It’s usually a good idea to listen to your gut.
There’s some kind of switch that just turns in your body when you know you’re in a bad situation that could get really ugly, really fast.
I’m sure most of us have been in that position at least a few times, and it’s always a dilemma to figure out if you should flee or stay.
Let’s check out these stories from AskReddit users who decided to stay in situations that felt super sketchy to them.
1. Sketchy AF
Got invited to a “party” by a random guy. I went with him as I was dr**k and thought “Sure, why not?”
This entailed going to a run down house. To enter the house we had to climb in through a window where there were five people sat in a circle made of half broken chairs and a moldy couch.
After entering the window the guy locked it behind him, it was at this point I instantly felt sober again and realized that something was wrong.
That’s when the crack c*caine and her*in came out. A woman who was part of the circle who apparently owned the house started telling a story about how her husband had hung himself in the stairwell, her kids had been taken away and that she kept a sharpened screwdriver under her pillow in case “they” came for her.
I was well past wanting to leave at this point, I didn’t have an escape though and my nervousness showed, that’s when paranoia set in within the “circle”, the guy who had brought me there had become incredibly tense, the slightest noise and he would flip out.
He stood by the curtains peeping through mumbling to himself about the police watching him. I had to prove I wasn’t wearing a “wire” at this point.
Before long however the drugs began to run out, this made the paranoia be temporarily forgotten. I saw a chance here and said I had money and I could buy more drugs, the guy said he would book a taxi for us to go in.
About 15 minutes later a taxi turned up, he unlocked the window and I jumped out first and slammed it shut behind me, ran as fast as I could towards the taxi, jumped in the front seat and just shouted “DRIVE!, DRIVE!” to the taxi driver who took off down the street and to the safety of home.”
2. Terrible.
“Mum’s new boyfriend.
My siblings and I never discussed it until years later but we avoided talking to him, left a room he entered, and hated going to mum’s place when he was there. We had no control over the situation as we were children with divorced parents. I was probably around ten.
Many years later mum actually told us why she left him – because she found out he was a pedophile.”
3. Sharks in the water.
“Was on a camper van trip up the East Coast of Australia and stopped at Bondi for a few nights.
On our last morning there, my friend had some work to get done on his laptop, so I decided to head out for a surf by myself to k**l a few hours.
No one else was surfing, the water was murky and anyone that’s surfed knows you can start to get a feeling the water is a little ‘sharky’.
I left the water unscathed and told my mate about the eerie feeling I’d had. We both headed back to our home towns, only for him to tag me in a news report about a guy that had been attacked while surfing alone at that exact spot one week later.
Have had a few other ‘encounters’ in that part of the world and every single time you get a bit of a feeling in your stomach beforehand.”
4. Wedding day.
“I got this feeling on my wedding day to my now ex husband. Getting my hair & makeup done, putting on the big white dress, listening to how excited everyone was, and the entire time I felt white and sick to my stomach.
It was like a burning ball inside me, and I felt cold all over. I kept wanting to hide, and I remember my Dad jokingly saying “We can still make a run for it!” and I wish now I’d of taken him up on it.
Not even three months after the wedding, he started picking out what I could wear (you shouldn’t be wearing pants, women should wear skirts & dresses!), complaining that I wasn’t working TWO jobs instead of just one, and not ever letting me out of his sight when I was home from work (I couldn’t even walk to the mailbox alone).
A month or so after that, when I’d had enough and started pushing back, he attacked me and started hitting me, right in front of his brother.
I remember begging his brother to help me, and instead he sneered and said “Women like you get what you deserve”, and when I yelled that I would call the cops, my husband said “Go ahead, I have many cop friends.”
The very next day I made a phone call to an old school friend telling him my address and that I would be at the end of the road at a certain time. When my husband was outside working on his boat, I threw a few clothes into a bag and ran.
Filed for divorce and never looked back. Ended up working two jobs (haha) and living with my grandmother until I could get back on my feet. Listen to your gut ladies. It might save you a lot of bruises and maybe even your life!”
5. My ex.
“My ex-boyfriend.
I started to get the feeling that he was lying about things, but it was only little things. I tried to brush off the thought that he was lying about random stuff.
I stayed with him another 4 months, then realized he was also lying about a drug addiction, stealing my money I was giving him for rent, and not paying our bills.
I probably should’ve trusted my gut and left sooner.”
6. Listen to those warning bells.
“In my 30s, my husband was having an affair and I was sick of staying home alone, so I went to a dance club in Boise by myself.
I had a fantastic time and met a friendly couple, James and Tammy, ended up spending most of the night with them laughing, dancing, joking. Just really fun, open people.
We shut the place down, and out on the sidewalk Tammy says, “Want to go for pancakes?”
“That’s a great idea! I’m starved,” I said. “My car’s around the corner. Should I just follow you to the restaurant?”
“No, don’t do that! We’ll give you a ride, then bring you back,” said Tammy.
“Thank you!” I said. “I’m worn out from all that dancing, haha.”
As soon as I get in the car and it pulls away from the curb, I get this sense of dread. Just a few blocks down the road, James says he wants to pick something up at their apartment, and asks if it’s okay if we stop off there for a minute.
I’m ignoring my warning bells, still hoping that everything’s okay, don’t want to ruin a great night by freaking out unnecessarily. They’re both still super casual and friendly, so I say, “Okay…”
We get to their apartment, which is really low rent and scummy, and my alarms are getting louder.
“I’ll just wait in the car while you get your thing,” I said.
Tammy stays, too, and we talk about this n’ that, and I start to relax again. There’s no pressure coming from her, she genuinely seems delighted to have made a new friend.
“Let’s go check on James,” she says after a bit.
As soon as I walk through the door, I know I’m in trouble. I’m miles from home in an unfamiliar area, no friends in town and my husband’s God knows where with his girlfriend. Did I have a phone? Was the battery d**d? I can’t remember.
Tammy’s between me and the only door, and James is on the sofa watching TV. She offers me a drink, which I decline, then goes to fix herself one.
“Are we staying here?” I ask. “Let’s go to the restaurant.”
“You bet! I just want one drink, then we’ll go.”
All this time, Tammy seems great, but James is silent, staring fixedly at the TV, all tense and excited, but trying not to show it. I’m getting super weird, scary vibes from him and this whole situation.
“Do you party?” Tammy asks brightly.
I’m distracted and have no idea what this means, so I say, “I guess.”
She sets up some c*caine on the coffee table and she and James have a toot. I’ve never seen c*caine in my life. I can’t believe what I’ve gotten myself into. I look away from the coffee table toward the TV and finally realize that James is watching GB p*rnography.
I stand up and announce that I’m going to call a cab.
“Oh, don’t! Do you want to go?”
“Yeah,” I say faux-apologetically. “I’m just really tired.” I start walking for the door.
“We’ll take you back. Don’t pay for a cab, honey. We’ll drive you.”
I don’t remember how she convinced me to get back in the car, but she and James ended up driving me back to the bar and giving me a friendly wave as they drove away.
I think it was an honest misunderstanding: they thought they’d found a willing third, and if I wasn’t down with a threesome, that was perfectly okay. And, c*caine was just a normal Saturday night, I guess.
But, man… When I recall turning to face that TV screen, my heart still drops into my stomach. I always, always trust my instincts now.”
7. Fire!
“I went to some kinda church thing with a friend, it was like a little Christmas play or something.
We were sitting in the auditorium waiting for the show to start when I started seeing smoke pour out from behind the stage… it was bellowing out too, and nobody seemed to be noticing it.
It reminded me of videos I’ve seen of fires. Anyway, I wanted to leave but didn’t want to be ‘that guy’ so I stayed.
Turns out it was just a smoke machine and I’m a dumb*ss, but man was my fight or flight activated.”
8. Because you got high.
“Went to my friends house for the night and he kept saying he was hearing voices and went past the hallway to check again and again. Came back and kept suddenly turning his head towards the hallway mid sentences.
Freaked me the f*ck out and I had this chill down my spine, the kind that sobers you up instantly chill, it kept making me want to leave and go home but then I realized it was way too late and I was way too tired to deal with this.
Plus I was baked so that didn’t help. The fool was baked too.
In the morning it turned out to be the family that lived up stairs (he lives in a rental basement).That spine chilling feeling though. Super freaky stuff. Like it made me focus on his eyes and how sort of d**d they looked.
Was super freaky.”
9. Good thing Joe was there.
“I was a dumb 17 year old. My friend “Joe” and I smoked weed, a lot.
One of then guys we brought it from, “David”, was in his early 30’s, lived in a normal house, had a wife (who he was in the process of divorcing and not living with), and one or two young kids. But he sold a lot of stuff besides weed: pills, meth, etc.
So he was involved with some sketchy people, but he was always really nice to us. A few times he fronted us weed when we couldn’t afford it. One time I had had the worst day ever and he just gave me some just to be nice. So needless to say, what happened to him really scared and upset me.
One night (sometime between 9-10pm), Joe and I went over to get some weed. David told us he was waiting on his connection to drop it off, it’d be about an hour if we wanted to wait here. I said yea sure, no big deal.
But Joe said “no I want to leave.” I looked at him, surprised, and said it’s just an hour wait, by the time we drive home and come back it will be an hour anyways.
Joe said “no, I think we should leave, I just don’t want to stay here.” I asked him why but he said he just got a bad feeling. I will admit that David did seem off, he seemed really nervous and tense. There was a girl I knew from school there (like everyone bought weed from this guy), she decided to wait, but Joe didn’t want to, so I left with Joe.
About an hour or two later we tried calling David, no answer. He never called back so we just hung out and watched TV til the next morning.
He still didn’t answer so we drove by there (we really wanted our weed), and the entire house is covered in crime scene tape, part of the house is black and obvious there was an extremely recent fire that significantly damaged the home.
We had no clue what happened and weren’t about to stop and ask the cops there.
I found out from the news, and then from friends of ours what happened. Around 12am, 3 guys kicked down the door. David, and the girl I knew from school were sitting on the couch, they were both shot in the head and ki**ed instantly.
The guys then tried to set the house on fire to destroy any evidence, but a neighbor called the fire dept shortly after they left so the house wasn’t badly burned enough to destroy much evidence.
It took them years to catch the guys who did it.”
10. Total creep.
“In 5th grade my math teacher made me and another girl stay after school.
He said we did too well on the test. We must have cheated. I always got a weird feeling around him, but when it was just him and us, he was actually smelling our hair.
When I finished my test, he told me to leave. There was no way that I was going to leave him alone with the other girl. I told him my dad said I had to walk home with the other girl.
The teacher said I was lying. I was, but I told him to call my dad and tell my dad that he thought his daughter was a cheater and a liar. My dad was super friendly but built like a grizzly bear.
He let me wait for her to finish the test.”
11. This is gonna be bad.
“When I was a teenager I was best friends with a girl who had an older brother who had mental health issues. This led to him also drinking a lot and generally being a d*ck.
One night we were hanging out in her basement and he came home dr**k. As soon as I heard him coming down the stairs I knew it was going to be bad.
He walked into the room, looked at us and said “ What are you b*tches doing down here?”
My friend had a big shepherd/ chow mix and the dog immediately got up and stood between him and us growling.
My friend yelled for her dad and that set her brother off. He lunged at her and the dog grabbed him by the arm. Suddenly I was trapped standing on a couch, up against the wall .
Her brother is on the ground kicking at the dog. The dog is clamped down on his arm and not letting go. My friend is next to me screaming for her dad.Dad rushes in, tries to separate them to no avail. Her Mom had called the cops from upstairs ( not the first time ) and they show up.
I sh*t you not, the second the cops came the dog let go on his own and stood in front of my friend again. Cops arrest her brother and her dad drives me home. I never went over their again unless she could promise me he wouldn’t be there.”
12. An awful feeling.
“Family all visited my grandparents, and I always took that time to be rowdy outside with my cousin. We played games inside all day until they told us to play outside.
Walking around at night with my cousin, we tried to come back to the house and turns out we got locked out, as it was like 12 and they thought we were in bed. We had his yellow lab, Yoshi, walking with us.
They lived pretty deep in the country, so his dog was used to coyotes, bears, etc. I got this awful feeling in my chest, mentioned it to my cousin who just said “Yoshi isnt acting weird, so everything is okay!”
I trusted that for the most part, but knew Yoshi could outrun us and we really didnt have a house to bolt back into in case something happened.
We kept walking until I nearly tripped on Yoshi who was just frozen and whimpering. Her tail was between her legs, and she was staring at this huge bush. The feeling I had in my gut hadnt left me, and I just panicked and stared into the bush.
I heard a rustle and Yoshi started barking like crazy, before growling. My cousin and I took that queue to take off running back towards the house. I heard Yoshi yelp but we kept running.
Whatever it was didnt follow us, and after about 5 minutes Yoshi came running back to us. She didn’t have any scratches on her, but it scared the sh*t out of me.
After we calmed down, I remembered my Grandma telling everyone she could have sworn she saw a Mountain Lion in her garden a few days ago. They were in Oklahoma, so no one took that seriously as a Mountain Lion that far into OK was pretty uncommon.
Week or so later, it was all over the news that there was a Mountain Lion in the area. It had been hit and k**led a few miles from where we were. I am positive that the awful feeling I had was us being stalked.”
13. Join us.
“Participating in the LDS (Mormon) Temple endowment ceremony as an 18 year old kid.
Made terrifying promises to a religion and a god without having much say in the matter which then created severe anxiety, shame, and guilt that I lived with on a daily basis until I finally left the cult 8 years later.”
14. Out hiking.
“I was hiking down a trail and I felt like I was being watched.
I’ve read a lot of stories about people going missing in the woods, so I was hyper aware of every little thing. Instead of going down this one path, I turned around and walked back.
I still felt like I was being watched, so I power up my bluetooth speaker, plug in my hiking mp3 and blast some heavy music. A few minutes later the feeling passes.
A day later I heard someone was attacked by a mountain lion on the trail I was going to hike on.”
15. This is terrible.
“Story for my sister, who is no longer around to tell it.
My sister was absolutely beautiful, and it got her into a lot of trouble. She would often drop off, very into drugs and alcohol and partying a few states away from where I lived, so it wasn’t uncommon for me to not hear from her for a while.
Well she went to a party one day. She said she wasn’t comfortable pretty quickly, but they were giving her free drugs and she was an addict so free anything was welcome. Next thing she knew, she was in their basement. There was never a full story of what happened. I learned all of this way post event, through sobs.
They kept her in the basement for weeks, drugging and r*ping her. She managed to get out because apparently one of the guys felt guilty, had a breakdown, and released her. She had newspaper clippings of the event and everything…
Trust your instincts, people. At worst, you’re uncomfortable or make people grumpy. At best, your life could be saved, in more ways than one.”
16. A good story!
“Went to visit my sister in a very small town for the school holidays, met some guys (2 guys) across the street from her house, hung out with them for a couple of days, smoked A LOT of weed..
Weed supply got low and the 1 guy said we could go get some more from his friends, got in the car and he pulled up at a police station and went in, said he’ll be back soon..
Bad feeling, paranoid AF, and as high as a kite, me and the 1 guy in the car freaked out, as we were planning our escape, I was sitting in the back, only 2 door car, the guy came out of police station with 4 cops, they got in their police van and he got back in casually, we were asking loads of questions but all he said was – just chill and you’ll be fine.
He drove deep into the woods/plantation with the police following us, I left my phone at his house, don’t know her number by heart, couldn’t let my sister know where I am, guys in front won’t give me their phone, at that moment I thought.. this is how I d** and my body will never be found, or get sold on the black market, thoughts racing wild in my mind, trying to plan which way to run, only girl between 6 men, 4 of them armed, don’t know their last names, nothing..
We stopped in the middle of nowhere, both guys and the shady looking cops got out, stood one side and chatted, 1 cop instructed the guy that was driving to get me, I refused to get out the car, guy promised me everything will be fine…
I just thought, its over.. let me just co-operate, cops asked me if I have been smoking weed, where I’m from, does anyone know where I am, do I have a phone on me, answered honestly… stupid I know.. the interrogating cop grinned and said, well thats great news, looks like we will be having some fun today, other cops and guys chuckled, he pulled out a massive joint, lit it up and blew the biggest cloud i have ever seen.
As it all turned out, we had a great time, smoking some A class evidence, turns out all the guys were great, had a blast, came out of the situation unscathed with a great story to tell.”
17. A weird feeling.
“When my fiancée and I started dating I lived across the street from a fairly popular bar so we would go over there and hang out to watch football games.
One night we were there having a few when I got this weird feeling about a small group of people who were playing pool across the bar. My girlfriend asks what’s wrong so I tell her I was feeling off about the situation.
The very second I say this a fight breaks out amongst the group. The fight ends up spilling outside and the cops get called but not before someone gets stabbed with a piece of bottle. Cops come in and start clearing everyone out so we call it a night.
It’s weird how humans can have feelings like that.”
18. A bad relationship.
“Ended up in an emotionally, mentally, and nearly physically abusive relationship for two years.
A couple dates in, he told me about one of his many ex girlfriends. He told me that this girl was extremely physically abusive and constantly treated him like complete sh*t. He then told me that this girl lied to the police about him physically abusing her, which ended in him getting sent to jail for a month (supposed to be longer but he got out on good behavior), so that she could take his apartment.
Alarm bells went off in my head when he was telling me this story. It didn’t add up then and it still doesn’t add up. Everything in my gut was telling me to ghost this guy and never talk to him again. But I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.
During our two years, he never got actually physical with me. However, i watched him destroy countless amounts of furniture. I watched him shatter his phone. I watched him floor his car and drive like a maniac over something silly. And when i broke up with him, he pushed a dozen full beer bottles off the table in my direction.
When I threatened to call the police, he accused me of being like his ex.”
19. Not a good idea.
“I was at an illegal squat rave – was tripping hard on acid sitting at a desk in this abandoned office.
Some dude came up to me and I could tell maybe from tripping that he wasn’t at all a good person.I stayed anyway and he robbed me and my girlfriend of all our possessions.”
20. Don’t sit there.
“The company I worked for had a nice custom of beer party on Friday afternoons on the 5th floor patio.
The patio had a low (sitting height) wall at the edge. Some people thought it was cool to sit there. It made me very nervous. I asked them not to sit there.
I went home. It just made me too nervous, and those people didn’t want to listen to me.
Next morning, in the parking lot outside, one of my coworkers told me that one of the guys fell off. He d**d.
There were no Friday beer parties after that.”
21. Waiting for the bus.
“I was waiting for the bus in a not great part of town.
I was 18, the dude who walked up was at least twice that. He started trying to flirt, and my gut just started screaming that I needed to get out, but the bus was my only way.
I was silently cursing the bus for being late, but my gut also said to play along until it finally came. A few minutes later, some other dude comes up, buys h*roin. I see a gun in the flirting dude’s waistband; I don’t say sh*t.
Thankfully the bus came about a minute later. A couple months later, I saw dude’s mugshot on the news after he shot someone in a deal gone bad.”
22. This is crazy.
“My dad used to be into some pretty shady sh*t when I was a kid. He had a pretty bad drug/alcohol habit and my mom left because of it, but she wouldn’t take me with her so I was stuck.
During the summer he made me go everywhere with him because he thought I would call the cops if he left me alone but usually it was nothing dangerous, besides the occasional dr**k driving. I’d called the cops a few times before when he hit my mom but when he got out of jail I knew I’d get a beating for it so I gave up on the idea anyway.
One time in particular he drags me to this drug house in rural Michigan, a pretty notorious spot for people cooking methamphetamine. Immediately I wanted to leave, because even 12 year old me knew this was sketch.
I’d been to drug houses before and honestly everyone was always nice to me, they would feed me if they had food and some of them would even try to empathize with what I was going through, but they didn’t have the balls to kick out a paying customer.
This house was different though, there were guns on the tables and people were looking at me suspiciously like I was somehow a tiny DEA agent. My dad was pretty sh*tfaced at this time though so it didn’t really matter what I said.
He’s talking with some of the people and this woman starts joking around with him, he’s joking back and trying to flirt but she’s making it pretty clear she’s only into women.
Eventually he takes it too far with a comment, and she stabs him in the chest with a knife. He stumbles back a few feet, says “F*ck! You stabbed me?” And then he proceeds to beat the hell out of her with a knife in his chest. At this point, everyone else is laughing.
My dad falls down, and one guy helps me drag him into the bathroom (I didn’t really help I was mostly making it harder) where I pour the rest of his pint of whiskey on his chest. I don’t think this actually helped but I’d seen it in action movies and I thought alcohol was like Neosporin.
The guy who dragged my dad into the bathroom told me to stay quiet and he’d make sure I was ok. I hear the other people in the room talking about dumping him outside and driving me somewhere to drop me off. I find my dad’s cell phone in his pocket and call the cops.
Luckily, an officer was already close to the house because they had probably been watching it due to drug activity. Once the sirens come on, almost everyone leaves.
Once all was said and done, my dad survived with no permanent damage, the woman who stabbed him had a broken jaw, fractured ribs, and a broken pelvis. She was charged with attempted murder but I think she was released not too long ago.”
23. Acid isn’t for everyone.
“My college roommate had slapped his girlfriend twice before.
One night, around 2 am maybe, they came back from a party. I was still up (I had done LSD earlier in the day and wasn’t really sleepy yet) but I could tell that something was off anyway.
There was a tension between them and, sure enough, they started fighting. Since it was also my room, I had nowhere else to go. Eventually he slapped her, and tried to do more, but I was alert enough to get between them and separate them.
The door was open and the RA turned up with campus police. I had to give a statement at the station and everything.
Haven’t done acid since.”
24. That doesn’t sound right.
“I used to work at a theme park as a food and beverage supervisor (this was about 10 years ago).
I knew the place like the back of my hand because I grew up in the area and went a lot as a kid, and had been working there about 3 years.
During the quiet periods of the day we would take it in turns to go for a “cigarette break”, our nearest break area was past a nearby rollercoaster. On my way back from one break I stop mid stride and look down at this coaster going under the path. “That didn’t sound right” I think to myself. I check my radio is tuned in, and press on back to my food outlet.
20 minutes pass and I’ve forgotten about this when there is an almighty thud, the lights flicker and in less time than it took to check the fryer settings were ok my radio lights up, chaos on the waves.
I hear amongst the chaos “Echo 4, code 11, section 8” which roughly translates to “watsis-name, serious incident, emergency service access only, section 8.”
I respond “Received, on it.”
We shut everything down and start redirecting customers around the area, that rollercoaster had crashed, 2 people d**d and 3 are now permanently disabled.
That turned out to be a rough day.”
25. You live and learn.
“I worked with a girl when I was 18. She was 4 years older than me, and we came from the same small hometown so knew some of the same people.
I quickly understood she was not a great person. Narcissistic. Loved to pit people at work against each other by spreading rumors. Backhanded compliments. Dominated every conversation by turning into something about herself. You probably know the type.
She didn’t like me because I ended up explaining her behavior to our boss after she tried [and failed] to get me fired over a rumor she created.
She didn’t last long, thankfully. People caught on, and they knew me well enough to trust that I’m a decent person in that regard.
Fast forward to my late-twenties, back in my hometown. She walks into a bar with my friend. We are awkwardly polite. The night wears on. Drinks. We get to talking and are actually laughing together. It seems like the past is distant. I say I’m going to leave. She looks directly into my eyes and asks if she can come with me.
It was like looking into the eyes of a demon. Every hair on the back of my neck and forearms. Heart rate increased. Cold sweat and the blood drained from my face. But, dr**k me, severely lonely from previous years, thinking only of that night’s chemistry, said yes. Told myself it was just the anxiety of such a physically attractive woman asking to come home with me.
We ended up dating for almost a year. I have never been more physically, psychologically, or emotionally abused, cheated on, and just destroyed inside. It was severe. My cat’s hair started falling out from the stress in the home [he’s been a happy, healthy chonk before and after, don’t worry]. I won’t go into details.
But, it was ugly. I was so turned around as a male abuse victim that I had been gaslighted into thinking I was an abuser.
I finally got out, but had to do it alone. With narcissistic abusers, they tend to look for people they can use, that have something, that are unique, stand out, etc. People with potential.
I made myself seem thoroughly “pathetic” [what a person like that would think is pathetic], and she casually moved away and found a new victim.
We still shared some friends and she had convinced most of them that I was a bad person. But in time her nature hurt all of them, and while I had moved on and made new friends, they slowly trickled back into my life and related their own horror stories of her.
Ultimately I became stronger and grew in many ways from it, and can even trust, but I’ll always have to struggle with thinking no one is ever interested in me so not picking up on it, and confusing boundaries/self-respect for hurting my partner and potentially causing a serious altercation.
That night in the bar I should’ve just left. Every sense in my body told me to get away from her. But I stayed.”
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