31 People Shared Their Third Man Syndrome Experiences

Buzz Feed

2 days ago

These last few months, my "Roman Empire" has been "third man syndrome." Also known as the "third man effect," it's a phenomenon that most commonly occurs in people who are in extreme distress, danger, or are about to have a near-death experience. The feeling is often described as the sense that another person is present, either giving them an unexpected sense of comfort, warning them of something awful that's about to happen, or literally (and, sometimes, physically) stepping in to intervene and prevent harm. 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.
People have come up with all kinds of explanations for the feeling, from paranormal to spiritual to psychological. However, the term itself comes from the T.S. Eliot poem, "The Waste Land," which was inspired by the real-life experience of Ernest Shackleton — an Irish explorer who went on a near-death expedition in Antarctica in 1916. After their ship got trapped in ice, he and two other members of his crew made a 36-hour-long trek over mountains and glaciers to a whaling station. During that time, each member of his three-man team — Ernest included — kept feeling like there was a fourth man alongside them. T.S. Eliot wrote this stanza inspired by that phenomenon:
In case you're confused on all the numbers going on here, the members of the real-life expedition felt a "fourth member" was present, but T.S. Eliot took some artistic liberties and changed the number of people who were present, making the "additional person" the "third man." There doesn't literally have to be two people present — let alone two men — to experience the phenomenon, it's just a term that seems to have stuck!
I asked BuzzFeed readers like you to share their own real-life "third man" experiences, and y'all certainly have some skin-tingling tales. Here are just 31 of them that had me questioning everything:
"I was 20 years old and had just moved to San Francisco. I was walking to the grocery store and about to cross a busy street at an intersection. Just as I stepped off the curb, a voice in my head said, 'Don't take another step,' and it seemed like everything started happening in slow motion. Just then, a truck came flying down the street, blew the red light, and smashed into a car that was driving through the intersection. If I'd taken two more steps, I would've been smashed between the two vehicles. I'm so glad I listened to that voice."
"My ex, 20 years before we met, was living with her parents in the north San Fernando Valley. She went to a party one night and was found the next morning on a sidewalk in Long Beach, unconscious with no ID. 911 was called, and three paramedics took her to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead on arrival. As the three paramedics wheeled her to the morgue, one of them detected a faint pulse. They took her back, and she was hooked up to the only life support machine of its kind on the West Coast. She was still unconscious and unidentified when her parents found her two days later. The head nurse told them the story of the three paramedics."
"When I was 11, I was riding my bike to a friend's house after dinner. I wanted to see how fast I could get there and started to race through the neighborhood. It wasn't a busy neighborhood, and there were usually no cars parked on the street. I had my head down, pedaling, and heard a voice say, 'Look up.' The instant I looked up, I hit a parked van and went face-first into the rear windshield. Ended up with over 80 stitches in my face, but had I not looked up, I likely would have broken my neck and died. There was nobody around or outside at the time."
"I was taking a shortcut across a frozen reservoir on the way to a friend's house. Suddenly, the ice cracked, and I started to fall through. I felt two hands slam into my back, and I skidded across the ice. I was soaking wet when I arrived at my friend's house, cold and shivering. I told him the story as I changed into some of his clothes so we could throw mine into the dryer. My friend turned white, and his eyes were bugging out of his head. He guided me to the bathroom so I could look in the mirror, and I saw what disturbed him. There were two hand-shaped bruises forming on my back. 40+ years later, I still get chills thinking about it."
"I've never told this story publicly. My brother was 19, stood 6' tall, and weighed 210lbs. He decided to hike the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine. I was 21 and away at college. They (he and my mom) called me to tell me his plans. I have no idea why, but I was terrified and panicked immediately. I shouted over the phone and pleaded with him not to go, and then told my mother this was a big mistake and to NOT LET HIM GO. She tried to reason with me and tell me he was a man and could make his own decisions, but I was panicking and just kept shouting, 'NO NO NO.' He left in April 1981."
"I was on a motorcycle in Des Moines, Iowa, and thought I would avoid traffic by going through an empty truck yard, and through the trees I saw beyond. There was a steep hill of maybe ten or twelve feet in height at the side of the yard, and I went up the hill. As I neared the top, I heard a voice in my head say, 'STOP!' Without a moment's hesitation, I put both brakes on fully. The bike barely made it to the top of the rise and stopped. I looked down and saw water from a river only three feet below me. I recall thinking, 'Oh. So that's what a levee is.' I was wearing full gear for touring, and certainly would have drowned if the voice had not spoken to me."
"This happened 30 years ago. Our 3-year-old had a peanut allergy, which can be fatal. This allergy was not understood or well-known. We went to a restaurant during off-hours. The tables surrounding ours were empty. At the end of the meal, the young waitress said our child's meal came with an ice cream dessert. We were assured there were no peanuts in it and were told it was only sprinkled with chocolate-filled Smarties, so we said OK. I was watching my weight and told myself that I wasn't going to taste anyone's dessert. Also, I disliked the texture of Smarties. Just as our daughter was about to dig in, I felt a very firm push against my upper arm. I don't know why, but I didn't turn to see who did it. Instead, I reached over and grabbed a Smartie, then popped it into my mouth. It was a Reese's Pieces, filled with peanut butter."
"In the early '90s, when I was at most 6 years old, my older sister and parents had an event to attend that I wasn't invited to. We had some family friends who also had two daughters our ages, and they had a full-time live-in nanny. I was friends with the younger daughter, and since the family friends were invited to the same event (with the exception of the younger daughter), I was dropped off at their house for a playdate while the rest of them went, supervised by the nanny. Right as the nanny was about to start making dinner, I stopped her and insisted that we couldn't cook anything and had to get out of the house because I could smell gas."
"In 1976, when I was 23, I woke one morning with a strong feeling to stay home and not go anywhere that day. It was my day off from work, so I decided to stay in, but my boyfriend called me that evening and wanted me to come over. I felt uneasy about agreeing, but I wanted to see him, so I did. About 11 p.m., I decided to go home from his place. I suddenly heard the whispers of a crowd of people telling me not to leave, but I ignored them. As I got into my car, I heard a loud shout. 'Put on your seat belt!' it said."
"My dad was in the hospital, and we were talking on the phone. A few minutes into the conversation, my dad said his nurse wanted to talk to me. A man got on the phone, said his name was David, and said my dad wasn't in very good shape. I asked what was wrong. He said my dad wasn't getting his meals or meds regularly at home. I was shocked and devastated. My dad remarried some years before, after having lived with the woman for over a decade. I had met her and her daughter numerous times over the years and thought they were decent folks. But, something was horribly wrong."
"When my oldest son was 4, I took him to a local rural creek to walk around. It was a secluded location with no one else around. While crossing the creek, I slipped and sprained my ankle so badly that my ankle bone rolled over and touched the ground. Knowing that I was in trouble, I immediately grabbed my son and got him to the car and home. My ankle was so badly torn that I couldn't put weight on it for another two weeks. When we were talking about it later, my son casually mentioned that it was good that those two men were there to help me get to the car."
"I developed PTSD before I learned to tie my shoes, and as a result, I had a lot of 'behavioral problems' as a child. This resulted in me spending much of my elementary education in isolated suspension. Essentially, I was put in a very small room in the administrative office, which had a big glass window. There were two desks in there, and I became close friends with a boy from another class in my fourth and fifth grade years, because he was usually in ISS with me. Well, turns out he never existed."
"The very first time I remember this happening, I was around 8. My daily chores included taking out the trash, and my parents had to frequently remind me to do it. One particular time, I neglected my chores, it was raining all day, and I was being lazy. My mom yelled up the stairs for me to take the garbage out. I, of course, had to chime back and tell her it was raining and I'd do it later. Since it was a rainy day, my mom used the opportunity to clean the house. This meant the trash filled up faster than normal, and she needed it done. She started using her mom-voice, and for some reason, I kept resisting. I had a gut feeling. Eventually, I begrudgingly obliged."
"My sister and I were teenagers, driving around town and drinking. We drank way too much that night we shouldn't have been out driving. Her car was pretty much a piece of junk that would quit running at random moments. Well, that random moment struck as we were close to railroad tracks. The engine stopped and we rolled onto the tracks as a train was approaching."
"At one point, I worked 10 days straight with no days off, so when I finally got one, all I wanted to do that particular evening was watch a good movie with a glass of wine and relax. Around 9:30 p.m., I started hearing this voice telling me, 'You must get out of this house.' I couldn't understand why I was thinking this thought, so I tried really hard to stop thinking it. After some time, I realized it was not my thought. I had no control to stop it and over time it was getting louder and more persistent."
"The first time I experienced this phenomenon was in 1981. I was mowing my lawn, and my dad dropped by. It was very hot and I had been mowing for a while. My young son was playing in the yard, also. My dad walked up and offered to take over the mowing, and I was going to let him, but I heard a very loud voice say, 'Don't let him do it.' So, I told him no, I would finish it myself. The next night, he had a fatal heart attack. I believe that if I had let him mow, he would have died right there in my yard, in front of my son."
"A few years ago, I got my daughter a cat for her birthday. About two months later, we were painting together and used an old sports water bottle to rinse our brushes. We were having fun, and I didn't realize how late it had gotten, so I put my daughter in the bath and to bed without cleaning up. After she fell asleep, I went back downstairs and laid on the couch, thinking I would clean up after an episode of The Boys. About two hours later, I was woken up from a dead sleep with a voice telling me to check upstairs. I looked at the baby monitor, and my daughter was asleep and breathing, so I tried to ignore it out of sleepiness. The voice repeated itself, getting more and more urgent. It sounded so urgent that I got up and went upstairs immediately."
"One Christmas break from college, my parents decided we were going to drive from Montana to California to see my sister. On the first day, we were driving an isolated road with no traffic. The roads were very icy. I was lying in the backseat when the car started spinning and landed in a ditch beside the road. My parents and I piled out and had to walk up a steep bank to where we'd been driving. We looked down at our car and couldn't figure out what to do. There were no other cars on the road, and this was before cell phones in the early 1980s."
"When I was about 8 years old (this would have been 1948–49), I took a city bus to school every day. I crossed a busy street, walked across railroad tracks, and walked a couple of blocks to school. On this occasion, I got off the bus and, like most kids, didn't look both ways. I took two steps into the street, and out of nowhere, felt someone grab me by the shoulders. Suddenly, I was back on the sidewalk. Just as this happened, a car flew by going very fast."
"When I was 10, my aunt (who was my guardian because my mom at the time had a serious illness) passed away. I moved with my parents to a remote farmhouse. Fast forward two years, and at age 12, I was awake late one hot summer night when an orb of light appeared above my bed. It was so bright I thought it would blind me. I heard a voice call me by a pet name that only my aunt used. I couldn't move, I was so terrified. She said, 'Tomorrow, a blue van will drive into the driveway and men will knock down the door. It will be OK if you do exactly as I say.'
"I was driving home from work, tired after a long day of construction. I also had just stopped drinking a few weeks previously, and my temper was worse than before. I was driving in the slower lane on a four-lane divided highway (there was a wide, grassy median between the directions). Suddenly, two cars slightly ahead of me in the faster lane came over into my lane, cutting me off, and I had to brake quickly. My temper flared, and I was about to pass both of them, just because I was surprised and mad. A voice popped into my head and said nearly audibly, 'You don't have to do that.'"
"My son was 5 years old and seemingly healthy. We went to the beach, the zoo, Disney, and road tripped. He was fine. He started kindergarten. When we were home, he was in the playroom with his little brother, having at it, as usual. I was watching them play while cleaning up, and suddenly, out of nowhere, I heard a man's voice. Clear as day, I heard him say, 'That child is not long for the world.' I knew he was talking about Zac."
"I was traveling home to bury my mother. I had to go by myself, because my husband had to work and we lived 3,000 miles away from my family. I suffer from bipolar depression and anxiety. The TSA security area was a zoo: people packed like sardines, the trays banging, and the TSA agents barking orders. I was a mess. When I finally made it through the line, I was quietly crying and shaking like a leaf. I sat down on the first empty bench I could find and quietly wept, defeated and broken-hearted, when a little old lady who was not there a second ago put her hand on mine. She didn't say anything, just smiled gently and handed me a tissue."
"In 1989, I was visiting my best friend since childhood. We were out shopping at a mall where her son, my godson, worked at a restaurant as a waiter. He took his break and came over to the booth where we were sitting and pulled up a chair. We were all talking and laughing when all of a sudden I felt like I had been pulled out of my body and then heard the words, 'He's not long for here.' Hearing that, in my mind I heard myself say, 'Life is but a grain of sand,' I guess to say that the warning could mean 30 years from now, or anytime. But then again, I heard the words, 'He's not long for here.'
"It was the summer of 1986 and I was about 5 when this happened. My father was a marine and the marines brought their families together for a day of hot dogs, baseball, and fun. The park we were at had a paved walking trail that was basically just a really big circle around the park. Little 5-year-old me had my hot dog and went for a walk on the trail. At the furthest(ish) point on the trail from where everyone else was, I began to choke. I took a bite of hot dog that was too big and was having difficulty chewing it, which led to me accidentally swallowing before it was ready to be swallowed. I knew I was done for. I stood there, looking at the ground, hot dog in my left hand, and right hand where I felt the stuck dog right below my voice box. I was trying my hardest to push or vomit it out. I began to think, 'I'm gonna die.' That very second, I felt the urge to look up. To my left not three feet away was a tiny little old lady."
"I was in Vietnam, '68–'69, in armor, tanks. My crew and I were out in the field guarding a highway on a cleared dirt section on the side of a hill. The army was great about making sure we got at least one hot meal a day. This one morning, believe it or not, we were all chipper, had just had a hot breakfast, and were standing behind our 'track' (slang for tank). There was a slight breeze blowing. I heard something new, I heard it again, and then I asked my crew, three of them, 'Did you hear something?' They all said no. I heard it again and told the guys, 'Let's move over there,' motioning about fifty feet away. Well, we moved, stopped, turned around, and WHAM! An enemy rocket, 122mm, hit right where we'd been standing!"
"Several years ago, my husband and I were in a Lowe's store. My husband had a history of heart issues and had a pacemaker as well as a defibrillator. He was 6'3" and weighed over 200 pounds at the time. Suddenly, he told me that he was feeling unwell and knew he was going down. I looked ahead and saw a lawn swing on display. I told him to try to get to the swing. He didn't make it and started to fall. The store had a concrete floor, and I knew I had to keep his head from hitting it. I was trying to hold onto his upper body and ease him down, but I was struggling, and there was no one around us. Suddenly, a pair of tan leather shoes — obviously expensive, handmade, and I assumed Italian — appeared, and two slender, tanned arms slid under my husband's shoulders, just inches from the floor, and very gently laid him down."
"My husband and I went out to lunch one afternoon. The restaurant had TVs hanging from the ceiling, and one of them was in the corner next to our table. As soon as we sat down, I kept hearing a voice telling me to go to the bathroom. At first, I ignored it. I didn't need to go, but it was so persistent that I decided just to go and wash my hands. I was in the bathroom for about 30 seconds when I heard a huge crash. When I went back out to the dining room, I realized that the TV above our table had fallen and landed on top of the chair I had just been sitting in. Thank God I listened to that voice!"
"In 2014, my husband was suffering from ulcerative colitis. It was so bad that he was wasting away, delirious and needing regular blood transfusions. We opted for surgery and had the date set for mid-September. One day in late August, I was chatting with a friend when I suddenly 'knew' that he needed the surgery right away. I was so certain that I jumped off the phone and called his surgeon's office to find out how to get him in sooner. That night, I took him to the ER, and he had the surgery three days later. His colon was so disintegrated that they had to change the surgery they were going to perform. Six weeks and four surgeries later, he came home. That message was so powerful that I never questioned whether it was true or where it came from."
"One day, I was on my way out the door to drive to work. I had a pair of open-toed, flat shoes on. I was home alone, but I heard a disembodied voice telling me to put on boots. So, I immediately turned around and put on a pair of boots. As I drove to work, traffic came to a stop, and the truck behind me did not slow down like the rest of us. It plowed into me, pushing my car into the van in front of me. The front end of my car was crushed, all the airbags deployed, and the dashboard dropped onto my foot, cutting right into the top of my boot. If I had not changed my shoes that day, I would have suffered a deep gash on top of my foot. The car was totaled, but thankfully I was OK, just shaken up. This happened at least 10 years ago, and I still have those boots in my closet."
I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, from left: Tariq Withers, Sarah Pidgeon, Chase Sui Wonders, Madelyn Cline, 2025. ph: Brook Rushton /© Columbia Pictures /Courtesy Everett Collection
And finally, "When I was young, around 9 years old, I had to have pretty major surgeries for a birth defect. I was feeling sick, in pain, and frustrated about not being able to sleep or get out of bed. When I rang the bell for the night nurses to help me to the toilet, a smiling man dressed all in white would come straight away and help me. He was so happy and peaceful, with the biggest smile and a bright aura to him. He always came straight to me as soon as the bell rang. The next day (after the second night of his help), I asked another nurse if he would be on duty that night. The staff were very confused, even after my description of him. She told me there weren't any male staffers on duty those past two nights and that none of the porters or other staff wore all white or would have been answering bells on the ward."
Thank you to everyone kind enough to share their stories! Have you ever had a "third man syndrome" experience like these? If so, I'd love if you'd tell us your story in the comments below or via this completely anonymous form.
If you enjoyed these stories, you can read a bunch more of them here.