Anyone a Facebook expert? Slightly Concerned

[confused1730]

Broke up back in October with uExBPD girlfriend having being devalued and discarded in vitriolic fashion. No contact as I have been turned black sister from one ridiculous text to me ten hours after seeing me in my car ten hours after the event "don't drive dander its to get my attention" - no reply from me as I have gone NC.

Something that's bothered me today and I'm not a social media expert. In the spirit of total NC back in November I blocked her, her close friends, mum/dad and sister and brother and their partners - just easier that way. Anyhow I'm no Facebook expert and simply do not nor will not involve myself with Her life. Today in the "people you may know" section of Facebook as usual there a lots of people that crop up - all of which are people that it says I have mutual friends with that is understandable. Out of the blue also on the list was her uncle. I have no mutual friends and had only met him for 5 mins briefly - nice family man who has a child on the same primary school class as my ex. Am I reading too much in to thus as I cannot for the life of me see how he has come up a list as people I may know as there's nothing at all mutual! Has someone been looking at my profile page? Gas my ex has asked him? I am not asking people to play detective but does this seem a bit more than a coincidence or am I Over analysing?

Help?

[Maternus]

Have you visited his profile recently?

[confused1730]

No I have never ever visited his profile at all

[JRT]

Sorry that you are going thorugh this first and foremost.

FB is a very complex place where, from an IT perspective, we can only guess at what is going on behind the scenes. Knowing IT as I do, I can speculate that the function of serving up 'people that you know' is very likely FB functionality that is apart from other functions within FB. I would guess, that the information that included her uncle was gleaned while you were still connected to her on FB OR that your disconnections were not yet reconciled with other elements of FB's systems. Only time will put this theory to the test.

Having said that, it is highly likely that your ex will try and look you up on FB (BPD's are famous for this) even if she has been unfriended. Its an easy thing for her to set up an alternate account and stalk you at her leisure. I know that mine did and I caught her red handed even though she broke up with me and has refused any contact for 5 months. If you don't want her to see you at all, make sure that your privacy settings are 'friends only' and even then, she will still be able to see a bit.

[confused1730]

The thing is I have not been on Facebook till we broke up and I have never been her Facebook friend at all - it just seems too coincidental to me.

[GuiltHaunted]

The real question here is: What worries you?

- Do you want to hide from her?

Privacy settings, as mentioned above, but she will still be able to see things like cover photo and comments, which is always public. And profile miniature, even if set private.

But if this is the case, why do you care what she sees, as long as you don't see her?


- Are you worrying about contact attempts?

If that is her goal, probably she will try to contact you by any means anyway. Can you prevent that entirely anyway?

[fromheeltoheal]

I'm not a FB expert either, but my experience anyone who's posts you comment on, comment on yours, is friends with your friends, is friends with someone who comments on your posts, someone who went to your high school or college, someone who lives in the same town you do, anything FB can grab onto, may show up in that 'people you may know' thing.  So it makes sense if you were friends with her and/or her relatives, or if any one of them commented on a post of yours, they or someone from their world may show up there, even if the original people are now blocked.

I wouldn't stress on it, it doesn't mean much, but to me Facebook is more trouble than it's worth, especially when we're trying to second guess mental illness.  If it brings value to your life, except for random uncles showing up, then that's good, otherwise I'd bail on it entirely.  Take care of you!

[icom]

Over-analyzing.  

If you and your ex were once Facebook friends, or even if you were not friends and only peered at her page from time to time, this information will become part of the algorithm that generates suggestions.  

I would look at my ex's page on occasion.  It wasn't long before her page, and the pages of other members of her family, were in my suggested friends list.  

[confused1730]

I am probably over analysing - just worried this was an indirect checking up on me through someone else as she is blocked - guess I'm just wondering if this was some indirect future recycle type thing on the cards and was just bring guarded as three or four months with a replacement might mean she is getting to end of idealisation and I am also dating A nice girl

[lipstick]

I am probably over analysing - just worried this was an indirect checking up on me through someone else as she is blocked - guess I'm just wondering if this was some indirect future recycle type thing on the cards and was just bring guarded as three or four months with a replacement might mean she is getting to end of idealisation and I am also dating A nice girl

Hi confused1730,

I can only tell you of my own experience with my BPD ex and Facebook. He blocked me over a year ago. However - he uses an alternate account to continue keeping tabs on me. I've seen evidence. I'm also starting to suspect that he uses more than one account to spy, actually.

One of our very insightful members here on the forum - "FromHeeltoHeal" -  stated that BPD is an attachment disorder. Therefore, it makes sense that our exes would want to spy on us to keep that "connection". I was also taught how to look at FB profile source codes. There are (4) deactivated accounts among the codes associated with my account. They jump way up in the rankings during the night (when my ex "creeps" my page), then go back down during the day when other people are interacting with me. Might not mean anything - but it's odd. I've deleted over 700 people from my Friends list (tired of the Drama Llamas!) and those four accounts are still there... . 

Best to you on your road to recovery!  

[JRT]

lipstick... .is that the method I provided?

[lipstick]

lipstick... .is that the method I provided?

Hi JRT,

It is indeed. I found four deactivated accounts in those codes. I thought that after I cleaned up my Friends list (deleted over 700 people) that they would disappear. No such luck. I would not be surprised if more than one of those four belongs to my ex. I don't understand how those codes work - but they do SOMETHING. And like I stated - they move up during the night. Which is his favorite time to "creep". Around 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning, preferably.

[JRT]

glad it worked for you... .I have confirmed mine was stalking me through a ruse... .I would use the method that I provided but I have 1200 fb friends!

[Fluff]

I think something changed with the people-you-may-know-algorithm recently.

When I looked at the list today, suddenly my Ex's name was there twice, on accounts without photos. I don't know if they are hers or someone else. These are accounts I visited maybe 6 months ago, and now suddenly they're in the top 5 of my list.

[Heldfast]

hell, just tried it out. My exBPD fiancee's best friend scoped my profile page 6 times last night. Interesting.

[confused1730]

So folks having asked the question and opened the initial thread - has anyone got a definitive view? It just seems a bit too coincidental to me!

[Fluff]

hell, just tried it out. My exBPD fiancee's best friend scoped my profile page 6 times last night. Interesting.

How do you know this?

[confused1730]

That's what I would like to know too!

[Heldfast]

once you review the numbers of the accounts, there is a log number next to it giving the number of times that number has come up against your page. Final count was 6 on the friends number (so there was a ******-0, ******-1. *******-2, etc) in the mix.

[Heldfast]

She's nowhere near me, so I'm not considering myself at any risk, now I'm just trying to decide if I feel complimented or just block the friend... .

[JRT]

once you review the numbers of the accounts, there is a log number next to it giving the number of times that number has come up against your page. Final count was 6 on the friends number (so there was a ******-0, ******-1. *******-2, etc) in the mix.

\

Are you sure on that? I have people that come to my page more than once or twice and the highest number on mine is 2. Its either a 1 or a 2, not any more. I think that the most frequent visitors are at the beginning of the list. My most frequent visitor is by an account of someone that I do not know. Hmmmmmm... ..

[Heldfast]

Ive got threes and higher

[enlighten me]

I had a weird one last night. On the people you may know was an account with no picture and no friends in common. What was odd was that it was my exs new bf's name with an additional letter. I was wondering if he has a new account which is hidden but as he is friends with her it has cropped up. Is this even possible? If so it seems a bit paranoid.

[willieb4]

OP, I wouldn't sweat it.

My ex had a friend request on my fakebook account for a long time. I say fakebook because I use an alias and do not correspond with anyone. I find it useful to follow pages that spark my interest, for example, I am following numerous NPD abuse pages, and it really helps to stay NC.

The friend request from her had to have been generated by that "find friends based on your contacts button". Because she did not know I was on Facebook, but I was in her email contacts list. This mechanism also put her friends in my "people you may know list". Some of them still show up on my list even though I declined her friend request.