist but what I do know is that Demons just don't leave because you politely ask.  They are there for some ungodly reason and their mission is to turn good to bad and bad to worse,  They don't rest until they complete that mission and they don't leave without putting up a fight.  Luckily we had an advantage as the Demon hadn't fully entered and was weak.

Without hesitate, we ask Lisa to get to work.   She explains to us the stone pendent she was holding will move a certain way when (and if) we get rid of the Demon.  I am holding one myself and it dangled toward the ground motionless.  Lisa begins to do her thing, praying, chatting, and asking for strength.  She ask Jennifer to repeat the Lord's Prayer.  As she does, Lisa's stone pendent moves left to right, right to left.  The one I'm holding starts to do the same.  As they both continue to speak, the pendants move faster, changing directions multiples times.  The room got heavy and we could feel the angry, the resentment.  

After about 20 mins, the pendants stop.  The air in the room clears and you can feel peace.

"It's gone", Lisa says with a smile.

"It's gone?  Thank you God", Jennifer says.

This episode was a wake up call that we cannot let our guard down and they we need to stay diligent.  

We won't make this mistake again or take our peace for granted going forward.

This time, we closed and locked the door.




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