Every morning, a teenage girl finds bruises on her body, leaving her and her parents puzzled. To figure out why she keeps getting these bruises, her parents decide to put a camera in her room.
When we’re asleep, we do things without knowing. If you sleep alone, it’s harder to know what you do while asleep. People move around or change positions during sleep to get comfy. Some talk or even walk in their sleep. Because we’re asleep, it’s tricky to understand exactly what happens during that time.
The young girl was going to sleep each night, and in the morning, her parents would notice new bruises on her body.
Now, at first, this happened only occasionally and the bruises were pretty light, so they didn’t really worry about it. Most days you couldn’t see the bruises unless you really looked up close. But over time, things got worse in more ways than one. The girl’s bruises were getting worse and they appeared more frequently, and this brought all kinds of trouble to the family.
When the couple would send their daughter to summer camp, she’d wear shorts, and it wasn’t long before the staff started to notice those bruises on her legs. Each day that she was going to camp, she had fresh bruises. The staff had a responsibility to report what they saw to authorities, and while this was happening, the girl’s parents were also worried about the bruises. At first, they thought that she might have had an iron deficiency and that was causing her to bruise easily.
The girl’s parents made an appointment with her doctor for testing. Before they had a chance to get to the doctor’s office, the social services visited their home. They explained that they got a call from the summer camp about a potential child abuse situation. The young girl’s parents were at a loss for words. They knew that they had never and that they would never hurt their child. Unfortunately though, the proof supposedly was stacked up against them. Since they couldn’t really explain the origin of the bruises, it didn’t look good for those parents.
The social workers had a conversation with the little girl, who denied that there was any abuse happening in the home. She explained that she woke up each day with bruises. When the girl’s parents informed the social workers that they had already scheduled a doctor’s appointment to determine the cause of the bruises, the case was put on hold. The social workers agreed to wait for the doctor’s findings since the parents had taken action to address the issue.
The girl’s parents took her to the appointment, and the doctor ran a battery of tests on her. When the tests came back, they couldn’t find anything wrong with the little girl. For her parents, this was a blessing but also a curse. They were thankful that their daughter didn’t have a serious medical condition, but that meant that they were no closer to finding out where the bruises were coming from. They were also no closer to getting social services off their backs.
The parents of the little girl realized that they needed to uncover the reason behind her bruises. After much consideration, they decided to take action and purchased a video camera from the store on their way home. Their plan was to install the camera in their daughter’s room to determine what was causing the bruises. That very night, the father positioned the camera on the desk and started recording.
The little girl’s parents kissed her goodnight and turned off the lights and left the room. Both of her parents slept soundly that night because they knew that they’d finally be able to have all the answers to their questions. The next morning, at least they’d hope so, the next morning, the little girl again had fresh bruises on her legs. Her father went to a room, retrieved the video camera, and set it up so that they could view the tape. And what they saw was shocking.
While the daughter was asleep, she wasn’t walking; she was crawling backwards, which made things even stranger. The way she moved while sleeping looked as if she was possessed and it horrified her parents.
They were deeply concerned and didn’t know what to do. Finally, they decided to film her while she was sleeping to try and find some answers. After reviewing the footage, they contacted social services who referred them to a sleep specialist. Although the video was disturbing, it helped them get the help they needed.
What was the result of the specialist.