Having grown up with a playful poltergeist, these cases are always favorites for me. I have the pleasure of one such case at the moment, so I’ve been doing some pondering on the subject.
Poltergeist is a name given to a particularly noisy haunting, typically hallmarked with loud sounds and the movement of objects. Many parapsychologists attribute poltergeist manifestations to psychokinetics – the movement of objects through the influence of the human mind. These cases can be extreme in their manifestations in many ways, and can be both fascinating and frustrating for those living with one.
Psychiatrist Ian Stevenson (1918 – 2007) was the founder and director of the University of Virginia School of Medicine’s Division of Perceptual Studies, investigating the paranormal. Although Dr. Stevenson is best known for his work on reincarnation, he studied the poltergeist phenomena as well. He asserted that psychokinetic poltergeist activity can be distinguished from spirit activity simply by the type of object movement; in psychokinetic poltergeist cases the movement of objects is without purpose and often violent, while cases involving spirits of the dead involve intelligent communication, purposeful movement of objects, and little violence.
The distinction Dr. Stevenson was trying to make is an important one. In certain poltergeist cases, such as the one in the 1982 horror movie by that name, poltergeist activity is forceful and often violent. Generally these rare cases – the one’s in real life, at least – are thought to be the product of psychokinetic activity surrounding one of the family members, called an “agent”. Often the agent is a pubescent or pre-pubescent girl, but recent findings also identify agents who are epileptic or have similar brain dysfunctions.
The other type of poltergeist haunting is one with more playful types of activity. Objects such as keys and watches may be hidden, showing up later either right where they originally were or somewhere totally unexpected. Doors may be locked and unlocked. Footsteps and loud banks often accompany the object movement. Entire books have been written about the poltergeist phenomena so I certainly can’t do it justice here, but here’s where I think Dr. Stevenson’s theory needs an amendment…
I agree that the violent books-flying-across-the-room types of poltergeist cases are likely due to the agent alone, with no ghost or spirit involved. However, I think the other type, the playful poltergeists as I like to refer to them, are a ghosts that are amped up somehow by the presence of an agent. In other words, when a family member has certain characteristics that a spirit can draw on – adolescence, epilepsy, or even psychic sensitivities, the manifestations can be stronger than a typical haunting and fall under the category of a poltergeist.
That was certainly my own case, long ago, and it fits the case I’m working now as well. Here the couple both have sensitivities; the woman’s sensitivities have always been with her, and the gentleman’s are likely from a near-death experience. A renown medium was brought in and she immediately confirmed the presence of two strong spirits. The activity there is definitely of the poltergeist variety. The couple is often locked out of their residence (the front door locks are electronic). They constantly hear footsteps and loud bangs, as well as voices. Things are always going missing, despite the couple being very neat and organized. And several times they’ve gone into the kitchen only to find all the cabinet doors and drawers open – another hallmark of a poltergeist haunting.
When I first began working with the clients I suggested that when it locks them out – which happens on a daily basis – they simply ask the spirit to open it back up for them, with some sort of “Ha-ha, that was funny, now can you let me in please?” type of a comment. They later reported that this does work much of the time.
At our initial client home meeting, the woman was mentioning some odd photos she wanted to show us, but said she couldn’t because her camera had disappeared. The psychic nicely but firmly asked the spirits to please return her camera. During our investigation Saturday night the client reported that it did indeed turn up a few days later – she found it, in off all places, in the vegetable bin. Welcome to life with a poltergeist!
Now we’re working on getting it to return a large sum of cash and a bottle of cologne… I’ll let you know how that goes…
Living Haunted 