Have you ever had a friend that you just never heard from again?

[BeBusyBird]

No big fallout. No dramatic ending. Just one day they stopped reaching out, didn’t respond to your calls/texts and that was it. Did you ever find out why? Did you try to reconnect or did you let it go?

I had a really close friend from school where we shared all our problems, in-jokes, we worked and went away together and I knew all about her difficult home life. I encouraged her to go to university and we kind of lost touch when she got a serious boyfriend and I got the feeling she wanted to reinvent herself and forget about the past, which I don't blame her for. She also knew I'd been having a hard time but didn't contact me - maybe she couldn't handle it.

We have met up only a few times over the years and I was always the one trying to make contact, sending cards and presents. I got the feeling I was making more of an effort than she was and was an emotional support friend.
She has contacted me out of the blue a few times recently but my heart's not in it after being ignored for so long.

I really missed her - there's no-one who knows me as well as she did, and I often think of the jokes and fun we had, but it's all a bit like a bereavement now - I have had to make my peace with the fact that she just didn't really want me in her life for many years and the contact all feels quite hollow now. It's very sad.

I had a friend who I met when our children were small. They’re grown up now and more recently we sang in a choir together. She knew that I was having trouble with the people on the (un)welcome desk and with hindsight I think she distanced herself from me at choir because, as she said herself, they’re not people you’d want to get on the wrong side of, and we both ‘needed’ the choir. It was intolerable and I’ll be forever deeply sad that I had to stop going.

After messaging her and being ignored and feeling let down, I heard from her months later out of the blue. We met for coffee, she talked non stop and I wasn’t able to get a word in. It was very odd. We parted ways with her knowing nothing about my life since I’d last seen her and that I was waiting a referral for a breast lump.

I know she’s heard since then that I’d had breast cancer and surgery and apparently, she was going to contact me. I haven’t heard from her but no loss there I guess.

Yes theres been a few. The only one which really upset me was someone who came to my wedding, we used to keep in touch all the time and all of a sudden after we last met up in 2017, for no rhyme or reason things just stopped, it was always me doing the messaging and chasing and when I stopped, she stopped too. Ive never said anything but its really upset me as to why. I did a lot for her and it was all one sided. By me. It dosent bother me anymore but at the time caused me a lot of upset

Yes, sadly it's happened to me quite a lot since school days, I'm now in my 50s.
I only have a couple of close friends, always seemed to be the third friend in a group.
Someone I was close to who lives abroad has completely ghosted me in the past couple of years.
I wasn't always good at keeping in touch but with Facebook and messenger it was easier. I don't know what I've done, I've sent several messages asking if they are okay but they haven't responded. I feel bad as I know they've had personal issues.
Another one who I met when we had babies the same age cut contact then unfriended me on Facebook.
I was quite upset at the time but realised I was just useful to her at that time as someone to meet up with as she wasn't working. I haven't tried to contact her again.

I had a very good support network and had what I thought were very close and good friends. A few stopped talking to me and I couldn’t find out why. It was awful I was going through an awful divorce and I needed concrete grounds. Then one day a local neighbour asks me in for tea and said .,.
You need to know that Zoe has been saying some things about you and what you are.
Zoe was a woman I knew vaguely but knew her son better - her son was a drug dealer (15-16) who I had the previous year been line managing someone professionally who was helping her son access support through their professional role I was their line manager manager …. I have changed some deals but that is the crux of it. Over ten years ago now and I moved away but that woman destroyed my friendships and yet I had not mentioned her son or her family’s intimate details to anyone and I refused to even when I found out it was her and she was saying some horrific things. I moved away and lost many friendships but she knew I had done nothing - I think she was embarrassed and humiliated by her son and wanted to make sure that anyone connected was discredited.

Yes. A lifelong family friend suddenly stopped her weekly phone calls to my parents without explanation and when they tried to contact her phone was disconnected. We eventually sent the police round to do a welfare check and apparently she was alive and well! Never heard from her again.

Yes I think my ex best friend of 30 plus years semi ghosted me. We were very close but contact dwindled a bit around 10 years ago. The last time I physically saw her was 5 years ago. Then messages became more infrequent and “the drift” just started. I would send a happy birthday message, but heard nothing on my birthday three years in a row.

I started to look back at our message history and realised that in the last 6 years. every single interaction had been started by me. She always replied if I messaged her, but it was a bit generic and she would never instigate it. I last messaged her 18 months ago to wish her happy birthday, she replied telling me what a great night out she’d had with friends. I just didn’t have anything to say after that so I left it. We’ve both had big milestone birthdays since and neither of us have acknowledged each others. I feel sad about it as 30+ years is a very long time. I was her bridesmaid (though she since divorced).

We are still friends on Facebook so I see she happy in life. I don’t post on FB anymore and rarely use it so she wouldn’t know anything about my life. She doesn’t even know where I live now tbh. I don’t think anything specific happened, I think she found more convenient friends who live closer (i.e walking distance to her house) and values those people more now. I could actually be dead for all she knows, but I try not to dwell on it.

I find a lot of my friendships have drifted in the last 10 years as I didn’t have a core group and my close friends were dotted about from different jobs and situations. We don’t have those situations in common anymore so I guess that’s how things drift. Kids and work and everything else just gets in the way eventually. Some times some of them message me randomly, I reply and say great to hear from you, how are you all etc etc. Then it’s silence until the next time. I don’t really get it.

Yep. One of my best friends just stood me up
one day without explanation. Still baffles me almost 18 years later!!

Had a work friend ghost me after 14 years of friendship.

Helped him through some crap times (death of both his parents and redundancy). He was, I thought, a close friend.

He started dating someone, we all met and had a lovely meal with my other half and made welcome at my home afterwards. Arranged to have a day out with him which I often did when other half was on nights. His girlfriend apparently went ballistic, was crazy insecure and practically became hysterical. She sent my friend loads of texts slagging me off and accused me of “using him”! She went completely bat shit 💩

Within a short space of time I’d been ghosted. He’d sold his place and I think he moved in with her. Still to this day I am completely baffled 🤷‍♀️

Several, tried to reconnect 5+ years later but no luck. I broadly know why in each case though.

Yes 12 years of daily support, both ways then one day messages shes moving abroad
never heard again

Yes, loads, but that's over the years and me moving several times for career. It's not personal, it's just people moving away and lives changing from when we all knew each other.
Social media helped get back in touch with some for a while, but I got rid of SM a few years ago.

They still alive?!

Yes, I have. It was a close friend who I’d met at university. After university, she moved into my shared house and would hang out with me, my (then) boyfriend (now husband) and his friends and would come on holiday with us. She then got transferred to another country and since then has dropped me.

What is difficult about being ghosted is that you do feel a bit haunted. At times, I would wonder if I’d thought our friendship was closer than it was - but we’d flown out (long haul) to each other’s weddings and I’d flown out to visit her in the country she lives in. Sometimes friends who’d known her through me would say “How’s Sarah?!?” and then, when I’d say that I haven’t seen her in a decade and she stopped replying to me 5/6 years ago, would say “Oh, you really should make the effort to get in touch! She was so fun!”. This doesn’t feel great and I can’t make the effort any more.

Yep and it still bothers me to this day. No fall out, no crossed word - very good friend. We used to talk daily via messenger. One day I realised I hadn’t heard from her for a few days and she hadn’t replied to my last message. I sent her another one - no reply. I looked on her Facebook profile to see it no longer existed (I assumed I’d been blocked at first but nobody else could find her either). I sent her a text message - no reply. Sent her an email - no reply. Got worried and messaged her husband - no reply. I messaged her daughter and her daughter replied saying her mum was fine! I sent her a birthday card in the post and heard nothing back so I gave up. 3 years ago this and I never did hear from her again. No idea why I was ghosted - I wish we had an argument beforehand so I at least had a reason for it.

Majority if my friendships has ended like this. Never any drama. You just stop texting or have the "let's meet up for coffee sometime" and you just never agree to a time.

Yeah. A Scottish girl I worked with years ago. We were great friends and had 2 of our babies at the same times. She just stopped responding and I figured she’d moved back to Scotland. I wrote to her at the address I had but no response. I often think of her and wonder how she’s doing.

Definitely! We’re still friends on facebook. She doesn’t post anything but very occasionally will get tagged in a photo by someone else.

One of my best friends dropped me when we were 18-19. I have no idea why. I felt too proud to ask her what the fuck was going on, and I was busy making lots of new friends at uni. But now I deeply regret it. I was too young to understand that your childhood friends are irreplaceable. I try not to think about it any more; it was a long time ago.

Do you think it’s time that we remove these people on our social media now? 😆

Yes, still don't know why but I guess she has her reasons and I wish her well

I don't expect every friendship to last for life, that would be impossible

Yes. A couple of women I used to work with. Texting was always sporadic but we kept in touch still. Met up every now and then.

1 had their daughter a year after mine, I made the effort to go see her, messaged to arrange play dates. She cancelled a few times. I realised it was me messaging first never her. The last time she messaged it was for free heating advice from my husband. Nothing since. I invited her and her family to my birthday party last year, literally the day of she said she couldn’t make it. Nothing since.

The other, we had both cancelled meet up plans due to illness. She also cancelled coming to my party on the day. I since did try to meet up, at her suggestion when she said she was free. I gave her a day that would work and she never responded. I don’t know if she just forgot then felt bad about it and the longer it’s gone on is awkward. But I also don’t want to be the one to reach out and be made a fool of.

Yes ... my aunt ghosted me. She's only 10 years older than myself. She's godmother to my son. She had a free holiday with us when we lived overseas and her husband had left her. She was last at my house about 2019 when she said I was lucky because I had my meal ticket !! (my husband) ... radio silence since. Our best man who also stayed with us and then remarried and pretty much disappeared up his new wife's a**hole. One woman that I thought woukd be a good friend for life moved overseas and that was that. I don't understand people at all !!

Yes, a very very dear friend did a 'slow fade' to my messages. But I completely understand why and bear her no ill will. I wish we could have had an 'exit conversation', but that was not to be.

We became friends through our husbands and immediately 'clicked' and became 'besties'. We even travelled together 'just us' trips every year. Husbands had HUGE bust up feud that ended their friendship. My DH didn't care if she and I remained friends but her DH was adamant that she had to cut me off. She tried to keep in touch but he was such a controlling arsehole that it was very difficult for her (monitoring email, texts, listening to phone calls) and I'm sure she got grief for it.

Her messages became briefer and briefer and eventually it was just one or two word responses to my messages to her. I figured at that point I was probably causing her problems by messaging so I stopped.

I still miss her terribly and it's been probably 6-7 years.

It's unlikely to be personal and sometimes people have bad stuff happen in their lives. Bad stuff in your life makes you narrow your life down to survival mode to deal with the bad stuff.
Stop taking it all so personally and accept it's not all about you.