The Ghosting That Wasn’t

I’m an eighteen-year-old high school senior who also happens to be a queer woman. I’ve been out for four years and my romantic life has been mostly healthy over that period. I started seeing a senior who recently transferred to my school and I had a really good time with her. We like the same music, books, etc., and she would get on my level, conversation-wise, in ways that most others wouldn’t. She wasn’t afraid to disagree or argue with me which I liked and I found her to be someone I often playfully sparred with. For a while, we were really enthusiastic about seeing each other. But after a couple of months, she grew very uncommunicative and things fell apart. She kept canceling dates without explanation which seriously frustrated me and when I called her on it (by asking if she was trying to tell me she didn’t want to continue seeing me), she ghosted me. She outright pretended I wasn’t there at school and refused to answer my texts. I felt like I didn’t even have closure which drove me insane. It’s been about three months since the incident and I feel at times downright obsessed. I realize that her breaking things off in that way was wrong and immature but I can’t help but feel that I still have feelings for her which also drives me insane. It makes me uncomfortable to be around her, and I can’t figure out why it’s taking me so excruciatingly long to get over something problematic that lasted such a short amount of time. What do I do to keep living normally?

Confused And Frustrated

I don’t want to minimize your pain—or the insanely intense feelings you’re experiencing right now—but most of what you’ve described is standard-issue, one-size-fits-all, off-the-shelf breakup stuff. You met someone, you knew you were into her, she seemed to be into you (you can never really know someone else’s mind), she began to pull away—cancelling on dates, not responding to texts—and then she ghosted on you.

Or not.

For the last three people out there unfamiliar with the theory and practice of ghosting, here’s how Jennice Vilhauer defined it at Psychology Today way, way back in 2015:

Ghosting, for those of you who haven’t yet experienced it, is having someone that you believe cares about you, whether it be a friend or someone you are dating, disappear from contact without any explanation at all. No phone call or email, not even a text.

It’s impossible to ghost on someone you have to share space with on a daily basis. If you live with someone, you can’t ghost on them. If you work with someone, you can’t ghost on them. And if you go to school with someone, you can’t ghost on them.

What your ex is doing is actually crueler than ghosting, CAF, and it’s something most people would find absolutely maddening. Your ex is giving you the silent treatment, she’s pretending you aren’t standing in front of her, she’s refusing to acknowledge your existence. And while being ghosted on sucks, as everyone who has ever been ghosted on can attest (even if most ghosting victims admit to ghosting others), someone doesn’t ghost on you over and over again. They disappear and they’re gone. Your ex didn’t disappear and she isn’t gone. She’s actively ignoring you—she’s treating you like shit—every damn day. That’s not a ghosting. That’s a haunting.

So what do you do?

Well, you say you want closure—in fact, you say not having closure is making you insane. To which I would say… closure isn’t a rimjob. No one can eat their own ass, CAF, but closure is something we can do for ourselves. We often have no choice because we don’t always get an explanation when someone wants to end a relationship. And even when we do get an explanation, CAF, it might not be a truthful explanation or a satisfactory one.

In the absence of a heartfelt and honest breakup conversation that provides us with the kind of closure we feel we need (but are not entitled to), we have to figure out what went wrong or what didn’t work on our own. And that means examining our own shit too—that means taking a big whiff—because there’s always a chance it was our shit that screwed things up. (Maybe your ex didn’t enjoy those playful sparring sessions as much as you did? Maybe you came off as intense or scary when you called your girlfriend on her shit?) It’s possible you did nothing wrong, of course, and your ex-girlfriend’s behavior is a pretty good indication it was her shit that derailed the relationship.

But whoever was at fault, CAF, you’re going to have to put up with your ex for four more months—until you graduate—at which point your ex will be out of your life and out of your face. And that’s when life will return to normal.