The Groping Ghost

Doris Birch of Kent, UK has been dealing with an unusual and disturbing paranormal manifestation haunting her apartment over the past four months - a groping ghost. While it's not unheard of for ghosts to touch living people during the course of traditional hauntings, according to reports they rarely are as determined to do so as this one seems to be.

'It's like an octopus,' she told This Is Kent of the spirit. 'It started four months ago. I was lying in bed when I felt this creepy pair of hands.

'I kicked frantically and it went away. Next time it came I hurled the duvet on to the floor!

'But the ghost keeps coming back. I've tried sleeping without the duvet. But it started shaking my mattress.

'I even threw the mattress off the bed and bought a new one but it has made no difference.'

Doris, who accepts many people 'are going to think I am mad', emphasised that, despite living alone, she is 'not lonely' and feels she may need to 'call in the Ghostbusters': 'I told the vicar and he said it is a lost spirit.

'What I want to know is, why has it got lost in my flat?'

Perhaps the octopus reference hints at something more sinister than a mere ghost, such as one of the Lovecraftian Deep Ones trying to push through into our reality from an alternative universe. Or maybe this particular spirit just finds the afterlife boring and is looking for some action. In my experience earthbound spirits aren't exactly the brightest bulbs, so to speak, in that they usually are those spirits that can't figure out how to move on properly.

For most hauntings a good set of banishing rituals will probably do the trick, provided that they extend into the macrocosmic realm. Sometimes pentagram rituals don't do that on their own, so I generally also recommend banishing by hexagram to really clear out a space. As long as you catch the ghost within the field when it goes up, the spirit should be sent on to wherever it belongs.