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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To get an overwhelming sense of danger from a stranger?

676 replies

ThisIsCheese · 07/05/2019 09:57

The weirdest thing just happened. I’m in the supermarket and as I’m stood selected and bagging vegetables I suddenly feel very uncomfortable.
There is a man about 50 something stood with his elderly mother a few feet away to the side of me and I felt very sick and uncomfortable when I looked at him.
Absolutely no reason for it but it was overwhelming, like a sense of fear he was not a good man.

Completely clueless why I felt that way I moved along quickly but I crossed paths with him again in another aisle and knew he was there before I saw him because the sick / anxious feeling returned.

Anyone else ever had this? I don’t have anxiety or anything but this feeling was so odd, like I could sense he wasn’t a good person.

Never met him before, he could be perfectly lovely but my physical reaction to him was so strong Confused

OP posts:
Callywalls · 07/05/2019 10:35

I read in one of Paul O'Grady's autobiographies that, when he was younger, he worked in a hospital (as a Porter, I think) and that he was asked to take something into a female patient's room (I can't remember what it was). When he entered the room she was laid in bed with someone sat at the side of her. He said she smiled at him and was very friendly but he said he had never known a feeling like it - he felt as if he had just encountered pure evil. He later found out it was Myra Hindley who had been brought to hospital for treatment from prison and the person sat with her was a prison guard.

chaosisaladder · 07/05/2019 10:35

I work in a job where instincts are v important (a lot of lone working)

We pick up on body language and all sorts without even realising. I’ve been in danger and felt it from the minute I’ve met the person. You just know. I’ve had the heeby jeebies off randomers - act first, apologise later. Fuck politeness.

Hoppinggreen · 07/05/2019 10:38

I sometimes get bad vibes off people, maybe I’m wrong or maybe I’m right but I won’t risk it. I move away and avoid from then on
I’ve told DD the same, if somebody makes you feel uncomfortable don’t ignore your instincts just to be polite

DoneLikeAKipper · 07/05/2019 10:48

I had a case of this the other week. Last in line to use a cash machine by the local shop when suddenly two blokes turned up next to me. Not even in the line, stood far too close for personal comfort. It might have just been my brain working overtime, but I suddenly had a sense of dread that these guys were going to rob me at the cash point (we would have been completely alone after the next person used the machine). I decided to just go into the busy shop instead. They came in as well, not sure if they bought anything but I made sure they had long gone before I left.

As I said, could well have just been a moment of silly anxiety on my part. I’ve lived in pretty rough areas before though (live in an ok one now) and never had that sense of danger before.

Dvg · 07/05/2019 10:53

I've had this before, was in Sainsburys and nearly burst out crying, i had to leave because i felt really faintish and he wasn't even looking at me but every time i felt him near me i got this sense of doom or danger.

Saw his picture a few months later in the paper that he was arrested for kidnapping among other things and always thought it was strange that my body was telling me.

ALittleBitofVitriol · 07/05/2019 10:56

Yep. Glimpsed a guy on the street as I was walking to the train station. Immediate fear so I walked really fast to put distance between us.
He caught up and assaulted me.

princessTiasmum · 07/05/2019 11:03

This happened to e when i was about 22, my friend and i went into our local pub and a young man came and sat with us, he asked me if he could take me out,i said no,i had this awfu feeling about him, and he never stopped smiling strangely,
He then asked my friend,she said she would meet him the following night, i begged her not to go, because of that feeling of danger, she went, and he tried to rape her ,we found out later that his mother had told the police he had just been released from a mental hospital
Makes me shudder even now to think about it,
My friend was battered and covered in bruises

outvoid · 07/05/2019 11:06

I get this a lot more when I’m out with my DC. I feel the need to pull them closer when certain people are around. I’m sure those people are perfectly harmless and I’m just riddled with anxiety but there you go!

Ratonastick · 07/05/2019 11:07

famalam. Jesus. I went to school with that guy and knew him pretty well. I’ve moved away from the area so had completely missed this. That’s given me a jolt this morning.

HollowTalk · 07/05/2019 11:09

Re Paul O'Grady, it would be such a big deal that Myra Hindley was in the hospital that there's no way he wouldn't have known who she was.

I used to live in a top floor flat with my boyfriend and the TV needed to be fixed. We got someone through the local paper and I was alone when he got there. He fiddled around a bit with the TV - I don't think he knew any more than I did - and then he stood up to go. He stood blocking the doorway and just stared at me - in that moment I thought he was really dangerous and was going to rape me. And then my boyfriend arrived home and the guy just clicked back into normal mode. It was absolutely terrifying.

HollowTalk · 07/05/2019 11:11

famalam I don't know how that guy wasn't jailed for murder. Stabbing someone and chopping up their body doesn't sound like manslaughter.

chaosisaladder · 07/05/2019 11:13

alittlebit Flowers

HollowTalk · 07/05/2019 11:19

@ALittleBitOfVitriol, that sounds terrifying. Did they catch the guy?

Callywalls · 07/05/2019 11:21

@HollowTalk - I'm only repeating what I read in Paul's book. I think he was very young at the time so it must have been many years ago (no offence Paul) Maybe for security reasons it was not openly discussed in the hospital that she was a patient - I hardly think they would make a big announcement!! but, obviously, people knew and someone told him when he came out of the room. His description of the chills he felt when he looked at her struck me - much like many other posters have said they felt something "off" about someone.

recklessgran · 07/05/2019 11:23

I feel like this about our window cleaner - no idea why but he just gives me the creeps. Odd really because I'm not an anxious person at all and generally friendly and confident. I can't even answer the door to him so get DH to deal with him. It's weird I do agree.

HollowTalk · 07/05/2019 11:31

Better to do your windows yourself, @recklessgran, or get someone else to do them. I wouldn't take the risk.

recklessgran · 07/05/2019 11:36

@Hollowtalk you might be right actually!

BlueberrySkies · 07/05/2019 11:40

@recklessgran Indropped a window cleaner because he made me uneasy! I wonder where you are (roughly)!!

recklessgran · 07/05/2019 11:45

@Blueberry I'm very rural Northamptonshire.

onalongsabbatical · 07/05/2019 11:50

Yes if I felt like this about my window cleaner I'd get another one. And let's face it window cleaning is one of those jobs where you could choose to do it in order to be up to no good (not casting aspersions on the vast majority of window cleaners!). Trust your instincts.

Inertia · 07/05/2019 11:53

Not quite the same as it doesn't really involve a sense of danger as such, but I once had to visit someone who was supervising one of my students for work experience. The visit involved asking general questions about his organisation/ role, and the activities that my student was taking part in. I've never sensed such outright hostility and 'warning off' from somebody who was superficially polite ( we obviously spoke to the students individually too, so they had the opportunity to voice concerns, and this particular student had a parent working within the same organisation which reassured me). Soon after, the man was convicted of embezzling huge sums from the organisation he worked for.

Famalamaringwrong · 07/05/2019 11:54

@HollowTalk they said he had some kind of learning difficulties/memory loss around the incident so they couldn't get a murder charge - my experience was he does not he was just a very sly man. At least he got put away for a long time - I hope he never gets released.

@Ratonastick do you mean Hilder or Guy? Sorry to give you a shock!

TeaForTheWin · 07/05/2019 11:55

Sure. I mean there are plenty of people you notice walking down a street and instantly think 'that person is a sociopath' lol.

But I think on occasion it can be heightened when people are having bad thoughts/intentions towards you too. That would explain the anxiety. Maybe something like a facial cue. Maybe you detected malice or hate.

I don't think its some psychic warning about how they are awful people, I think we are just good at reading body language/feeling people looking at us hatefully or just sensing danger in general.

Reminds me of that clip there was of a woman being followed by a man (unbeknown to her) and a dog nearby noticed and was up watching him closely before he even went to attack her. Maybe it's some sort of thermone change people who are more aggressive or want to cause harm give off and dogs sometimes notice it better.

ALittleBitofVitriol · 07/05/2019 11:58

Thanks chaosisaladder

HollowTalk
No, the police never caught up with him. They were nice enough but after taking my statement I never heard anything.
It was more surreal than terrifying in the moment. I'm not a small person and was a decent match for him so I was able to get away after a minimal assault and scream.

janeybumtum · 07/05/2019 12:05

I never liked my mum's friend and got a very bad vibe around her. My mum was insistent that she was lovely, caring and completely harmless. I'd been saying I thought something was off about her for about 3 years. A couple of days ago I found out that she goes round funerals of people she's never met, befriends vulnerable/elderly widows and uses this as a ploy to extract money from them or commit identity theft. My mum is absolutely stunned, I'm not.