Source : Perth Now news
An author has opened up about her “absolutely blood-chillingly terrifying” experience of moving into a haunted farmhouse.
Ashley Woo – the writer behind gothic mystery novel Wildwood – left suburban Massachusetts in December 2019 to move to a historic property in rural Vermont with her husband, two-year-old daughter and newborn son and she soon realised the country retreat would be anything but relaxing. Ashley revealed the house was built in 1830 and is located right next to a cemetery but she wasn’t prepared for the spooky encounter in the guest bedroom.
After opening up about the family’s idyllic first month at the property, she told PEOPLE: “Then came the haunting … Given my fascination with gothic tales, the fact that our house is two centuries old and located across the street from a cemetery, I know I was primed to think our house was haunted. I recognize that …
“There’s a room in my house with rose-colored walls … We set it up as a guest room. One night, when I was struggling with insomnia, I wandered down to the rose room, wondering if I’d sleep better there.
“I curled up in the bed, under a white and blue quilt with a design of the evening star. You’d think I would have slept peacefully, and perhaps I did, for a while. But then, I woke up to discover I was no longer alone.”
She went on to add: “I didn’t see anything, but I felt them. A pair of arms wrapped tightly around my chest. I hurled myself awake, heart beating wildly, and turned on the light.
“No one was there, just the quilt thrown back and wrinkled sheets. I ran upstairs. I told myself it was a fluke. A nightmare. Sleep paralysis. “
Ashley tried sleeping in the room again but the same thing happened again. She said: ““. I fell asleep. I woke up to a set of arms wrapped tightly around my chest. Arms that did not belong to my husband, nor my children. Arms that belonged to no visible person at all.
It was terrifying. Absolutely, blood-chillingly terrifying. For a while, I didn’t want to go into the room, and it was easy enough to avoid.”
Ashley trie napping in the room one final time and she had a “pleasing” dream about her late grandmother and she woke up to the ghostly hug once again.
She explained: “When I awoke, arms were wrapped around me once again. I lay there, heart pounding, eyes suddenly wide open. The arms disappeared a moment later.
“I can’t tell you who or what I think was in that room with me. I don’t think it’s my grandmother, as lovely as that thought might be.
“I also don’t think it is malevolent. I realize it could be nothing at all, nothing but some strange process in my brain. I have not slept in the rose room again, since that third time.”
After avoiding the room for some time, Ashley decided to face her fears and set up a writing desk there to start work on her debut novel – and she’s now convinced the spooky experience helped her write her first book.
She concluded: “So as strange as it may seem, I’m thankful for those unsettling experiences in the rose-colored room. I think they unlocked something for me.
“The belief that I could write a novel and the idea that walls can haunt.”
