To ask if you’ve ever suddenly stopped talking to a friend?

I have once. A friend married a very rich man and after a few years her attitude completely changed.

We were out with a mutual friend who was going through a very tough time. Her partner had killed himself after hiding a fucktonne of debt, some of which was in joint names and friend was having a hell of a time fighting some of the companies to believe that it had been taken out in joint names solely by him.

In a short space of time ex-friend stated that anyone who didn't know what their partner was doing was obviously a shit partner, that she would never, ever, ever get over someone she loved killing themselves and that she didn't know how people managed to get into debt as all you had to do was work hard like her and you could have a lovely lifestyle (as if her one morning a week job covered the luxury lifestyle her husband and she had...).

I realised at that point she just had no clue and no empathy whatsoever and I never contacted her again. She only tried to get in touch 8 month later when she wanted to queue jump at an event I was organising. I ignored her email and I've only heard from her annually (same event) since when she's looking to book tickets

I stopped being friends with someone a while back and I was relieved that they never asked me why. So, if they’re reading this….

My first child was born four months prematurely and was extremely sick and not expected to survive. Friend knew exactly what the situation was. He was a few weeks old and fighting for his life and she texted to say “I got a positive pregnancy test this morning! How exciting that they’ll both be in the same year at school!” (This wasn’t her first child, so couldn’t even be put down to PFB excitement.)

A few weeks later, lots of people were asking to see photos of him. I was terrified of sending photos to anyone at all in case he’d died before they saw them (this was years before camera phones). I eventually found the courage to send her a photo and she replied, in full, “Christ, his ears are massive!”

A few years went by. We are so lucky that my son survived, but he has multiple complex disabilities. On one occasion I met friend with her mum. The mum told me that I was going to have to do “something drastic very soon”, before my son realised how delayed he was.

The final straw was when friend was pregnant again. I messaged her one day to ask how things were going. She replied “just had a scan, one of the kidneys looked a bit bright…. think I might abort as I don’t really want a disabled child”.

So that day I stopped talking to her.

Yes. The last few times of me trying to arrange a meet up I’ve gotten lots of excuses and reasons why they are too busy. So I just stopped asking. I think they might view it as ghosting. Maybe it’s more that we’ve drifted apart.

I was ghosted by my best friend of 20 years because I had to keep rearranging meet ups. I was going through depression after a break up and struggling as a single parent, I didn’t want to burden anyone so I kept to myself. My friend obviously took it personally and decided she didn’t want to be friends anymore. I never tried to get in touch because I know she didn’t make the decision lightly so I chose to respect it.
Then when I was in the position to ghost someone I understood her better.
I lowered contact with a friend of 15 years because she changed and was very negative and judgemental towards me suddenly. She made hurtful comments and gossiped about me behind my back with her best friend (who hated me at school and didn’t want us to be friends) so I left her to it. I gradually stopped replying then eventually blocked her. She never tried to make contact. I didn’t realise until then how on edge she made me feel, like a toddler being told off.
I think I’m also in the process of being ghosted by a newer friend, we used to talk daily and meet weekly but since I had my baby she’s only replied twice and avoids me.
I learnt not to chase people anymore and to cut out anyone who doesn’t better my life. I prefer no friends to crap friends, it’s not worth the stress

DS has recently been ghosted by a best friend of over 5yrs. He has no idea why and has tried to make contact on several occasions to ask why but has just been blocked.

I don’t understand how people can do this. Why just not speak to them about the issue and let them know.

Yes. You fuck me over in any way, shape or form, you're dead to me.

I have stopped messaging a friend. long story below 🤣

She was a neighbour who I thought was normal / similar age professional job, young couple like we were . She would message every day asking if I was ok and said she didn’t have any friends and was needy. I had lots of friends and we can go ages without speaking and were still best of friends and very secure without speaking daily. She started behaving oddly to me - we had moved house (other side of the village) and she had talked lots about moving house as well like non stop. Then she was odd and put her house on the market and bought another house (in another villlage) without mentioning it. It was really odd as it’s all she spoke about and then when they decided to move and find a house she didn’t mention it, and we still saw each other . I saw her house on right move . I didn’t ask as she must have not wanted to say but it was odd as she spoken non stop and then nothing 🤣 it was a relief tbh when they moved village from ours.

We knew they weren’t really our type people as we once went for a meal
with them and her husband spoke non stop about them hating fat people and how disgusting it is ( we’re not fat but Id just had a baby so maybe half a stone over weight) it just felt odd chat for a meal out.

Then we had Covid and didn’t see each other much, she was pregnant when we met up. We went for a walk and she started saying how I could be their babysitter once a week and every day she thought I could meet her as she didn’t join the NCT and didn’t have any baby friends. I politely said I work (which she knew!) and how I joined lots of groups and NCT and made friends as i had to expand my circle. My DH works abroad so no idea how she thought I could babysit once a week when I have my own kids and I don’t have babysitters.

On this walk she started talking about having a baby shower. She didn’t say when or anything but was telling me her plans. (At the time I was going through IVF which she didn’t know about - but I really don’t like baby showers. It triggers me - I never go. Even now after baby losses and having 2 of my own now luckily I wouldn’t go. My choice). That night after the walk she messaged me saying she’s adding me to a baby shower group, she’ll leave the group and I will organise pay and sort the baby shower out. I hadn’t even said I could go. Luckily it was the first weekend when restrictions lifted and we went to see our in-laws anyway . I also really was not that good a friend to her , it was so odd.

Final hurdle was when she had her baby she messaged. I congratulated her and knew to send my love etc but I didn’t ask the ins and outs as I felt she would tell me if she wanted / not my business. A week later I sent a message saying shout if you need any help - cleaning shopping etc or when her DH was back at work I could help her if she needs anything and asked how she was. She wrote really short message back and didn’t respond when I asked about baby etc I tired again a few weeks later and the same short response - As she could have been struggling etc . Decided 2 months after to do a final trying message asking how’s everything etc and she wrote a sentence back . So I never wrote to her again - she messaged about 4 months after saying how am I and she’s not heard from me but I never wrote back again.

Never had that with any friend. It was odd and I understand why she doesn’t have friends now. She didn’t know how to behave and what was appropriate and what was too much.

Also to add to this- im more wary about friendships and people nowadays. I have some amazing solid friendships from school
age and I assume all new friends I meet are similar. But I now know they aren’t necessarily and I step back, take a long time to get to know people and make sure I can pull back. For example- my kids school mums. Been there 5 years, there’s 12 of us mums who go abroad for a weekend each year now but it took us a long time to find each other and know who the sane non drama ones are 🤣

Not ghosted but faded. A friend I'd known forever, literally decades. She just seemed to be getting worse and worse. Everything I tried to arrange, or speak about, or ask a question about, or just general chit chat.... I spent the whole time thinking 'will this make her go funny'
'will she get arsey if I say this' (just normal conversation)
The treading on eggshells all the time was so wearing. I think she found my very existence irritating or something! I spent all my time trying to make sure she wouldn't get upset, pathetic I know. She'd known me forever and I hadn't changed.
It's such a relief to not be good friends now, I see her occasionally as we have mutual friends, and it's OK, but I would never go back.

I spent my life trying to be a good friend... total waste of time and not worth it.

I’ve never ghosted anyone as I think it’s cruel (have had this done to me before), however I have grey rocked a few people. One was a mum friend who talked about herself all the time, always had to do one better than everyone else and was basically a user. I still get the odd message from her now and again which I respond to but never commit to doing anything with her.

Ghosted by a friend of over 20 years. It happened during lockdown and DP was very ill first with COVID and then Long COVID. It was very hurtful as she and I had been through a lot together and I just never understood why she blanked me.

I have. Didn't think I ever would but after two years of feeling anxious about seeing her I'd just had enough. She would be fine for a while but would then take the piss out of me, take credit for stuff I'd done, she made nasty comments to mutual friends about my new house. She complained to a new (mutual) neighbour at their first meeting about a pub meal where I'd invited her but hadn't paid for her, nine years after the event! (The neighbour told me some time later when we became good friends.) I was fond of her (ex-friend) but she was severely testing me. Her DS and DIL had blocked her and she had no idea why.
She went working away for a few weeks and this gave me space to reflect on how she made me feel. When she came back she phoned up and I told her I wasn't prepared to discuss e.g. the 'mutual neighbour' because I had nothing to add, liked the neighbour and didn't like the gossipping. She agreed, said she understood, and then immediately said "What did 'neighbour' say about me after I saw her last time?" And that was the final straw. I told her she wasn't listening, I wished her well but didn't want to be in touch anymore, and put the phone down. I've seen her in the street a couple of times and ignored her.
I have since heard that she has died and did have huge guilt for a while about my action, because we were friends for a few years. But I'm over that now. She didn't behave like a friend, and eventually I saw sense.

No, I haven’t stopped speaking to anyone suddenly, but I have deliberately pulled back from one friendship and let it “wither on the vine”.

The reason for doing so was we had grown apart, she’d become very bitter, negative and self-pitying for reasons I won’t go into. Initially I was supportive but a decade later, when every meet up is going over the same old ground, it’s draining and toxic. It was also very one sided - lots of late in the day cancellation and not paying me for things like tickets. I think it was noticeable that lots of her other friends seemed to drift at that time.

There was no point in having a chat, she wasn’t going to change so I just stopped suggesting stuff, and if she suggested anything I generally made excuses. Messages became further and further apart and then nothing.

Its a shame it had to end that way but I don’t regret it.

I’ve ghosted a couple of friends, but usually I’d do a slow fade if I didn’t have the time or energy to maintain that friendship. In general I would ghost if they’re toxic, or constantly making horrible comments/digs. I really can’t stand people who make sly digs constantly and I’m happy to ghost after that.
When I’ve done a slow fade it’s usually when they are extremely needy. I’ve got a chronic illness and I don’t have the energy for that.

Yep, she started posting some fairly racist stuff on social media around the time of Brexit, so I just unfriended her and ignored her when she text a few months later. Really surprised me, as she'd had friends in the past who were muslim, and that was where most of the abuse was being aimed.

Bumped into her a few years later, we had a civil chat, and then she asked why I'd ditched her. Was very blunt with her, and she claimed that her abusive husband (who she'd now left) had forced her to post this stuff, it was easier to just do it than start an argument. She'd lost a number of friends because of it.

We bump into each other every so often now, and have a good chat when we do, but we've never really struck up the friendship again.

One of DS's "best friends" from 6th form ghosted him and the rest of the friendship group after 2nd year of university.

DS first thought perhaps he'd done something but this friend also cut contact with the rest of the friendship group. This hurt DS because he'd previously invited the boy round one day and they had a good time. But DS wasn't like completely distraught, he still had his other school friends and he still has his lovely lovely uni friends who he is still in touch with.

Yes.

We had been friends for 30 years. She was often difficult company, passive aggressive, argumentative, high maintenance, suspicious, patronising, judgemental and could be bitchy. But she wasn't nasty, untrustworthy, or deceptive. In fact her trying traits clearly came from a place of insecurity and mistrust.

But finally the exhaustion of having to pretend I didn't tune into her intended dig, smooth things over after she had yet another tantrum or set her mind at ease some imagined insult wore me down. It was death by a thousand paper cuts. I tried to be clear to her "it's not fair that you keep playing games with me, I am not doing anything to you yet I'm being punished" and she would stop.

I felt sorry for her and really cared about her.

But one year she had yet another go at me in her usual underhand manner about something irrelevant to me. It happend on a very painful day when I was in the throes of grief. I blocked her. She contacted me later on another channel and I told her honestly I thought it was so hardhearted. She wrote some big long messages which half apologised but mainly talked about herself. It was clear she didn't worry about me and my trauma but expected nonstop tolerance based on hers.

I didn't reply. I still care about her but don't want to be friends anymore.

I’ve distanced myself from friends in the past, sometimes fully, sometimes just dialling things down a bit over time. When I’ve walked away from a friendship, it’s been because there have been ongoing and obvious issues between us that have been discussed but not resolved, or continue to recur.

I don’t think many people ghost long term friends without having had conversations about issues, but I do think some people are oblivious to their own faults in friendships (which are usually on both sides), or to those sorts of conversations.

Yes.

My friend was desperate to move house (issues where she was living) and wanted to also move in her new fella. They found their ‘dream house’. My Dad had just died as had her fella’s Mum. My friend knew I had inherited a sum of money from my Dad and asked if I would loan her the money needed to pay the deposit and month up front as it was way out of their budget at that time, I did on the proviso that when the sale on her fella’s mums house went through they would pay me back. Several months went by and her fella’s mums house sold but they split up and he moved out. He then refused to pay me the money owed because they were no longer together. I hit a rough patch and really needed that money back, In the end she begged him to pay me as agreed and told him she would pay him back in instalments so as not to leave me out of pocket. She got the money off him in cash and arranged for me to go and collect from her later that week. When I turned up a chunk of the money was missing, she told me she was sorry but her oil bill (no mains heating) for the house was higher than expected and she’d been getting into debt and they wouldn’t deliver again until she paid up to date, she couldn’t afford it so dipped into my cash, she promises she will pay me back soon. No worries, yes I needed it but I’m also not going to see a friend freeze. Months go by and she asks me for my bank details as she’ll soon be able to transfer me the money that she owes and thanks me for not hassling her for it. Weeks go by, no payment, she then starts telling me about how everything is going wrong at the minute, her dog had been sick and she couldn’t afford the vet bill and is stressing about finding the money, theres been issues with her daughter, her heating bill is extorsionate and shes feeling at rock bottom so I don’t mention the money. More time goes by, she seems to be doing better, things are moving up she seems in an ok place now and mentions she needs to get a new bank card as shes lost hers so I mention ‘speaking of banks’ here are my details again could she try and pay me at least some of the money she owes. She tells me I’m taking the piss asking that right now when I know she’d been really struggling financially and has outstanding vets bills to prioritise etc. Literally a few weeks later she not only posts about her not mentioned ‘new horse’ on facebook but the fact its injured and has just cost her a bloody fortune at the vets!! I was done, she couldn’t pay me back but could afford to buy a new horse and cover its vet bills but apparently couldn’t afford to pay me back, I was livid. I deleted her off Facebook there and then and never spoke to her again the cheeky bitch!

I deleted someone off Facebook as I was fed up with her passive aggressive posts about “some people shouldn’t be allowed to have children” and “now I know who my real friends are” etc

Over many years she’d been moody and manipulative, often ignoring myself and our other friend if she passed us and we were talking to each other, then getting arsey that we didn’t stop speaking when she saw us.

We had a sit down intervention with her at one point and explained how her behaviour was unacceptable but of course it fell on deaf ears.

Then one day I’d just had enough so I unfriended her. She didn’t notice until she went to message me and noticed we weren’t connected. She played innocent “I must have done something terrible but I have no idea what” so I told her. She then told me what a terrible friend I’d been as I never asked about her mum (I didn’t need to, as she told me all about her whenever I saw her, and I’d never even met her mum!) and some other bullshit. Honestly so over it. I do sometimes feel bad for her, but I don’t miss being friends with her. Everyone else she’s been friends with has done the same thing, so I know it’s not just me being a bitch.

Yes. She'd comment on everything I'd post but clearly didn't know what I was talking about. Or if I had a problem, she'd reply and just say she manages fine, why can't I?

She cane across a post id made, said she'd never heard of the condition I'd been diagnosed with and then asked how my parents missed it? She then said she was worried about me as she didn't see my posts and wasn't sure who to contact?

I did "ghost" someone - in the 6 months we were friends we had a conversation where he kept pestering me about going somewhere and said he'll guide me around. He couldn't grasp why I couldn't get somewhere 6 hours away and the nearest train station was 3 miles with no bus. I unfriended him a few months later because other than that, we never talked. He messaged me twice on Facebook to ask why I'd unfriended him as he was "rather perplexed". I blocked him because he kept asking. He then sent me a friend request on Strava. Blocked

I often give my friends lots of chances and have open conversations if there is a misunderstanding or something is bothering me. However, if they don't change or apologise, I have dropped them. This has only happened to about 2 friends of mine in a lifetime. Some friends have naturally faded, as our situations changed eg University, nursery/school mums, work colleagues but my absolute close friends have been with me for years and years and even if we don't contact each other that frequently, when we do meet, the gap has no relevance and we pick up with each other easily.

Yes my ex-friend (Sarah) was also friends with another girl (Vicky) who never liked me and always seemed jealous but I’m not sure why. I supported my friend Sarah through the loss of her mum and her marriage breakup but Vicky (who was her best friend since school) was nowhere in sight; she was only ever interested in a night out. Sarah eventually got engaged to a new partner and had an engagement party. Vicky was also at the party and so was Vicky’s ex husband as they had mutual friends. Vicky told my friend at the party that I’d shagged her ex husband in the toilets. Completely not true, he’s horrible and I wouldn’t touch him with a barge pole and I wouldn’t be shagging someone in the toilets at an engagement party anyway. I had no idea this had even happened until a few days later when my friend asked me over for a cuppa. She sat me down to tell me how disappointed she was in me and that I’d ruined her party cause Vicky was so upset at the end but said she forgave me anyway. I was horrified that she could even think I would do this and also believe Vicky (who was known to lie and cause trouble) over me. She couldn’t see that it was Vicky who had ruined her party. I cut her off immediately and have never seen her since. I felt uneasy about it at the time but im so glad I did. I now have the most incredible group of friends who are more like family; this is what true friendship should be.

Let a friendship drop once which I regret. We couldn't go to visit friends one New Year. Kids were tiny and we were exhausted/sick/stressed. Just felt impossible to pick up again as i was embarrassed and felt like we behaved badly. And suddenly its 12 years later. I think of them often.

Two I don't regret. One stiffed me over a work thing (my work which she went to a conference and presented abroad). The other, of 20 year friendship, talked about herself incessantly and I supported for years and years of phone calls about her (many) relationship issues. The final straw was her self obsession during Covid when we were very ill and I had family members who were being hospitalised. I gave up after that.

oh goodness I think there are several others now i think about it! Just leaving it because there wasn't enough to keep things going, different life stages, different views, parenting, users, boring partners, kids falling out. I sound terrible, but I'm old and do have good friends and am a good friend, longterm and more recent - honest!

You can get sick of people and they of you. Sometimes just letting go is easier, rather than going through the cycle of sorting it out and being let down again or even discussing it. I think sunk cost fallacy is often in play, so we let things drag on.

I have in the past although we hadn't been friends long and weren't close but I have also had it done to me in recent years. It's actually not a nice feeling because you rack your brains wondering what you said or did wrong, especially if they were once a close friend as the 2 friends who ghosted me were.

I ghosted a friend once because she was unreasonably demanding of my time (expecting 1.5 hour phone calls a couple of times a week when I had just had a baby). She couldn’t read fairly clear hints that it wasn’t cool so I just stopped responding.

I’m afraid I have no compunction about doing that in a situation where someone is unreasonably lacking in emotional intelligence. Any adult (except maybe one with a neurodiversity) should be able to read basic body language and respect boundaries and if they can’t they need fairly clear language. Life is too short to make yourself endlessly available to people who don’t pay you the respect of listening to you and considering your needs.