To think that ghosting friends is just mean?

[thereareflowersinmygarden]

Just that really. A few people have done it to me over the last couple of years. Clearly I'm doing something wrong but since it's apparently socially acceptable to just ignore people like that, I have no idea what.

Sure this sort of behaviour was considered rude at one point.

I've no idea what ghosting friends means.

Ignoring them, basically. Not replying to messages etc. No explanation.

I have had to. I felt I was being emotionally controlled and a confrontation would have led to a lot of manipulation.
They have zero awareness of how their control made me feel even when I tried to tell them.

I took the decision to cut contact with that person as I felt it was the only option.

One of my closest friends since we were 12, from school did that a year after we graduated from high school. So we were around age 19 then.

We hadn't had any arguments, saw each other regularly, and talked on the phone regularly, then one day she just stopped answering the phone.

About a month after that started was her birthday, I took the present in person, her Dad came to the door, and said she wasn't home but he'd give her the gift. I'll always remember how sad he looked when he saw me, I always got along with him, and looking back I think he felt sorry for me.

19 years later I still have no idea why she stopped talking to me. When I was 23 she contacted my great-grandmother asking her for my current phone number but she said she'd have to ask me first. I told her and my Mother to never give her my number, I don't need someone who would do something like that back in my life.

PEOPLE SUCK.

Isn't it more likely they have something seriously wrong in their own lives and aren't able to deal with the emotional work of a friendship? Many people withdraw under stress. I don't resent them for it.

I have to be honest I've done it once. I've been tempted to do it since to someone who keeps claiming she's a friend but doesn't actually seem interested in meeting up, keeping in touch, finding out how I am etc she just wants to meet once a year at her convenience - lord only knows why. I decided instead of ghosting her I'd explain to her why I was unimpressed and the texts have just tailed off there (last one was still a vague plan to meet I think).

Have you tried asking your friends directly? I think if the first one I ghosted had I would have told her.

Yes people should be forced to carry on being friends with people they dont like

Somebody did that to me recently and I was very very hurt. However after a while I realised that I don’t want to be friends with someone who behaves like that and now I just think it was a lucky escape.

I did it to a so called friend a couple of years ago after she was incredibly insensitive after I had a miscarriage. She is still in the friendship group but I make my excuses to not be in her company.

In fact, the two friends who stayed in close contact with her I also reduced contact with. When everyone else was horrified by her, they stuck by her which was their decision but it made me realise they are self centred arseholes too.

Okay, so I'm doing this to someone at the moment. She is incredibly needy and decided that I was her best friend/sister. She wanted far too much from me and made my life difficult. She would call me throughout the night for a chat, turned up at the hospital when I was in labour demanding to be let in to see me as I "couldn't do it without her", cried when I didn't ask her to be godmother. She even "joked" about using my DHs sperm to have her own baby so our children could be related.
I tried letting her down gently but she never took hints. I couldn't be blunt as when I have in the past, she does a proper hurt puppy face, cries and emotionally blackmails me.
So I decided to cut contact. I stopped replying to her messages, don't go places I know she will be etc. I feel awful doing it but I don't know how to deal with it!

Apparently I am being unreasonable then....

I dumped a friend once. I told them why. I thought I owed them that.

I think ghosting in general is wrong tbh. Whether it be love interests or friendships, if someone annoys you that much that you have to distance yourself by ignoring them- surely it’s better to just tell them why?! Constructive feedback for the future? You don’t have to engage anymore after that last text/ meeting where you tell them why and whether they agree with the reasons etc is irrelevant. At least people wouldn’t have to go through life wondering why etc

I've gone over a year without talking to my best friend once, sometimes I just cannot handle human interaction. Thankfully I don't have friends which make my own personal problems all about them.
However, if I was to "ghost" someone, it certainly wouldn't be for no reason.

I have done it. I hated doing it but had no choice. I had tried to deal with the racism, Tommy Robinson adoration and anti muslim stuff, but couldn't any longer.

I think I’d far rather be ghosted out than endure the humiliation of being sat down by a friend who then explains in painstaking details exactly why they no longer want me as their friend.

I had a friend do this and to this day I still do not know why!

We texted every single day without fail, used to go out for drinks on the weekend or if one of us was working would just meet for a coffee in the afternoon - this went on for about 5 years, we were really close.

Then one saturday night we were just chit chatting over text, arranged to meet the next day for a cuppa and signed off for the night.

Next day I text about an hour before just to confirm we were still meeting and no reply... waited a bit closer to the time and text again no reply

Rang, no answer. Sent a whatsapp text so i could see whether or not they had read it just to make sure nothing had happened and they had read it!

I must have sent about 10 messages over the next few days asking if they were ok, each one was read but no reply...
We have a mutual friend, I rang them to make sure she was actually ok and nothing had happened and mutual friend said how odd it was that she wasnt answering and that she had only seen her just yesterday and was absolutely fine!

She says happy birthday on facebook, occasionally likes my posts but will not answer any messages.

I've done it. She was a very intense, high drama, emotional leech. She was only interested in our friendship in order to use me for "loans" which were rarely repaid and a shoulder to cry on after her latest tedious tinder hookup went south. When I had my children she upped her intense behaviour massively as she was upset I was now choosing to spend my time and money on my children instead of her. I tried a million different ways to ask her nicely to back off a bit but eventually just cut her off. I'm not saying that this is a reflection of how you behave, but if it's happened to you several times it might be worth reflecting on whether those friends ever tried to hint/say politely that the friendship wasn't working for them. The woman I ghosted was utterly impervious to all such hints, and would probably say that I ditched her out out of the blue for no reason, but that isn't true. If she'd ever bothered to look beyond the end of her own nose she'd have seen the signs a mile off.

The other thing is, would you really prefer for them to outright dump you? I think a lot of people feel this is a kinder way than phoning someone up to say "I don't want to be your friend anymore".

The friends/former friends I have who contact has slipped with, who see my messages but don't reply, all have very busy lives and we no longer live close or see each other naturally (as we did when we worked/studied together for instance). I don't consider this ghosting though, I know it isn't personal, it's just life moving on in different directions. Not all friendships last forever.

Isn't it more likely they have something seriously wrong in their own lives and aren't able to deal with the emotional work of a friendship? Many people withdraw under stress.

I agree this can be the reason in some cases. Also, people moving on to someone else, people keeping away from an abuser or just realising that they don’t have anything in common anymore.

I agree it’s rude if there has been no bad behaviour from the other side. We were ghosted by a parent at playgroup who up until then had been calling everyday wanting to come around or go somewhere. I worried for a while wondering what I had done and then let it go. Found out months later this was the way she was, full on practically moved in with her new best friend and then suddenly gone, onto the next one! I worried for nothing.

I think this is more prevalent these days. Friendships are different thanks to social media and technology. People make and break easier, friendships are flimsy. The woman who ghosted us is in her 20s.

Yes people should be forced to carry on being friends with people they don't like

Sigh! That's obviously not what OP is saying. Just that people should grow a back bone and just say rather than leaving the friend to wonder. Obviously this doesn't apply to controlling or abusive people.

I certainly don't ask for loans, or repeatedly text/message people. I'm not about to start pestering people (about half a dozen of them) for explanations either. I have some self respect.

Just seems a bit of a cowardly and arrogant thing to do.

I’ve never intentionally ghosted anybody but I do find friendships hard to maintain sometimes. I have social anxiety and suffer with other mental health issues and sometimes find it very hard to reply to text messages or answer the phone etc - it’s never occurred to me that if I don’t keep contact with someone they might think I’d ‘ghosted them.’ That said, even when I can’t deal with social interaction I do try and at least like things on Facebook/ Instagram etc so that I’m not completely invisible, but if friends aren’t active on these it might sometimes seem like I’ve dropped off the face of the earth. I guess I’m lucky my closest friends understand and are supportive of this and even if we haven’t really connected in months when I’m ready to be around people agsin they’re always there.

I must have sent about 10 messages over the next few days asking if they were ok, each one was read but no reply...

Gosh you persevered more than l! I sent one email, one text, and then decided the ball (never to be seen again) was in her court!

I’ve done this before.

The behaviour of the “friend” in question towards me had become very toxic and would probably have been called emotionally abusive if it was coming from a boyfriend / partner.

I knew from experience that any attempt to point out why her behaviour was hurtful and unacceptable would just result in a barrage of justifications, emotional blackmail, reasons why it must all be my fault anyway etc.

So I decided not to even try explaining myself and ghosted her out.
I think if she ever tried being honest with herself about the way she’d been behaving towards the end, then she’d be more than capable of understanding why I ghosted her.

It could also be that we're all feeling overwhelmed by the myriad of different means of communication? I find I miss some messages, because I don't check all of them everyday!

about half a dozen

If you haven’t done anything that you know of, do you think someone could be causing trouble for you? Do these people all know each other? Could someone be spreading rumours?