I think I am going to have to become a vanisher to my "vanisher."
P.S. pretty much no one, if anyone, on these Vanishers threads has a real vanisher, myself included. A real vanisher does not contact now and then. The LBS had no idea where the MLCer lives, what he/she does, we don't know their OW and they do not keep social media. At least none that are aware of or can see. What we have is boomerangs or low contact MLCers.
Give me a couple more weeks. The only thing I have contact on is the divorce and that is minimal.
I can't even have contact on the divorce anymore, as my H changed his phone number. The only way I could contact him now about anything would be via snail mail. I know where he works, but I'm only 90% sure I have the correct home address.
We don't have kids and no divorce has been filed, but he's changed his phone number and email, which makes
the divorce he wants much more difficult to obtain.
I had a clinger who moved 1100 miles away to live with OW and texted me the entire 22-hour drive the day he moved. I stopped responding to his "buddy" texts and for the next year mostly only contacted about legal/financial issues.
A couple of times I did what Nah suggested, a simple "how are you?" and always got nice responses. He'd reply and then a few days later even instigate a text, a picture of my dog or something.
Last May 2017, he even for the first time opened up about some info on his new life, telling me about working at a golf course on the weekends and he sent me a link to an article about a high school girl he works with at the course who used golf to get through her cancer diagnosis. He thought she was so brave for what she went through and called her "really something else."
Oddly enough, literally a month after that text conversation, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. And then my off and on-er pretty much became a vanisher. Coincidence? I think not.
I wonder if he thinks I'm "really something else"? Doubtful.
I was diagnosed exactly one year after he started his new life in his new city. He found out through my MIL, who heard the news at the hair salon (we go to the same salon...or we used to. I'm bald at the moment).
I got a text from him when he heard. It was robotic and I couldn't even respond to it. Maybe I should have, but I had just been told I had advanced cancer and it was an aggressive subtype that is harder to treat. I was reeling from the news and reading his text that sounded as if it was written to a stranger made me so sad.
I didn't text him back, but I did send an email asking him to please resume making deposits (which he hadn't made since the previous November) as I was going to be in treatment for a long while and needed to budget.
He wrote back and basically told me he was not going to resume deposits until we had a signed agreement (which we already have, it just was never filed because I moved out of state and had to meet the residency requirement. Then when I was diagnosed I moved home). He said he was no longer able to correspond by email because his laptop was broken and email wasn't working on his phone. So he cut off that avenue of communication right away.
I got a text from him a month later on my birthday wishing me happy birthday from the dog (not from him). I replied the next day and just said "Thank you." Then nothing. Just last week I found at that at some point in the last 6 months, he got a new phone number. So even if I had texted him just to check in over the past 6 months that we've been nc, he wouldn't have gotten it.
I don't know why they vanish. I think it's different depending on the MLCer. Some are cowards who think, similar to toddlers, that if they don't have to see the person/people they hurt, they can successfully outrun their guilt over it.
Some are so angry and so convinced of their irrational narrative that the LBS is 100% to blame, and they may stay away until something happens to make them realize their new narrative is in fact irrational and the LBS isn't to blame for their choices.
Some are still so foolishly infatuated with the OP that they allow the OP to control everything, and that includes their contact with the LBS and even their kids.
There's probably lots of other reasons they vanish as well.
I can't ignore that mine vanished when I got cancer. I can't decide if he just doesn't care or if he's such a delusional coward that he thinks if he ignores it all, it isn't really happening.
My diagnosis was pretty bad and I have been in treatment with chemo and now radiation/chemo for almost 8 months, with at least another 8 months ahead of me (oral chemo, etc).
During the time I have been dealing with chemo and surgery and feeling like hell all the time, OW decided to change her FB profile picture to a picture of her and H looking like a perfect happy couple. I don't know if she even knows I have cancer or that we are in fact still married.
I have heard from my MIL every few weeks since the day she heard I was sick, and last week was the first time I mentioned H to her, because I had to ask her if he changed his phone number.
The mere mention of H changed the dynamic of our communication. She got very defensive and was evasive when answering my question. I know she wasn't aware that he didn't give me his new contact info, but she still basically covered for him and wouldn't get involved. It's clear that she is only willing to have contact with me if we can pretend H doesn't exist.
I personally think in my case, my H has become more of a vanisher the more he finds that the grass really is greener and his new life suits him. He lives in a house of cards, because I know he's deep in debt and not paying his bills and has several collections accounts now. So clearly he's not thinking about anything long term. But the more he settles in and succeeds more at his job and becomes more a part of his new community, the more guilty he feels, so the more he vanishes and pretends I never even existed.
The bottom line is he's vanished. I got cancer and he got a new phone number. He lives an entirely new life and is getting deeper and deeper into it, yet has now made it so much harder to get a divorce.
It's insanity.
Anyone else have a vanisher? 14
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