When has your gut told you something you couldn’t otherwise have known?

[ButterGutter]

Just wondering really. Recently I knew a friend had got engaged on a particular dat despite having had NO discussions with her about it at all with this man. I just knew. I don’t know how.

Even more recently I could tell something was wrong with a neighbour and they were ill. I hadn’t been told anything or heard anything. I just felt I knew something was wrong and when I did find out for sure, she fell ill on the day I had sensed it.

What is this? It’s spooked me a bit. I guess it’s probably senses that you’re not aware of as you’re used to certain things and so any shift in interaction or environment then you may subconsciously know something?

I knew the sex of my baby. No doubt in my mind he would be a boy from the moment I found out, people all laughed at me when I said I just know it’s a boy. No surprise from me at the scan when it was confirmed 🤷🏻‍♀️. Not a gender preference on my part at all, I wasn’t bothered for boy or girl. But I knew he was a boy

I knew I was going to have a son and what he would look like during my embryo transfer. The image just flashed in front of me as DH helped me out but it sank to my bones it was so eerie & I thought nothing of it until we had the scans. When DS was born and he looked exactly how I knew he would, I tried to understand how I could have known & apparently, according to my HV, it’s really common. That’s why they include ‘maternal gut instinct’ as referral criteria for pregnancy and post-natal referrals.

I have this all the time. Sometimes I wish I sensed less. I'd prefer to be oblivious more often than not!

Extraordinary Knowing by Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer addresses this issue and the science (yes, there is some) that might explain the phenomenon.

I knew that my first baby was a boy - it was a girl.

I knew I was miscarrying, despite reassurances by the GP that hormone levels were still high. I just didn't feel pregnant one morning. (happy ending though, had my 2nd little boy after 3 miscarriages)

@tunainatin

I knew I was miscarrying, despite reassurances by the GP that hormone levels were still high. I just didn't feel pregnant one morning. (happy ending though, had my 2nd little boy after 3 miscarriages)

Yes, me too. I remember once even having a dream of giving birth only to find I didn’t have a child & when I woke up I was bleeding. I guess I had gone through it so much my brain knew and was preparing me for it.

I knew the day my sister died. It was coming anyway and we had seen her the day before.

I had a dream that night where my deceased grand parents (who I hadn't thought about in months) told me they would take care of her. She died that morning.

I'm not a very superstitious person but the things I experienced in the week she died really made me question a lot of things. There were all kind of weird things going on that week.

DP was fixing a large mirror to the wall in the bathroom. I asked if he needed help but he said he just had to put in a couple of screws (the mirror was already fixed on the wall) so I went out to get milk & bread. While I was out I just knew something awful had had happened.

When I got back to the flat, sure enough, if was like a scene from a horror film, blood everywhere.
He had decided that the mirror needed moving slightly and it cracked, the main part had severed an artery and 3 tendons in his wrist, he was on the phone to the ambulance people and on the verge of passing out. I wrapped a towel around the cut, putting pressure on the cut & held it above his heart.

Luckily, we lived near a hospital & he made a full recovery.

I know a lady who knows if someone is pregnant (before they do) and what they're having. I think she'd like to know where her info comes from as it seems to feel like she's always known it.

I get really, really vivid and accurate deja vu, sometimes I'll have a dream and then many months later that exact thing will happen.

I find it quite creepy at times. I even had a dream about a particular incident whilst working from home, except it wasn't my home. Anyway, we ended up moving house and this was my new lounge I didnt know I was going to have, and the wfh incident happened.

My best one was my friend came back from the US and was telling me about the new FRIENDS episode she watched. I was able to tell her exactly about the episode, the lines said and everything but the episode hadnt even been broadcast in the UK yet and this was pre internet so no chance I could have known. My friend was creeped.

Nidan

You have to tell us what the wfh incident was now!

That my ex was cheating - we were in a long distance relationship.

That my aunt was going to die within less then 2 days.

That the coworker who seemed overly nice was actually a snake.

@Chachasha

Nidan

You have to tell us what the wfh incident was now!

nothing crazy exciting. Just a call where a customer said something really quite vile which resulted in me calling the Police which in my line of work is fairly run of the mill albeit each one is memorable.

My mother always knows when I'm not feeling well, even when I haven't told her. She'll ring and say "is everything alright?" and I mightn't want to worry her so I'll say it is, but she just knows.

We'll also often ring each other at exactly the same time.

I have this a lot. I frequently hear someones name in my head and within a minute or so I bump into them or they message/call me. I have had dreams about random family members and received bad news about them the next morning. I sometimes get an incredibly unsettled feeling when I meet someone and have learned to listen to that instinct. I don't talk about it much as I know people roll their eyes! I am generally the least 'woo' person you could imagine so I find it fairly odd myself tbh.

I have another friend who wrote to me from a remote place in the world (pre social media) where she was travelling. She wanted to know what was wrong with my family on a certain date three weeks earlier. We hadn't spoken to her and this was before people kept in touch by email, hence the letter taking three weeks to arrive. As a family we were recovering from a traumatising accident that had taken place in the home on that night. A family member (a child) was hospitalised as a result of the accident during that night but had gone on to make a full recovery. My friend was woken up by the awareness that something bad had happened to the family but didn't know who (out of the six of us) it involved. She spent the night in prayer for my family as she's religious and she felt that was the purpose of being woken. She knew when the crisis was over and she could sleep again. But was concerned and curious about why it had been necessary.

They wanted to deliver DS2 at 38 weeks. I had a really strong instinctive feeling this was too early. I arranged to see a paediatrician who reassured me that there was nothing to be gained from staying pregnant longer as I was full term and had had steroids several days earlier. He was born by ELCS and was grunting. At 3 hours old he was taken to SCBU and put on oxygen. I was a bit upset but mostly completely unsurprised, I just knew he wouldn't be ready🤷‍♀️

My mum met her partner about 16 years ago. From the start, something felt off about him, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. About 6 years ago, I started to have the urge to search to find out more about his background. He was recently divorced when they met with two teenage daughters who refused to have contact with him and the usual ‘crazy ex-wife who took all his money’ story. I started trying to find any sort of criminal record because my gut just told me something was off. I searched for years, every few months. Found nothing. They live abroad and it’s much easier to find criminal records publicly there than here in the UK.

Finally, one day about 2 years ago, I spend hours trying to search out information. And finally records of a court case popped up. I did some more digging, ended up hiring a PI in their country, and discovered that he has a conviction for sexually abusing his daughter. (I eventually confronted them, my mum admitted she always knew and is okay with it because he feels bad about it now and needless to say I am NC with them both now). My therapist said when I told her, your gut did an amazing job of keeping your dc safe and you should be thankful for that.

Incidentally, I worked for a children’s charity many years ago where part of my work involved vetting volunteers. I had one guy come through who just made me feel a bit sick to my stomach. Again I couldn’t have told you why. He was just wrong. I told my line manager and she agreed that we needed to reject his volunteer application. He made a complaint about the organisation as a result and I got a bit of a talking to by the director, but they did ultimately reject him as a volunteer on a technicality. 6 months later, there he was in the news having been arrested for grooming a 13 year old girl online and attempting to meet her to abuse her.

So appears I have a very good gut instinct but it’s frankly all a little bit grim.

It seems to happen with people with whom I'm not close.
I stared at the back of a colleague's bare arm once at an event thinking that something to do with the skintone or consistency didn't look quite right and wondering if she was OK (she was rushing around as usual so no obvious signs she was at all unwell) a few weeks later she went off sick and within two months had died of cancer. She was a very private person and none of us had any idea (and still don't really) until soon after she went off sick what was going on.

I knew my colleague was pregnant just from the way she was smiling on a Zoom call the other week! She's not announced it yet but my line manager confirmed it was true to me privately.

I've also twice taken DS1 to A&E thinking I'd kick up a massive fuss if they sent us home as I knew something was wrong. Both times it turned out he was seriously ill. We've been in A&E with him countless times, but I've never really had that feeling on other occasions.

I have a really icky feeling about a colleague, that he's violent towards his partner. I have literally zero indication that he is and I haven't even ever met her, but it really wouldn't surprise me if something came out about this in years to come. He's also recently "decided to step down" from a middle management role, which I suspect might be for misconduct...

When my mum was dying I went to see her (I lived 100med from my home town ) but decided to say my goodbyes before she lost consciousness ( morphine) and return home.
Two days later we were sat watching the TV around 10pm and a really cold feeling spread from my feet up my legs through my whole body. It was such a weird feeling. Ten minutes later my dad rang to say that mum had just died. Obviously knew she was dying but it was before mobile phones so wasn’t getting a regular update since my dad and sisters were at the hospital.
My special power at work is sensing when patients are pregnant, early stages, I just get a very strong feeling. Can’t explain it but 99% right.

When a friend years ago told me she was marrying her boyfriend at the time, my heart physically sank. Such a distinctive feeling.
I put it down to being worried/envious in a selfish way about 'losing' her to marriage and parenthood.
But after they'd been married for a bit, and had a DC, he turned out to be controlling, abusive and an alcoholic, plus was fucking her over financially. She's still dealing with the consequences.
But of course you can't say to a dear friend 'Don't marry him, my stomach just sank like a stone,' can you.

Nidan2Sandan

How horrible for you

With each of my 3 pregnancies around the 6 week mark ,I had a dream and knew what sex they would be and what name they should be called . All accurate and very weird 😕