History:

- Met X through a mutual friend MF because of a shared interest. X was newly interested and had a newly reconnected with MF after about 5 years. MF and X are from different a city about 2 hours away from where I live.

- X became very intense about how much they liked me and how cool they thought I was etc. They kept asking to come to my home and said we needed to be best friends going forward. I didn't have any solid reasons to reject the ideas so I was polite but non-committal. I thought it was because we were drinking alcohol and I was one of the only people X knew other than MF. (A)

- X and I communicated casually online for a while, the previous reverence seemed to evaporate as they became more comfortable. They began to disparage certain interests they knew I felt strongly about - seemingly just to upset me? They told me out of the blue

"I thought you were cool until I got to know you"
which I thought was a very odd thing to say to someone even if you thought so. (B)

- An event for one of our mutual interests was announced and X asked to stay at my home to attend the event. They repeatedly mentioned that if I refused they would be unable to go. (C)

- Before the event, X shouted at me in front of all my guests (in my own home). For fifteen full minutes, they dominated the conversation and talked over other people to complain about the food we got. X said:

'I paid for this it should be #'
I laughed and in an attempt to lighten the mood/change the subject said:

'Well, you haven't paid for it yet'
I had paid for the order online. X blew up shouting:

"You didn't need to humiliate them like that in front of everyone"
They ranted for about 5 minutes, reiterating the same point. No one else in the room had paid me yet, I wasn't singling them out. Eventually, they aggressively threw the money at me. (D)

- X ruined our groups experience of the event with their ceaseless complaining and negativity about a perfectly great event.

- The next day, X had said they would leave at 11:00 for work at 14:00 but called in fake sick and didn't leave until about 20:25. They kept their legs stretched out on the sofa initially preventing and eventually just making it uncomfortable for me to sit in my preferred seat {pressing their feet into my legs}. They made me turn off my favourite TV program after they complained every 90 seconds (it was timed) for the first 20 minutes of the episode. The other who had stayed cleared out by midday, offering X a lift that they refused on grounds of being too lazy to get ready and asking if they could stay a while longer. I thought a while was 2 hours max. They put on a show I do not enjoy and was very vocal about not enjoying for ~6 hours. They farted repeatedly and deliberately (laughing hysterically) in my sleeping bag (which I had given them to make sleeping on the sofa more comfortable) even after I showed signs of being uncomfortable with it. Throughout the day, I kept looking at the clock and sighing about needing to get ready for work the next day in an attempt to indicate I wanted them to leave. When I eventually managed to pluck up the courage to suggest they get the 7.30 bus instead of the 9.30 as I had to prepare for work, they confronted me very angrily about it - shouting,

"You should have told me you want me to leave - now you're making me look like an asshole"
and variations of it for about 5 minutes. I was silent and frightened. They then asked if they could change in my bedroom and I agreed, anxious for them to leave the room. As soon as they left the room I realised it was very strange to not change in the vacant bathroom (I live alone) but it was too late. They spent 40!!! minutes alone in my room before returning and spending another 30 minutes stalling "getting ready" to go - in order to miss the 7.30 bus and instead get the 9.30. I was shaking and extremely anxious at the end of the encounter. I cried for 45 minutes after they left. (D/E)

- MF told them I was planning to move out of my 1 bed flat and X asked if they could take over the lease. I was happy to facilitate this with my landlord as it would save me the bother of people coming every day for viewings. X was starting a job in my city in July and my lease ended in August. They kept asking if they could stay with me during the month between the leases exchanging. They repeatedly mentioned that if I didn't it would make their life so difficult. I did my best not to commit to that in any way as the idea made my skin crawl. (C)

- X expected to be given the key with no deposit, cancelled an appointment that my landlord was travelling for over an hour to get to at extremely late notice, and just basically made me look terrible by being rude during their confrontation. X constantly slandered my landlord to me which made me very uncomfortable. They became enraged by my landlord being so 'unreasonable' [about needing a deposit] and took a different apartment [X gave a deposit for this]. (F)

- It became increasingly difficult to have conversations with them without being made to feel terrible about myself and my interests. They slandered something I loved or someone I cared about in every conversation. They critiqued and blamed me for every detail of my personal life that I shared with them. I was filled with anxiety any time I saw their name in my inbox. (A/B)

- As we approached their move to my city, they became relentless, messaging me daily. Ignoring me when I said no and explained why not. They started demanding I skip work to spend time with them. [I didn't, of course.] So, I began to ghost them. I couldn't take it anymore. I blocked them on my most active social media site so that they wouldn't know where I was or what I was doing. (A)

- My silence worked - I got a couple of messages demanding to know why I wasn't replying then after about ten days, they stopped messaging me every day {~1/week after that}. (A)

- Things came to a head a few weeks ago when X messaged me about an event (similar to the last one we disastrously attended) to ask if they could see me. I had been looking forward to this event for 6 weeks and hearing that X was attending made me feel so anxious that I cried and thought I might not go. I ended up going in disguise (literally wearing a wig) and X did not recognise me that night - though every time I saw them I would leave the area so they didn't have much of a chance.

- I shared my concerns with MF and they apologised - admitting that they had broken contact 5 years ago after having a similar experience with X but they had thought X may have matured in the intervening years. (G)

- Another event that I knew they were likely to attend was 3 days later so I decided, finally, to decisively block them on all social media so that they could not message me anymore. I had been looking forward to this second event for almost a year and did not want my day to spoiled.