Encounters Across Generations: The Ahrens Family Alien Abduction Case

Although they didn’t realize it fully until the early 1990s, husband and wife, Dan and Joyce Ahrens experienced an episode of alien abduction during the fall of 1976 in West Plains, Missouri, that would spark events that would not only engulf them but would also affect their children, both at the time and years later. Indeed, the encounters that would change the lives of the Ahrens family are arguably some of the most intense episodes of repeat alien abduction on record.

Furthermore, as we shall see, these events were so harrowing that they had far-reaching consequences for the family, specifically, Dan and Joyce’s two children. Indeed, the case is perhaps a good example of how unsettling and negatively life-changing these ordeals can be for people who find themselves the victims of apparent alien abduction.

Although some people would air suspicions that the family had orchestrated the events, a close look at the details of the case doesn’t back this up and suggests that accounts of the family are very credible. Many details of the Ahrens’ encounters also resonate greatly with many other accounts of alien abduction from around the world and across the decades. Like many other cases of apparent alien abduction, the Ahrens’ encounters make up a small part of the overall big picture of the UFO and alien mysteries.

A Trigger-Point Evening In The Fall Of 1976

One evening in the fall of 1976, Dan and Joyce Ahrens were settling into bed after settling their children – 3-year-old Daniel and 1-year-old Heather – when a bizarre red light suddenly lit up their bedroom in a strange glow. To begin with, they believed a fire was ablaze outside and went to alert Joyce. However, despite how hard he tried, no words or even sounds would leave his mouth.

It was at this point that they both realized they suddenly couldn’t move – they were completely paralyzed, unable, it appeared, to even speak. Needless to say, each was beyond perplexed by the events that were unfolding around them, and both were frightened. Both also knew that they had been fully awake when the light appeared moments earlier, so they were not imagining this unsettling episode.

Joyce recalled years later that she suddenly “felt different” and “couldn’t feel my body”. In fact, she elaborated, the only thing that she could move were her eyes. In her head, however, she was screaming as loudly as she could.

Although this episode only appeared to last only several seconds, it felt like a small eternity for the pair. Then, as suddenly as it arrived, the light suddenly went out, returning the room to darkness. As soon as it did so, each regained full control of their bodies and speech. Realizing he could now move, Dan leaned toward the bedroom window and pulled back the curtain, asking aloud, “What the hell was that?” Still confused but also able to move, Joyce responded that she didn’t know.

It was then that they turned their attention to the crib where Heather had been sleeping only moments before. Now, she was standing up inside the cot with her eyes wide open and “huge”. Both Dan and Joyce remained completely confused by what had just transpired. Rather bizarrely, however, rather than discuss the events, the pair simply settled their daughter and then returned to sleep. In fact, they wouldn’t speak of the events for years.

Discreet Signs Of Something Untoward Having Taken Place

When Dan and Joyce eventually did begin to explore the bizarre events of that fall evening in 1976 after contacting a researcher in such matters, they discovered that they were not the only members of the family who experienced something strange that evening, and on many occasions after.

Heather, for example, would recall two decades later that for as far back as she could remember, “there was a recurring nightmare that I had”. She elaborated that in this nightmare “was this gigantic monster” that she struggled to fully explain as “the dream had this dark focus to it”. She could, though, recall looking into a strange eye in which she could see her own reflection.

When she was only 11 years old, Heather eventually drew a picture of this “monster”. As you can see below, the picture is identical to a creature we would all identify as a typical grey alien. And it is important to stress that not only was Heather, like the rest of the Ahrens family, had no knowledge of alien abductions at this time, but this picture was also drawn before the Whitley Strieber book detailing his own alien abduction, Communion, was released, which had an almost identical picture on its front cover.

Joyce recalled around a decade after Heather first presented the picture to herself and her husband that they “didn’t really understand what it was that she was talking about”, continuing that because of this, they “didn’t believe her” and thought instead it was simply her imagination sparked by the intense bad dream.

It wasn’t, however, just Heather who showed signs that she had experienced something strange.

Although recognized more in retrospect, the Ahrens realized that their son, Daniel, also appeared to have experienced something truly out of the ordinary. He recalled two decades later that he “truly believed that something happened back in 1976”.

His father recalled that on multiple occasions they would wake up in the morning and then have to “hunt” around the house to locate Daniel, who was often discovered in another room as opposed to being in his bedroom, even being discovered “in a closet or under a chair, or under a table”, adding that it was “very strange”, almost as if he was “hiding from something” but both he and his father “didn’t know what”.

Something In The Mind “Trying To Come Out!”

It was a decade and a half later when Dan (Senior) next had something truly strange happen to him. His wife would recall that she received a call from her husband while he was at work. He asked her to come and collect him and drive him to the hospital. He would recall that during the drive there his “heart was pounding” and he “couldn’t breathe”, so much so, that he thought he was having a heart attack.

He was admitted to the hospital and doctors quickly established that he wasn’t having a heart attack. However, they were at a loss as to what the problem might be. Several doctors examined Dan and his symptoms. One believed, for reasons unknown, that he was having a series of panic attacks, perhaps caused by severe stress. Another suggested that Dan might have an inner ear infection. Ultimately, though, his condition remained undiagnosed.

From that point, Dan became a recluse of sorts. Joyce recalled that “he couldn’t do anything, he couldn’t work” and he “couldn’t leave the house”. Dan quickly came to the conclusion that there was nothing physically wrong with her husband, but that there appeared to be something “mentally wrong”. Perhaps of more importance was the feeling Dan had that there could be “something in the back of my min that’s just trying to come out”. Eventually, that something did indeed force its way to the forefront of Dan’s conscious mind.

A Sudden Revelation

One night while watching the movie Communion at home, Dan had a sudden revelation. He recalled that there was a particular scene in the movie “where this little alien peaked around from behind a doorway”. As soon as the scene came on, Dan “just burst into tears”, recalling how he immediately noticed “these piercing eyes staring out behind that door”. For a “very split second” he had a “flashback of what had happened back in 1976”.

Joyce also witnessed this reaction, stating that he was “absolutely hysterical” and was crying. What’s more, at the time, she had no idea why he was reacting in such a way. Following the episode, Dan and Joyce began to contemplate if what Dan had seen in the Communion movie was connected to that strange night in 1976, and even if his sudden panic attacks that left him unable to leave the house were also connected.

It was around a week later, while watching television once more, Dan saw a program that featured psychiatric therapist, John Carpenter, who had worked quite extensively with people who claimed, or at least suspected, they had been victims of alien abduction. He had had referrals from other therapists – including the celebrated Budd Hopkins – eventually working on over 100 cases.

Dan eventually contacted Hopkins and began to put together just what happened that evening in 1976 slowly.

Memories Suddenly Returning

As soon as they began speaking and Dan began telling Hopkins of the strange evening in the mid-1970s, the bizarre panic attacks, as well as the intense and strange reaction he had had to the Communion movie, he was cautioned that they could very well find other explanations other than alien abduction. Ultimately, Dan would undergo hypnotic regression. It was soon clear that those potential other possibilities were not very likely.

During that session, as Dan was taken back to that evening in 1976, he offered to Carpenter that a strange figure was “showing me something”. When Carpenter instructed him to “take a good look” Dan responded that the object appeared “metal…like a little spade” before adding “it’s going to hurt”.

Initially, Dan kept the details of the session to himself. However, a short time after beginning these sessions, Joyce began to have her own flashback recollections. In fact, more than just flashbacks, Joyce recalled that “the conscious memories just came back”. What’s more, there “wasn’t anything that I could do to stop them from coming back”.

Following these sudden recollections, Joyce also visited Carpenter in order to also undergo hypnotic regression. And it wasn’t long after that Carpenter realized that not only had both the Ahrens likely been abducted, they had likely been abducted together, at the same time.

They Are In Control And You Can’t Do Anything

It was quickly determined that the strange evening involving the red light in the fall of 1976 was the couple’s first “shared” abduction experience. Eventually, under hypnosis, the Ahrens began to piece together just what had happened that eventful night.

Dan recalled that on the night in question, he was “cowering in the corner of the bed” and was “scared to death”. Even stranger, there was a “little being at the foot of the bed”. There was also another being with Joyce, and a third at the crib where baby Heather had been sleeping.

Joyce also recalled seeing three of the unsettling entities, stating that “one of them touched my arm” causing her to sit up on the bed. She watched in horror as they took Heather out of the crib and began to carry her off. She continued years later, stating that they (the aliens) are “in such control and you can’t do anything”, adding further that you literally watching “a kidnapper kidnap your child and you can’t do anything” about it.

Dan too recalled seeing this, and further recalled feeling “overwhelming” feelings of helplessness as she watched the events unfold. Under regression, Dan recalled one of the beings heading toward the crib. He recalled that he was unable to move and had “no control over what was happening”.

Joyce further recalled that both she and her husband were “marched outside” by these strange beings before all the family were “floated on a spaceship”. She further stated that she “never wanted it to happen to her children” and that she “didn’t realize until later that it had”.

While it was now clear that the entire Ahrens family had seemingly been subject to a harrowing alien abduction ordeal, it would be a further five years before Heather – now (then) in her early 20s – agreed to also undergo hypnosis. And the revelations would be startling.

Telepathic Games

Carpenter offered that what Dan and Joyce had learned during their hypnotic regression sessions they made a “very special effort” not to discuss in front of their children. They both suspected that they too had been abducted by these creatures, and they didn’t wish to influence their own potential suppressed memories of the events.

To begin with, Heather was a little dubious about hypnotic regression and if it would reveal anything of consequence. However, as soon as the session was underway “memories and flashes” were at the forefront of her mind almost immediately.

She recalled that “one of the beings and taken me out of my room” and that she was taken “onboard something”. Furthermore, this strange creature repeatedly asked her “if she wanted to play”, specifically, if she wanted to play “telepathic games”, to which Heather always answered that she didn’t and that she “wanted to go home”.

Whether it was a subconscious act of denial or not, Daniel, despite the fact that he was repeatedly discovered asleep in different rooms of the house, believed that he had not been a part of any strange events. At the time, though, two decades after the 1976 night, he offered that “something obviously happened to my parents and (to) my sister” and that he was “a little too scared to discover what memories he might have”. In fact, whenever his parents spoke about the encounter, even to themselves, Daniel found listening to the details “too emotional”. He would, though, eventually agree to undergo hypnotic regression.

Carpenter would highlight the recurring dream that had plagued Daniel since he was a young child, stating that this dream would be an ideal exploration point, as it likely was triggered by suppressed memories of a very real event.

“Something’s In The Garage!”

After taking Daniel through the basics of hypnotic regression, including reassuring him that just because his family had recalled bizarre events didn’t mean that he necessarily would, or that he had even been subjected to them, Carpenter took him back to his childhood when he was around five years old. Eventually, Carpenter would guide him to the recurring dreams, asking him where he was when “the dream begins”.

Daniel responded that he was in bed and that he could hear a noise that sounded like a “can dropping”. When asked where the sound was coming from, Daniel offered that it was coming “from the garage…something’s in the garage”. At this point, he could recall feeling so scared that he didn’t want to even look.

Suddenly, he realized he was no longer in his room but was somewhere completely different – a location he recalled that he had “never seen anything like” previously. He further recalled that these mysterious surroundings were “stony”, which is an intriguing if discreet detail.

Many other abductees often recall their surroundings looking stone-like, with some even describing them as Biblical, while others also attest to seeing stone-like tables and furniture. Might we assume that these apparently advanced crafts, at least internally, are made from stone, or at the very least, or stone-like material? Or perhaps abductees are not taken onboard a futuristic spacecraft at all, but to some underground cave-like location?

There were, though, further revelations.

“That Wasn’t A Dream, Was It?”

Daniel further recalled seeing two strange beings standing in front of him. He described them as being tall with “real long fingers, big heads, (and) dark eyes”. At this point in the session, it appeared Daniel was recalling the entities walking towards him. Despite the fear he was clearly feeling, Daniel further described these strange beings, revealing that they had “no hair” and “no ears”, as well as a “mouth like a coin slot”.

Of more concern, the figure had “something in his hand” that looked “like a shiny stick”. He elaborated that this stick also appeared wand-like and that the figure was “making it move in front of him”. It then appears that the figure places the stick either on or even in the back of Daniel’s head – once more, another detail that shows up in multiple other abduction accounts (a stick-like device that is touched to the skin, often causing paralysis or placed to the head, sometimes resulting in visions or other transfers of information). Daniel would also offer that whatever this stick was, when it was placed to his head “it hurt”.

When Carpenter finally brought Daniel out from hypnosis – after more than two hours – he offered to him about his recollections that “that wasn’t a dream, was it Dan?”, to which Daniel replied, as if he had always known, “No”.

Carpenter also asked Daniel, before the session, about any strange “marks, bruises, or cuts” that he had suddenly noticed on his body, to which he replied that he could remember one specific time when he did indeed discover something strange.

He recalled waking up one morning and, like he did every morning, heading to the bathroom. However, this particular morning, he discovered a “spoon-shaped mark” on his left inner thigh. He immediately told his father of the mark, saying he didn’t know where it had come from or how he had got it. To his shock, his father had also discovered the exact same mark in the exact same place on his body.

Whatever the truth, Daniel was left in an extremely emotional state following the session – something we will return to very shortly. He did, though, offer to the Sightings television show that, “If it (alien abduction) has never happened to you, (then) feel fortunate”, adding that he wouldn’t “wish it upon anybody”. Carpenter also stated on the same television show that people who believe that “just watch TV and just think that this is entertainment” and that “people are just making it up” would perhaps feel different if they “sat through these (regression) sessions and felt these people’s confusion and trauma and absolute panic”.

Signs Of Abductions In A Third Generation

The Ahrens family not only believed that they – Dan and Joyce – and their two children had been victims of repeated alien abductions, but that at least one of their grandchildren had also received visits from these potentially ominous creatures – creatures, incidentally, that the grandchild referred to as his “little buddies that come into his room and play”. On one occasion, following what could have very likely have been another encounter, he even told his grandmother (Joyce) that he “wanted to watch the ship leave”.

To many in UFO and alien circles, this is not at all surprising, with many repeat abduction encounters taking place across multiple generations of the same family. There could be several reasons for this, perhaps not least something to do with the genetics of the family, and the fact that they, for some reason, are suitable for whatever agenda is behind these abduction encounters.

Just one of the many details often present in these repeat alien abduction encounters is the presence of strange implants, something Joyce also recalled. She recalled that during one of her abduction encounters, she recalled one of the beings taking a “very long needle” that was pressed to her right temple. Joyce further recalled hearing the device “crunch” as, she suspected, some tiny alien device was inserted into her head.

There is also the fact that some people, mainly skeptics of UFOs, in general, were more than suspicious that the Ahrens family might have concocted the whole affair before the hypnotic regression sessions took place.

However, as Carpenter points out, this suggestion, while not completely out of the question, rests upon them all knowing what the “trick questions and leading suggestions” were, and then how to successfully negotiate out of them. And these are most often unique to the person conducting the session, in this case, Carpenter.

He also highlights how there are simply “many details they wouldn’t know about that we would be looking for as markers for truthfulness and reliability with other abduction data”. In short, although not completely impossible, it would be highly, highly unlikely that four people would have been able to orchestrate such a hoax, and that they were, equally likely to be very credible people whose accounts should perhaps be treated more seriously than they might be from some.

Something Real But Exactly What Remains A Mystery

Of course, whether the Ahrens family is still experiencing these strange encounters remains, for the most part, unknown. And it appears that they have no desire to court mass publicity and wish, as much as they can, to lead what most would recognize as a “normal life”.

It is perhaps also worth mentioning an article that was posted on an Internet forum in 2002 ^[1] written by Dan Ahrens, in which, it was put forth that both of the Ahrens’ children had seemingly suffered significant long-lasting mental affects from the encounters. Dan Ahrens himself stated that he had significantly “more to lose than gain” by speaking of the encounters publicly, something which would appear to be accurate, and certainly a concern of many other abductees.

Ultimately, it would appear that there are many reasons to accept the credibility of the Ahrens family, and, in turn, that they very well were the victims of alien abduction, at least how we would collectively understand it.

Of course, we might consider that while the Ahrens are most certainly telling the truth, that the alien abduction encounters, while very real, are not cases of “alien abduction” at all, but some kind manifestation of the collective human mind. And while this is not a theory that we will explore in any depth here, given that we can be almost certain that the Ahrens family experienced something strange, it is a possibility that we must consider.

With this in mind, it is perhaps worth ending with some words of Joyce Ahrens, who stated in the Sightings television show that “if this (alien abduction encounters) is some kind of mental thing that’s happening to people, then why aren’t the scientists or the doctors or whatever trying to find a cure”. It is a fair point. And just one reason why academia, for the most part, turning its back on claims of alien abduction does humanity a great disservice, whatever the truth of the matter finally proves to be.

The video below explores this fascinating case.