Why ghost someone?

[Anonymous]

I met this guy a couple of months ago and we hit it off immediately. Lots in common and could talk for literal hours about a variety of subjects both in person and on the phone. He's funny, charming, smart, etc. Physically everything was an A+. We were very vocal with how we were feeling about each other and reiterated often that we really liked each other. He mentioned that he was nervous about falling in love again, but there was no pressure and I assured him that we had time to figure all of that out. One night after being on the phone for hours we made plans to see each other again the next morning.

That was the last time I heard from him.

He inexplicably stopped responding to my calls and messages and seems to have blocked me. I was at first worried that something had happened to him but noticed about a week later that he updated the photos on his dating profile. I was (and am) devastated.
Why would someone do this? My friends suspect that he's a love-bomber and gets a high off of this feeling, then dashes. It was a brief relationship (?) but I started developing some pretty strong feelings and honestly, I'm having a hard time getting over it. I racked my brain with what in the world I could have done wrong, but nothing makes sense. Our last conversation ended with us going to bed and plans to see each other a few hours later, so what in the world could have happened overnight?

Why ghost someone? Why not say "I changed my mind and I no longer like you" or whatever?

Dating is emotionally draining.

[Anonymous]

Maybe the several hours phone call had him rethink his time commitment, and he is too weak to be honest with you.

[Anonymous]

You saw this guy in person how many times?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You saw this guy in person how many times?

I didn't count (before just now), but approximately 9-10 times over a 6-week span.

[Anonymous]

Usually-you don't want to have the conversation so you put it off, you know that you are more of a jerk for avoiding and she already knows that you don't want to see her so what's the point of an awkward conversation.

Having been on the receiving end of "actually, I'm not that into you after all" conversations, I really don't think it feels better than silence.

I'm sorry that happened, it's really hard when you feel like you found someone and it doesn't work out.

[Anonymous]

Oh honey. Something like this happened to me, but unfortunately he didn’t ghost me (which would have ended it faster). What he’d do is have hours and hours of discussion, then abruptly stop for a few days, then pop back up like nothing happened. One time we spent days talking about our next meet up and how great it will be to see each other at the agreed-upon place and time, then he didn’t show up. Gave me a very lame excuse afterward. After a month or two more of this yo-yo, I called him out and he admitted he thinks he is in fact a sociopath. Go ahead and look it up. That could be your answer.

Even if he didn’t have bad intentions and just got cold feet, this guy sounds incredibly immature and not worth another second of your time thinking about. Consider yourself lucky you got rid of him quickly and with your wallet intact.

[Anonymous]

I ghosted a guy once after I listened to a voicemail he left me to tell me how very much he enjoyed our date, only he called me the wrong name — it wasn’t even close. So either he had more than one date that night, or he wasn’t paying attention at all. I didn’t care to find out.

[Anonymous]

I am the one who proposed a Ghostbusters/Honesty app. I would have a default setting set to true "If I dropped off all communication I would want someone who has dated me for 4+ months to act as an emergency contact and come looking for me". It would cost $$ to set it to false. It would also have an automated "moving on" message "{Soandso} is seeing others" sent to all previous contacts so it would be less work. It would also have a no retaliation protective clause. Everyone did a 180 and said "rejecting people is hard", "I wouldn't want to have to do that", etc.

[Anonymous]

He’s married or a narcissist

[Anonymous]

The last person I ghosted, I was just feeling really overwhelmed with life and I kept wanted to ex and explain that but then I would think "well, that's going to be a half hour of texting back and forth before I can politely sign off" and that just was not what I wanted to do.

[Anonymous]

Immature. You have dodged a bullet.

[Anonymous]

That’s odd he ghosted after 6 weeks. I’ve ghosted after a few dates out of laziness/not wanting to explain my reason (e.g. usually not enough chemistry). At that stage, I would assume he’s in another relationship or mentally suffers from something (eg from socio/psychopathy to anxiety).

[Anonymous]

I am wondering if he is a narcissist. They tend to discard their victims with no explanation, no remorse, etc. Once the narcissist decides their victim isn't filling their supply needs, they just dump them like trash.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe the several hours phone call had him rethink his time commitment, and he is too weak to be honest with you.

+1000 this sounds insane to me.

[Anonymous]

I've ghosted a few times when the guy seemed mentally unstable and I wanted to avoid drama, or worse, by being direct about ending things. Also a few times when the guy's behavior was so bad that it really didn't seem necessary or worth my time to say "that's not okay with me."