Tati Bernardi: what to do after ‘ghosting’? – 04/23/2023 – The Worst of the Week

Paulo says he suffered “ghosting” from his childhood best friend: “I was the victim of a sudden disappearance and for no apparent reason. I had known the guy for over 40 years. old friends and rare chances to meet new people that please me to the point that I tell them everything about my life.”

I find it interesting how Paulo tells that he was the victim of a “disappearance” and then immediately uses the word “apparent”. When a friend of that importance leaves, it seems that we (or at least part of our history) also cease to exist. Long or essential friendships that end give a terrible feeling that they stuck their hand inside us, ripped out a very significant percentage of our hard drive and dragged it mercilessly to the trash.

Paulo, dear, you’re only in the Worst of the Week column because your ex-best friend deserved the title so much. I even understand a person giving up on another, maybe you’re as unbearable as I am. However, I think it’s terrible that we can’t be invited to end a friendship that back then needed two people to happen. That he had at least said to his face “I don’t want any more”, as Brendan Gleeson’s brilliant character did to Colin Farrell in the movie “Inisherin’s Banshees”.

Today, at the age of 44, I have many new friends and others made in the past fifteen or twenty years. But childhood friend, which is an enviable rarity, I had zero left. I follow about three or four people on social networks, I send congratulations on birthdays, but I wouldn’t be excited to see them beyond the photos and texts in which they replicate so many conservative speeches full of platitudes. These are people who have nothing to do with me anymore.

I watch with fascination and an evil eye (it’s always good to admit that we feel bad things every day) my friends who, in moments of tension or drama, send audios to these beloved creatures and known deeply since Kindergarten 2. I always think that the lucky one who arrived even maturity with a childhood friend knows very little about loneliness. The same luck for people who have a vigorous and healthy coexistence with good brothers.

I am an only child, which gives an indigestible feeling that my memory of games, trips to farm hotels, first passions, red notes and very sad moments, such as the death of my grandfather, are my sole and exclusive responsibility. post-three Covids brain.

Many times I don’t remember who I am anymore and I would love to be able to ask someone what I would say if I were myself.

Paulo, like a good neurotic, spent five years asking himself what could have been so wrong, talked to countless other colleagues to try to understand his part in this landlord of abandonment and pain that is the end of a fraternal partnership.

And, just now, when he was more resigned and moving on with his life, the poker face ghost just sent a “hi”, as if nothing had happened. To which Paulo rightly asks himself: “Do I ignore it, do I block it or send it to that place?”

Paulo, this is the question that 10 out of 10 women have already asked themselves, when receiving messages from guys who at first seemed wonderful and who decided to put a gap of many months or a few years between the “I can’t live without you” and the famous ” hi missing”. I think that the bad friend deserves from you the same thing that feminism taught me that sexists deserve: they won’t pass! (and also send it to that place, of course).

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Tati Bernardi answers the most unusual questions and strangest comments from her readers. Do you want to participate in the O Pior da Semana column? Send your message to [email protected]

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