the creeps

Idioms  

1. Also, the willies. A sensation of horror or repugnance, as in That weird man gives me the creeps, or I get the willies when I hear that dirge music. The first of these colloquial terms alludes to a sensation of something crawling on one's skin. Charles Dickens used it in David Copperfield (1849) to describe a physical ailment: “She was constantly complaining of the cold and of its occasioning a visitation in her back, which she called ‘the creeps.’” But soon after it was used to describe fear and loathing. The variant dates from the late 1800s, and both its allusion and origin are unclear.

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Example Sentences

“It was 24 hours a day of worrying, trying to keep the creeps away. Fame and money in rock-and-roll — it’s all a very dangerous area to live in.”

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 28, 2025

Now Crawley is up against a New Zealand team that gives him the creeps.

From BBC • Dec. 5, 2024

Many pointed to the Astro home monitoring robot launched in 2021 that, at $1,600, remains niche and was criticized for giving some consumers the creeps.

From Reuters • Sep. 19, 2023

Basements give her the creeps; plus, a property manager told her the floor had been torn up.

From Salon • Nov. 17, 2022

Knowing what I knew and not knowing what if anything Grandpa knew, all this funning and politeness gave me the creeps.

From "Cold Sassy Tree" by Olive Ann Burns