Do you ever get a strange feeling about someone ( or something?)

[Trixiefirecracker]

I recently met someone, just a friend of a friend, and had a really visceral gut feeling about her and not in a good way. It made me feel so uncomfortable and I felt really awkward around her, like she might know what I was thinking. I have no idea why this happened and has never happened before, there was no obvious reason for it. She was perfect polite. However It felt like all the hairs stood up on the back of my neck and something about her really rattled me.Has anyone else ever had this experience and were they ‘right’ about their gut feeling?

Yes but it's usually OCD. I have to ignore it or I wouldn't leave the house.

Duh, why has that been hidden? It's a link to an interview with Gavin de Becker.

I’ve had visceral reactions to people but I’ve never followed them up afterwards. I just do everything I can to get the hell away or grey rock if I’m stuck.

Once I was meeting a guy for a date and as I was walking to where we were meeting, I started slowing down, my legs getting harder and harder to move and I was overwhelmed by the most awful sense of dread and it became an intense panic attack. He would have been waiting around the corner about 300 yards away.

Once I could breathe again, I turned around and started walking in the other direction, I couldn’t even look behind me. That makes it sound like a decision but it was my body taking over and just moving, moving.

I’d already met him, chatted over a coffee and he seemed quite ok. It was odd, but even thinking about it has me feeling a bit nauseous. I’ve absolutely no idea if that was justified or not.

On the other hand I’ve been deeply drawn to some dark characters. There was a child I taught on a work experience placement who was brilliantly intelligent but from a terrible background and he’s now a not insignificant gangland figure in that area. He was 100% my favourite pupil.

And I was raped by a man I found intensely compelling. Moth to a flame. People always say to trust your fear instincts but mine were wired backwards in that case.

Was that in reaction to @Hoppyhops , I'm also interested in what the item was haha

Out of interest why did you think baby clothes? My OH can be really superstitious about second hand items picking up vibes from former owners lol

Yes, it was.

Absolutely- here’s a whole book about gut feelings Blink by Malcolm Gladwell

”our world requires that decisions be sourced and footnoted, and if we say how we feel, we must also be prepared to elaborate on why we feel that way...We need to respect the fact that it is possible to know without knowing why we know and accept that - sometimes - we're better off that way”

“Anyone who has ever scanned the bookshelves of a new girlfriend or boyfriend- or peeked inside his or her medicine cabinet- understands this implicitly; you can learn as much - or more - from one glance at a private space as you can from hours of exposure to a public face.”

I don't know why I thought of baby clothes tbh.

This kind of chat unfortunately exposes not just confirmation bias but prejudice.
Lots of people ‘have a bad feeling’ about groups that they have been taught harm them subliminally or explicitly.
see Eammon Holmes/ Jeremy Clarkson having a bad feeling about Meghan or the well documented white womens fear of black men.

It was the first thing that came into my mind. I really want to find out what the item was now!

I have met a lot of very nasty people through work. Some give me the creeps, others don't.
A couple of incidents come to mind, one man that had been grooming young girls was physically very attractive and personable. It just seemed really off he was accused of grooming. He was guilty though but some how his appearance distracted my senses I think.
Another time I was told to go and find the client in the waiting room, I'd know who it was. I walked into a waiting room at court full of people and instantly knew who the client was, another pedophile. The colleague with me that had said I'd just know felt the same and said everyone who meet him seemed to know. He gave off such strong nasty vibes but was a little old man.
Worryingly I've had several occasions when the defence solicitors gave me the creeps as well, always men.

I don't think we are prejudice by having bad feelings. MLK wanted his son to be judged by the content of his character. I would like to think we have moved a lot from the 1960s.

The bloke I didn't have bad feelings about was super friendly nice and chatty. He is white. Still murdered a child.

As a 15 year old used to walk past a house where the man often sat on his step smoking , I'd get a odd feeling about him and would cross the road .
Walked past one day to see a policeman outside the house, turned out he'd been sexually abusing his own kids and the eldest daughter had told her boyfriend and the boyfriend had stabbed and murdered him.

I agree with the posts about our lizard brain and gut instinct telling you that something wasnt right. However, it might be that she exhibited certain body language, eye movements or micro expressions that you have experienced in the past to be associated with danger or untrustworthy people- dont forget our brains draw from years of experience of interacting with people and then log certain behaviours to be associated with untrustworthiness. Our brains work by using the past to predict the future and that is how our brains work to keep us safe. This also explains phobias, so if you were once bitten by a dog, your brain stores that information as fact that any time you meet future dogs, not matter how gentle they are in reality, your brain sees them as a threat causing a fight or flight reaction. Therefore, it makes total sense that your brain concluded from this that something was wrong. However, this doesnt objectively mean that SHE is a bad person with ill intent, it might just be that the way she carried herself subconsciously meant your brain was sounding the alert based on past experience (which you may not even consciously remember).

There are certain behaviours that the majority of people associate with untrustworthiness- eg lack of eye contact, shifty body language, someone fidgeting a alot etc but often that may be due to conditions like autism or ADHD etc so it doesnt always follow that a certain type of behaviour = cant be trusted.

I am not saying you shouldnt listen to your gut instincts because you absolutely should, but the fact that the brain uses our past experiences to predict the future is exactly why some people immediately pick up on untrustworthy people, others get it completely wrong and others are manipulated by people who groom them for malicious intent and are completely blindsided by that person being an abuser.

😁

@Hoppyhops Can I please ask what the item was? @kagerou We would really like to know please x Thank you x

Oh my!

Oh absolutely. About two years ago I saw a woman from a distance and instantly knew something was ‘off’. As I walked past she started questioning me about my dogs….didn’t fuss them or smile, just asked how old they were and where I was going,,,,,was I going to the very large park across the road? I knew she was planning to steal them so I asked why she wanted to know and she came up with a load of rubbish about how she used to be a dog walker. A dog walker who has no affection towards dogs🙄.

I posted on Next Door to warn people but obviously a lot of them made fun of me, partly because the woman was wearing white lace gloves for some reason. Anyway a few days later a little dog was stolen. I can prove it was her but I suspect it was.

I sometimes wonder if I can spot sociopaths because I’m autistic and I’m looking more at body language rather than focusing on what’s being said. There have been other incidences where someone has been popular and I’ve just known. I feel like they know I see them too.

I've autism too. Wonder if that is a factor?

Not a person, but a place. I'm the least "woo" person, but I had a really weird experience when we were visiting wedding venues a few years back. One place looked perfect on paper and they were having an open day.

We walked around the grounds, which were beautiful. I started getting quite excited that this could be my venue, then we walked inside and I just got the most dreadful feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Even my DM asked me if I was OK because the colour had drained out of me and I went silent for the rest of the tour. I could not get out of there quick enough and had to break it to a still excited STBDH that I would never be stepping foot in there again!

I'm guessing the gloves were too cover her prints so assume her dabs are in HOLMES! I.e. she's been nicked before!

This horrible male colleague who constantly made me feel uncomfortable. I’d be completely normal, but he would single me out for being shy or quiet in a group. He’d insist on seeing pictures of me outside of work. He’d try to hold my hand (but would also do this with all other female colleagues so he had a reputation of being “one of the girls”.) Cutting a long story short, he was sacked for sexually assaulting a colleague. I’d already distanced myself from him at that point, as his behaviour did start to escalate with me ie asking when the last time I had sex was etc. thinking back, from the day I met him, I thought he was gross.

I felt like that at Posh Country House in Wales. Then saw the pagan stone circle where they made sacrifices... Was very glad to leave

I think we tend to see the person rather than the mask. That’s why I always question this autistic masking thing. I think neurotypicals mask and we generally see right through it and that causes confusion….like why won’t this person connect with me authentically? A sociopath is all mask and no authenticity at all.

Some autistics will attempt to mask but most of us are really bad at it! I don’t think neurotypicals are aware that they’re masking.

I know some may think it's crazy but I've definitely had that feeling several times and I've been right every single time. I'll narrate 2 experiences.

DH were dating then, we had been together for about 6 months or so. He started introducing me to family and friends of his and I met a particular male friend of his. DH said they had been friends since college days and was one of his closest friends. We gave each other side hug and exchange pleasantries. I can't explain it but a feeling of dread just overwhelmed me when we hugged. I just knew something about him wasn't right. I'm the kind of person that always speak up when I'm feeling a certain way so I told DH. He didn't really take me seriously. I just told him to be careful around his "friend". Long story short, friend wanted my DH to take out a big loan on his behalf and wanted to secure the loan using my DH's house. DH said no of course. Well he went ahead and did fraudulent activities and attempted to take out the loan out anyway, forged signatures, the whole 9 yards. Not sure how he thought he could get away with it tbh. That was the end of that friendship.

The other one was when me and DH once met a man at church and we usually socialize after service. It was him and his family's 1st time visiting so we went over to greet him. I shook his hand and that same feeling of dread. I couldn't shake it. On our way home I told my DH that I don't think that man was a good person and although DH may have been a bit skeptical of my "assumption", he has learnt over the years to trust my judgement. Every time I saw that man I got the same feeling. His wife and I actually became a bit close via a mutual friend and I would occasionally invite her and the kids over to our house. She broke down one day and told us her H has been abusing her in every way possible. I can't even type some of the horrors he's done to her. A week ago he actually broke her leg. Another mutual friend and I have been encouraging her to leave, offered help etc but it's been a back and forth, she'll leave and then go back. I just knew my feeling was valid as usual.

I would just like to say woman in question was definitely not ND. I know this because she is good friends with a friend of mine. She also (as one poster commented) wasn’t displaying any outward signs, like holding eye contact for too long or behaving in an odd manner in any way. She was chatty and engaging and very pleasant on the surface. There didn’t seem to be any reason why I felt this way and no one else there felt an ‘off’ vibe at all.