We’ve all experienced ghosting at one point or another. It’s the millennial equivalent of telling someone "this isn’t going to work." If you’re the ghost-er, it saves face and is completely pain-free. If you’re the ghosted, well... it stings. A lot. Here are the various stages of being ghosted, eloquently described by your favorite PR woman.

Stage One: The Moment You Realize

You’re feeling especially cute today, so you send a Snap to your crush. After a few hours, you haven’t heard the familiar sound of a Snapchat notification. Huh. You open the app and check... he opened your snap but didn’t respond.

So you send him a text. He reads it, but still nothing. You even made sure to include a question. Why isn’t he responding? Is he... is he ghosting you?

Stage Two: Second Guessing Everything

You start analyzing everything you’ve said in the past. What did you say that made him run for the hills? Was it talking about your dead dad? Or sharing your worst sexual encounter? What happened? You send another text asking if you’re annoying him or something, hoping that he’ll say no... or anything, really.

Stage Three: Figuring Out How To Fix Things

Of course, you’re annoying him. Should you playfully joke about that last text? Will a cute Snapchat make him talk to you again? That snap wasn’t that cute, maybe a DM. You start texting and double texting and quadruple texting, telling yourself you won’t send another but ending up sending one anyway in hopes that it will make the last one better. It’s a vicious cycle.

Stage Four: Not Again

Is this really happening? Are you really being ghosted again? It’s almost laughable how often this seems to happen. Cue grabbing a bottle of something strong and drinking away your sorrows. You just *hiccup* you just thought this guy would be different!

Stage Five: Anger Sets In

You get mad. You get petty. You text them that .gif of Miles Teller screaming “Hello?” from Allegiant. Still no texts. It’s at this point when the storm clouds form around your head and lightning shoots out of your eyes as you rant over FaceTime to your best friend. The look of terror on her face isn’t even funny enough to calm you down.

Stage Six: Last Resorts

In a last-ditch effort to get some kind of response, you say something so outlandish that they have to text you back... right? You know it’s probably too late, but it’s just the principle of the thing now. You are dead-set on getting them to acknowledge your existence one way or another.

Stage Seven: Accepting Your Fate

So they’ve ghosted you. It’s OK. Sure, it’ll sting for a little while. Your ego is a bit damaged. But you’ll get through this because you are a strong, independent woman who doesn’t need a guy that will drop you like a tampon.

Get you a guy who is actually interested in talking to you and won’t leave you guessing what you did wrong in the first place.