An article on ghosting

[reynard_muldrake]

I Got Dumped by One of My Best Friends

My take: both parties may have exhibited questionable behavior (often the way here). The author indirectly admits to letting past friendships wither on the vine, so I suspect "Jill" cut off contact after losing patience with her. Anyway, I'm posting this article here as I've encountered a few threads about losing contact with friends or meeting people who don't return messages.

 

[Peaches]

painful even just to read - didn't know that was called "ghosting"

 

[BeyondShy]

painful even just to read - didn't know that was called "ghosting"

You should have also read the comments from that article.

 

[kamya]

This is one if the main insecurities i have in a lot of my friendships. More so lately.

 

[SofiasMami]

I had to laugh at the blog's title: Scary Mommy
After I became a mom, I learned there is a Mommy Mafia out there - always at the ready to judge, judge, judge other moms. I stay out of that honeysuckle but have almost been sucked into their web a few times lol

As for ghosting, I've been ghosted. And, I'm not proud to say, I ghosted someone a few years back (she was a member of the Mommy Mafia). I've heard ghosting happens a lot these days with online dating. If you're mainly communicating by texts and social media, it's very easy to just stop responding to messages.

-Teresa

 

[Solivagant]

Has happened to me many times. Didn't know there was a term for it.

 

[reynard_muldrake]

As for ghosting, I've been ghosted. And, I'm not proud to say, I ghosted someone a few years back (she was a member of the Mommy Mafia). I've heard ghosting happens a lot these days with online dating. If you're mainly communicating by texts and social media, it's very easy to just stop responding to messages.

Most of us must have ended friendships this way at least once. I admit to commiting this act a few years ago. I'll never regret cutting the other person out of my life, but another approach was needed.

This is one if the main insecurities i have in a lot of my friendships. More so lately.

Agreed. It's gotten to the point where the question shifts from "Will they fail to keep in touch?" to "How long until they stop talking to me?" You (generally speaking) start to expect it after awhile. Just my experience, at least. Maybe yours has gone a different route.

 

[TheRealCallie]

I don't really care what it's called and I don't care if it happens to me. (It has)

The way I look at it is that if they can't keep in touch with me, if I have to do all the work, they aren't my friend anyway. They don't deserve to be in my life, good riddance to them. I don't need someone in my life like that, so if it happens, so be it, clearly I wouldn't be losing much anyway, as they don't really care.

 

[VanillaCreme]

I don't really care what it's called and I don't care if it happens to me. (It has)

The way I look at it is that if they can't keep in touch with me, if I have to do all the work, they aren't my friend anyway. They don't deserve to be in my life, good riddance to them. I don't need someone in my life like that, so if it happens, so be it, clearly I wouldn't be losing much anyway, as they don't really care.

That's how I see it, too - for the most part. I'm always available. I've never made it so contacting me was impossible. If someone's a friend, they have at least 7 different ways of messaging me or talking to me somehow, and if they choose not to do it - for whatever reason - that's on them. I personally don't like to feel that I'm bothering someone, but I don't mind anyone contacting me for any reason. And if I'm close enough to the person, that feeling of bothering them goes away.

I've actually gone through an issue with someone that I thought had some sense when it came to us (my group) but apparently, they didn't. Oh well. You didn't care, so I'm not going to.

 

[Oldyoung]

I don't really care what it's called and I don't care if it happens to me. (It has)

The way I look at it is that if they can't keep in touch with me, if I have to do all the work, they aren't my friend anyway. They don't deserve to be in my life, good riddance to them. I don't need someone in my life like that, so if it happens, so be it, clearly I wouldn't be losing much anyway, as they don't really care.

That's the right way to think about it. It's difficult at first though, when you realize you care a lot about somebody, and they don't give a honeysuckle back. Or if it's the other way around. When people do nothing wrong, yet you have no motivation to interact with them.

 

[BeyondShy]

The way I look at it is that if they can't keep in touch with me, if I have to do all the work, they aren't my friend anyway. They don't deserve to be in my life, good riddance to them. I don't need someone in my life like that, so if it happens, so be it, clearly I wouldn't be losing much anyway, as they don't really care.

That's about the only attitude you can have towards this, but it is hard to make yourself feel that way. I have had this happen to me too and with my memory it has stayed with me. I first thought that I did something wrong but when I realized I didn't that is when I got mad. Then I had nothing to do with them. Years later some of them tried to get in touch with me and tried to play the let's-get-together card and I told them to forget it.

 

[VanillaCreme]

I wouldn't get mad at it. Sometimes, people react a certain way and they don't even know it. If there was a falling-out (which is what happened to me), then maybe getting mad might come natural. But people react all different sorts of ways. Sure, I could extend my hand first. But I'm just not going to.

 

[BeyondShy]

I wouldn't get mad at it. Sometimes, people react a certain way and they don't even know it. If there was a falling-out (which is what happened to me), then maybe getting mad might come natural. But people react all different sorts of ways. Sure, I could extend my hand first. But I'm just not going to.

I understand.

I got mad because I didn't do anything to cause it. If someone needed a ride someplace I would do it. Or a couple of bucks for gas. No problem. Then one day it was like someone grabbed all of them and I didn't see them anymore. It took me awhile but I got good and mad.

 

[LonesomeDay]

I find the comments attached to the article (and here) very interesting, and I can see why someone might walk away from a friendship. When I walked away from someone (after two years) whom I hoped would become a friend (but who showed no particular interest in me other than as an acquaintance), I was labelled passive-aggressive but I prefer to look upon it as an assertive act. I left not by way of aggression, but of simply removing myself from an intolerable and deeply hurtful situation.