Facebook Unfriending

Sunrise_Sunset

Do you think it would cause more harm than good to unfriend and ex-friend on FB? I see this person around all the time, have many mutual friends etc.

I have friends tell me it's immature to unfriend someone on this platform. But I think it's immature to stay connected. I feel she only wants to stay connected so she can snoop on me, and then gossip about it. Whereas I'd rather she knew nothing about me, and that I didn't have to see her stuff in my timeline either.

But unfriending her might not be any use, as we have so many mutual friends, if she wanted to snoop, she'd only have to ask one of her friends. Unless I were to unfriend about 10 other people too.

Maybe there is a chance that down the line we'd become friends again, I really don't know. I would think that doing this would completely burn any bridges though.

My gut is telling me to bite the bullet and unfriend, and to stop overthinking it. Interested to hear others opinions or advice on this though.

bigpink

Sunrise_Sunset wrote: »

Do you think it would cause more harm than good to unfriend and ex-friend on FB? I see this person around all the time, have many mutual friends etc.

I have friends tell me it's immature to unfriend someone on this platform. But I think it's immature to stay connected. I feel she only wants to stay connected so she can snoop on me, and then gossip about it. Whereas I'd rather she knew nothing about me, and that I didn't have to see her stuff in my timeline either.

But unfriending her might not be any use, as we have so many mutual friends, if she wanted to snoop, she'd only have to ask one of her friends. Unless I were to unfriend about 10 other people too.

Maybe there is a chance that down the line we'd become friends again, I really don't know. I would think that doing this would completely burn any bridges though.

My gut is telling me to bite the bullet and unfriend, and to stop overthinking it. Interested to hear others opinions or advice on this though.

Just don't post your life on Facebook

dzsfah2xoynme9

Just delete Facebook completely. It's poison.

o1s1n

Sorry but the only truly immature thing here is caring so much about small inconsequential things on Facebook.

You're no longer friends? Delete the person. Simple as that, don't give any more thought or reading into it. It's social media, not real life.

Jim Root

You are 100% overthinking this. Just ignore it.

Caranica

Just update your privacy on your posts to "friends except ex friend" and they won't see any of your new stuff. You can also change old posts if you want to but it would mean they are still your friend officially just can't see your stuff

ongarboy

OP, If they are already an ex friend, then why is it an issue to unfriend them on Facebook? Just do it. You've already had the falling out with her to make her an ex friend. What's she going to do if you unfriend...fall back in with you?

I've unfriended and been unfriended by people who were former workmates or secondary type friends (or even just acquaintances) 10+ years ago but who I'd never be in the same circles for years now. I don't need to see updates from them, particularly if they're prolific posters. It's no big deal.

Aglomerado

People often don't notice. I only noticed this week that I had been unfriended by someone. When I don't know.
I didn't care: the person was a former neighbour whose updates were typically of the yummy mummy variety and sharing stuff publicly with her mother telling her she loved her, (stuff that is better in private or in person!) so I wasn't missing out on much.

Tork

Is this the ex friend whose kid you got a birthday present for recently? If so, definitely delete delete delete.

Hannibal_Smith

You can hide her from your newsfeed and change your own settings so neither of you will see each others updates.

irishblessing

You can put this person on the restricted list. Then they will only see things you post publicly. But also there is nothing wrong with removing people from your life who are no longer serving you. Since you see them around all the time and have mutual friends, it could be awkward to delete so maybe restricting is best. If this person did you harm and you can be brave in the face of confrontation, bite the bullet.

Sunrise_Sunset

Tork wrote: »

Is this the ex friend whose kid you got a birthday present for recently? If so, definitely delete delete delete.

Yes

Sunrise_Sunset

bigpink wrote: »

Just don't post your life on Facebook

I don't post a lot, so that's not an issue. But others will tag me in things etc. And I'd prefer for her to not know much about my life these days.

Heres Johnny

Unfriend if you want. A guy unfriended me because I called him out on his nonsense (person to person, I didn't call him out on Facebook). Gave me a little laugh when I noticed. Don't put too much emphasis on social media, it's a load of nonsense. I've all the accounts, twitter for news, WhatsApp for chats, Instagram for perving and Facebook not sure why but I'm just a lurker I wouldn't be posting my life's events on it now.

Tork

OK. So this is the toxic ex friend you posted about before. It's time to stop letting her have a hold over you. I bet you think about her a lot more than she does about you. You've already made the wrong decision about giving her kids a birthday present even though you'd fallen out and you got a bad reception for doing that (I hope I'm remember the details of that thread properly). What exactly are you afraid of?

Bythefire

I told him I was deleting him off social media as I'm not fully over it and he has since moved on. I don't want to see pictures of them. I tried unfollowing but I still checked. I did it for myself to move on, after all, he has.

LilacNails

It's not gonna matter what she thinks or how bad it looks..... If u don't like her you shouldn't be bothered about it.

If u do unfriend her, she still might be able to see posts u would be tagged in, on mutual friends pages.

I'd unfriend, if u really don't care.

Sunrise_Sunset

Tork wrote: »

OK. So this is the toxic ex friend you posted about before. It's time to stop letting her have a hold over you. I bet you think about her a lot more than she does about you. You've already made the wrong decision about giving her kids a birthday present even though you'd fallen out and you got a bad reception for doing that (I hope I'm remember the details of that thread properly). What exactly are you afraid of?

I guess it's the usual crap from me. Fear of not being liked. Fear of being talked and gossiped about. But she already doesn't like me so.....

Irish_rat

It would be easier to delete your account. Facebook is poison.

Tork

Sunrise_Sunset wrote: »

I guess it's the usual crap from me. Fear of not being liked. Fear of being talked and gossiped about. But she already doesn't like me so.....

So the less she knows about you, the better. Would you hold the doors open to your house and invite in all your neighbours to look in your presses and read your mail? No. So why let this toxic woman know more about your life? You're drawing more attention to yourself by continuing to be her friend on Facebook and to be honest, I think it makes you look really weak. Unfriending her sounds like a good first step towards finding your backbone and valuing yourself.

rainbowtrout

Sunrise_Sunset wrote: »

I guess it's the usual crap from me. Fear of not being liked. Fear of being talked and gossiped about. But she already doesn't like me so.....

If she doesn't like you then why would you be bothered about remaining friends with her on FB?

I have a simple rule for FB, if you're not someone I would speak to in real life I'm not friends with you on FB. That means I'm not adding random people who have sent me friend requests to up their friend numbers. Nor am I friends with people I am no longer friends with. If they are not in my life in real life, they are not in my FB feed.

And nobody will be talking and gossiping about who you are friends with on FB. They have better things to do with their time.

freshpopcorn

You can put this person on a restricted list of the posts she can see.
I'm on Facebook but hardly anybody really posts on it.
I'm slow to delete people because some people might really take it to heart.

qwerty13

Sunrise_Sunset wrote: »

I guess it's the usual crap from me. Fear of not being liked. Fear of being talked and gossiped about. But she already doesn't like me so.....

I remember your posts before. My take would be that the decision to unfriend or not is a symptom - and that real problem is what you said about fear of not being valued as a person.

Can you speak to someone professionally about this? Yes, it’s expensive - but it’s also an investment. Do you have a trusted friend that you could voice your thoughts to?

I think you’re all too aware that being in negative relationships is a serious detriment to your happiness. Just that you’re not quite ok in yourself in severing toxic relationships - which is understandable, it’s really hard! But it will in my opinion make you happier in the long run.

osarusan

I don't really get why unfriending them is such a big deal? It's not like it is out of the blue or for no reason - you broke up and the relationship is over. It's a perfectly natural thing to do.

As for seeing her stuff on your timeline - you can 'unfollow' so you won't see their posts any more, even while remaining friends.

Don’t unfriend, block.

osarusan

ReginaldSmythV wrote: »

Don’t unfriend, block.

Blocking a friend automatically unfriends them anyway.

osarusan

osarusan wrote: »

Blocking a friend automatically unfriends them anyway.

Yes but with the added benefit of blocking all their access on your own terms if they’re the snoop and repeat type.

Dial Hard

Just unfriend her and think no more of it. I don't get all the navel-gazing about whether it hurts her feelings or who else notices.

Irish_peppa

I had a friend / former work colleague who unfriended me a few months ago out of the blue.. We would regularly chat on FB and watsapp meet for odd chat every few months. Weird thing is the person still has my brother and sister as their fb friends whom they met a handfull of times (and decided to send them friends requests which i thought was unusual but didnt really care to be honest). I only noticed the unfriending when I went to send the person a message arranging an xmas drink and couldnt find them on friends list.
Absolutely nothing bad was done by me absolutely nothing I went through all my old texts ...watsapps and FB messages to see had I said or done something to offend in any way at all. There was zilch there.
I thought they may have deleted their fb profile or put it in hibernation but sure enough saw on an old chat window this person was still active on fb.
Sent a message via the most recent chat and said something to the effect "Hi XXX looks like fb deleted you off my friends list hows things" as to be honest I thought there had to have been a glitch in the system as we got on really really well had similar interests, similar ages and I had also been instrumental in getting this person quite a good job promotion where we had worked together.
Never a reply despite knowing this person a good ten years !
Sent a Happy xmas message after that on watsapp which was read but never replied too either
I see the person hasnt blocked on fb me which is interesting. I dont know if I should block this person from my side or just let on I didnt even notice she deleted me. Some people can be strange OP