Ghosting Is Evil (or at Least Unkind)

👻 🫢😖

I can’t say that I have been truly “ghosted” where someone disappears from my life without any contact or notification whatsoever, but I have been abruptly and inexplicably cut off from all further contact with no explanation or opportunity to discuss it with the other person. Admittedly, that singular experience ranks as one of the most painful and traumatic experiences in my life. And brothers and sisters, I can tell you that, "Love ain’t no stranger.”

Had it not come out of the blue from someone that I cared for deeply and that I had assumed cared for me at least to some small degree, it would have been perhaps unpleasant, but not crushing. As it was, it really did a number on me.

It really screwed up my self-confidence and my ability to trust myself and others. I was emotionally staggered for quite some time. I was in a bit of a daze. I felt pain, but with many other things I felt numb. I did speak to someone in the immediate aftermath to help me navigate the heartache, but it affected me for some time after our handful of sessions ended.

I know in my heart now that this person really didn’t care for me. Well, not enough to risk being uncomfortable and vulnerable. And that, of course, put every previous friendly and loving interaction that we had ever had into doubt. There is little that is more painful than knowing that you meant absolutely nothing to someone that you shared time with as a friend and/or as part of a couple. Even now, years later, I still have difficulty reconciling my memories and perceptions of the past with the treatment that I received at the hands of a friend.

I suppose that I just don’t understand why a person would think that it is OK to cut and run with nary a word. In my high school days, I remember once driving around a girlfriend’s home for several minutes before I finally got up the courage to break up with her and to give her the opportunity to hear it directly from me. It was uncomfortable, but I know that it was the right thing to do. Of course, that doesn’t mean that it wasn’t painful or that she doesn’t think ill of me to this day (I hope that she doesn’t). But I hope that she at least respects me for not bailing on an uncomfortable face-to-face conversation.

Anyway, if you are remotely interested in the phenomenon of ghosting and why it can be so traumatic for the person that has been ghosted, click on the links below. And if you have ghosted someone, maybe resolve to do better next time. We are all guilty of being kind of awful at times, but ghosting is really a cruddy way of ending a romantic relationship or a friendship. And if you understand how negatively it can affect someone, you should now recognize it as a particularly cruel act.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/ghosting

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/living-forward/201511/why-ghosting-hurts-so-much