To ask: have you ever had someone just stop speaking to you for no reason?

[GutsyBrickMoose]

Not a big argument, not a clear falling out - just silence.

Someone you were close with suddenly withdrawing, ignoring calls or messages, and acting like you no longer exist.

If so, how did you deal with it and did they ever come back?

Yes, then she told me why and it was the most ridiculous reason, I apologised straight away for inadvertently upsetting her but she just flipped and wanted me to agree with her narrative that I deliberately set out to insult and belittle her, all her own issues she was projecting on me so I ended the friendship and she had no interest in repairing things.

I still don’t agree. It’s fine to have boundaries but communicate it. Communication is so incredibly necessary. I can no longer continue in this relationship because of x y z. I don’t see why that’s so difficult. I find an unwillingness to communicate and ghost unhealthy and toxic

Yes, unfortunately, someone who I've known for decades but only met up with a few times a year now due to distance. I chased her for a while and worried something was wrong, but she seems fine on Facebook.

I later heard from mutual friends that she decided to cut off all friends with children (she is child free by choice and has always been vocally anti kids). Apparently says it's boring to listen to anything child related and will be back when they are grown up?!?!!

She hasn't come back yet. I've accepted the friendship has ended but I'm really gutted about it tbh. Even if she did come back in the future I can't see it being the same.

I’ve been the guilty ghoster once.

It was a friend I had been very close to at school and we were in loose touch after, seeing each other very occasionally. She was a Christian and I’m an atheist but that never bothered either of us.

She is intelligent and has had advantages in life in terms of family, background and education, as have I. I know it sounds a small thing but she shared a report on Facebook about a child of 15 having a hand or hands chopped off for theft (obviously abhorrent) in somewhere like Saudi Arabia, this must be around 2008, and she added the comment that “this is what Muslims do to children”. I just couldn’t think of a way to make it alright and didn’t want a row about it so I just dropped contact. It wasn’t as if we met up regularly.

I hope she is well and happy and I don’t wish her ill but she’s not dim or sheltered enough for me to find excuses for her and I just found it and would still find it immediately alienating.

I’m not usually so reactive, I have acquaintances who occasionally share those posts that crop up around Remembrance Sunday about Our Heroes living on the streets while immigrants get given houses and driving lessons 🙄 and I haven’t ghosted them. I suppose we all draw the line at different points.

I had two very good mum friends that I met as all our children were at the same pre-school for 2 years. We all met a lot with the kids after school and at weekends, and all went to each others houses and even went out for drinks in the evening. Fast forward primary school enrolment time and my DD didn’t get into the school attached to the pre-school (we were out of catchment) and from then on they avoided me and avoided all contact. I saw them at the library one day with their kids and I had my daughter with me and they chatted to me like nothing was wrong but left the library as soon as they could. It was sad more for my daughter who asked why their children didn’t play with her any more. One positive is that one of their kids was a total nightmare and pushed my daughter a lot and hit her a few times on play dates and the mum never did anything - so at least we didn’t have to cope with that situation any more.

Yes, a very long term, close friend. We lived in different towns. I am godmother to her three DC’s, and she is to mine. Bridesmaids to each other.

Met up/stayed every school holiday.

Then nothing.

I have absolutely no idea what happened?

I tried to contact her, nothing. A few years later she joined FB and I tried again. I am in touch with my god DC’s ( her DC”s) but she isn't with my DC’s.

I've had recent bereavement which her DC’s are aware of, again nothing.

There isn't anything I can do. I can't apologise as I don't know why I would be apologising.

No contact now for 10 years.

Yes,.my best friend since university. She was engaged to a lovely guy, but was cheating on him with our boss's son. She used me for cover and I told her I wasn't comfortable with that. I then advised her to postpone the wedding if she wasn't sure about committing. She promised to stop cheating. I was her bridesmaid but told her I couldn't stand next to her if she lied in her vows. She promised she'd stopped. Then during the wedding reception she called and spoke to the boss's son and arranged to meet up with him.
I left the wedding and never spoke to her again. She didn't try and speak to me so I guess she realised why.

No. Not on the receiving end.
I have done it, sadly, I do feel awful, however the visceral reaction I felt around them wasn't good for a long-time.
It is my problem that I clamped down contact.

Yes. Very good friend of mine, we would chat almost daily on messenger and meet up etc. She just disappeared. Deleted her Facebook, stopped answering texts - literally disappeared. I sent her a birthday card through the post - no response.

It was so weird and sudden I actually started thinking something might have happened to her! A few months of silence and I couldn’t shake the feeling that something had happened so I messaged her daughter. The daughter replied saying everything was fine. That was it. No idea why, there was no fall out, in fact days before she disappeared we’d had a lovely day drinking coffee in the sunshine laughing and joking. I’ll never understand it. It’s been 4 years now, never heard from her again.

Yes, a few times.

One because she didn’t think I was grateful enough for my hen. It wasn’t what I wanted but I definitely said thank you. I didn’t want the traditional boozy affair because I was 6 months postpartum and not drinking due to BF but that’s what I got! I played along as far as possible but she was so furious that I wanted to leave by 11 that she just stopped speaking to me about 6 months later.

Another who stopped speaking to me after she started dating (now married to) a friend of mine from work. I think that may have been more him, though. He’d been a bit of a lad and I think he didn’t want me telling her about some of his antics!

I also lost a lot of couple friends post-divorce for no real reason other than the fact I was then single, but apparently that’s common.

I did it to someone because she started dealing cocaine and went strange - I am far too old for that shit and would never want that kind of crap in my life thanks. I didn't feel guilty at all and it's been years now.

Yes I think that's basically what "ghosting" is and it's probably not for no reason, not that this makes it okay. A good friend stopped talking to me after we had been best friends for years.

Yes. A group of 3 friends and one was going through a divorce. The other friend gave some advice which wasn’t taken well by the first friend. Not long after myself and the friend who was getting divorced had been blocked by the other friend. I felt really upset to be blocked for no reason as I hadn’t fallen out with anyone!
around 18 months later the friend got back in touch with us both and after a lot of talking she admitted she’d been in a really bad place from a mental health point of view and thought that we hated her.
it was all a bit strained for a while but she apologised and we were able to continue the friendship

Yes. In my early 20s made friends with a colleague who wasn't in my department but who I bumped into in the ladies crying as her father had just died. We socialised together with other friends, became close and stayed in touch when I moved abroad, meeting up on my twice-yearly visits home. She lived rurally and after a night out she would drive me back to my parents' house where I was staying Sometimes we'd sit in the car and talk for a long time too. If you'd asked me then I would have said she'd be a lifelong friend. Later I got married, she commented on my photos on Facebook and then...nothing. I later wrote her an email asking if I had done anything wrong, she replied normally (nothing mean or cold) and said of course not. Never heard from her again. It was deeply deeply upsetting and took me years to get over. Twenty years later I'd still like to see her again just to ask her why.

Yes. BIL and SIL. No idea why they suddenly dropped contact. We invited them to our wedding this year, they can’t come which is fair enough - but not even a congrats text message received 🤷🏻‍♀️.

Survivor's guilt

Or juat simply moved on, i have lost contact with people and people have lost contact with me, there does not have to be anything behind it same with the 'they're just jealous' I think people come up with scenarios to make themselves feel better rather than accepting people move on

I’ve actually done it for the first time recently. I had a choice of messaging her and saying for the love of god just stop messaging me or to just block her
(We’ve never met in person)
Met online in a support group and she just bombarded me. Even booked a weekend in my home town and messaged me literally the night before to tell me. Luckily she started the conversation asking how I was and I genuinely was really poorly and had tested positive for Covid (vulnerable local friend)
she still came for the weekend it turned out but blocked me from seeing her (usually daily) instagram posts
when I re developed the issue we’d ‘met’ over I just … I couldn’t do it/take it again
blocked her on everything because she exhausted me
i had stopped responding to anything other than absolute direct messages over time and muted stories etc
I do feel guilty but either way I was going to hurt her feelings

someone I thought was my best friend did this. I don’t know the reason. Reading people say they don’t regret doing it shows they have no idea how painful ghosting someone is. I needed counselling after to deal with it. Grow a backbone and say a goodbye, it’s much kinder. Ghosting is cowardly and cruel

When I stopped going to church a couple of people stopped having anything to do with me. I didn't care as I'm not interested in conditional friendships like that.

If someone stops speaking to me, then there will be a reason. The position I take on that is that if they have a problem with me or something, they can talk to me about it. If they don't, their problem.

But this is assuming it is an active thing when I don't hear from somome I assume they are just getting on with their life i don't assume it is anything to do with me, I don't think they have made an active decision to stop contact with me

Yep, happened to me once. Sent her three texts over a couple of weeks, and then two emails over the next few weeks and then I just stoped hassling her.

We used to see each other about once a fortnight and text every other day babysat one another kids and went out for drinks and coffee - we were good friends, so it was pretty noticeable. Every now and then I wonder why.

But I know I did nothing wrong so either: she was going on bad information and wasn't a true friend anyway, or had her own reasons that had nothing to do with me.

The reason people get ghosted is usually that they are clingy, needy and demanding and the person knows they will want an exit interview that they're not owed. The person doing the ghosting owes you nothing at all, no matter how much you wish they did and all the "yes but that makes them a nasty person!" crap doesn't matter to them.

It's either that or there is a reason you just don't know.

Either way, nothing at all you can do about it, so just move on. Anyone who craps on long afterwards about being ghosted has just proved why they were ghosted.

It’s happened to me… I thought we got on well, she also gave me that impression.

She said I was the only person she could speak honestly to.

then one day “poof” !!!! GONE.

no explanation, nothing

Yup. A friend has been flaky for years and I've just gone along with it and chased her up periodically, initiating contact so we didn't lose touch.
Just over two years ago, she messaged me at Christmas, saying we should get together and asking when I was free. I replied with dates and said I'd love to catch up. Have heard nothing from her since and have stopped chasing now.
I know she's fine as her social media is full of her busy life/work/grandchildren etc.
I think I've finally accepted she's a crappy friend, and it's not a "me" thing.
(Gosh that was quite therapeutic and liberating! )

Yes, school mum friend, we did stuff together with and without kids several days per week. Just stopped wanting to do stuff and now refuses to talk to me at all other than an occasional hello. Awkwardly our daughters are close friends at school but she is never invited to play even though we have had their daughter round.

She has done this to another woman I know too, so I think its her issue.

It's been a few years now but I really wish I asked her at the time what the problem was. 1 more school year though and I won't need to see her again. I can't wait.