"We Gotta Go": 63 People Share The Times Their Instincts Told Them To Run Before It Was Too Late

When I was younger, around 10 or 11- I lived across the street from a school that was old and still had a bell tower.

In our driveway was a fairly large “shop” think detached garage that can hold maybe 4 cars comfortably.

Well it had a massive white sliding wooden door on it.

I was taking the trash out one night and had to walk across the driveway to the trash cans. As soon as I got outside I had an uneasy feeling. Like when you think something’s going to grab your feet under the bed. I ended up running across the driveway and dumping the trash and running back. As I ran back I SWORE I saw a laser on that white wall.

I told my mom, she didn’t really believe me but called the police anyways.

Come to find out there was two twenty something’s in the bell tower on substances … with a weapon. Apparently they had taken some shots at people’s cars driving by already but the police couldn’t find them. Apparently me telling them I saw the laser gave them a frame of reference to where they were so they could find them.

When I was a kid, there was a park near my house that me and my buddies would always hang out at. One day, me and my friend were playing basketball there. I was maybe 10 years old and he was around 12-13. We were the only ones at this park until one guy pulled up to play basketball. He seemed pretty normal, nothing felt off about him. His friend came soon after. He just seemed like a creepy loser. I could tell there wasn’t much going for him even as a kid. They were probably 25-30 and I remember one of them had a on a safety vest. At some point, we all started chatting. I remember him being super interested in everything I was saying, and he was kinda joking around with us. A little later, I pulled out a pocket knife to show them (ig I thought that was cool) and in a joking tone he said “that little knife ain’t nothing, I’ll show you what I got in my car”. He was serious tho. I remember having to say I didn’t feel like looking. Later on, he was saying how I’m funny and sometime he’s gonna take me to party in a town nearby. I just felt really off and my friend seemed oblivious. Soon after I wanted to leave so I said to my friend and him that I have to be back soon so we have to go. The guy then offered to give me and my friend a ride home. I remember getting an adrenaline rush and thinking oh this guy probably wants to kidnap me. My friend said sure and I was like “no it’s fine”. He asked if I was sure and I said “yeah it’s not that far, we can walk”. So we ended up walking away and nothing more happened.

Maybe I over played this situation in my head, but I’m 21 now and I wouldn’t imagine offering a ride to some random 10 year old at a park. This guy did that while pushing 30. I just know something was off about that. I didn’t put much thought into it at the time but later on I wonder what would’ve happened if I took his offer.

I was invited to a friend’s pool party at her mom’s house. It was supposed to be adults only, no kids, bring friends and family. The only warning I got from my friend was that her family was “toxic”.

I show up, they’re making tacos, music and alcohol are flowing. I feel good, welcome even. Then I start hearing quiet, side conversations; along the lines of “that girl over there? She’s married to XYZ. Some people don’t like her because of ABC.” I listen and nod, not really sure what to do with the gossip.

At one point we’re all playing a game in the pool. One of the cousins (male, my age, idk who he’s married to, IF he is…literally just a guy on my team) and I high five. I start hearing my friends mom talking about ME, in Spanish, a language I understand. They say I’m flirting with him, I have no shame, I’m doing it right under his wife’s nose.

I look at them and ask are they talking about me. With a saccharine grin, her mom and other woman say, “no :) of course not” and laugh to themselves.

I take one glance around the pool. Literally everyone is so tense; some people look at me like I’m the joke. Some look sad. Some look suspicious. I hear this voice in my head, “it’s not safe here, you need to leave.” I tell my friend to meet me in the kitchen.

I get my stuff and tell her my gut is telling me I need to go. She understands, and apologized for her family.

Two days later, we’re at work and I ask her how the rest of the party went. She tells me her stepfather had invited his ex-wife to the party. And they were caught kissing in one of the rooms. It broke her moms heart. Pissed off the men in the family. A fight had broken out and the cops were called.

Much later, like the next year, I saw her mom again for my friends bday dinner. She had stayed with the stepdad. I never let it slip that I knew about the fight but I felt super smug all that happened. That’s what you get for starting stuff. And I never felt bad for listening to my gut.

Working in a residential house fire with attic extension that started in the basement. Crews working in the basement got a knock on it but it burned through a gas line right under us (unbeknownst to us). In all my gear I was still getting hotter and hotter with flames in the attic above us. Grabbed my captain and said we need to back out. Withing 10 seconds of backing out the entire house lit off with flames shooting out the door we just escaped from
That is a scare I will never forget and the feeling of getting cooked….

My friend and I were on our dinner break( we worked at a bar,), so we went and sat in my car. It was parked in a pretty rough area of town. We had the windows down, having a smoke and a chat, when I noticed this guy walking past. He looked a bit rough and kept staring at us as he walked by. Then he disappeared behind some bushes.

Straight away, I got a really bad feeling. Something just didn’t feel right. I told my friend we needed to leave. I started reversing out of the parallel parking spot, trying not to hit the gutter with my front wheel. As I backed up, I heard a loud bang and thought I’d hit something.

I looked up and saw the same guy jump out from behind the bushes and start running towards the car, yelling. I immediately put my foot down and drove off. When I looked back, I realised there was another guy behind my car as well. It looked like they had been trying to box us in or set something up.

We got out of there safely, but it was one of those moments where trusting my instincts probably saved us from a really bad situation.

I was a teen in the car with other crazy teens and the driver was being reckless. I decided to have me and a friend get dropped off early and legit right after that they got in a terrible car crash.

I was alone in the woods walking my dog (who luckily has very protective instincts). We came across a well kept man pushing a stroller. My dog doesn’t love strange men, and is uneasy around things being pushed. So he asked if he could pet my dog and I politely said she’s a bit aggressive. I looked down in his stroller to see his baby and it was a doll. An adult man, who presented well with a baby doll and no children in sight. Every instinct in my body said run, but luckily my dog wouldn’t unlock eyes with the guy as we slowly walked away.

Went paddleboarding alone in FL bayou. Had full body panic anxiety about sharks. Ignored it. Headed back towards my house and I passed a neighbors house. I start hearing people on a dock talking about how they've been chumming the water. Two massive (bigger than my board) bull sharks pull up under me in very shallow water and start to follow me. My paddleboard is wooden and much smaller/less stable than the big buoyant plastic ones. I raced home and moved to the desert shortly after
😂 Every time I went to the beach in the months after that I would see a shark. Hadn't seen one my whole life in FL until that dang summer.

Me and my ex girlfriend once smelt fireworks when on the attic of my home with the door closed. Checking the origin of the smell we realised it did not came from outside. We both realised and instinctively felt this was much more serious than we could have predicted and dropped what we were doing to check it out. At that point the whole of the first floor was already on fire. We got seperated for I tried to check if I could put out the fire but that moment was long gone. We made a separate narrow escape and both only ended up with burned hair. Nothing serious.
As a bonus 'I need to act... Now': when we got out of the house I realised our cats were trapped for I blocked the cat entrance for cleaning. I ran to the back and removed the blocking stuff. All cats came out unharmed but extremely scared.

I for reasons I can’t explain, I knew that me and a friend were about to mugged (street robbery)

It was a very long time ago, when mobile phones were rare.

I was actually on the phone to the police when they attempted to mug me, and the police had already arrived. Problem was I was walking around a lake, with no road access.

The police told me to just chat like I would with a mate, and they would intervene

They got arrested. I was thankful.

But it’s weird how sometimes we just know something isn’t right.

I was a kid, playing at the park with a friend. Construction dude leaning on his bulldozer watching us, gave us the creeps. We decided to run into the woods behind us, and he jumped in his bulldozer to drive around to the other side of the woods. We waited until he was in a spot he couldn’t see us and booked it home as fast as our little legs could carry us. Never told our parents, never saw him again. Avoided that park for a long time.

LOL, sitting on a bench at the zoo. It was the end of the day, wife, myself and two toddlers needed to sit before walking to the train station. Some kids started acting up on the bench right across from us. Told the wife it was time to go, picked up the kids and just started walking. She was pissed all the way to the train station and when we got back to where we were staying. Next morning, the photo of the sheet covered 16 year old was on the front page of the newspaper. Teenagers got in a beef and one started spraying bullets. Happened with 15 minutes of when we left.

It was 2002, we were in a town in South Carolina for a funeral. All package stores and gas stations stopped selling alcohol at 19:00 on Saturday and no alcohol until Monday. Members only bars were the only places to get a drink. We walked in the closest club to our destination. Rock music blared from the jukebox. We could here laughing as we walked in. We saw a couple dancing. Not our vibe but whatever. When we walked in all the patrons turned around and looked at us with a weird disdain. "Let me get a beer." My friend asked, as we started noticing we were not in good company. "It's members only." The barkeep said. "OK, how much is membership?" My friend asked. "Your life ain't worth it boy. You'll be a member of that wall with the deer head." A patron belted with anger. My friend ignored him. "Any bars around for us," my friend retorted looking at the barkeep. "I suggest y'all be leaving."
We were chaperone to the door by 3 guys and the guys in the parking lot were looking anxious. We ended up buying bootleg from some big hispanic man in a gas station parking lot. Funny enough the barkeep was at the funeral.

I was a window cleaner in NewYork during the late 90's and early 2000's. It was September 11, 2001 and I was cleaning a window towards the top of the world trade center. I got this weird feeling that If I didn't finish the job quickly I'd regret it. I packed up and left before the job was done only to find out as I was taking the elevator down that a plane had struck the building. I barely made it out before the towers fell.

I was driving from MA down to GA and stopped off an exit to go the bathroom and let my dog out. Parked at a Burger King or similar I think, there wasn’t much off the exits as you her further south and had my dog on leash in grass in front of my car. Suddenly got this insane urge or push telling me I wasn’t safe and I needed to get in the car.. I grabbed my dog and threw her into the car and sat down by the time I shut the door and hit the locks a man was standing there grabbing my door handle. I stared straight ahead but could see him gesturing in a way like “what? Aw come on.. open up” it was terrifying. All I could think was if I was unaware or 2 seconds later could he have pulled a gun and forced me into the car with him? I drove away and he sort of slowly walked behind my car following me out of the lot. It was terrifying. I’ve never felt that way before- it truly felt like some higher power was watching over me in that moment to save me.

I have two instances of this happening:

1. When my family first moved to the UK, we used to go rambling in the countryside. The last time we ever went on a big walk like that, we wandered into what we found out was a cow pasture. I remember the minute we saw the bulls in the corner starting to move toward us before coming at us full tilt, my dad turned to me and said “you’d better run fast because I’m not coming back for you.” We legged it to the other side and got out thankfully, but the air practically stood still while it was happening.

2. My extended family and I took a trip to Tunisia and pretty much as soon as we got off the bus, we were snatched up by a man offering us a traditional tea experience. We followed him innocently enough at first, and he gave is turkish tea and then set off on selling us his very expensive rugs. I remember my uncle turning to us like “we need to get out of here now”. Fortunately my aunt and uncle were wealthy and could placate him by buying one of his rugs and he let us go, but things got very hostile very quickly while they were haggling. It kind of felt like a hostage situation where he would not let us leave until we paid him an exorbitant amount.

We were on holiday in the Philippines, staying at a quiet hotel, which had a bunch of huts around a swimming pool so each of the rooms we isolated, it was dark with not many other guests around (if any at all).

We had been lazy sods and ordered food from the hotel bar to take back to the room, and were taking the empty dishes back to the restaurant and I saw up ahead, in shadows, someone stood loading bullets into a revolver.

I turned immediately 180 and walked back to the room, grabbing my girlfriend who was loudly asking what was wrong - I was whispering there is a guy loading a gun - get back to the room.

We sat in the dark, with the door secured, and waited for the police to arrive.

It ended up being the moronic security guard loading his gun while bored - but I didn't want to just assume the best.

I grew up in a very small town in Western New York. I hitchhiked a lot. Never had any problems. One night I was hitching home and a red pick up stopped. As I approached the passenger door, the driver leaned forward in his seat and looked at me. I was overcome with the most awful sense of dread I had ever known. I jumped back from the truck, then jumped over the ditch onto somebody’s lawn just to get farther away. The truck took off and I walked the rest of the way home. I never hitchhiked again.

I was walking with my pregnant GF and our 2 year old in a secluded part of the city and we were passing by two homeless guys. One said something to the other that I did not hear and the other one replied “No, they have a kid with them.” I noped out of there as fast as we could.

Me and my friend were fishing along the river bank one time, nothing was biting so we decided to head over to the bridge to cross the river and try the other side. As we were climbing the stairs up to the bridge a man was coming down, I had a vibe immediately and I looked back as he passed and I watched him hit the bottom of the staircase and immediately turn around and come back towards us. I told my friend and we picked up the pace and made our way to the other side of the river with more people, still determined to fish. After fishing for a few minutes I spotted the man crossing the bridge back towards us. Thats when we decided that we needed to leave. Not sure if he was really following us, but both my friend and I have been robbed and we were in a rough end of town so we didn’t want to mess around.