Hi! Before continuing, please read my original blog post from the other day. It gives some important context to this entire situation.

Hey Slade,
I let Engineering know about your friend blocking you once again, [sensitive information withheld], just for a sanity check. They got back to me pretty quickly with confirmation that it is showing as a legitimate block. They’ll look into it if they get a chance but I can’t make any promises.

I know you’re not doing the best mentally right now and I think you could use some friends around you right now. So please, take this advice: reach out to them soon and talk to them. Just talk, nothing more. Isolating yourself is only going to make things worse. Please, lean on your friends and just get better, because that’s what they’re there for. I’m sure they’d tell you the same thing.

All my best,
A [name withheld]

This isn’t the answer I was hoping for, but it’s one of the more thoughtful ones I’ve ever gotten. My contact isn’t wrong, I’ve been getting more and more anxious over this. The truth is I have no idea what’s going on, and neither does the skeleton crew at Twitter. Max can see my account, but I can’t see his. I can’t DM him, I can’t even see past DMs. And I definitely can’t interact with him at all. It’s so beyond frustrating and weird.

It’s what I’ve been referring to as a “phantom block” — wherein the block is there for me, but definitely not for him. I’m hoping they can find a resolution soon — but it sucks I can’t keep up with one of my best friends on Twitter until it is. Somehow. I am at the mercy of the team behind a platform that is actively on fire.

But don’t worry, I’ll be taking that advice my contact gave and reaching out to Max and a couple of my other friends privately within the next day or so. They’re right: I haven’t been doing well, and isolating myself isn’t going to help anyone. My friends are there to lean on if I need them, and I do… so I’m going to stop isolating myself and be more communicative.

The future is bright, folks.