I'd Rather Be Ghosted
I’d Rather Be Ghosted
Written by Emma bowen
Art by Izzy Maher
It took 14 months to get over my ex-boyfriend. I thought I was over it four months after. Then, eight months after. I guess I missed the memo that people who are genuinely “over it” don’t spend all night crying on their couch because of how over it they are.
Allegedly healed, I ambitiously took on the dating app scene again. There was a thrill in seeing how I was wanted, desired, intriguing, enticing. I charmed, I flirted, I swiped and swiped and swiped. I fantasized and daydreamed, envisioning a future in each surface level conversation about songs on my profile or about how beautiful I was. I learned a large population of Boston would pay me to look their way. I learned I criminally overshare, potentially to a fault. And I learned who I was and who I was becoming, through the lens of those interested in learning too.
After a valiant dating app run, I was convinced I had endured it all. I dated a man for a month just for him to tell me to my face he would never date me; I talked to another guy for two months just for him to get back with his ex-girlfriend; I collected a graveyard of Spotify followers that never made it past the talking stage. Unsurprisingly, in all of them, I suffered the same fate—radio silence.
At what point does, “Oh he’s just busy” turn into, “Well, he ghosted me?” The cat and mouse chase got old; as I memorized the formula like the back of my hand. Give them some space, distance makes the heart grow fonder, push and pull and more push and more pull. I spread myself thin feigning nonchalance as a famously very chalant person. Forced by the hand of TinderGod, I simply had to accept it: I was getting ghosted. I was waiting for Godot.
I vowed to never download a dating app again. Or, talk to a man ever again.
Then, I talked to a man again. Oops! Sue me. A genuine meet-cute, a genuine soul, a genuine interest in me, how could you blame me? I was skeptical, sure. Through months and months of rejection I became acquainted with the custom of letting go: What’s meant to be will find you, and all those cheesy cliches. So, I convinced myself I had succeeded in letting go and this was Aphrodite rewarding me for my troubles. This one was to be mine, and I to be his.
Anyways, I found out he was engaged and set to be married in January of 2026. And, well, he ghosted me.
I was faced with mourning a relationship that was never truly mine to begin with. I had spent all that time fiending for male attention, attempting to be good enough, charismatic enough, someone of enough substance to make it to the next stage. In this situation, there was no competition. It was never a matter of being good enough, it was a race in which I did not come first. I realized this chronic fate of getting-ghosted-itis was never about me, but an ailment that plagued every man I mistakenly afforded my time and affection. My diagnosis: an incurable case of up-and-run-away-osis.
And that really blows!
So, after all my failed crushes and stages of limerence and infatuation, I’ve adopted a new mindset:
If your intuition is telling you he’s talking to other girls, he’s talking to other girls. Maybe even his fiancée.
Your internet stalking skills are not crazy—don’t let anyone convince you otherwise.
I’d rather be ghosted.
I’d rather be ghosted than be told I’m undatable and have to grapple with all the reasons out of my control that created that mess. I’d rather be ghosted than knowingly resign to “second-best,” constantly compared to who came first and living in fear of never meeting that standard. I’d rather be ghosted because sometimes, it’s easier to cope with the absence of acknowledgment than the insecurity and brutality of rejection.
The beauty of The Ghost is that it’s translucent: you can see right through it all. To be Ghosted is to be abandoned, and that is the clearest and most transparent closure of all. A Ghost will only haunt you if you choose to believe that it’s there. And sometimes it will view your Instagram story—and that’s just the way things go.