Haunted for years.
As a young'un, we lived in a terraced house and as such were always told to "Keep the noise down!" and "The neighbours will hear!"
So I grew up in fear of what the neighbours would do if they did hear me.

At night, without fail, I would hear my neighbour pacing up and down, up and down, up and down. The worry was that he was just waiting for his opportunity to do me harm after all the noise I must have made.

Every night for years, pace, pace, pace. It kept me awake, shivering in fear and worry. It didn't matter what time I was in bed, or even if I woke up in the middle of the night, I could still hear him. I lived in fear, of him and of my sanity. If I lifted my head off the pillow, it was a momentary respite from the dread of hearing those feet. I couldn't sleep sitting up, so had to put my head back down sooner or later.

I don't remember when, but there came a point when I realised it wasn't worrying me any more. Perhaps I'd lived with the fear for so long I'd gotten used to it, perhaps I didn't think of him as a threat, (he was a nice chap, after all) but it was only recently I clocked what was really happening.

I'd been hearing the pulse of my heartbeat as my head rested on the pillow. Go on, try it.
( Blind Meach Cautiously optimistic, Wed 18 Jan 2012, 17:25, 3 replies)

Times Two
I thought I was the only kid who made that error--for me, the sounds were the steady, unrelenting, unstoppable footfalls of a monster who was coming up from underground, under the house, right under my bed. Luckily, it turns out he was very deep underground, as he never actually arrived, and some mysterious law of nature decreed he had to start all over every night. Lucky for me.
(Mrs.Fonebone, Sat 21 Jan 2012, 2:21, closed)

Thank goodness for that.
I thought I was the only one!
( Blind Meach Cautiously optimistic, Sat 21 Jan 2012, 12:05, closed)

I'll second that...
..to me it always sounded like the crunch of feet on virgin snow coming to get me. Every night - crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch.

It coincided with watching the film "Call of the Wild" and all that walking through snow and then seeing Charloton Heston floating under the ice gave me nightmares about him walking through the snow to get me. Even now, if I hear my heartbeat on the pillow, I can see his face floating under the ice nearly 30 years later.
(twistngo, Mon 23 Jan 2012, 10:57, closed)