This is a kind of long, I haven’t heard of kids having this experience before.

Once I was watching my little sister, she was around 2-3 and I was 15 at the time. I was reading her a bedtime story about a girl on a boat. She points to the boat looks at me and goes remember when you were my mommy and I was the daughter?

I ask her what she means. She looks at me frustrated and points at the boat and says something along the lines of, “remember you were the mommy and I was the daughter that time. The water came to swallow us up. Remember you told me it was okay because I’d become a mermaid. You don’t have to be scared anymore because I’m a real mermaid now. Don’t worry mommy I can save us”

When she said that I got chills down my spine. My worst fear is drowning so much so I have panic attacks when I’m on boats or in deep water. I’ve always known what the sensation would be like to drown. She’s about 10 now and still tries to convince me she’s a real life mermaid when she gets a chance.

Another strange thing happened while I was babysitting her (she was around 4 then). She started telling me about her friend “Esteban”. She said he watches over her. I asked her if she could see him. She told me he comes to her in different ways. A little while later she taps me and goes he’s about to come. She then points to our 5ft solid wooden fence and a squirrel pops up. He runs over to us so close I could have touched him. After she whispers “Hi Esteban” he runs off. It scared the fuck out of me.