Why Did He Unfollow Me But Not Block Me?

Former dating partners often unfollow, delete, and block each other on social media. They don’t know how to handle each other’s emotions and expectations (as well as their own emotions), so they protect themselves in whichever way they see fit. Some only partially remove each other online whereas others completely cut each other out of their lives and ensure their own safety and happiness.

What they do depends on what their post-breakup policy is and how threatened, hurt, anxious, or annoyed they feel. If they feel victimized and are okay with blocking and ignoring, they typically move on with their lives by blocking and showing their partner or ex-partner that they’re done and not open to friendship.

They block their former love interest despite knowing it would hurt him or her and make them look resentful.

Unfollowing and unblocking are two different things. Unfollowing shows that a person doesn’t want to see updates on your life but may be open to occasional communication – especially in an emergency. Blocking, on the other hand, indicates that a person feels overwhelmed by you and may even resent you and have things to hide.

It’s a complete termination of the relationship and the end of friendship as well.

A person who blocks you (typically due to anger, pain, and overwhelm), has no more respect for you. He considers you disrespectful and a waste of energy, emotions, and time. A blocker forces you to stay away from him and indirectly tells you to respect his decisions, feelings, and boundaries.

If a person you’re seeing, were seeing, or wanted to see unfollowed you rather than blocked you, he didn’t see the need to block you. You probably weren’t bothering him enough for him to block you out of his life and show you how he dealt with difficult emotions and how annoyed he was with you.

He was okay with just unfollowing. Unfollowing let him avoid seeing reminders of you and allowed him to have total control over his social media.

If you don’t want to see certain people or businesses on social media, you unfollow them too. You do that to stop seeing their updates and feeling unwanted emotions. When you’re done with them, you prefer to direct your attention toward more pleasant things.

And the same goes for the guy who unfollowed you. He didn’t want to stay connected with you anymore (whether it was due to negative associations or the loss of interest alone). He decided to prioritize people and things that made him feel positive feelings. Since he stopped seeing you in person, it made sense to him to stop seeing your posts and stories (updates on your life).

If you dated this person, he probably felt that he needed to get you out of sight to recover. He needed to think and worry less about you and more about himself. The easiest and quickest way for him to do that was to unfollow you. He could have deleted you and blocked you on top of unfollowing, but that wasn’t necessary.

It would have let you know that he doesn’t like you and blames you for everything. That could have hurt you and incentivized you to find other ways to reach out and give him a hard time. So to avoid problems, he kept you on his friends list and unfollowed you. It was enough for him to feel in control of his life and be happy.

So if a guy unfollowed you rather than blocked you, bear in mind that unfollowing sufficed at that particular moment. It let the guy feel happy, respected, in control, and everything he needed to feel as a free person. He didn’t feel the need to delete you and block you because unfollowing was enough for him to be free and feel the way he expected to feel after the separation.

The guy is currently able to enjoy and control his emotions. He feels in charge and will stay in charge for a while. This doesn’t mean he’ll keep you “unfollowed” forever, though. If curiosity gets the best of him (which it does for many exes), he could follow you back or check up on you without following.

Many if not most exes stalk each other. It doesn’t matter who dumped who and if they deleted, blocked, or unfollowed each other. Occasionally, they get curious or nostalgic and open each other’s profiles. They may not spend a lot of time on each other’s profiles, but they do scroll through the posts and try to figure out what’s going on with their ex.

When they learn things, they may block/unfollow their ex again and go back to living their life.

In today’s post, we discuss why he unfollowed you when he could have blocked you instead.

Why did he unfollow you but not block you?

The simplest explanation for why he unfollowed you rather than blocked you is that unfollowing accomplished what he wanted to achieve. It helped him change the dynamics between you and him and have just the right amount of space. Unfollowing let him keep you in his life in a way that was fair to you and still comfortable for him.

For him, unfollowing was the sweet spot between deleting and conversing as it let him do two things at once; be a moral person and keep you at a reasonable distance.

He could have blocked you, but that would have been too much and too soon. It would have told you that he despises you and blames you for the breakup.

Bear in mind that he might still block you in the future when he thinks it’s safe to block you out of his life. Some dumpers block their ex a year or years after the breakup. They think their ex won’t get hurt and react negatively, so they block their ex and his or her friends and family.

It’s possible that your ex still wants to occasionally receive updates on your life. He doesn’t want them daily, but he may want to check up on you when he wants to check up on you. This means he wants to be in control of the split and the updates he receives from you.

In other words, he wants to avoid getting caught off guard. He wants to satisfy his curiosity on his terms when he feels curious and actually wants to see what you’re up to.

It could be that he doesn’t believe in blocking exes and that he considers blocking mean and disrespectful. If he were to block you right after the breakup, he might think of himself as a bad person who impulsively pushes people away and hurts them for selfish gain.

I can’t read his mind and don’t know his history, but maybe he blocked exes before or was blocked by them and doesn’t want to make you feel discarded and unwanted. Maybe he feels guilty for breaking your heart and thinks that unfollowing is hurtful enough for you.

Whatever his reason for unfollowing may be, he believes it’s the right (best) thing to do.

His morals or beliefs tell him he can focus on himself as long as he doesn’t block and hurt you. If he were to hurt you, he’d automatically be the bad person who can’t handle his emotions maturely.

He may also like you as a friend and want to see if it’s possible to be friends someday in the future. If that’s the case, he doesn’t want to burn all bridges and prevent friendship from developing. Conversely, he wants to keep the doors open and try to be friends when things settle down.

If he blocked you and hurt you, it may be too difficult to recover and establish a healthy foundation to build a friendship.

Having said that, here’s why he unfollowed you instead of blocked you.

Many dumpers unfollow or partially block their ex. They want to keep their ex in their life to some degree in case there’s an emergency—and they or their ex need to contact each other. They usually don’t keep their ex unblocked because they’re thinking about getting back together.

If they still had feelings for their ex, they would have tried to make things work with their ex, rather than leave the door open for a potential reconciliation. You have to understand that dumpers don’t think far into the future. They say and do things that help them in the present moment.

Sometimes they leave their ex unblocked due to guilt or shame and make sure their ex has moved on before they block their ex. They want to avoid making their ex feel uncared for and abandoned. Such dumpers keep their ex on their friends list until they’ve stopped feeling bad for dumping and hurting their ex.

How should I respond to my ex’s unfollowing?

First of all, don’t do anything rash. Don’t unfollow your ex just to be even. If your ex checks his followers or the app notifies him of your unfollowing, he’ll see that you’ve been checking his profile and that you’ve taken his unfollowing personally.

The guy will notice that you’re not over him and that you lack purpose and self-control.

I suggest you unfollow your ex immediately after the breakup or randomly sometime after to minimize pain and avoid emotional setbacks. Unfollow your ex if he’s actively posting on social media and making you analyze his behavior. Do what it takes to protect your emotional well-being and decrease your recovery time.

Don’t unfollow him, however, if he doesn’t post. That will make you look hurt and reactive. He’ll think you’re angry and incapable of controlling your emotions.

If you want to be with your ex or try to be with him, you have to project a strong image. Show him that you’re not stalking his social media and that his actions don’t phase you. Your lack of reaction won’t necessarily reattract him, but it will prevent him from feeling in control of your emotions and actions.

If you refuse to react to his post-breakup decisions, you’ll look emotionally independent and determined to move on.

React to him, on the other hand, and he’ll consider you weak and easy to control. He’ll see you haven’t done the work necessary to detach and find your own purpose in life.

Hence, it may be best not to unfollow your ex when he unfollows you. It may be better to act unaffected and carry on as if he never unfollowed you. The same logic applies to an ex who ignores, deletes, unfriends, and blocks you. Simply mind your own business and forget that he changed the status of your online friendship.

So if a guy (presumably your ex) unfollowed you but hasn’t blocked you, bear in mind that the best way to handle his unfollowing is to do nothing at all. Doing nothing sends the message that you’re not checking everything he does and that you don’t mind his unfollowing.

Regardless of how your ex perceives your reaction or lack of reaction, stay in no contact and focus on yourself. Let him do what he wants as long as he doesn’t breadcrumb you and string you along.

Why do you think he unfollowed you rather than blocked you? What kind of message does his behavior send you? Share your thoughts in the comments section below the post.

And if you want to talk about your ex’s unfollowing with us directly, sign up for 1-on-1 coaching with us here.

Zan

My name is Zan and I’m the founder of Magnet of Success. I enjoy writing realistic relationship and breakup articles and helping readers heal and grow. With more than 5 years of experience in the self-improvement, relationship, and breakup sphere, my goal is to provide advice that fosters positivity and success and avoids preventable mistakes and pain. Buy me a coffee, learn more about me, or get in touch today.