Need advice, online friend is suddenly ignoring me (long post)

In an earlier post you said that Monday would make it a month...as I am typing this it's Monday...Honestly I really believe you should follow JosieTheGirl's advice. Majority says to unfriend him and obviously I agree. However I'd like to add something:

It's been mentioned that he's keeping up this behavior as punishment. I'm going to add to that and tell you since you already know he's a pretty passive person (as in, not confronting the conflict at all) it only makes sense that he'd do this, as messed up as it is. He's really passive-aggressive. He's angry for whatever reason and won't face that, so he'd like you to feel that too by making trying to make it seem you don't have the upper hand in this situation.

I'm going to give you a different thought. I know you still think of him as your friend...yet I have to tell you that he's most likely not thinking this of you. I'm being as honest as possible because I know if I were going through this I'd want the next person to do the same for me. Now enough with the I's and more of the you's...

He's keeping your name as a good friend on his profile to give you the idea that things will still be okay in the friendship. However, he knows - even though he isn't acknowledging this himself...if that makes sense - that things aren't okay on his end. He's making this clear not by what he's telling you but by how he's acting and by posting the whole thing about not accepting new requests. He's purposely not giving you room for options. So the result is him logging on, you seeing him being there and him not acknowledging his problem. Not okay. Oh: notice I said his problem. If he didn't have his own internal struggles he wouldn't have an issue about discussing it with you; this was a friendship after all. Sometimes we have to know when to walk away from something and unfortunately this is one of those times.

Which leads me to say, give him what he wants but is too afraid to do himself. Cut off all ties and leave it at that. It's hard to hear yet that's really the best approach. If he was interested in keeping things going he had more than enough time to do so by now.

For you hun:

Despite what I said in my last post it hasnt gotten easier. I thought I was movin on but I guess I wasnt. For the last few days he hasnt been playing any games and hasnt been online much and his inactivity calmed me I guess ,but today he jumped on and played with his other friend. The fact that he once again chose to ignore me cut just as deep as when it started. I suppose I tricked myself into thinking that maybe he was thinking things over and when he resumed his normal gaming routine he would start trying to address this, but I was wrong. I went outside afterwards, stood out in the night air to clear my mind and then sat on the porch and almost cried. I can't keep doing this.

I think I'm going to go with what Blur suggested and send him one last message with my thoughts with a short time limit for him to respond and after that I'm done, for better or for worse. I know you and some other posters here would rather have me just remove him without a word and continue with my life, but I just need to try one more time and if i don't get a response then I'll take my closure from that. At this point I'm probably just causing myself unnecessary pain when I've already felt enough of it but I have to do it. I don't know when I'm going to go through with it, I might do it after I'm done typing this, I may do it a few days from now or in a week. I'm honestly afraid to confront him because if things to south (even further south) then that'll be the final time I speak to him and things will be over.

I hope you and the other people that have given me advice don't take this as me not appreciating the help, I truly do. Thanks so much for everything. I'm just having a lot of troubling walking away.

Something has to give though. I can't take this anymore.

I understand. I've been there myself.

It's like, if you shut this down you'll never know if things could have gotten better or maybe the end of the friendship will then be your fault?

You do what you have to do.

You have to do what you feel is the best for you. I wish you all the best. Tell us about any reaction.

That first one fits exactly why I've been hesitating on ending things myself.

After I finished that last post I went and sent him my final message. I basically told him that I wasnt sure what his continued silence meant and that I still wanted to be friends but if he didnt reply to me before he went to sleep for the night I considered the friendship over and was removing him. He said something, to my surprise. Told me that he wasnt sure where to begin with what he needed to talk about and when I said he had to start somewhere and that I didnt know what him prolonging things was doing for him he said he didnt either. He then said that hes been really stressed out for the past week or so and hasnt been able to really focus on anything. Despite being angry at that because I knew where this was going to end up I told him that I was willing to talk about whatever crisis was going on if he needed to vent. I also said that if he needed more space that that was something I could do for him but he needed to give me a timeframe and at the end of it we needed to talk about whatever I did to set him off. He said he couldnt give me a timeframe.

I told him that if this whole thing has anything to do with me that I see no reason why it couldnt be said now and he said it was really late and that he didnt want to drag it out (it was 4:30am at the time so its understandable). He also said that he wasnt exactly sure what was wrong.At that point I got upset and told him that he needed to think it over and tell me about it whenever he figures his feelings out, but that I wasnt going to wait forever.

I'm not sure what I've done to myself here. I'm ecstatic (more than I care to admit) that he still wants to be friends, but I know him and I know I could be in this for the long haul.

Good to hear you got something!

Well, its over now. Though from what he said before he ended the friendship, I probably lost him a long time ago. If I were being completely honest with myself I knew things would end up this way, I tried to be optimistic and hope for the best but in my gut I knew things would go south. And today they did. Sure wish he would have waited until I came online before he did that but it was probably for the best that I wasnt there, because I would have fought to keep things from ending. Hell, its not like him unfriending me stopped me from trying one last time though. I went to another person that was on his friendslist that i also had on mine and asked her to send one final message to him. I hoped that it would change his mind, but it didnt. Now that the day has ended though and I'm preparing to go to sleep I look back at that final message and cringe. I look back at this thread, all of the venting I did, and I realize that I've been utterly pathetic.

The worst part about this though is the fact that it was completely my fault. My anxiety problems slowly and silently burned our bridges and I had no warning that he was getting fed up with them until it was too late. I find myself getting angry at him for not letting me know it was too much for him, I could have easily just kept everything to myself if I was bothering him, but its too late now. Im not getting a second chance. If I were to be honest Im still hoping he considered what i said in the final message (if he even read it) and will be friends with me later on down the line but I need to stop that train of thought. If i don't i wont be able to move on. It may take awhile but I will move on eventually.

With the way things are going though its going to be difficult. I met him through steam while playing team fortress 2 and almost every other day for 2 years we played that. I love that game, clocked over 4,000 hours into it, but now I find that i dont even want to play it. Its just not fun without him. Hes really the only person I talked to on steam and now that that wont be happening anymore I dont even want to play the games that give me joy. It feels like suddenly the enjoyment I get out of things is gone. Today my mother surprised me with a headset so I could talk while I play, but the only reason I wanted a mic to begin with was so that I could talk to him. How ironic that I finally got one the day the friendship ended. Earlier in the evening I joined a server and accidentally came across him and his friend completely by chance, I left immediately.

I was looking forward to going to see a few movies when i got my check. I was looking forward to finding another job so that I could buy a better computer and play more games with him. Last night I started watching Hannibal and wanted to continue watching the series. I recently picked up lord of the rings and had planned on reading the trilogy because he saw the movies and I wanted to talk to him about it. Ive got some games that Im eager to play when they are released later in the year, some of which i wanted to play with him. I started exercising again after falling off the horse for a month, but now I dont want to. None of that matters now though, I just don't see a point anymore. No Im not going to kill myself over this, of course not, but I just dont know. Everything feels so empty right now. Whats the point of doing anything?

I've been thinking though, i was thinking about this ever since he started to ignore me a few weeks ago. I'm not sure if this is my minds way of trying to cope with all this but I'm not completely sure I wanted to continue being friends with him anyway, despite what Im currently feeling. Our conversations had been kind of boring for a long while. He was bad at conversation and so was I. Most of the time we would talk about whatever game we were currently playing because he couldnt think of anything else to say. Whenever I tried to change the topic he would make a short comment on it and after a little silence he would go right back to talking about the game. I mentioned that to him a few days before he started giving me the silent treatment.

I think what this all comes down to, at least some of it anyway, is the fact that i'm a creature of habit. I can go about the same routine for a long time before I need a change. I may not have been enjoying our talks all that much, but every other day like clockwork for 2 years I logged onto steam and we talked for a few hours. Since thats no longer going to be the case though Im floundering a bit. The other part of it has to deal with my social circle, or lack thereof. I now have two friends, both of which I met back in high school. Slowly we've been drifting though due to me putting off contact because of my social anxiety. I can still talk to them sure, but because we don't talk as often as I'd like I sometimes feel like we really arent friends. This former friend was really the only person I had to talk to consistently and the only person I could call a friend for sure without wondering if that was the case, but thats gone now. I might as well be alone for the time being.

I'll get over this eventually. I had a good cry when I first saw his last message and when i can get the house to myself and stop suppressing my feelings I'll probably cry again. In the meantime though, my obsessive thoughts are going to be doing a number on me.

So don't! Don't let what he does affect what you do? I have friends on my email list I haven't heard from/talked to for years because they "dropped" me kind of like your friend because of their thoughts/ideas/feelings, etc. We can't do anything about what another is thinking/feeling, even if it is relating to us and the relationship we have/had with them. I'd look for other friends on there to play with and just kind of keep him there too, in case he was interested in playing with you in the future.

I went through a similar thing with my ex. He was a huge part of my gaming life so when I cut him out I could barely even look at my computer. Took me a month just to turn my PS3 back on because not seeing him in my FL upset me- still does a little and I still find myself waiting for my skype to ping even though I've completely unistalled it.

It'll pass. I know that doesn't help right now but it is the truth. This person has been a big part of your life for a long time, it takes some adjusting.

I would also like to say that I don't think this is entirely your fault. It sounds like you've done you're fair share of supporting him too and his own actions kind of show him to be someone you probably couldn't have relied on anyway.

There are some kind of persons that aren't able of telling what is not right, wating for a magical solution. Or hoping that you have a magic ball to be able of knowing without tell what's wrong. Times flys and one day the little issue is bigger and then you can't do anything. I can't understand why they can't say at the first moment what's it wrong. It's better let it die.
I know there's nothing I can't say to make you feel better but when someone can't be honest since the first moment, let it behind is the best. I talk about my experience.
Sure you are going to find new friends soon. Hugs.

should have read the rest of the thread. nvm

At this point I'd rather have him back on my friendslist so that could possibly happen, but its too late now. Thanks for replying though.

I'll probably take a little break from gaming, or at least from team fortress 2 so I won't have to be reminded of things (or wind up joining a server he happens to be in again on accident). Time heals most wounds though, I know I'll get to the point where this no longer bothers me, but in the meantime I'll just try to preoccupy myself with other things.

Yeah, thats him alright. Hes not a confident person and has trouble speaking his mind so when things got too much for him, instead of coming out and telling me about it he let it build up until it stressed him out to the point where he couldnt deal with it anymore. He told me that he had been secretly wanting to end the friendship for a long time now but kept things going in the hopes that they would get better. They would of gotten better if he had just said something before now. These issues that bothered him though are no longer a problem for me, I told him as much in that last message but it didnt sway his decision, even though I wish it had. I find myself going back and pinpointing all the times where I could of done something differently but I cant go back in time and change anything. I just have to deal with things as they are now.

I am really disgusted with the way your friend decided to end things. It shows a complete lack of respect, or any sort of empathy for you. It sucks that things have gone like this for you, and I wish there were something I could say that would make things instantly better for you. If it makes you feel any better, I also play on Steam, and have been in your shoes before. I'm actually in this sort of situation, now. and it's what led me to this discussion. If you ever feel like you need someone to talk to, just let me know, and I can add you. Take it easy.

While I'm not happy with the way he went about it either, I understand why he did it that way. One, he didnt want to do it to my face because he wasnt confident enough and two, if he did it while I was online I probably would have been able to talk him out of it. If I had stayed online like I had been doing instead of going offline to give him space maybe things would have been different, who knows. Thank you for the sympathy.

And you know whats funny? I also ended up on this website due to coming across another users post concerning the same subject. I wouldn't mind you adding me, I'm Mr.Sentlementlegentlemen on steam. I know how distraught one can feel in a situation like this so I'll offer you the same kindness you extended to me, if you need to talk I'd be more than happy to listen and say what I can.