Some people say it’s like a disembodied voice or a gut feeling they can’t shake.
Others…well…they are literally visited by a “third person” in the flesh.
However, the term itself comes from the T.S.
I was an 18-year-old girl without a weapon, and I felt absolute terror wash over me.
I knew these men meant me harm.
Suddenly, the men stopped walking, and one said, ‘Sorry, guys.
We didn’t see you there.’
I looked at them in shock, but they weren’t looking at me.
They were looking next to me.
I knew then that I wasn’t alone, even though I couldn’t see my companions.
The men could see them, and that’s all I cared about.
I heard two extra sets of heavy footsteps until I was about a block from my house.
I thanked them and didn’t ever go walking in the middle of the night again."
“Not me, but I was with my dad when he experienced this.
I was about 6 years old.
When he finally complied, he saw that my brothers were with strangers and not my mom.
He told me to meet him at the towel and ran off.”
She was not coherent enough to give any information regarding my brothers or who to contact.
My dad was able to rush back and attend to both my brothers and my mom."
Anonymous
3.
“I once accidentally dumped scalding coffee all over myself.
I was wearing a tank top, so a lot of skin was exposed.
I heard a woman say, ‘Cold water!’
and I reached for the glass of water next to me and dumped it on the burn immediately.
I got up and went to the sink to put more cold water on.
She hadnt said a word and didnt even realize I had a full water glass next to me.
“I was living in another country as the wife of an American attached to the military.
We had a small plane at our disposal that we could use for trips to visit another country.
I had been on it many times in the three years we lived there.
As he told me the news, smiling, I blurted out, ‘No, not going.
Take me off the trip.’
I don’t know where the thought came from; it just came out of my mouth.”
“He was disappointed with my reaction but did as I asked.
To this day, I dont know where the thought or reaction came from.
Though, it is not the only time I voiced a thought that has saved someones life.”
He talked and waited with us until the tow truck came.
He looked different to all of us.
We could all only agree that he smoked a corn cob pipe!
Whoever he was, he will always be appreciated.”
I watched as a car sped by in front of me that definitely wouldve hit me.
I turned around to thank the person who saved me, and there was NO ON THERE."
sparklycrocodile213
7.
Usually, during school days, there were a lot of families walking, so I was never scared.
I looked over and saw a man driving slowly next to me, trying to get my attention.
I got a feeling in the pit of my stomach that I was in danger.
There were no other cars nearby, either.
“He signaled for them to go around, but they wouldn’t.
They just kept honking at him until he took off.
Then, these two little older women rolled down their window and asked if I was OK.
I did not hesitate to get in the feeling of danger was no longer there.
They dropped me off in front of the school and told me to alert security about what happened.
As I was about to turn around to thank them, the van was gone.
I told security, and they called the police, who patrolled the school for a while.
“I was 17 years old, driving by myself in the middle of winter.
It was late at night and colder than 20o below zero.
The impact was hard enough to bend the front of the car upward.
I dont remember the crash at all, and I was unconscious after it happened.
They brought me to my mothers house and left.
“The house that my parents live in has a sort of steep staircase leading down into the basement.
The handrail is on the left side going down and there’s a wall on the right side.
When I was a teenager and home alone, I slipped on a step and started falling down.
As I was falling, I felt a hand grab my right hand to stop me.
It pulled me hard I could feel the tug up through my armpit.
Andrea, Indiana, USA
10.
“I’ve experienced this a couple of times.
The first was when I was a kid at a school camp.
We were staying in cabins by a huge lake.
The boat would drag you around the lake while you tried to stay on the rocket.
It was prone to flipping, but apparently that was part of the fun.
Also, the person driving the boat would deliberately make sharp turns to make the rocket flip.
Everyone wore lifejackets, so usually things were fine when it flipped over and the rider fell off.
I shook it off and kept driving.
I cursed at the irony of a brand-new car malfunctioning.
I coasted into a gas station and rolled the car to a halt.
I saw nothing amiss.
I closed the hood, got in the car, and discussed our options.
The motor turned right over!”
“I shrugged and let the car run on idle for a few minutes.
Thinking it was OK, I resumed the climb up the Grapevine.
After a few minutes, I heard ambulances, highway patrol cars, and fire trucks behind me.
I pulled over to let them pass.
The voice in my head and the stalled Volvo saved our lives.
If I ever hear a voice in my head again, Im going to listen to it!”
“I wastraveling alonein Amsterdam as a young woman.
It didnt sound like a casual business call to the credit card machine company.
It said, ‘GET OUT OF HERE, NOW!’
Terrified, I backed out of the store.
The shopkeeper started yelling at me, and I headed off at a brisk pace.
About a block later, I realized a van was following me.”
When my friend looked ahead again, we were in a turn-only lane that made a sharp curve.
When the dirt and dust settled, we both said we felt like someone was there with us.”
“I felt as if someone had their hands on my shoulders, keeping me in the car.
This was before mandatory seat belt laws, and we werent wearing them.
We both believe our guardian angels kept us safe that day.
Amy, Oklahoma, USA
14.
“On my honeymoon, I went kayaking with my husband and his cousin.
It was my first time kayaking, and I was pretty far behind the guys.
Suddenly, (I don’t remember how now) my kayak flipped over.
But I was too freaked out to think straight and didn’t even attempt to pull the cord.
I forgot it even existed.
“I was living inHawaiiwhile my entire family was inNew York.
They were all over the state and nowhere near each other.
I was sleeping one night and had a dream at about 2 a.m. Hawaiian time.
It was of my great uncle, who died a year previously.
He was screaming at me to wake up and call my mom.
I woke up in fear but shrugged it off as just being a dream.
It was 7 a.m. on the East Coast, so knowing my mom would be awake I called her.
I told her that she should probably check on her.
My great-aunt lived another ten years, dying in her sleep at 100.
When I woke up the next morning, we found out she passed away.
I still have no rational explanation for knowing all this except for the third-man effect.”
“A friend and I were in a Philly subway station after a concert.
While we waited for the train, five guys approached us and started pushing us around and robbing us.
When they started pushing us towards the tracks, a giant of a man showed up.
With a soft-spoken voice, he asked them what they were doing.
They told him they were just having fun with us, but he didn’t back down.
He said we were friends and demanded they give us back our things and go home.
They did and we watched as they ran away from us.
We turned around to thank the man, and as mysteriously as he had appeared, he was gone.
This happened over 50 years ago but is forever engraved in my mind.”
He was more than a teensy bit drunk but wouldnt let me drive.
Of course, he hit it on my side of the car.
After impact, I was in shock.
I wiped my face, quickly realizing that my hands were full of blood and teeth.
Ive often thought about it and I remember it like it was yesterday.
Tonight, I was watching aLaw and OrderSVU episode that mentioned Third Man Syndrome.
Nancy Clare, California, USA
18.
“I was 24 years old, working and living alone in a sketchy area of Seattle in 1977.
My apartment was at the top of an old house with an outdoor stairway entry.
I’d gone out that evening with a new guy.
I went to sleep, having left my bedroom door open and all the lights off.
Suddenly, I woke with a start, having heard the sound of a creaking floor.
I saw someone walking across the threshold into my bedroom.
I startled him, and he panicked.
“My husband died in August of 2001.
The fan sounded fine, so I laid back down.
I heard my deceased husbands voice in my right ear, as clear as a bell.
He said, ‘DONT BLOW ON IT!’
in that exasperated tone we sometimes use with our spouses.
I literally threw up my hands and said out loud, ‘Sorry!
and unplugged the fan.
The flames went out immediately.”
“This was not a voice-in-my-head sort of experience; I HEARD the words in the room.
However, I truly dont feel my husband was there literally saving me.
Truly, our brains are mind-boggling!”
Karen, Kentucky, USA
20.
My favorite band at the time was Janes Addiction.
Unfortunately, I caught the flu a week before the show and was physically wiped out.
But as weak as I was, I was determined to go to the concert.
I remember getting there just before the band went on, and everyone was starting to get really rowdy.
I remember feeling energized by the crowd and starting to forget how weak I felt.”
“When I was 9 or 10 years old, my mom and I went to Florida on vacation.
I knew how to swim, so she wasnt too concerned.
Well, the latter two happened to me.
It felt like my life was flashing before my eyes as I fought the current.
At that point, I knew this was how it was all going to end.”
“All of a sudden, a little boy probably the same age as me appeared out of nowhere.
“I was home from my first semester of college for Christmas in the winter of 2000.
I had moved to North Carolina for school and was glad to be back in Michigan for the holidays.
The party was as usual, tons of fun and full of good food.
It was nice to see all my friends from back home after being away at school.
The party went late that night, so Karl and I left to go home around 12:30 a.m.
It started snowing rather heavily, but not bad enough to prevent us from getting home.
The falling snow made it harder to see around the curve.”
“I was riding in a friends car through downtown Pensacola, Florida.
We went over a speed bump and heard a pop, and the car came to a complete halt.
As we wondered aloud what to do, a man appeared out of nowhere to offer help.
He was relatively short, with a receding black hairline.
He wore a red-and-white polo shirt and tan khakis and looked very much like a doctor of some kind.
The part that had popped off had vanished.
“We didn’t know where he came from so quickly, and no one saw where he went.
We all went home very shaken up.
This was almost 30 years ago, and I still remember it with chills.”
Once, I was driving home on a five-lane road in the rain.
In fact, one of the deer was in my lane.
Any way I looked, I was going to hit something.
Something inexplicably told me to close my eyes, drive forward, and not slam on the brakes.”
“This happened decades ago to my ex-husbands great-uncle, who was in his late seventies at the time.
The uncle lived his entire life in a small Ohio town and essentially knew everyone.
One day, he was outside pruning his fruit trees.
He didnt have many, and the yard was open and clear otherwise.
When he got down, he found a man standing there, miraculously holding fabric in his hands.
“The uncle thanked the man and hurried into his house.
It was then that he realized he didnt notice how the stranger arrived at all.
He never saw him walk over or away and didn’t notice a car.
According to neighbors, no one witnessed anything.
The uncle recovered, and he and his wife believe the stranger was a guardian angel.”
“When my daughter was maybe 4, we were coming down an escalator.
She was next to me on my left.
Her foot was quickly getting strangled.
I tried pulling her foot out of her shoe, but I couldn’t reach it in time.
Out of nowhere, a man’s arm appeared between us.
I wondered how he did that so quickly and if he was even real.
At the time, I was sorry I couldn’t thank him before he disappeared.
I am grateful.”
“In college, I had an Alfa Romeo a glorified FIAT.
Something was always broken.
In particular, I started to have issues with my horn.
It would go off at the most inconvenient times without me doing anything.
People always thought I was honking at them.
One day, I was stopped at a red light in the San Fernando Valley.
I looked over and saw another Alfa Romeo stopped next to me.
The light turned green, and she took off.
I was a few seconds behind, shifting my car into first gear.
Within seconds, my car horn went off by itself.
Hearing the horn, she stopped short.
At that moment, a tractor-trailer ran his light from the other direction and went barreling through the intersection.
Had my horn not gone off, she would have been instantly killed.
She turned around, thanked me, then drove off.”
Lori, Long Beach, NY
28.
My sister was still in the baby carriage when we would go places.
I had not made any friends and spent the first week alone exploring the base while on liberty.
On this one evening, I found myself walking the piers on an isolated part of the base.
Dont ask me why, but I felt the urge to be adventurous.
I stepped off the pier and jumped on the large wooden pylons supporting the piers and quay walls.
I know, not smart at all.
I was young and thought myself to be immortal.
As I hopped from one pylon to the next, I didn’t judge my landing properly.
I overshot, and my inboard shoulder hit a storage container on the pier’s edge.”
The force was so strong that it actually stood me straight up, giving me perfect balance.
I quickly got off the pylon, realizing a miracle had happened.
One year earlier, I lost my favorite cousin to a violent act.
I believe it may have been her that pushed me back on that pylon that late evening.”
Reginald, Conyers, GA
30.
“I was 17 and making the long drive home from an evening out with friends.
It was around 11 at night.
The highway was desolate, with thick trees on both sides.
I popped the hood and got out of the car.
It was winter, so it was dark out early.
I didnt have time to respond because they were already at the side of my car.
But then, all of a sudden, they werent.
In the blink of an eye, I had somehow made it across the intersection with no impact.
The other car’s headlights were right at the point of impact, and it was blinding.
Then, it was suddenly pitch black again.
“Its like they passed through my car, or I passed through theirs.
Ginger, Indiana, USA
Note: Submissions are edited for length and/or clarity.
