Just goes to show you that you should never ever ignore your intuition. Read More Lifestyle
Recently, I asked women in the Buzzfeed community to tell me about times when they listened to their gut instincts, and it likely ended up saving their lives.
A close-up of a person’s face gazing upward, showing their focused expression. Background is softly blurred
From escaping near-death experiences, to avoiding assault, these women did not ignore their gut feelings, and that likely saved them. Here are some of the most jawdrop-inducing responses I came across:
Note: Not all submissions are from the BuzzFeed Community. Some are from this Reddit thread.
1.”My friend and I were out on a Saturday night with some of her friends whom I’d never met. I’m an anxious person, so when I’m out with a group of new people, I don’t drink. It was around 1 a.m., and my friend was trashed.”
Close-up of a car’s side-view mirror and door, reflecting light
“I called an Uber, and was half carrying her out of the bar to the street. A car pulls up with an Uber sticker — the same make and model of the car we were assigned. I got in first and then pulled my friend in basically onto my lap. The door was still open, and I asked the driver for his name. He said ‘I’m your Uber,’ and I said, ‘OK, what is your name?’ And he again said, ‘This is your Uber,’ and asked me to shut the door. I immediately got a bad feeling, and essentially pushed my friend out of the car onto the cement and fell out myself. The car takes off with the door still open. Two minutes later, another Uber pulls up. An hour later, after talking to police, we learned this had happened to several other women in town, and two were still missing. Scares me still, and I pray for those women.
2.”I was a college student in a large midwest city and had evening classes. My safety plan was pepper spray, while always keeping an eye on my surroundings and moving like a bat out of hell to get to my car, which was parked in a parking lot near campus. One day, this guy and I started chatting, and I kept seeing him around. He was always friendly and pleasant. He had friends he would hang out with, and I always saw them around. The thing that stood out to me was the fact that they always wore the same clothes.”
“I started getting bad vibes and stayed away from them as best I could, but to no avail; they saw me on campus and said they wanted to ‘show me something.’ I cautiously followed and then left quickly. They wanted to show me the inside of an empty room. I skipped the next class and reported them to school security. Turns out they were unhoused and sexually assaulting women on campus. Had that door closed, there’s no telling what could’ve happened to me.”
—Anonymous
3.”When I was 21, one of my friends from high school tried to fix me up with a guy friend of theirs. Something inside of me compelled me to say, ‘Nah.’ And I did, which proved to be a good idea. Because within a week of turning down the date, this person was arrested for lewd acts with a minor.”
A person in a hooded sweatshirt stands with their back to the camera, surrounded by darkness, creating a mysterious and dramatic effect
—Anonymous
4.”It was back in college in the early 2010s. I had gone to a grocery store in the city alone, and two women were outside talking by the inside entrance after you passed the shopping carts. They approached me all friendly, asking if I was a woman of God or if I went to church. I went along politely, but I got a weird vibe from them.”
“At the end of the conversation, they’d asked for my phone number to meet for a bible study church group sort of thing. Being a stupid teenager, I gave it to them but ignored their text and never met them. It wasn’t until years later, when I read about a trafficking scheme at that particular grocery store in the news, that I realized how lucky I was.”
—Kayleigh from Buffalo, NY
5.”I used to live in a small rural town and never worried about locking my door unless I was going out of town. One night, I woke up and immediately felt that I needed to lock the door. I did and went back to bed. An hour later, I woke up to lights and sirens all over town. A high-speed chase ended in my town where the driver fled on foot. They found him just down the street hiding in someone’s unlocked garage.”
Police car with flashing lights at night, parked on a street lined with traffic cones, indicating an active scene or road closure
—Anonymous from Wisconsin
6.”A guy who hated me in high school (we were friends-turned-enemies because he became possessive of me so I put a stop to our ‘friendship’) started driving back and forth in front of my house one day. When he saw me out front, he stopped and asked me to get in the truck and talk things over with him. I thought it was weird because we did not get along anymore, at all. I felt scared. Instead of answering him, I ran inside.”
A person sits inside a car at night, seen through a rain-covered windshield, creating a contemplative atmosphere
“The next day, someone found a burned body at a trailhead. It was a lady who was the owner of the truck that guy was driving; his roommate. He had strangled her to death for her money and truck. The police questioned me about him because they knew we had a history (he lied to the police and told them I was stalking him when it was him who would follow me around school, taunting me. He put a restraining order on me, claiming I threatened to kill him. I did no such thing). The police told me that the woman’s body was in the back of the pickup the day he tried to get me in the truck. They said I was lucky because they thought he was planning on killing me, too. I had to testify at the murder trial. He got put away for life.”
—Zin from Alaska
7.”20 years old, staying at a house in Malibu with my new husband. We were invited to a party at Michael Douglas’s home. As I was getting a drink, I felt my skin crawl. I turned about and saw a dark-haired man staring at me across an enormous room. I asked a nearby guest who that intense man was. She responded, ‘Anton LeVey, the pope of the first Church of Satan.’ After breaking the hypnotic stare, I told my husband I was feeling unwell, and we left the party and town that night.”
Candles surround a stone pentagram on the floor, with additional candles on a rectangular stone object
—Anonymous, 71 from California
8.”I used to live in a somewhat sketchy area of Chicago. I would never go out late by myself, would always Uber to/from places, etc. When I adopted my dog, I would take him to a nearby park and I got a little more bold, taking him out later, perhaps pushing my luck thinking I had a somewhat scary dog and tall girl energy. As I was thinking of wrapping up one day, I watched my dog and every other dog in the park suddenly stiffen, looking at some people on the other side of the park.”
“Every other owner there paid zero attention. My dog looked at me, and then back at the group of people. It was dusk on a Saturday in the summer. I don’t know why, but at that moment, I just knew something was about to go down. I shouted his name, and he instantly came (THANK GOD FOR RECALL), and about 30 seconds later, I heard gunshots fired. Not just gunshots but, shortly after, what sounded like a freaking machine gun in response. We took cover behind a car and then immediately sprinted home. We moved a month later. Just a reminder to pay attention to your surroundings. More often than not, nature, animals, our pets, etc., can sense when something is amiss. When we tune that out, we lose a valuable and potentially life-saving connection.”
—Amy, 30, from Chicago
9.”Went on a walk on the boardwalk after work on a beautiful spring afternoon. The boardwalk was crowded. But this one guy with long hair and a hoodie immediately set off that little voice in my head. I walked a few blocks and couldn’t shake the feeling he was following me. I turned off the boardwalk and he followed me up the street.”
“I panicked and J-walked across the street in front of a hotel with lots of windows so I could see if he followed me via the window reflection. Sure enough, he did. I started picking up my pace, and thankfully, this girl my age turned the corner with her massive pitbull. As she was passing me, I told her to please walk with me. Without skipping a beat, she walked with me, the man immediately ran off in the opposite direction. Right after that, an undercover police car rolled up and the cop asked if that man had been following me. He said they had had problems with him in the past and that I should go home immediately. If someone triggers that inner voice, listen to it.”
—Lindsey, 33, from Delaware
10.”I had just come back from grocery shopping, and the second I came inside, I felt VIOLENTLY ill. Like a migraine and the flu at once. All I wanted to do was fall asleep. For some reason, though, my brain kept nagging me to bring the rest of the groceries up (non-perishable). Even though I felt like death, I forced myself to go down and get the remaining items. As I came up the stairs, I was at eye level with the kitchen stove, where I noticed that the stove was turned on. I must have bumped the gas knob while doing dishes and unknowingly had a gas leak. I honestly think if I had gone to bed, I would not have woken up.”
Gas stove burner lit with a blue flame
11.”I was in an abusive relationship for two years. And for many years after leaving my abuser, I was angry at myself for not fighting back. I felt like I hadn’t fought for myself, and that made me feel like I was complicit in my abuse. I was seeing an incredible therapist, doing a lot of EMDR and other kinds of trauma therapy. And I brought these feelings up during a session where we were revisiting a specific memory of physical abuse. My therapist looked me in the eye and said, ‘Your body has three instinctive responses: fight, flight, and freeze. You froze. Tell me, what would’ve happened if you had tried to run that day?'”
“I thought about it and knew right away. He would have caught me and killed me. I told her as much, and she nodded and asked, ‘And if you’d fought back?’ I told her he would’ve killed me, and it would’ve been horrible. He would have made it hurt as much as possible. Then she said: ‘You did the only thing you could have possibly done to save your life that day.’ I still carry those words with me. Sometimes the gut knows things years before the mind catches up, and if I had tried to do what I thought was ‘right’ on that day, I wouldn’t have survived.”
—Sarah, 37, from Washington
12.”In college, I went to sleep in my dorm room on a weekend night, and my roommate was away for the weekend. I must not have locked my door before going to bed because as I was falling asleep, I heard someone open my door, saw the light from the hallway, and heard low chattering. I did not recognize the voices, and I could tell what they were trying to do. My instinct told me if I turned over, they would get startled and run away and that’s exactly what happened. The next day I realized they stole my keys, ID, and credit card off my dresser. While I was able to get all of that replaced, I always wondered what would have happened if I hadn’t rolled over.”
—Anonymous, 42, from Vermont
13.”I was walking home from work in the dark, turned a corner, and a man was already walking on the path through the park in the direction I wanted to go. He turns and sees me walking behind him, and he slows his walking speed, so I have to pass him. It just gave me a bad feeling, so I slowed right down so I didn’t approach him, ridiculously slow.”
“A guy walking a dog was coming down the path towards us, and the creepy guy stopped to talk to him. At that moment, he was distracted, and I left the path and hid behind a tree in the darkness. The dude with the dog walks away, and the creepy guy looks back down the path, looking for me, but I wasn’t there anymore. Then, the creepy guy walked around the other side of the sports building looking for me. If I had just turned and gone back the way I had come, he would have popped out from behind the building. My gut was right, I saw the moment to hide and took it. So glad I did and didn’t dismiss it as being silly.”
Do you have a story about when a gut feeling might have saved your life? Share it in the comments!
Note: Responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
