People that vanish and don`t want to be found

[TheCheekySloth]

Just been watching a documentary about people that have vanished basically evaporated.
Some just up and left no warnings no fall outs no coming back.
Others left for other reasons, reasons some of us would think are silly.
But to just wake up walk out never come back.
No calls messages nothing they just evaporated.

This got me thinking does this happen more than we think, i dont know anyone that as done it.
Would you do it?
I dont know if i could as ive cut most out of my life, but to just evaporate is a different level.

nothing exciting just a shitty family and the need to never get dragged back into that. I would never make contact again. It’s been years, over ten.
I am lunfindable online (I’m sure someone who was some sort of super sleuth could maybe but even then I doubt it) but for the average person, no. Anon online, deed polled a new name, no connections to my old life, the only person that knows about both “me’s” is dh and moving countries soon (that’s not to get away though, just a job opportunity! But it makes the chances even less)

I think my DN would do this. She recently said to me "out of sight, out of mind.", when I asked if she misses anyone since moving to another country.

I wish you all the best.💐

A great uncle of mine, going back to the 1930s won a lot of money, told nobody and disappeared. He eventually came back to visit, then left again. He had a new life in a foreign country.

The parents ran off and left the children behind? That is horrific.

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/evaporated-gone-with-the-gods/
This is it.

I've thought about it a few times, as a way of leaving all my problems behind me - more of a fantasy during times of stress.

I used to joke about finding a grotty bedsit in a city and taking a job on a market stall.

ETA I have no children and now have no immediate family.

There have been times in my life when I have been under great pressure and stress that this option would have been very appealing. being overwhelmed with grief in intense moments. The sort where you don’t want to die, but if a piano was falling from a tall building, you wouldn’t rush to get out of the way. Bleakness and numbness rolled into those moments. Can’t really explain it.

My father vanished never to be seen or heard from again. Late 1950's.

Yup this is what the “flight” is in fight or flight.

My dad vanished. Just gone one day when I was 3. I didn't hear from him or see him again until I was 25

Being a fan way back when Richey Edward’s aka Richey James of Manic Street Preachers disappeared, completely effective disappearance is both fascinating and frightening (for loved ones left behind). That case will always be something I wonder about

I never stay in touch if I move house or jobs and have no online presence. My kids know where I am always but I don't carry my past from one place to another.

Didn’t this happen to Olivia newton john?

From 1957 to 1976 there was a bus that used to run from London to northern India. Every week some businessmen wearing their work clothes and carrying nothing but a briefcase decided that another week in the office was too much to bear and would board the bus instead. Many were never heard from again and never came back.

People have always done this, although it’s much harder these days to do without being tracked down.

Some have good reasons. Others are just people who are useless at life and believe they can run away from their problems, that they had no agency in causing them and won’t take the problems with them, and therefore create exactly the same problems wherever they go. My mother was the latter kind of person: constantly running away and creating similar chaos wherever she went.

My brother is like your mum. He fell out of contact with us, deliberately and without an argument having taken place. I have been left to care for our ailing mum and whilst he has started speaking to a few cousins who he blanked even before cutting us out, he has blocked us from being able to contact him. There have been multiple instances in the past 9 years where we didn’t even know what country he lived in.

He is a decade older than me, ambitious and hard working but selfish by nature and prefers to run to a new place to escape the one thing he can’t -his own mind. Our childhood was far from ideal, both parents suffered with mental health but he got a slightly better version of our parents due to being around before their mental health declined and the resulting negative effect on finances.

Like your mum, it’s always someone else’s fault for whatever issues he’s going through and I take comfort in the fact that he can no longer blame me or my reluctance to bail him out for whatever he’s inevitably going through now.

More common pre-digital era, and sometimes major disasters used to be used as "cover" for these disappearances (floods, earthquakes etc). People unhappy and thinking of escaping their situation took the chance to be "presumed missing/dead" if something happened close to them and setup anonymously elsewhere...

People obviously still go missing, but harder to start again without bank account, ID etc in the modern era. But people can disappear from family life and tell police they are safe and ask that family are not told their whereabouts.

And were her parents pleased to see her, or had they already died?

Why not? You never miss anyone you knew?

It happened in my family and it really is horrendous for everyone left behind.

For me it was a cousin,he went to work one day and never returned,he left behind a wife and 2 young DC and lots of family that all loved him,I don't think we'll ever know why.

16year old girl I knew growing up walked out one day. Her parents were distraught but they had been very strict. But not unusually so. She turned up about 7 years later with a dh and young dc. This was in the late 70’s when you could disappear more easily. I think she’d sent them a couple of postcards that she was safe during that time.

I couldn’t imagine walking out on my DCs.

I occasionally had to report women as missing in my job. Family lawyer. Usually they were fine. Others murdered by their partner.

My late dad’s girlfriend disappeared three times. Each time for different reasons. This was before the internet so tracking her down was hard.

I think she always wanted to be found but just needed to run away for a while and couldn’t find the right words to say what she needed. She had lifelong mental health problems but was a lovely woman.

The first time she was found in an Israeli kibbutz after about nine months, and my dad went and joined her. They lived over there for about three years.

The second time was about eight years later. She got on a coach to visit her mum and just never arrived. She was missing for a couple of years. Dad eventually found her when she was admitted to a hospital on the coast. She had a severe mental health episode. Her family initially refused to go and see her as they were so angry with her for disappearing.

She was never found the third time. Dad used to get these random pieces of post occasionally, with clues to where she was. And he’d get silent calls. He said he knew it was her so he’d just talk. He’d tell the silent caller what was going on, how we all were, and that he loved her and hoped she was doing ok. And then he’d say goodbye and hang up. And then a few weeks later it would happen again. And again.

I haven’t seen her since I was 21. I’m now 50. I still think of her and hope her life turned out ok. She was so vulnerable and had been abused badly by multiple men. I hope she found someone who treated her well. She loved my dad so much and vice versa, but when her mum developed dementia, she couldn’t cope. My dad didn’t want to leave me and my brother again (after leaving us to go to Israel) and I don’t think she could deal with everything she was feeling.

I used to know someone who’s husband went out for a packet of bacon and some bread and never came back.
He had 2 children.
He turned up 15 years later, with not much of an explanation iirc, understandably the DC wanted nothing to do with him.
He went missing pre internet days though, so it was a lot easier then I imagine.

What caused you to do that, if you don't mind me asking?

Apologies – already asked and answered!

Oh I didnt read it like that/put that spin on it.