ANDREA SCHNEIDER, MSW, LCSW
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No Contact, The Silent Treatment and Ghosting: What's the Difference?

10/19/2016

7 Comments

 
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Many of my clients are immersed in the dating world, searching for healthy love relationships and healing from toxic ones. I wanted to take an opportunity to define a few terms that are floating about in the cybersphere.  

When an individual is dating someone, the connection either continues to evolve in a healthy direction, it ends, or it tapers off. I am going to talk about when dating relationships end, what's healthy and what isn't in terms of leave-taking.

So in an abusive relationship, a psychological abuser will oftentimes engage in what experts call "the silent treatment "(ST). The ST is an emotional abuse tactic employed by psychological abusers....it is designed to cause harm to it's intended target and to render that individual "non-existent." See my article about the Silent Treatment I wrote for goodtherapy.org here for further definition. Basically the abuser falls off the face of the earth with no explanation, causing tremendous anxiety for the recipient of the ST. The silent treatment is cruel, and no one deserves to be dealt the silent treatment. Typically, the ST is employed when the abuser does not like a healthy boundary that was set by their significant other -- it's like stonewalling with silence, and it accomplishes nothing productive. What it does result in is the usurping of power and control for the abuser. 

A survivor of an abusive relationship decides to go No Contact (NC) when they have determined to end the relationship. No Contact is designed to help the survivor reclaim their personal power and heal from a toxic, psychologically-damaging partner. Experts in the field virtually unanimously agree that No Contact (or Limited Contact in the cases were there are children or a business ) is essential for the healing of the survivor, to work through and sever the trauma bond and reclaim personal self-worth and agency. I've written more about No Contact here.  No Contact is like detoxifying from an unhealthy "drug" of a toxic relationship. 

"Ghosting" is a fairly new term in the dating world. Now that we have entered the era of Tinder and dating websites, texting and email tends to be the first way that potential dating partners begin to get to know each other before their first phone call or in-person encounter. When a dating partner loses interest (after one or more dates), often what will happen is "ghosting." In other words, the person disappears like a ghost and ceases texts, phone calls, emails, etc, and won't respond to attempts to re-engage.  It's basically a cowardly way for a person to say (without having the balls to say it) that "I am not interested in you." In my non-clinical definition, it's a$%hole behavior, and the person on the receiving end of it is fortunate to have dodged a bullet from an immature, shallow dating partner. The person who is doing the "ghosting" is at minimum, immature, and at worst,  potentially a psychological abuser.

Hope that's helpful to the folks out there in the world of dating... Be safe, remember your boundaries and values, and demand respect!!!  

Namaste,

Andrea Schneider, LCSW
7 Comments
Browndog
10/27/2016 02:35:42 pm

Wow. Another great article.

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Andrea Schneider, MSW, LCSW link
10/27/2016 06:12:36 pm

Thank you -- glad it was helpful.

Reply
Deborah Sheffield
1/17/2019 12:33:51 pm

Please delete last post—didn’t know it would be public.

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BLONDEDEADHEAD
11/28/2021 07:59:15 pm

blondedeadhead

Reply
N
2/12/2022 06:58:24 pm

Thank you. I had to go No Contact with my emotionally abusive, covert narcissistic husband of 30 years during the pandemic. We had to continue living together but I needed to preserve my sanity and guard myself from manipulative tactics. I asked him to live with his mom for a little while because I was so overwhelmed with stress but he refused so I told him I would not be talking to him anymore to give myself space... I recently came across articles that "Silent Treatment" was abusive & narcissistic so then I started stressing that I was a toxic person when all I was trying to do was to protect my sanity.

Reply
Kate
11/30/2022 06:53:02 pm

I see you ladies drank the look aid too… Labeling someone’s who never harmed you as your abuser Narcissistic to justify ghosting is out of hand. The courts are flooded with with cases like this and the cult following of women who claim to be empowered by emotionally abusing their partner with the same tactics covert narcissistics use. It’s ridiculous, break up have the lady balls to say you’re not happy to your partners face and go. You’re getting duped by online pseudo psychology that is more damaging to you than just communicating with your partner to begin with. We take these extremes and twist them so we’re all diagnosing our so as this or that but that’s not our place. Any real therapist worth a damn will tell you to communicate first. Don’t follow DR Ramani or Face book groups or your enablers out there. We ruin our lives and mental health and pay these people who led us astray with the promise of empowerment… you created an army of emotional manipulative fake abuse victims thanks internet psychiatry!

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N
11/30/2022 07:01:08 pm

"Kate" - I didn't go into my whole story here in a public space but my husband of 30 years was full blown GAY. You have to be pretty manipulative to pull that sh*t off. Even with everything out in the open he was trying to belittle me in ways to make me stay with him. So please keep your unsolicited opinion to yourself. The situation is hurtful enough without some nobody chiming in about it.
*Only sharing details in case anyone else is in the same boat.

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    Andrea Schneider, MSW, LCSW

    Psychotherapist

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