Have you ever experienced finding someone you have got to know online has died?

twice, both times people i knew on youtube. one lost his mind and killed some girl and then killed him self, the other was actually more or less the same and did something similar.

i would have not called them friends, but we did used to debate and talk quite often. both times i found out through the news.

Just once. There was a wonderful lady on askville and Facebook who recently died. It was difficult and hard to explain to others that I was sad to have lost a friend I hadn’t met. (Met in the physical sense.)

@tedibear39 That’s right, Tedi. We sure miss her, don’t we? And what about KORC? I’m really worried about him. I have a gut feeling that’s not good about him, too..

Well, I’ve kinda had this happen once.

Someone I’d played WoW with for about 6 months was having a really bad time, he’d gotten fired, been in a car crash and he and his fiancé had broken up. All within about a month. Then he just disappeared. Next we got an email from his email address, appearing to be from his father, outlining our involvement in his will. It was bit vague on some details, and we thought that was forgivable, considering the guy’s son had probably just died.

Next we found a news article, with what appeared to be a report of a suicide around where we knew he lived, and it appeared to be the same name. Then about a month or so later, we got an email from him. He’d heard through someone that we thought he was dead, and informed us that he’d just joined the army, and the sending of the will was just in case something happened to him while he was there. Turns out the news article was just a freaky coincidence and was a few years old.

He’s come back online a few times now while he’s been out of training. And while there was an initial shitstorm of rage, we’re just glad he isn’t dead. It really screwed us around.

@daemonelson – That sounds like a veritable soap opera!

@jbfletcherfan – Yes. I didn’t know her really well, but what I did know I really liked.

@tedibear39 We were pretty close. We emailed, exchanged pictures…..I sure miss her.

@tedibear39 It really was quite distressing. Made me question a lot.

I belong to an online support group for mental health. So unfortunately, yes. It’s just as disruptive, terrifying and crushing as it is ‘IRL’. I deal with it the same way I do grief in my physical world. I journal about it when I need to, talk about it when I need to and picky myself up when I need to.

This not something that I have experienced as far as I am aware but I do often wonder where people that I talk to online disappear to and I do worry and hope they return soon. If I haven’t seen someone’s input on Fluther for a while I start to wonder if they are ok but I am sure that in a community like this, someone would know something and inform the collective.

Not yet. I currently have one planning suicide. After exhausting all avenues, I am waiting to hear the news at this point.

@tedibear39 @jbfletcherfan :( I miss her too.

Not yet and I hope it never happens. That would be a serious downer.

Two of the people I met as Mafia Wars friends on Facebook have recently died. One in a car crash, one in a motorcycle accident. I’d never met either of them, but we exchanged pleasantries and played the game together online.

The weird thing is that they still have the applications added on their Facebook page, and as such, are still sometimes randomly chosen by the computer to “help” me find things in the game. It’s a little bit eerie.

I counted myself fortunate that in the years I did psychotherapy with people who were depressed, none ever died from suicide or anything else for that matter.

I do not shy away from seriously depressed people and I recognize that at some point someone I’ve tried to support might die by their own hand.

It is a risk we take in being a caring human being. When someone you care about dies, you grieve. The difficulty of the process depends a lot on your level of attachment to the relationship.

If it happens to you and you are troubled, you know I am here.

I took my friend out of my email addresses, because it pained me that I couldn’t send her things & write her. But she’s still in my Facebook list. I….don’t know what to do. Any advise from anyone on that? I certainly don’t want to be disrespectful…...

Yes, at least twice, one of whom had become a very good friend. I keep the memories of her in my head, but have not saved any of the emails, etc. that she wrote me. This is fairly typical of me, as I tend to toss out letters and such after I read them. Since very, very few of my friends are also friends with others in my family, there doesn’t seem to be any point in saving this sort of thing for my family to have to throw out after I’m gone.

@jbfletcherfan I still write her, even though its likely no one will ever read what I write. But that’s me.

Awww….I was just thinking of her last night. Damn, I miss her.

Sorry if this has re-awakened sad memories/emotions for some
Hugs all round

@Sandydog No problem…see my PM.

@jbfletcherfan I think I would be inclined to leave a person who had passed away on my Facebook friends list. I don’t know why.

@Leanne1986 thank you,. You’re the only one who has answered my question on this. Yes, she’s there & I’ll leave it that way. It’d be like deleting her, & I just can’t do that. It makes me think of her whenever I see her in my list.

Yes, my husband. We met online in a chatroom. We met and married in real life and two years ago he passed away.