My Niece's Dinner Show

Before I can begin this next experience, I have to give a little bit of background. If only to give some sort of perspective to our circumstances when this happened. At the time of this experience, I was attending a local college. I was living with my parents and attending classes part time. About halfway through my time in school, my sister moved back home, because she had become pregnant and could no longer afford to live on her own.

Fast forward to when my niece was around a year old (she's 3 almost 4 now), my family was sitting in our living room eating dinner. She was sitting in her highchair, eating, and babbling away like children that age always do. Then all of sudden, she went quiet. I looked up from my plate, to find her smiling at the ceiling. My Dad was more focused on what was on the TV then I was, so I elbowed him to get his attention. He looked up, and as all four of us were watching, my niece started to clap her hands and giggle, like she found whatever she was staring at, highly amusing. Up until that point, I was okay with what was happening. All that mattered to me was that my niece was happy, and didn't seem to be in any danger.

However, there was a moment when I stopped being okay with what was happening. When my niece started reaching up, like she wanted whatever was above her to pick her up. The entire room gained a slightly sinister feeling, and we were forced to distract my niece, and keep her distracted until the feeling faded, and she went back to eating.

My sister thinks it might have been my Grandfather (who died of cancer in the early 90s) stopping by to check on us. I'm not so sure that's what happened.

This wasn't the last time something like this happened with my niece either. There are to my knowledge, at least three more occasions of this happening. The dinner shows seemed to stop (thankfully) when she outgrew the highchair. However, when she turned 2 the poor thing started to experience night terrors so bad, we could hear her screaming and crying, and very clearly saying NO! All the way on the other side of the house. She still has them occasionally, though not as often as she used to (she used to have them every night, now she has them around once a month or so.)