Ghosting shouldn't be a paranormal activity

My how to on not being a paranormal prick, what it feels like to be ghosted when you have BPD and protecting your heart in the modern age of internet dating

(Credit to the amazing photographer Sarah Smile Photo)

I’ve written a lot about ghosting, professionally and personally. My stance on it has always been; don’t get overly hung up on it and try not to do it as a rule. You don’t have to write reams and reams of reasons why you don’t want to continue speaking or seeing the person. I mean who in their right mind would actually want to have several paragraphs on why their personality is so bad they can’t stand to communicate with them any longer. Not me! However saying nothing at all is actually fucking horrible. 

So if you want advice on how to exit without ghosting it’s pretty simple, or at least I believe so. I’m not here to say what and when justifies a little goodbye, (unless you are slipping away from an actual relationship then no, you actually need to break up with them properly) but if you find yourself in this position, this is pretty much ideal. Sending a very simple short message saying “hey just wanted to let you know I am not really feeling this, good luck out there” is perfect. You can even put a “it’s not you it’s me in there”, by way of “I am not in the right place atm”. Romeo done. You can’t really argue with that can you? If the recipient starts acting unhinged then block them. You have done your bit. 

What is not cool is connecting with someone and then fucking off into the ether. I don’t know about you but I do not connect with many people on dating apps. In fact, to get a coherent conversation where you don’t want to rip out your own eyeballs is impossible. To find someone who aligns with your beliefs, is sexually compatible (really really compatible, is a total sex freak in fact)  likes the same music, art, film, TV, fucking i don’t know, literally everything - is impossible. So if you find this person, lead the other person on, and then ghost away, you are a fucking dickhead. 

I am coming from this specific experience with a little bit of well seasoned Borderline Personality Disorder. Rationally I know how to deal with it. I didn’t actually do anything wrong, the other person is being a silent jerk. I was clear with all my communication, and all the other self soothing things I tell myself. But the BPD bit of my brain is fucking unhinged. Not to the point where I am harassing the individual or demanding an answer. Thanks to therapy. But my brain will not let me rest. “Maybe he is dead, maybe you should check his last seen, maybe you should check his social media???”. Ghosting is zero closure, and to an extent abandonment! Conflict is not abuse etc and I am not trying to equate that ghosting someone you barely know is actually abandonment, but the merest hint of perceived abandonment to someone with BPD is tortuous. 

Fear of abandonment is one of the main criterias of BPD, according to my personal bible; The DSM 5. A book detailing all psychological disorders, how to diagnose and to treat them. When I am ‘abandoned’ I do take it very very personally, and it is physically and mentally excruciating. Once when looking at BPD diagnosis and academic papers, I saw that BPD is unequivocally thee most painful mental illness. Meaning that the symptoms people experience are so painful, you can equivocate it to physical injury. It sounds quite extreme, but having your emotions go from 1-100 means that you will experience everything on some sort of Alton Towers adrenaline-inducing rollercoaster. It is like having no skin, no outer shell, so everything you experience feels so much more. 

Having BPD is my problem and not some dating app strangers to be honest. You shouldn’t walk on eggshells around me or change your behaviour to such a big extent. Meeting my reasonable demands however is completely normal. Neurotypical even. Something I didn’t know I could do without being branded as ‘difficult’ before therapy. My basic things are, please never leave me on read, even a little ‘Okay’ is enough of a response for me. Please don’t ignore me or stop talking to me as a punishment, and when it gets to that point, let me know if you are coming home or not. These are reasonable requests even if you aren’t a person who thinks every time someone leaves a room that they are leaving you because they hate your company. 

How do you overcome the awful feeling of being ghosted, whether you have a personality disorder or not? Well first of all you need to remember you were ok before this person came into your life and therefore you will be ok after. This is a great mantra I think. Thinking back to the weeks, months or even days before this happened tells you that you are capable of functioning like a normal person and not being totally crushed by your crush. Remind yourself that you are not the bad guy here, you aren’t behaving poorly! That person ghosting you is a prick, and ultimately you haven’t actually done anything wrong. Try not to pick apart things you could have said or done differently. The facts are, that person cannot take accountability for their own feelings and that is on them. 

Some other more practical things you can do are; crying. Honestly there is something so cathartic about crying and I am pretty sure it does something like release stress hormones and they reduce your stress! Picking yourself up after a massive cry, wiping away your tears and reminding yourself that you are a bad bitch is actually very chic. This one is pretty obvious but, stop waiting for their texts. Stop checking their socials etc as you are just torturing yourself at this point. How do you do this? By doing something else entirely. 

Some of my favourite things for distraction are: listening to new music, spotify always has a million playlists curated just for you, and often new stuff they think you will like. You could find your new favourite band? Watch a film you missed at the cinema, the site/app Letterboxd is also brilliant. You can review films, make a huge ‘to watch’ list and it works like a social media platform so you can follow people and make friends and be inspired to watch films you didn’t even know existed. Another thing I like to do is find an artist you like and look at their work. This is probably a hangover from Tumblr but I used to get obsessed with digital artists like Tara Mcpherson and Polly Nor and pour over their work. This is an obvious one but, do your hobby! Or find a new hobby; needle punching is one of the best things I have learned recently and it is easy, cheap and a little bit violent. Stabbing your needle reasonably hard over and over again is brilliant. 

I think that despite hundreds of articles on ghosting and breadcrumbing and how to behave like a decent person in a relationship, you always run the risk of this happening. You don’t have to become entirely jaded about finding a partner, especially online. But you can protect yourself a bit. Don’t give everything away in hours of whatsapp conversations. Save it for real life dates, where you can gauge what the mood is like. Letting people have access to your emotions too soon is going to hurt so much more if it does go south. Don’t send nudes immediately, or you might just end up someones wank fodder and that's all. I don’t believe in playing it cool, so don’t play silly games like leaving hours or days between answering messages, but don’t plunge all your time in talking to someone who hasn’t made any sort of basic commitment with you. No one is expecting you to put significance on your relationship so early on, but again, once you have met a few times you can generally tell where things might go. Once you establish that things are good, then you can voice-note until 3am about that one time you got fingered in a caravan on millennium New Years eve. Balance is key.