I stumbled across this book (The Third Man Factor) at the library. I didn't know when I checked it out what this book was really describing. After only a few pages I was both excited and relieved. Here was a book of accounts describing an unexplained phenomenon I had once experienced! I finished the book in a day, but by the end of the book I realized my experience was not as similar to those in the book as I had originally thought when I started reading.

During the summer of 2018 I went on a vacation with my sister's family. Between our two families we had five young children with us. We stayed in an Airbnb. One day we decided to take the kids on an easy hike to a scenic overlook followed by lunch. We had some fruit in the fridge that needed to be used up and I decided to make a fruit salad for our lunch. Everyone else was either playing outside, or outside getting ready to leave. I was alone in the kitchen when I got the feeling that there was someone standing just out of view, behind me, on my right side. At my 4 o'clock. I turned to see who was there, but when I looked over my shoulder I saw I was alone in the kitchen and I no longer felt the feeling of someone standing there. I went back to chopping up fruit. As soon as I looked away the feeling of a presence behind me returned. I looked again, and again no one was there, but once I returned to chopping fruit the presence again returned. This process repeated itself five or six times. In the book people often describe a feeling of benevolence from the presence. I felt neither benevolence or malice, it was completely neutral. If anything, I started to become frustrated by this presence I could feel but not see. After that fifth or sixth time looking over my shoulder I spoke to the presence. I don't remember exactly what I said, but it was something to the effect of 'why are you here?'. After that the presence was gone, and I never felt it again either that day or any other time in my life.

About four hours later, after the hike and lunch, the kids were playing outside when a stray foam ball hit my fifteen month old son in the face. This caused him to hold his breath as he started to cry, and as I learned that day, this breath holding can sometimes cause a seizure. I didn't realize when I first picked my son up what was happening, and then I realized he wasn't breathing. I looked at his face and saw his eyes had rolled back and that he had started convulsing. I laid him down on the grass as I called 911. We pleaded for him to breathe again and again. I watched as the pink of his lips drained away and was gradually replaced by blue. I felt helpless, unlike a choking kid there was nothing I could do. It felt like I was watching him die. I don't know how long it was until he started breathing again. I think it is impossible for a mother to accurately estimate how long their child wasn't breathing because it felt like an eternity. Afterwards I estimated 2-3 minutes based on the length and timing of the 911 call. Not an incredible amount of time, but terrifying to a mother. (He recovered from his seizure and was fine in a day or two.)

When I had a chance to reflect on that day I couldn't help but wonder if there was a connection between the presence I felt earlier and the terrible experience of my son having a seizure and not breathing. I wondered what or who the presence could be. The presence had felt male, older than my husband who at the time was 29, but not as old as any of the male relatives I had known who had passed away. I did not feel the presence while my son was having a seizure, but I was also focused entirely on him and on my phone call with 911. If the presence was there at that time I doubt I would have noticed.

My experience was fundamentally different from those in the book, so much that I am not sure it would qualify as a third man encounter. When I felt the presence I was not in any danger or stressed in anyway. Instead I was quite mundanely chopping fruit. I also was not subject to extreme boredom, I was on vacation with my family. As far as being alone, I was alone in the kitchen, but there were eight other people close by. I have not read Geiger's other book, The Angel Effect, perhaps there would be accounts in that book that better fit what I experienced.

As a general comment on the book, I was not satisfied with the ending and conclusion that we have an angel switch that activates in our brain to generate a feeling of a comforting presence when in a dire situation. There are some encounters in the book that do not seem to fit with this. Such as the pilot who was told to turn to a certain heading when they had lost their bearings. Other encounters also reported the presence left BEFORE the person was rescued, but not at the exact moment the person realized rescuers were there. An example of this is on pages 179-180, recounting the story of Rob Taylor. He stated the presence left and minutes later he heard rescuers calling his name. If the presence was simply a coping mechanism his brain was generating in response to danger, why did the presence leave before he knew his ordeal had ended?

On page 16 Geiger states while assembling tales of the 'third man' he contacted survivors, read old handwritten journals, combed through published exploration narratives and survival stories. Given where he was looking for these accounts, it is not surprising that he came to the conclusion that boredom, stress, and life threatening circumstances were triggers for the third man factor. I can't help but wonder if there are more cases like mine where people experience this unseen presence in totally normal settings, or before a very bad experience. Was Ron DiFrancesco the only person in the Twin Towers to experience the third man? What about other disasters? Does anyone report the third man before disaster strikes? As a control, I wonder what Geiger would have found if he had interviewed solo hikers or sailors who did not encounter life threatening situations. Has any of them ever felt a presence when alone in the wilderness? Perhaps Geiger did look for this information, but did not include it in the book.