Love U: The Last Text

From break ups to make ups and everything in between, “Love U” captures the nuances of college students’ relationships. “Love U” runs in DeeTs on Mondays.

Maybe it’s the generic “Lol” or the “Goodnight!” or maybe even the seemingly promising “See you later :).”

You know, it’s the last text — that last time you hear from him before he disappears from your life.

You see, so many boys these days seem to have the idea that the right way to end any kind of “thing” is by just halting communication.

There’s even a name for it. It’s called “ghosting,” and according to Urban Dictionary, that means the act of abruptly cutting off all communication with someone the ghoster has been seeing, in hopes that the ghostee will just “get the hint.”

This happens all over the world — to me, my friends, my classmates and my colleagues. It’s an epidemic that’s spreading faster than the swine flu back in ’09.

And it’s not cool.

Last thing you remember, he was telling you “We should get coffee or something next week!” or “I’ll take you surfing one day soon!”

Then, next thing you know, you’re racking your brain, wondering what you did that caused him to stop texting you, to stop wanting to see you.

After hearing so many stories like this from my friends and experiencing this enough times myself, channeling my inner Carrie Bradshaw, I couldn’t help but wonder…

What happened to respect?

Now I can’t claim that girls never do this either. I’ll admit, I’ve done it myself once or twice. But from what I’ve seen and heard, us girls do this on a significantly smaller scale than boys do.

Sometimes it appears to be understood that whatever was going on between you and another is finished. It’s perfectly natural to feel this way; sometimes excitement dies down, sometimes you meet someone else whom you click with more.

But I still think it’s a matter of respect. Don’t we owe it to this person — to whom we’ve dedicated so much time and have gotten so intimate with — to let them know that our feelings have changed or even just that we’re not down to hook up anymore?

That way, we save this “ghostee” from wasting time wondering: Is he/she ever going to text me again? What did I do wrong?

I’ve done some research on the subject (by asking some of my close guy friends what the deal is with “ghosting”).

The phrase “fear of commitment” was thrown around a lot in their responses.

While that could be a valid reason for wanting out of any kind of commitment with another person, it’s no excuse for getting out in such a way.

Girls and boys of the world, let’s try to remember a little thing called respect.

I hear it goes a long way…