I ghosted a friend with mental health problems and now I feel kind of guilty

OP, don't feel badly about ghosting a vampire like that. If this person added value to your life and was fun to be around most of the time but had periods of mental issues, then I would say give it another shot. However, if it's nonstop negative, critical, jealousy dished out then good riddance. It's not your fault they had a rough life so don't burden yourself with guilt.

He is exhausting and you wouldn't have ghosted him if you had the energy to deal with it. I had to do the same to a friend three years ago, and occasionally feel a bit guilty, but have never thought it was the wrong decision.

It comes to a point when you have to look after yourself. Perhaps being ghosted will make him think about his behaviour, and he’ll change for the better.

You did nothing wrong. Tolerating his behaviour further just encourages it, and that’s no good for him or you.

I recently did the same to a friend I’ve known for 30 yrs. He wasn’t local & recently moved to Mexico, but had been calling me prior to his move & was in quite a manic state. I’d never known him to be bipolar but that’s the closest thing I can think of.

He started sending me text threads between him & another mutual friend, to prove some point or other, but the threads had no bearing on anything he was saying. The other friend kept asking him “are you ok?” & kept reiterating that they were still friends, though my bipolar friend seemed to be lashing out for no reason.

We’re still Facebook friends & I see he posts tremendously long rants, & occasionally there will actually be a number of replies, but when i expand the thread it’s just him replying to himself.

I would have told him I was tired of his passive aggressive bullshit, but that's just me.

I guess you had to become friends with him first.

Good... good for you, I guess?

Sounds like an abusive asshole.

I have bipolar and I used to get ghosted in my younger days - I don't think I treated people bad, but I was a Debbie Downer a lot of the time, which is hard for others to deal with.

If your ex-friend is aggressive they are probably not taking their meds so they should take responsibility for that. Maybe it will be a wake-up call for this person.

I don't think you should feel bad about it because you should look after yourself and your own mental health. It's not okay to harass and abuse people and why should you have to put up with that.

OP damn you make up a lot of stupid threads

Dropping a jerk is the norm.

He sounds insufferable OP. Did he at least throw a good fuck? Let's not kid ourselves here.

This thread must’ve affected me because I had a dream influenced by this topic last night. In it, I was driving with my bipolar friend & the mutual friend whose texts he’d sent me. The latter guy & I haven’t spoken for 30 yrs due to drama I’d caused in real life, but in the dream I pulled him aside & tearfully pleaded that we had to reconcile so we could help our friend. As we were commiserating, my bipolar friend took out a bottle of pills & started swallowing them. We both confronted him & asked him what he’d taken, & he said they were heroin pills (!).

I think I woke up right after that.

Sometimes you have to drop a friend or take a time out from someone simply because you really need to. Sometimes explaining why you don't want to hang out or have lengthy phone conversations just isn't worth it and doesn't solve anything. People who are depressing can pull you into their hole without either party knowing it.

I've had to drop both friends and acquaintances for varying reasons, just as it has been done to me. Neither way feels good, but if there's no value in that friendship, it's best to just bid it farewell. Loyalty can only go so far.