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Original poster

People who disappear and you wonder what happened to them...

212 replies

BobbolinaTheBitchyBrat · 01/08/2019 14:02

Anyone else have one of these?

About ten years ago, when I had my first, there were a lot more parenting forums, as opposed to just mumsnet and Facebook groups. I was on one which was quite attachment/natural parenting focused, and there was this one lady who was a bit of a guru to the rest of us. She had a gang of kids, homeschooled, ran a quite well read blog, and they were always off wild camping and that sort of thing. Very hippy/alternative. The forum had group meets, so we did in fact meet up as part of a group quite a few times, and she knitted my eldest a really lovely hat.

Then she disappeared. Posts wiped. Blog gone. Everyone deleted. Nobody knew what had happened. A year or two later there was a rumour her husband had left her, which was shocking as she'd often written about their marriage, all really positive stuff.

I've often googled and searched to see if there's any sign of her online, but there's absolutely nothing. Zilch. Like she never existed. Yet she was all over the online parenting circle at one point, she blogged nearly every day.

Not sure what I'm getting at... Just that it's strange really, how people can just drop out of view, even these days!

OP posts:
Waterfallgirl · 04/08/2019 17:24

@MacavityTheDentistsCat thank you! Yes I think that was her - i too hope she is happy.

LemonSqueezy0 · 04/08/2019 19:06

Someone I knew disappeared from SM after her husband had an affair. They'd been together since school, so over 15 years at that point of affair.... She was very image conscious, and liked that everyone thought she had the perfect life with her childhood sweetheart.... Turns out though, the draw of being seen to be happy on SM was too much, so she deleted and blocked those of us who knew, and had helped her through it, and carried on as before posting happy ever after pictures.

Enclume · 04/08/2019 21:12

Lemon, that's genuinely sad.

I hope if her marriage eventually crumbles and she contactsyou again, you can forgive her. She must be under huge mental strain.

AnastasiaVonBeaverhausen · 04/08/2019 21:27

I also wonder about Allie Brosh. I loved her blog so much. She was very public about her struggles with depression and after her sister's death she kind of disappeared from public view. I hope she's ok. She's a hugely talented woman

Chouxalacreme · 04/08/2019 22:01

I was a prominent handbagger back in the day I loved it !
I remember smileygirl Bowie’sbitch caramelx ummm forgotten other names now
I was bubs

perpetuallyperplexedbylife · 04/08/2019 23:02

A friend from work. She left to go to college (in her 30s) and had moved to
a city about 20 miles away, full of promises to meet up. She immediately deleted her Facebook and must have changed her phone number. Never heard from her again and there is no trace of her on SM, and she has quite an unusual name. Quite hurtful really, as I'd thought we were close.

yesthatstheone · 04/08/2019 23:09

Can someone tell me what happened to the handbag forum? I thought it still existed? Is this the same as the purse forum? What happened exactly?

Lockheart · 04/08/2019 23:23

Does anyone remember a poster who would repeatedly post the same threads about a guy she liked in her office? She would make 10s of new accounts just to post the same things on the same forums to try to get different answers and get confirmation he liked her. And then she'd deny it was her although it clearly was.

It was blatantly obvious he didn't reciprocate and that she needed help. But she would always get angry at anyone suggesting she see a professional.

This was on handbag, Cosmopolitan, digitalspy, and a few others, around 2008 - 2012 (I can't remember the exact dates, but it went on for about 2 years!). She was prolific.

In the end someone traced who she really was (her initials were JL and she lived in Cardiff as I remember) and she slowly disappeared after that, although she still popped up on occasion.

I hope she managed to get over her obsession with her work colleague and got the help she needed.

DoSomethingBob · 04/08/2019 23:54

I ran a channel on IRC in the early days of the internet and got very friendly with one of my admins.
We met up in real life and went camping and to festivals together. The channel closed and gradually we drifted apart. I had kids and got busy with domesticity and she had a fairly high powered career and wrote a blog about life with her even more high powered husband. She disliked Facebook but we’d exchange emails from time to time.
Randomly a few weeks ago she crossed my mind and as it seemed quite a while since I’d heard from her I dropped her a line. Didn’t hear back which was unusual so I googled her and found she had died from cancer a year or so earlier. ☹️

igotdemons · 05/08/2019 00:24

I had a Pen Pal way back in the late 90’s who I met through our (teenage!) love of a particular band. We lived about 250 miles apart but we wrote to each other a few times a week for quite a while and became good friends. One day I received a letter from her which said she was going through a hard time and was running away from home so I wouldn’t hear from her for a while but she’d be back in touch when she could... Sadly I never heard from her again and I sometimes wonder what happened to her 😢

MotherForkinShirtBalls · 05/08/2019 01:54

Lockheart, I think that poster has been on here in recent months.

Lolyora17 · 05/08/2019 02:54

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

colourlessgreenidea · 05/08/2019 03:00

I think that poster has been on here in recent months.

Just what I was going to say Grin

Enclume · 05/08/2019 03:42

Yes, she haunts the Relationships topic.

Thanks to you, I shall now be reading her drivel in a Welsh accent.

Sobeyondthehills · 05/08/2019 04:19

My partner's mother's family. All of them.

When he was young, his mother died, for whatever reason his dad (they had divorced) cut off all contact with them.

We have tried to get into contact with them, but so far they are either ignoring the letters we have sent or its not got to the right person.

He has a really common name, so social media is really not helpful on this one and there is only so many letter you can send.

NoGravyForYou · 05/08/2019 04:50

If I remember ESD had a son and found out she was pregnant unexpectedly and was a bit further a long than she'd thought and then somehow (?) someone brought it into real life and Derek deleted her profile and all of her posts. She is a poster I do genuinely think about now and then as she was one of the few that actually made me laugh big belly laughs out loud. I hope she's doing well.

Monty27 · 05/08/2019 05:12

@spashy yup!
There's more to ghosting than just dating sites

donutrehomer · 05/08/2019 05:57

Im another ex- handbagger. I was on there from about 2002 until the end.

My DP is military and there were a couple of others who were military WAGs on there. One was married, fell pregnant and had a baby but they split very soon afterwards. Just after he returned from Iraq, it was so sudden and completely it if the blue. She was a teacher I believe.

She was a prolific baker and used to send him a parcel out to Iraq every day.

There were a couple of others who had DP in the military. We just used to support each other really on a daily basis.

I remember the poor girl who was dumped just before her wedding, found out he had been seeing someone. It was terrible.

There were countless others, but if you are out there, I think of you all and hope you are well.

In real life, yes, an ex school friend who won't have nothing to do with any of her school fiends. It's an odd situation as the last time she spoke to anyone she was so dismissive of us all. They had tracked her down to invite her to a school reunion, she basically told them where to go. In no uncertain terms either.

Old work colleague from my first job at a large accountancy firm in London, can't find her anywhere.

bealright · 05/08/2019 06:45

@Alpacathebag I think I was on the same forums (fora?!). AWF? I often think of people from there too.

londonrach · 05/08/2019 07:04

Cant remember the posters name totally but it was jenny something...she had cancer and was worrying about her family. She suddenly disappeared. Think someone bought her posts up a year later but no further comments. Very sad

londonrach · 05/08/2019 07:09

I have disapeared myself to a group of 8 people. I had my reasons. Three years later i wonder if i should let them know dd was born ok.

Lockheart · 05/08/2019 07:24

MotherForkinShirtBalls (and others!) really?? Oh dear. I don't hang about in relationships much so hadn't noticed.

It's a shame it's still going on. I wonder if it's the same guy she's obsessed with - it's been many years now.

KitNCaboodle · 05/08/2019 13:39

@bealright @Alpacathebag I’m a former AWFer too. Have kept in contact with a few others from there on fb.

TalkToMeAboutSocialWorkPlease · 05/08/2019 13:45

@londonrach

Little Jenny wren I think???

londonrach · 05/08/2019 14:15

@talktomeabout socialworkplease. This one... www.
.com/Talk/amibeing_unreasonable/2259404-To-want-to-run-away