What’s it feel like when a group of strangers is around you?

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Anyone else feel like this when you’re around strangers-especially if they’re around you on all sides fairly close?

I can “feel” them around me. I’m not sure with what sense. It’s not sight, not sound, or smell (though smell bothers me). None of those things that I know of. But I can “feel” them and kind of pinpoint where they are.

They’re sort of like…a presence, or a bump, or a pinpricks or something. I can’t describe it well at all. Makes me more anxious…I think sort of like there are predators around me or something.

Just wondering if that makes sense to anyone.

A few strangers sat at the table I usually sit at during break, and I wanted to vomit.

Touch hypersensitivity. The human body naturally gives off energy and heat, trained (or gifted) you can use this to 'feel' when people are close by.


I don't like people around me unless I'm with someone else I know or I'm in my own little world in which case I wont even notice them. The circumstances depend on how close they are too.

I hate being around strangers.

So maybe I'm sensing heat? I really don't know what it is. And I don't notice it with people I'm comfortable around (maybe I just tune it out).

But combine "feeling" their presence with never knowing what to say, with hating the smells of people, with feeling scared about what they might do, and you get why I don't like crowds!

They're warm, they block air currents, their clothes muffle sound, they make sound when they breathe and they move and their hearts beat, and they have scents. You don't notice it when they're people you're comfortable with because your brain edits out the disturbance for you because it's not a threat.

I really don't want to think about it.... That's how much it annoys me.

I don't mind strangers one bit.

Yes, I do understand. Sometimes I go to a local coffee shop (alone, of course). I close my eyes and listen the din of human voices - just the sound, pitch, and intonation. In my apartment bedroom during the night I have actually woken up strongly "sensing" a human presence, which translates into a neighbor immediately outside, maybe taking their dog outside or smoking a cigarette. I feel "foreign" admist a group - hard to describe feeling but very real nonetheless.

I like to meet new people so i dont mind that but when it gets to many or the people are too "cool" or rude i dont like it.

Being in an excessively dense crowd is always irritating, but a crowd of strangers is often more comfortable than a crowd of people I'm acquainted with. There's less pressure to interact with them.

I get really claustrophobic when I am surrounded by people - no matter who they are, although it is a little worse with strangers.

I get anxious and just want to escape.

Although, interestingly, I don't often suffer with claustrophobia when in confined spaces - I only get it consistently when surrounded by humans!

I feel anxious when I'm around people I don't know.

I don't enjoy the company of strangers.

I can have a conversation on subjects that I find interesting and familiar, and once I do start a conversation it always seems to be ingnored or replaced by something else less interesting.
I become puzzled, isolated, lost once the conversation is between other NT's, I can never feel part of the conversation or the group. It's as though my opinions don't matter, It always brings me right back to school once this happens.

I do often become paranoid and vulnerbale at this stage becuase 'I DON'T UNDERSTAND THEIR CONVERSATION' and 'THEY DON'T UNDERSTAND ME'.
I take their laughter or smile as a reaction based upon my presence, I start to feel uncomfortable becuase they are communicating in a method that I don't understand.
I try to understand why my conversation wasn't accepted, and why another person less interesting, was.
It's as though they've all got something in common that I can never follow, they find somthing different about you and your immediatly ignored.