Exes solicitor sent letter to not contact him again

[Iamunhinged]

Long story short he ghosted me after being together some years. He also blocked me on social media and phone etc.

I sent him a registered letter just asking him what went wrong, he sent a letter back and then a week later I get this. I have no way of contacting him anyway and reading his letter I have no wish to but what do you do when you receive something like this? Do I respond to the solicitor? Do I ignore it? Its basically said not to contact him and not to contact his friends. I was actually friends with one of his friends and we only ever chatted about meeting up so I find that odd but I wont contact her again just in case.

Seems a very extreme thing to do and I dont know what the cost of the letter was (he is northern ireland and I am down south so it would be different) and I have no idea of any of this legal stuff.

There is no backstory, there is no huge thing I am omitting it really is as says above. Any advice?

Just don't contact him again, if you do I suspect you will get a visit from Mr Plod accused of harassment.

Both Harassment and its sister offence, Stalking cannot occur as one off's, your one letter is not harassment, just as following someone home on a dark night is odd, but not stalking.

Both offences require a pattern of repeated behaviour, twice or more, and proving a case of either is far simpler, especially where the parties are known to each other if the person being harassed has asked the other person to desist.

In this case your Ex has paid a solicitor to draft a letter telling you to desist, this has been drawn up by an officer of the court (solicitor) and a copy will be held on file - if you contact again your ex can report to the police with evidence, nice easy to solve crime, and it then is a crime!

Do not respond to the letter and do not contact your Ex again. Keep the solicitors details, if for any reason in the future you have a legitimate reason for contact, joint financial issue, some document arrives for him etc. address any enquiry to the solicitor, not to him.

OP, you sound lovely and he sounds like a complete and utter gaslighting dick. He's clearly trying to paint you as obsessive and unhinged to give his own appalling behaviour justification.

This is a really horrible thing that's happened to you, but remember that the solicitor's letter says everything about how weird he is and nothing about you. Just look after yourself and try to move on.

Another thread on Mumsnet which is just weird.
The OP has been dating a man for a considerable period of time. Their children had met, friends had met. The partner then ghosts her and blocks her. To be honest OP I think you have been pretty calm. I’ve been ghosted once after a year’s relationship. It is bloody horrible. It’s worse than a “it’s not you it’s me conversation” as at least there you get an end and an opportunity to say bye. Those posters saying you did wrong are probably in nice long term safe Comfortable relationships and really have forgotten what it is like to date in 2024. You did nothing wrong by sending a letter and who cares whether it was registered, pigeon mail or whatever - that’s besides the point. Good luck Op sounds like you dodged a bullet there. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has not been 100% honest about his situation.

Quite possible that he has another woman, wife or other, and OPs communications are awkward for him, especially if the post is asking at the door for a signature!!

@Shelinaa then don't ghost someone,anyone, but especially someone you've been with for years.

he's a wanker for not telling @Iamunhinged that it was over face to face after years together.

@Iamunhinged I'm sorry you're going through this. He's an absolute wanker for ghosting you!!

I hope you got some answers from his letter, at least he had the decency to reply I suppose.

people who are scared/freaked out getting a registered letter from someone they were in a relationship with for years, needs to get help. You didn't do anything wrong. Youre not in the wrong to want to know what the fuck he's playing at ghosting you!!

Still - it should help you move on from the bellend!

Take care of yourself xx

I think he is the unhinged one! That is just not normal behaviour. I think it's another woman, sorry. Reminds me of a work colleague. Her and her husband together, married years and 2 kids. Went away for a weekend as a family, got home and ordered a pizza. He packed a bag, picked up his passport and left. It was another woman.

I know it hurts now, but you're better off without someone who can be so cold and cruel. Take care x

A letter was calm. I would have driven to his and demanded an explanation after investing so much time.

I would be fuming in your position op. You’ve had a really lucky escape tbh. So you got drunk and made a bit of a scene. We all do stupid things sometimes. His reaction tells you a lot about him as a person and at least he ended things before your lives became even more intertwined.

He sounds like a coward. He knows he did a shit thing towards you and all the children. He doesn't like you've still found a way to confront him about it after he blocked you and ghosted you everywhere. His solicitor's letter is just so you can't respond to the letter he sent you.

How grandiose of him to send a solicitor's letter shortly after ghosting you. So cowardly.

Absolutely 👍

Sorry that has happened to you and he has ended things without even informing you. That’s really nasty, try not to take it to heart.

I would presume if you sending a letter checking he’s alright has been seen as a big deal that there’s another woman, but he went on the holiday anyway as already planned. Sorry if that is the case but you are best off without him.

Focus on yourself now and your children. Not the same but I once dated a right catch…not! Had moved in with me and we were also work colleagues so I thought he was a really nice guy. In the time I walked my child to school and got home he had ‘disappeared’ he was gone and a handful of his belongings in one drawer were gone but everything else was still there. I never heard from him again or knew anyone else whoever did. Years later I thought I noticed him once out of the corner of my eye when I was out but it was probably someone who just looked similar.

That’s probably true of the version you knew but if there is a new women who’s seen the letter and sitting with him in the solicitors office then yes he will pay. Sorry but that’s how spineless men who don’t even tell you it’s over behave.

Btw if you check your postage tracking code online you will be able to see the name of the person who signed for the letter you sent.

Do you have your house keys back? I’m just concerned as you mentioned you’d exchanged them…

I honestly wasn’t criticising your personal post, I happen to agree with your take on things in general and particularly in this thread! I made the mistake of quoting you for some reason when my post was for the previous replies.

I think he’s had his head turned and is taking advice from that person. That’s why his behaviour seems so out of character, because it’s literally someone else’s character.

Based on the fact you can’t see sending a registered letter is weird, I doubt very much there isn’t a back story. What I do think though is you were and still are very much in denial. Get yourself a good counsellor and leave him alone

Why is it weird to send a letter? The registered part is just to get proof of delivery so I don’t know why the fixation on that. It’s no different from a normal letter. It’s just a means of making contact and less intrusive than calling or going to his house. Would it be equally weird to send an email and request a read receipt? You haven’t explained why it’s so weird to try to get in contact with someone who was a long term partner who just vanished from her life with no explanation whatsoever. Do you have a DH/DP? What would you do if one day they walked out on you with no explanation and blocked you on everything? Would you really just shrug and leave it?
As for leave him alone, it seems to have been a good few weeks/months since this happened and she has sent one letter to him and doesn’t intend to contact him again. She’s hardly stalking him is she?

Have you changed your locks? Perhaps wise to do so m, even just for your own peace of mind, given his odd behaviour. 🌹

My take is that he decided he was done after your major row. He went along with the holiday as he would have lost money if he cancelled. He took the cowardly way out and just packed and went once you were home. Blocked. Done and dusted as far as he was concerned, having planned for months. I expect that he's already on OLD. The solicitors letter is just his full stop. Can fully understand how hurtful and confusing this has been for you. All you can do is move on. Hope you have a good weekend with your friends.

There's two possibilities here. Either he's friends with the solicitor and got the friend to do this as a favour or he might have legal cover as part of his house insurance. One of my neighbours has that and they are permanently getting solicitors to fire off letters to people about the slightest things.

It was awful of him to ghost you. What on earth is wrong with people these days that they think they can just walk out of someone's life after several years with no explanation and then simply block someone? He should have spoken to you and ended it or if he couldn't face that, he should have sent you an email or a letter to explain.
I don't see a problem with you writing a letter to ask what had happened. Registering it might have made him think you were going to cause problems in the future by continuing to contact him or whatever.
As long as you didn't do anything else to cause him concern that you might start stalking him or whatever, then I think the solicitor's letter was ott.

I'd wonder though if he had someone else or has recently met someone and doesn't want them to find out about you so he has to make sure you don't contact him at all and therefore scares you off with a solicitor's letter.
A possibility is that after the big argument he had decided it was over but hung around with you while "looking around" for someone else. I had an ex who did that. The argument blew over and everything was fine and then all of a sudden, boom, off he went and it turned out he'd met someone else.

Anyway, TLDR: don't respond to the solicitor's letter and don't contact this man again.

Leave the poor bloke alone.

OP, some people (mostly men) are able to flick a mental switch once they decide to leave a relationship. I've seen it happen to friends, and it shocked me how easily the husband could do it to the wife. In that case he went off with the wife's best friend, leaving my friend and the best friend's DH in pieces. Friend also got the legal letter as if she was unreasonable. She wasn't, she was broken hearted.
It had to have been planned for months, they took the friend's kids with them and set up an instant happy family. Posted all over social media.
Then had the gall to claim the partners they left behind were the unreasonable ones. Absolute bastard, he kept up the loving husband act until he left. Then bam.
So I'm guessing your now ex has a similar capacity to flick that switch. It's definitely not you. It's him.

Did you miss the bit where he walked out on her and her kids with no explanation after several years and she has contacted him the once just to ask for an explanation? Poor bloke indeed.