It is no secret that a mental health facility is.. well.. Creepy. I think it is less menacing during the daytime but at night it is rather.. Eerie to say the least. When I decided to work the overnight shift, I did not consider the consequences.  I had no idea why it didn’t dawn on me this place was going to be creapalicious as soon as the lights are dimmed and when you peer out the windows nothing but the darkest of night is your view. Needless to say, there are parts of the buildings I refuse to go to unaccompanied, and even then I try to avoid them.

I am a huge believer in energy. You can feel it..  Good energy, bad energy, and neutral energy. The Nut Hut is full of bad energy. Like. Gothica/Shutter Island type of energy. There are times when you feel pure anger and frustration overtake you out of nowhere. Seriously. You could be as calm as a Buddhist Monk one minute then WHAMO you want to kill someone.  I’ve never been exposed to a constant barrage of negative energy before. It is almost like I visit the Amityville Horror House nightly; sit around for 9 hours then go home. 

People are ALWAYS getting sick here. When you come on unit, all of a sudden phantom aches and pains will plague you. Stomach aches, joint aches, headache.. Just any sort of ache or pain will start up almost immediately. It is as if your body is having a biological response to the negativity, which seems to be shellacked into the walls here. People are always catching colds, food poisoning, or having allergic reactions. It is so very odd.

The building itself seems to be alive. Perhaps like in a Rose Red type of way. The walls moan and growl nightly. Many times I hear all sorts of strange noises, which I struggle to justify. I KNOW what I hear but I do NOT want to KNOW what I heard. Doors creek. Doors slam. Doorknobs rattle. Once I heard the washer turn itself on and start to fill with water. When you put your key into the many locks  there is always a spark when the key in inserted. ALWAYS. It doesn’t matter if there is static energy in the air or not. The spark always greets me whenever I use ANY of my keys.  Charts and books have fallen off of shelves as if disturbed by invisible hands. I HATE when this happens. The items must be picked up and put in their proper place, but I am afraid whatever wanted it on the floor is going to retaliate.

When you are here, you always have a feeling like you are being watched. The feeling someone is behind you all of the time. I try to sit strategically with my back against a wall but even then., I feel like I am an animal at a reverse zoo. The entertainment for something unnatural. I have become the world’s fastest peeer.. I am in and out of the restroom in 60 seconds flat and that DOES include washing my hands. Being a germaphobe I believe my hands aren’t clean enough so  I also use hand sanitizer  the moment I get within eyesight of a coworker.

I might sound paranoid or even mildly crazy to some but I know there are several presences here, which wish the clients and staff ill will. You can just feel it. I have even been fortunate enough to SEE a ghost here. Twice! Same ghost. I once saw him in the recreation room. So in efforts to avoid the ghost, I gave him the rec room and started taking breaks in other parts of the building. Well. He is not going to be outsmarted. Whatever part of the building I am currently in, if I am alone, he finds me. For some reason he hovers over me and looks at me with curiosity on his face. Or perhaps that is how I am interpertating it. Either way. I do not want to business with a spirit. I wish he would leave me alone or go find another person to make contact with. 

There are parts of the building which I really believe have serious concentrations of bad energy. Like. The quiet room. It is a room with padded walls and a steel door we place kids into when they are a danger to themselves or us. Let me tell you.. That room is creepy. I almost peed on myself last week when a staff member played a practical joke on me involving the quiet room. The feeling you get when you enter the room is rage, despair, anger, hopelessness, disgust, confusion, and a myriad of other unhappy feelings. There is no joy in that room at all.

During the night, there are certain times when you feel the energy of this place peak. Around midnight is one and three AM is another. I dread these times of night. I do not need a clock to know when 12 or 3 rolls around. Around 12 midnight I can feel the tension rising. It will ebb for a while then around 3 it will rise again.  It is an all round hair-raising experience to work or live at the nut hut. You never get used to it.

The people who have worked at the nut hut all have crazy stories. So bizarre you wonder if they are senseless themselves until something happens to you, and it will, it is only a matter of time. I never doubt my senses, working the night shift gives me sensory overload. Unlike Ghostbusters, I am afraid of a ghost.

FIN