to let you all know why I ghosted my friend?

[NoteworthyFactory]

This was 5 years ago. We were both in our late 40s.

I really liked her. We used to live in the same area and became friends through a mutual acquaintance. Around a year after our friendship developed, I moved out of area. We then started making an effort to meet somewhere half way three or four times a year. It was then when I noticed that she could be very negative about life in general and I felt like an emotional dumpster whenever I was with her. She would often tell me about outings with other friends and I wondered if she'd be moaning at them so much also, but somehow I got the feeling that she reserved that role for me.

I took up running. She mocked it by saying it was a cliche how middle aged women who had never exercised would suddenly feel the urge to do so and start running and damage their bones. To this day I still run 2/3 times a week.

I started training to become a counsellor. She mocked it and actually said how everyone and their mother was hitting middle age and boredom and would train to become a counsellor. I have been successfully practising as a counsellor for 4 years now.

She turned 50 and we had no immediate plans to meet, so I posted a beautiful scarf to her home address. I know she loved it because I've seen a lot of photos in sm with her wearing it.

A year later I turned 50 just before lockdown. We met for coffee. She had no gift for me. Not even a card. She did some of her usual moaning. She then told me about an amazing gift she had bought for her friend's 50th birthday. She then let me pay for the coffees.

She sounds awful, don't blame you at all.

I did this a few years ago too. I had known this friend on and off for about 20 years. She had recently met and married a deeply religious man who was very pious wrt to religion yet was divorced and had a child with my friend before they got married.

She too became super religious and hugely hypocritical of 'the rich' - i.e. people who were wealthier than they were (they were not wealthy but were able to comfortably rent a nice home) despite him owning two homes where he was from, hugely critical of people who had 'invaded' London, yet had moved from Surrey (he from elsewhere in the UK) to live in London together for a period.

It was a constant hypocritical whinge and moan that I started to dread meeting up with her and let communication just peter out. It was a relief tbh.

why are you posting then?

I agree. I read it assuming it was someone just giving their perspective as a ghoster.

Nothing deep, no anguishing over it or obsessing years later, just someone stating why they chose to remove someone from their life.

So many people who’ve been ghosted appear to lack self awareness so the OP was just giving a few reasons why someone may choose to drop you as a friend.

Sounds like letting this friendship slide was the best way to go. Life is too short to waste time on relationships which do not enhance your life, she sounds self absorbed.

Sounds like you made the right decision OP. In my experience, when friends mock positive things in your life there is underlying jealousy.

I agree with others that OP was probably posting because it has been the subject of a number of threads recently.
I don’t blame you a bit for ghosting your friend OP. I know people say it’s probably better to tell the truth rather than ghost but IMO that just leads to unnecessary grief. I suppose the friend could ask if they were bothered by the silence.

I feel after we parted from our get together over coffee she was completely oblivious because she resumed texting in a normal tone. I stopped responding, at one point she sent a '?', and that was the end of it.

Isn't this a thread about a thread?

I am not posting for validation that I did the right thing. I am posting because I feel that this comes up a lot and I felt it might be helpful to someone.

Thinking even further back, about 30 years ago I feel I was the draining friend to someone who then ghosted me, but I didn't realise this at the time. It took me decades to realise that I behaved negatively and gossipy around this person and she was right to dump me. I feel embarrassed thinking how little self-awareness I had back then.

No, OP has not mentioned any other thread.

I feel embarrassed thinking how little self-awareness I had back then. And yet you've ghosted someone, which is an awful thing to do, and seem to have no awareness of this?

I was ghosted by a former friend and it really damaged me. I hope you're kinder to people now.

OP, I think you were right to stop being friends with this woman.

I think ideally you would have found a way to express your unhappiness to her though, not for her sake, but for yours.

Words are powerful and if you had something like ‘your behaviour hurts my feelings’, ‘You’re not very nice to me’, ‘that wasn’t a nice thing to say’ etc, I think you would have felt some relief.

OP was kind to her friend, the friend wasn’t kind back.

it’s almost like you’re trying to gaslight OP, which isn’t very kind, is it?

If you’re nasty to someone, they have full right to ghost you.

I find this very worthwhile to read.

Thank you for posting.

So, you were ghosted by a friend and therefore know how awful it is, yet you did it to someone else? Wouldn't you have preferred that the friend that ghosted you had sat you down and explained why they were upset, rather than let you ponder on it for DECADES?! Ghosting is a cowardly, childish and downright mean way to treat someone who was once your friend. Have the decency to tell her what she has done wrong, especially since you admit she has no idea.

I am in full awareness that I did this.

Sorry but it appears you both ghosted each other.

If she's not contacted you either, or made much of an effort, why are you taking all the responsibility for this?

Her text with a ? was the chance to say you feel the friendship had run its course for XYZ reasons.

Why on earth should she be kind to that moaning, negative, rude and nasty user? Did you even read what she did? We owe people like that nothing, least of all an explanation for our departure from their miserable lives.

For me there was a real lack of reciprocity in the relationship which went on for too long I guess because of the physical distance between us. Our meet-ups ended up feeling exhausting for me and communication definitely felt one-sided. The way she spoke about other friendships and her efforts towards them made me feel that stepping away without further explanation was a boundary setting tool.

Thanks for posting, OP, it is interesting to see the perspective of a "ghoster" after reading threads from "ghostees".

With the hindsight that you have now and having trained as a counsellor, would you handle things differently and explain to her your withdrawal from the friendship (which was totally understandable) or do you think that ghosting was the best way to handle things with her? I imagine some people may want "closure" while others may not be able to listen to honest criticism.

That's really interesting OP, to hear from the 'ghosters' perspective. Because I bet your ex friend is one of the people who can't understand what she did wrong and thinks friends are 'flakey' or that you fell out with her for not getting you a birthday present. She won't have realised all that was building up, because the dynamic for a long time has been her putting you down and making you feel small, and you putting up with it, until eventually enough was enough. Whats interesting is how much time and headspace could be saved by speaking out though. If when she put you down you had told her it wasnt on then maybe she'd have changed, or you could have just had an old style row and ended the friendship cleanly.

I ghosted a friend too. She really wasn’t the kind of friend I needed: she wanted to meet for coffee or wine and talk about hair, clothes, holidays, gossip about mutual acquaintances. I am more of the go for a long walk together, cook food together, maybe meet for Pilates, share theatre trips type of friend. To me, she was determinedly trivial and the whole sitting for hours in coffee shops thing was very unrewarding. So I faded away. Embarassing really.

I can understand that.
Ideally, I suppose, you could have let it peter out by being 'busy' if she wanted to meet up, or by just giving very short replies to her texts etc.

FWIW I too have semi ghosted a friend (more of a good acquaintance) because they did something I found very hurtful. They carried on texting afterwards and I replied very succinctly, hoping they would realise they had upset me. I understand it may have come over as differently (and that she's blaming me for the 'split') but I didn't and don't have the emotional energy to spend on to-ing and fro-ing with messages. My DP has a terminal illness and my emotional bandwidth is short, dealing with him day to day and what it means for my/our future.

Ghosting /No contact- modern ways of saying one is not responding to messages .