Breath & Shadow
June 2026 - Vol. 23, Issue 3
"Before Olanzapine"
written by
Edward M. Turner
Contacted New Life Christian Fellowship Church—I must let Jesus help me. Not yet (prayers). Contacted Baptist Church—I must let Jesus help me. Not yet. Contacted Methodist Church—they don’t do this. Catholic Church—one never answered; another said I can’t be possessed and find help on the Internet. I said I’m running out of options. I don’t know what this thing is, but it is inside me and won’t leave. Shamed, he said he’d come. I said I don’t believe in God, but I do in a higher power. Shouldn’t have said that. Disqualified. Yet a Catholic Deacon did come and blessed all the rooms in my apartment plus me with Holy Water. Didn’t work. I found out the Catholic Church has a back door unlocked so the faithful can get Holy Water. I brought a half-gallon glass jug and filled it. With that and a paint brush I splattered the entire apartment, drank some (taste awful), took a washcloth bath in it. I put a small glass of some on my nightstand by my bed. When I began making noises with my mouth, I reached my fingers into the jar and brushed my teeth. My mouth made a raspberry noise. (Didn't work.) I lost this round.
Emailed a Psychic Cop. He came with his helpers (after getting lost). He blew an ocean shell a couple of times; with a small candle he prayed quietly in each room and then shook my hand. Success! I donated $200. That night it did seem Logan was gone. I felt so wonderful after 24/7 for months. Next day there were subtle signs I didn’t want to believe. Ticks in the baseboard, the faucet would drip, once. Talk about suspense. He’s back. The Psychic Cop tried to blame me. I said I didn’t invite it back, and I wanted a refund. He said he didn’t give refunds. I asked for references. He sent me by mail a refund, minus gas money. It was so close.
I’ve tried White Sage. No. Salt around the bed. No. I had thought events happened only in the bedroom. Not so. Open Bible under the bed. No. Daily reading of the 23rd Psalm out loud. No. My voice would fade near the end. I got a Psychic Minister to visit. Her and her husband roamed through the apartment (townhouse). She told me there was exposed wiring in the computer room upstairs. It is TV cable looped and neatly put away in a closet. She said the picture of the woman over our bed was my wife’s mother (because the woman had dark hair and wore glasses like my wife). Psychic was surprised it was my mother. Her husband came up from the basement and asked if rusty utensils down there were antiques. We said yes. He said there was a little girl down there wearing a bonnet. I didn’t have the presence of mind to ask if the bonnet was blue. The team discussed the situation in front of my wife and me. The words, “Men at Work,” came to my mind. Then I spoke up thanked them and we’ll be in touch. They didn’t want to leave.
Logan interacts only with me. The kitchen faucet dripped water designs in the sink. At eye level I could see it taking place. My wife didn’t like the fact I was talking to the sink. She was going to have me committed until I talked her out of it.
One place I emailed online, a guy called me, listened to my tale, and pronounced it as a UFO violation. He’d notify Mother Ship and all would be well. He called later and asked if I heard a sonic boom. He couldn’t believe I hadn’t. Eventually he stopped calling. After that I emailed a lady (20 years’ experience) in northern Maine for help. She emailed back that an entity raped her in her bedroom one night. I didn’t reply.
Logan and I get along. I know the rules. He gives me pain anyway. Lately it has been my lower back. Or pain in my Achilles Tendons while walking down the wooden basement stairs. That’s not safe. I gave away a new pair of shoes. I thought it was me. My left shoulder would throb. Pain! Hours. I lifted more weights at the gym and muscled the pain out. It was a horror show of pain while I did it, over weeks. He makes it so I can’t talk or breathe. I itch, and sometimes it’s the burning itches over my body, like slugs moving in half-time. This is all out of my head. He’s in my head and can control my physical senses. I sense-feel, sense-see. I learned to stand up to bad scary groups in my dreams—mafia, street gangs, paranormal bad dudes. It’s surprising what one can do in extremis. He’d make me bite my lips until they bled. Hard to eat that way. In bed he used to make my wife’s body twitch, sometimes so she’d bend up double. Uses her fingers and toes to tap me and keep me awake. Make her moan. Make her tug on my earlobe. It Imitates the cat’s meows, and my wife’s voice. Walk like an invisible sparrow with deliberate steps along my body in bed. Enter the soles of my feet and like static electricity throbbing to “one, two, three-four! One two, three-four!” creep up my legs. Make like a huge spider behind my head moving across the mattress—I “sense-see” this and break down and go sleep on the couch with the lights on and a small candle shining. The flame dances, twirls, shimmies. I break out in goose bumps, patches in my legs the size of a short pencil push out, from the inside. I hear groans coming from across the opposite wall in the bedroom, and near the recliner where the cat sleeps. When my wife turns to my side, the groan comes out of her mouth in my face while she is asleep. Ghosthunters don’t come because my place isn’t haunted. It’s me and they don’t do me. It is 18 months, 24/7. I treat it with courtesy, or else. HEY, who is going to help me?
Isn’t this a monstrous experience I’m going through? No one can—or will—help me. You never heard of this stuff? I haven’t either. You tell me, what does, “twenty years’ experience in the field,” mean? What does, “we help,” or “we want to educate the public,” mean?
How does a person beg for help? I don’t know how to beg. I’ve researched this paranormal in the 18 months, and why do I know more than the experts? Are there many out there, like me? Suffering in silence? Till death do we part? I even got on my knees and prayed. Sincerely. I’m a Heathen, though.
HEY! I’m being tortured. I’ve had more than twenty jobs, never fired, boss’s mate in the Coast Guard, in charge of a deck force of 16 to 24 druggies and drunks, and had to take command, force them to respect me, and they did. Drunken and drugged adventures in the dive pits of hell, got straight and earned a community college degree with honors at night, and working full time during the day as a welder, teach myself how to write, go my own way. When anybody needs help they come to me—and I can’t figure this out! I have always gotten out of tight places. The walls are closing in.
I’ve made friends with Logan, again. He doesn’t play notes on the smoke alarm anymore or cloud my eyes so I can’t type. If I’m pissed, I give it the “silent treatment.” Isn’t that pitiable? I say, “Is it time to get up, Logan?” It signals yes. “Good morning, Logan.” It signals good morning. I leave for an errand, “Are you coming with me, Logan?” It signals yes, or it gets stubborn and stays silent. Then I either talk him into going, or I say, “What’s this, you’re in a mood?” He signals yes. I say, “Stay then, I know when you’re in a mood, you won’t “talk” anymore.” I will leave. (I’m not alone, however.) My God, my God, he’s like a brother to me.
We communicate with a deep noise in my right ear. One for yes, none for no.
But I want my body back. He listens to my thoughts and hears my verbal voice. He doesn’t ‘read’ my mind, no letters appear. I can’t plot or plan or think in images, he sees the images. He watches my dreams like a movie, and sometimes, uh oh, changes the channel. He’s into horror. He has a vicious sense of humor. I accept pain. Who is going to stop it? He’s living or has come back to life through me. He’s not evil as such, but won’t leave, yet he says he doesn’t like this place or me. He has a relationship with me and is jealous when others intrude on our time. I spent $180 on Shamans over two sessions. He may have left the first time, but not the second. When I read a book, it listens to my voice recite history, action/adventure, and bios. Monday, I had him pick what DVDs to watch. He picked the ones I like. Huh.
I see a VA psychiatrist for meds. I suffer from depression. The doctor has known me for two years and believes me. The meds only do one thing to me—blocks my obsession with suicide. I have quit booze and drugs, and thought my adventures were over as I got older (I’m 58) (I’m 72 now). Not so. I have a fatalistic feeling that I’m taking Logan to the grave with me. I told him I’d find him and will kill him.
Before all else I would catch a glimpse of a black thing, a shadow. Again, I did not tell anyone. Yet I did google it online, though. I wasn’t the only one by a long shot. Try it and see. Many had their own opinions. As I do now.
Cat at head of bed seeing bedbug, gnat, swamp gas? Worship the entity? By the light of a candle. The candle’s flames would rotate. Again, bad dreams—mafia, gang members, bad paranormal people, etc….at the end I always stood up to them. I would kick out at them in the dream and unknowingly kick Amy. My affliction touch’s Amy. She suffers, too.
Call 1-800 to contact paranormal group on Wednesday. Emailed to the same group the next Monday night. Will get back to person within 24 hours. Right! Went to a Hypnotherapist to explore my inner self. Couldn’t be hypnotized. My eyelids kept trembling. He showed me how to hypnotize myself at home. My eyelids don’t tremble at home. $150 for that. But it’s my mind. Controlling me. I had to fight to remain me.
Ask Dennis if he has any emails about Logan.
Paranoid. I would kick at it. After going to the bathroom one night, I would flap my hands in the bedroom, trying to get rid of it. Amy woke up and looked at me. I felt I should tell her about the entity. She thought it was most interesting. Then Amy played with the cat (the next morning) and kneeled onto the floor. She turned to the bed and saw something underneath. She picked it up and it was a ceramic napkin holder. I went downstairs and checked which one it was. It was mine. She said she knew it.
Look up smudge (and the spelling).
Schizophrenia—Schizo-Affective Disorder.
But I want my body back. Who is going to stop it? He’s living or has come back to life through me. He has a relationship with me and is jealous when others intrude on our time. He wants our rituals. I spent $180 on Shamans over two sessions. Nada.
WITH OLANZAPINE, I’M OKAY. BUT WITHOUT IT…
30 milligrams daily.
Ed lives and writes in Biddeford Maine with his wife, Amy and her black cat, Betty. His stories and essays have appeared in The Orange Review, Maine Sunday Telegram, Terrain Journal, Fortean Bureau and several times in Breath & Shadow, Sunday Journal, and Flying Horse to name a few. His novel, Rogues Together, won the Eppie Award for best in Action/Adventure.

