SUPERMARKET GHOSTS made me psychic
Night shifts at a haunted supermarket sparked a new hobby for me!
Iwas playing on my bedroom floor when I suddenly noticed our Yorkshire terrier, Gemma, at my side. Nothing weird about that you might think, except Gemma had died giving birth to a litter of puppies a few days earlier.
When I told Mam, she didn’t seem surprised.
‘Gemma came to me in a dream just last night, when I accidentally slept through one of the puppies’ night feeds,’ she said sadly. ‘I think she was prodding me to get up!’
Both Mam and Dad saw Spirit, so they took my word for it that I’d seen Gemma.
Dad regularly saw a little ghost girl, in her nightie, sitting on the stairs of our council house, which had been built on the site of old pit houses.
I never saw her, but I often felt her around. I had odd dreams that came true too, and a regular sense of déjà vu.
At 17, keen to explore my spiritual side further, I visited a Spiritualist church. They were doing a night of trance mediumship, where the medium’s bodies are taken over by the spirits they connect with. I watched for a bit, then decided it was all too weird and left!
After that, the déjà vu, odd dreams and regular feelings
I’d had of someone around me seemed to stop.
Until aged 32, when I got a job restocking a local supermarket at night.
I was alone in the clothing department when a bunch of necklaces on the jewellery stand started swaying, like someone had just brushed past them. After that I often heard the scrape of hangers moving along the rails.
When I mentioned it to a colleague she didn’t seem surprised. ‘It’s probably the old lady who haunts this place,’ she said casually. ‘She was caught on CCTV once when the store was closed and empty.’
Not long after, I started seeing a figure crossing the aisles, always in my peripheral vision. It wasn’t an old lady though. It was a man, dressed in blue workmen’s overalls and a flat cap.
One night I was pushing a heavy crate of stock on wheels into the storeroom and I called out, ‘Hold the door for me.’
Even though it turned out there was no one around, the door stayed open.
Confused I added, ‘You can shut it now, thanks,’ and the door swung to!
Another night, I felt someone’s breath on my face as a male voice said, ‘Elaine!’
‘Thank you for talking to me,’ I said, my own voice shaking. ‘But don’t do it again. You’ve scared me.’
I knew the man was just excited to be heard but it was a bit much!
I never heard his voice again, but around the same time I started hearing voices at home in bed.
Once I was kept up half the night with a man and woman having a heated discussion. It sounded like static and I could only catch odd words.
I knew I needed to learn to control my re-awakened gifts, so I returned to the Spiritualist church. Eventually I began to train as a Reiki healer too.
By now, my interest in Spirit was back with a vengeance, but I didn’t just want to experience a spiritual connection: I wanted to capture evidence.
So in 2011 along with my friend Bev, a colleague from the supermarket who’d also seen Spirit there, I decided to do a paranormal investigation. I hired a local community hall, not far from our homes in Bishop Auckland, and with a reputation for being haunted.
That first investigation got me hooked and since then our group, Spectre Detectors, has gone from strength to strength.
We’ve travelled the country doing investigations, speaking to everyone from Jack the Ripper – and his victims – to connecting with serial killer Mary Ann Cotton.
In 2018 we explored Mary King’s Close, the underground streets beneath Edinburgh’s Royal Mile, and I was sent a vision of someone having a nail driven into their hand – only for my own hand to swell up!
We’ve captured numerous apparitions and spirit voices on camera and film and I’ve written 13 books about my experiences.
I no longer work at the spooky supermarket, but I left with a great friend in Bev – and a whole new haunting hobby!
I started hearing voices in bed