We look sexy for our spooks!
We want to catch the eye of spooks! Jo Lockwood, 38, from Wakefield, West Yorkshire
Standing in front of the mirror, I teased my hair into place. Then carefully applied foundation, mascara and bright lippy. Not for a night out, though. It was to see local spectres! See, I was off to hold a paranormal investigation with my ghost-hunting group Phantasmic Paranormal.
At the venue, I met up with Emily, 18, the other Phantasmic girl. Glammed up, too, she looked dead gorgeous!
‘You weren’t what I was expecting!’ the owner gasped.
We always take people by surprise.
Glam hunters
They expect paranormal investigators to be men, or goth girls dressed in black. We’re different. We’re here
to put the glamour into ghost hunting! Since I was little, I’ve been able to pick up on spirits. My mum, Mandy Jackson, said that, as a tot, I used to speak to my grandma, Regina Pearson, who passed away when I was a baby. And I often heard spirits talking to me. Luckily, Mum’s from a long line of witches, so taught me to enjoy my gift rather than be frightened of it. Then, when I was 10, I was out with Mum, stepdad Baldwin Jackson, brother Gary and sister Tammy. Suddenly, I heard a bang.
Horror crash
Spinning round, I gasped in horror. A car had mounted the pavement on the other side of the road, crashing into a wall.
It was quickly rolling towards us…
Poor Mum was dragged along by the car, suffered horrific multiple injuries. It was touch and go whether she’d survive.
Thankfully, she pulled through, but only after nine gruelling months.
Later, I had flashbacks, suffered anxiety. And, my spiritual senses stopped.
Then, aged 13, I started hearing crackling in my head as if someone was tuning in a radio.
‘Something’s wrong with my ears,’ I told Mum, now 58.
‘The spirits are returning,’ she smiled.
Talk back
Sure enough, I heard them talking to me again. With my interest in the paranormal rekindled, I read every book on the subject. And Mum and I attended a local spiritualist church. I was soon seeing spirits, too, including the ghost of a nurse at my school, which used to be a hospital. It continued at university. One night, I was preparing food at my halls of residence. Suddenly, I stared in disbelief as the spirit of a scruffy, dishevelled man walked through the wall. I found out that, apparently, the building once housed a
People expect paranormal investigators to be goths Mum taught me to enjoy my gift I was soon seeing spirits including the ghost of a nurse
mental asylum. The wild-looking man must have been a patient, and was still trapped there. Intrigued, I went on a paranormal investigation… and was hooked! And addicted to looking good whenever I went out. Well, I didn’t want to scare the spooks off!
Spooky times
Then, around 10 years ago, I started doing my own investigations with a friend.
And, in 2015, I founded Phantasmic Paranormal.
A few months later, I asked Emily, who I’d known for years, to join.
Equally glam, we’ve got dolled up and visited countless haunted locations, had some really spooky experiences.
In August last year, we visited an abandoned hospital.
Surrounded by old medical equipment, I felt a cold chill.
‘I don’t like this place,’ I shuddered, picking up on an unhappy spirit.
Wandering into a derelict maternity unit, suddenly an ex-team member, Rachel, gasped.
‘I can see the spirit of a woman,’ she said.
Lost baby
The air turned icy as the spirit box, a device that transmits voices, crackled into life.
‘Where’s my baby?’ a woman moaned.
Psychically, I knew she’d lost her baby on the way to the hospital. Now, years later, the poor woman’s spirit was still roaming the corridors. But some of the entities we come across have never been human. At 39 De Grey Street in Hull, one of the most haunted houses in the UK, something invisible grabbed my leg. Likely an elemental, summoned after a ouija board was left open following a seance there. Sure, ghost-hunting can be hair-raising. Like the time
we went to Ruthin Gaol, Denbighshire, and snapped the ghost of a guard who’d been abusive to inmates. He was thought to have been murdered by those same inmates after he disappeared mysteriously.
Safe with gran
But Grandma Regina is always with me, along with my Native American spirit guide, Horrawotha.
Now, there are five members of the Phantasmic girls.
We may not be what people expect, but we’re serious paranormal investigators.
We just love putting the foxy into phantom, too!
Emily and I put the foxy into phantom Some of the entities we find have never been human