Willowtigger, I've both been on ignore and put people on ignore. I agree that it is a shock to have the window pop up saying I am on ignore. My first thought was "what the heck did I do?" The thing about ignore is that is that it is more about the person doing the ignoring than it is about the person being ignored. To me it is a tool for self-care, not a way to punish someone.
As for your fear of being banned from the site. I've never heard of that happening at PC or MSF. Given your experience elsewhere your fear is understandable, but admin and mods here strike me as fair. I believe they would contact you by PM if there was a problem.
Maybe my personal experience will help you. Many years ago there was a problem between myself and a member I had on ignore. I got very upset (triggered) by what was going on. I sent about eleven zillion PMs to admins and mods freaking out. I'm still here so you can see I did not get banned. I got a nicely worded PM encouraging me to calm down plus remember that admin/mods are volunteers which was why I did not get an immediate response.
Hon, the only way you can get off someone's ignore list is to wait until they decide to take you off. That is hard, but the only way I know. Would it help you to frame it as the other person practicing self-care rather than that you did something wrong?
I hope you don't leave here. You post things that are helpful.