I’m in the middle of another ghosting episode now and have tried to contact her, to no avail.
What do I do if she contacts me to reestablish our relationship again?
My instinct is to ignore her once and for all, but that makes me no better than she is.
When she has re-contacted me in the past, I have gently tried to ask what was wrong, what’s been happening, why does she do this? I get nothing but evasive answers and thank-yous for letting her back into my life.
I find these incidents very hurtful and extremely confusing, as I think anyone would. I have tried to understand, and I think I’ve tried too hard. Tell me what you think; I can take it.
Ghosted: Interesting last words you chose, “I can take it,” because my answer and your friendship hinge on exactly that. Can you take it?
More specifically, can you find a way to interpret her behavior that makes the friendship takable, as-is?
You seem to see her vanishings as rejections of you personally, as hurtful actions that she takes when she could be choosing instead to remain warmly and consistently in touch.
That’s reasonable — but it’s not your only option.
Because she’s giving you blanks where her reasons would be, you get to fill in those blanks however you want. You can choose reasons that aren’t personally insulting. You can choose forgivable reasons.
Maybe she has health or family challenges that overwhelm her intermittently. Maybe she has periods of hyper-focus on a project, a relationship, a cause. Maybe she has some questionable coping skills and knows to separate herself from the rest of civilization when she’s struggling. Maybe she gets embarrassed and lets too much time go by.
Maybe she’s stone-cold eccentric.
If one of these were true — meaning, if her ghostings were only about her, never about you personally — then could you choose, consciously, to roll with them? Simply accept her as ephemeral and enjoy her while she lasts, like a seasonal fruit?
If not, then that’s fine, too. You don’t have to be able to take it, or even want to. (Though you would need to tell her explicitly it’s too hurtful for you to keep taking her back, to avoid the “no better than she is” issue.)
But her evasions and those “thank-yous for letting her back into my life” suggest she knows she’s asking a lot of you and doesn’t take your generosity for granted — and these alone, to my eye, are enough to say you’re taking her back advisedly whenever she returns.
Stranger friendships have worked; all any of them needs is mutual acceptance of terms. Such as: “She will be my friend when she can be my friend.”
By the way, you do have standing to be blunt. “Yes, you’re welcome, I’m glad you’re back in my life. But will you ever explain why you do this?”
