r/HowDoIRespondToThis

TLDR:

Hi everyone, my question is how do you know when to text someone, and if they don't reply what should you do?

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Context :

[btw I have a bit of difficulty with social stuff (neurodivergent) so idk if this is something ppl 'just know', but I have a problem with it.]

So the main reason I'm asking is I messaged my friend (who I kinda have a crush on) about a week ago; nothing hectic just a "Hi [name], how's it going?" and she didn't reply, I thought mby she was busy /forgot to reply so I just left it. Then yesterday I sent her a YouTube short that reminded me of her, and she again didn't reply. So now I'm thinking if I should message her again /send a vn/ phone, or if I should just leave alone until she either replies or messages to start a different convo. [btw, we don't message regularly, but we could have 2-3 text/phone convos a month, or only 1 in a few months. Also she normally responds within a few hours to a day at the start of a convo, but once we are both on our phones at the same time we have a real-time back and forth]

Additionally to this specific case, I've had similar issues with friends/acquaintances (both male and female) in the past, where if they don't reply I don't know if they are purposefully ignoring me, and thus don't know how to follow up. I'm also bad at telling if the conversation ended, and sometimes wait for a response when they think the convo is already done.

Thanks for your help <3

I use to date this guy. Met him off the internet at about 19 years old. He was a year older than me. We were kinda on and off at one point. We basically stayed inside like a couple. We would drink sometimes before sex. Only had sex a few times and thought everything was safe. Forward to now 38, haven't spoken to that guy in years, basically since then. I found a letter in my Facebook spam box dating to May of 2025. It was from him. Not sure how he found me either. He basically kept apologizing until he got to the part where he said he stepped out one night, while I was there. (Might've been asleep) I believe we did drink that night. He said he came back from drinking, had brought a friend back home with him. Then stuff started clicking.. I kept remembering him tryna cover my face and turn me sideways, during sex so I wasn't looking. I know the music was kinda loud...I kept thinking he was being insecure, bc he did feel soft at one point. I tried to go with it for a few mins until he moved out of me fast and jumped off the bed, because I turned around fast. I just remember him looking surprised and tryna laugh it off... his door was a bit open... I remember feeling groggy and half asleep. I thought it was all weird and I can't remember anything else besides feeling weird and never looking back after leaving that day. After reading his apology... I tried not to crumble into pieces. He wrote that I could talk to him about what to do, but that was a yr ago. He deleted his profile. The apology has his name.... I know I can't do anything about this now. When I looked his old number up it's still connected to that address... it's the same address where it all happened. I have no one to talk to. No way to get justice for what he did to me. Im sitting in my room crying on and off. How am I suppose to ever feel safe again? Who do you even talk to? It feels so pointless that I even found this stupid letter. I wish I never saw it....

The plot is getting more plot . Should I do something for plot?!

One day, I was scrolling through IG and came across this guy. I followed him, he followed me back, and he actually initiated the chat. So I started talking to this guy whom I found really attractive like, really HOT hot and it's been one week he's also being respectful towards me it was supposed to be only for plot then I started waiting for his txt , but then I got to know that he drinks alcohol and for some reason it's against my boundary even if it's only for plot. Also he said "he is doing this because he can't get over his ex"

But the plot is staring to get more plot when I got the follow req of my ex's friend idk why because things b/w me and my ex was already clear but lemme guess he is stalking me(my ex) and he got to know about the new guy but also I was planning to block the new guy

Ps I HATE MY EX ANDTHE NEW GUY I DON'T WANT SOMEONE ALCOHOLIC

Should I do it for the plot😭

Idk what to do now

And the new guy acc got suspended so he created a new id so should I follow him or leave that man behind maybe i do like him a bit a bit ig idk

I'm 17 btw and he's 20(the new guy) but he seems really sweet apart from the alcohol part

For the past couple of days, I’ve been talking to a guy over the phone. And every time I ask him something, he just says “MEOW.” What does that mean?

My bf and I are in a long distance relationship, and I’ve been dating him since I was 18. But I think he’s done this before on discord.

I gotten a message on instagram about beardies and i think i could make a new friend who also has a beardie. The conversation became sexual and I got extremely uncomfortable.

I tried to ask my bf if it was okay that someone kept bringing up my chest and he kept encouraging me to show it off to the person. I told him no I’m not gonna do that but he kept pushing.

Eventually I left my phone and my laptop and when I came back he goes “so how did it go?” I didn’t do it. Then he said something that kinda made me think it was really him

“Well hopefully I didnt ruin anything bewteen you two and you like blocked him or something cause I amde you overthink it”

How did he know I blocked the account??

Then he said “I just felt like I ruined that when I was trying to be supportive to you”

**tldr** I think he made a fake account based on the things he said and I need to know how can I confront him

my sister, she loved me immensley, we used to talk for hours on whatsapp chat because we live in different homes, both of use are in 10th class, and we both were absolute toppers till 9th class due to which we got the section of 10th class in which they only keep all the toppers, after that, one day, without any explanation, she turned off, her replies became dry, slower, the intensity dried, and she never said "i love you sm bhai" again, even though we used to say it to each othr a lot, I need your help, I have begged her a thousand times, toiched her feet, ki please agar kuch hua h to mujhe maaf kr dena, but I dont know, wo kehti h kuch nahi hua but still, she wasnt like this to me.
kya usko time chahiye? space? what should I do? feels like she has forgotten her brother ever existed.
PLEASE HELP ME GIRLS, PLEASE!
I HAVE TALKED TO HER A THOUSAND TIMES, CRIED ON TEXT, MADE A THOUSAND MESSAGES LITERALLY! AND SHE JUST RPELIES IN ONE OR 2 LINES AND NEVER EVEN CONSIDERS MY MESSAGES NOW! ONCE SHE SAID TO ME "MAINE BOLA THA KRNE KO" AND I FUCKING BROKE DOWN! PLEASE HELP ME

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This happened today and I’m wondering if I handled it badly.

There was suddenly very heavy rain, so I stopped under the roof of a shop. A girl also came there, and she was already pretty wet from the rain.

After the rain slowed down, she started trying Uber/cabs, but nobody was accepting. She also tried looking for an auto, but she couldn’t find one going toward her location.

I had my bike with me, and coincidentally I was also going in the same direction she was trying to go.

I thought about saying, “Excuse me, you’re not getting a ride? I’m going in the same direction. If you’re comfortable, I can drop you.”

But I just couldn’t say it. I kept overthinking whether it would come across as creepy or make her uncomfortable, especially because we were complete strangers.

I eventually left without saying anything. But honestly, now I felt bad seeing her struggling & walking around and looking for an auto.

What would you have done in this situation? Would it have been okay to offer once and let her decide, or is it better not to offer a stranger a ride at all?

Women especially: would you have found that offer helpful, uncomfortable, or suspicious?

So randomly every now and then the ex likes to hit me up from time to time giving subtle hints she wants to kick things off again. The first time I fell for it I won’t lie but things never worked out I’ve moved on. I always hear from other ppl that I’m usually her topic of discussion which is a bit depressing but it is what it is. Anyway point is about a month or 2 ago I went on a mountain trip with a lot of my friends and posted about it and just last week she texts me out of the blue asking if I enjoyed the trip and and if she should take one by herself, mind you we do not talk and recently a close friend of mine saw her at the bar and apparently she tried to make a move and have sex with him but he wasn’t going for it. Today when she told me she booked the trip I told her you should bring Jermey which is the friend she tried to hook up with. Now she’s saying “lmfao why should I bring him? What should I say back to her. This isn’t a fanfic either I’m looking for a genuine answer

okay so i got kind of set up with this guy. we didn’t really know each other, we just have a lot of mutuals, like a lot. so i knew of him, thought he was cute, asked to get set up, and we started texting. we were only talking fr for maybe a couple days, not even. genuinely mid conversation he randomly decides to ghost me out of nowhere??
to be honest, i don’t really care, like you do you boo, but i’m honestly just really lost because the conversation was good and he was so engaged, so i don’t understand why he just ghosted me mid convo.
it’s not like i need closure because we were barely talking, but part of me wants to text him and say something along the lines of “if you didn’t want to talk, you could’ve just said that… ghosting me is kinda a dick move.”
but at the same time i don’t even know if i want to text him because what would that ever give me? i don’t know.
also my friends are disagreeing with each other. 2 say text him, the other 2 say don’t. also keep in mind i’m 18 and i don’t really talk to guys that much, so i genuinely don’t know what to do here. help 😭

So I (21 F)met a boy (22 M ) at hinge, we started talking and then after talking for one week we met and it was like a whole day out and then we planned that we would go clubbing and after that almost all places were closed so we went to his place and then things got steamy, we had a heavy makeout and then we both felt like this shouldn't have happened and I left the place telling him we should never contact each other again. But then the next day he called and asked if I was okay and what we should do about the whole situation, so I told him that things have gotten complicated and we should not be in touch since I was also leaving the city in 1 month.

But after 15 days he called me and asked that we should meet him at his place once before I leave the city and we can be physical and get intimate again.

To which I said no.

After I came back to my hometown he called me again and said he was sorry for his behaviour and he was too high on emotions and he asked me all those things but I did not respond to him and we talked nicely.

After this I texted him that he should not be guilty and just move on and not connect again n again.

Now I feel he is not that bad guy but he is also not right for me bcoz it was really shitty of him to ask me if we can be physical once again when I had clearly said that this is not what I wanted.

He thinks that saying sorry once changes everything but it doesn't and that he is a jerk.

Where as I was getting connected to him but he had different intentions all this time.

So should I just tell him yell at him that this is where he is wrong and he should be better.

Or should I just leave it since I have already told him not to connect with me again n again.

What to say after breaking no contact?????????????? but i just want to be friends plus i followed him and he surprisingly followed me back WHAT DO I SAY

Context
Me and this girl my age have been talking for a month, she really was the one who took all of the lonliness away fronm my life and made it less miserable, and we even met up, she lives about 80km away. Recently she started acting a little strange so i just asked her if she wants to keep talking, she said yes a little, that shes in a spot where she really has no energy to talk to anyone, i said alright, thats totally okay. thing is idk if shes lying to get me off her back or actually is, cause something weird to add, yesterday we were talking just fine, until one point she left the chat, told me today morning she dozed off, which is completely fine, so i guess the talking js still fine and not weird if that helps anyone come to a conclusion. Now idk what to do anymore, im lost, im sad, im lonely, and im having bad thoughts. I really dont knkw what to do anymore im 17, this is the first time i felt wanted, or attention, or just had someone who would ask what im up to or how im doing. Now i have none of that again, like always.

No one has 2.5 seconds of their day to answer a message? They’re busy literally every millisecond? I’m anxious so don’t judge me but this should not become a habit, I don’t do it to others so why do they do it to me? Plus if I want to answer a message later because I’m too busy I just look at the notification and I don’t open it until when I’m gonna respond, everyone should do that instead of opening it and not answering.

So the problem is , whenever I asked my friend where he is he always use to say that I am outside like outside of state mostly like everyday and I used to ask him for what r u going ? He used to say I have work and his father has given him work ,

So are you also use to ask him like what are you doing now like Python or something like anything for college He used to say I am doing nothing, so at that time only I started Python and as I create content also so in that also my full journey is there from day one and like it's on the same days on which I told my told or asked my friend where he is and what is doing like man if a he everyday used to say the same thing like his outside what will or what should I say him that I am doing this so that he sometimes used to ask me and I casually said I am doing nothing just time person because at that time the main reason I was doing Python just to start my content creation and I was not even serious in that and now he has found out my channel and on 22 August we will meet and I know there will be a good fight so how can I confront him or talk to him I don't know how.

Like I genuine to know if it's my fault or not like besides Python I also did manything else

So basically im new at college and i have a boyfriend and im already worried about boys at college because yk they are looking for girls. I was at a student meetup that isnt scho organized and has a massive amount of kids in a huge glob meeting people and talking. I went to check it out but decided to just walk by with my friend and a group of guys walk by and one of them asks my name out of nowhere and i just shook my head no. I could tell it was for flirtatious reasons because no one just does that especially when your just walking by. but i immediately felt bad because i think it was pretty blunt and could come off rude. it just was like my bodies reaction before i really could think about it. I know there are better ways to decline but was it so bad that i did that?

I have been single for a little bit now but the other night one of my very good friend’s girlfriend (who I don’t know that well) was really excited about the prospect of me being interested in one of her close friends who was also single :))

Sounds amazing really haha your friends trying to actively help you out but unfortunately the girl was very much not my type appearance-wise and just vibes wise (after flicking through a few pictures…) and I wasn’t that interested.

Instinctively, I reacted with the aforementioned reasoning, saying almost verbatim “Haha sorry to disappoint but she’s not really my type. I really appreciate the gesture but yeahh that’s it really..” The mood was light so I said it with a smile on my face kind of lightly and I feel like I didn’t say anything too harsh. Just tried to soften any blow as much as I could. But immediately after I said that, her face dropped from being super excited to super disappointed.. and I felt really bad but also kind of stuck in terms of how to recover the situation without making it apparently worse.

Fortunately, the whole group had a good night afterwards so me personally, I had a great time but the day after, I still felt pretty bad about that moment and I guess I hoped the night just washed away any sour feelings on my friend’s girlfriend’s end. I ended up telling my friend that I didn’t mean any harm or anything - really just said what I thought and apologised if it came off in any way like that. My friend just said not to worry about it :))

I guess this situation is sort of handled but I was wondering if anyone had tips for dealing with this sort of situation in the future or anything I could have done better/differently?

… or more broader, just how to say what you’re honestly thinking without coming off condescending or hurtful in any way?

For context: my friend is a very good friend of mine, incredibly close and always have just been real w him. The girlfriend is pretty new so I haven’t met her too many times but she is very nice in general.