I went to the cinema this afternoon and a very creepy man sat right behind me (even though the whole row was empty). I kept feeling him shake my chair either with his hands or feet (I was too scared to turn around and look at him). Throughout most of the film, he kept making really strange noises, like high pitched wailing and whimpering/sobbing. I felt so uncomfortable and half way through the film, I was pretty sure that he was going to kill me and I was so close to running outside, and grabbing something like a fire extinguisher to use as a defense weapon if he would attack me.
I was also going to notify the cinema staff and ask them to call security or the police as I felt unsafe.
But instead of doing any of that, I just sat on the edge of my seat trying to not have a panic attack and considering the possibility that maybe this creepy man is not a serial killer and I should not cause chaos or make a scene.
What would you have done in this situation?
I personally would have turned around and said to him ‘Quit shaking my chair, dammit. I’m trying to watch the movie here.’ The guy sounds disturbed or something.
He sounds like perhaps he was special needs. I think your paranoia got the best of you! Still I would find my seat moving a pain and would maybe have tried to switch if possible.
yeah he sounds like special needs. but i would definitely sit somewhere by the exits after (maybe) politely telling him to stop moving my seat. you just dont know whats going on in a person’s head sometimes. men can be creepy, but i think thats beyond creepy and into something else
i understand the paranoia, its cool u were brave enough to finish the movie at least.
Because if he was plotting an attack on me and I moved during the film, he would know that I know he’s onto me and it may trigger him to immanently attack me except with even more violence and aggression because he’s annoyed that I figured him out.
It’s funny you say that actually - after the movie, I saw him again getting out of the lift downstairs but then he went into the lift next to it to go back up, which was a bit pointless imo.
I was about 90% sure he would try to hurt me. I was getting visions of what he would do… I would explain here but some readers might find it disturbing. I find it disturbing actually. I’m very, very surprised that he didn’t do anything to me.
As for your question, I’ve been told that I catastrophise a lot… I will admit I do think about worse case scenarios a lot but often I see this as seeing the future (I get visions like mini movies of what will happen) and I mentally prepare myself for these things to happen and work out how I can defend myself from these enemies/attackers , but mostly they don’t happen.
Over thinking things can feed into anxiety. It’s usually best to find the simplest expectation and go with that. The world is full of randomness and it’s impossible to really predict the future at all. If you can get close that’s good enough. But going overboard running infinite scenarios can just make things worse.