Navigating social media and real relationships can be very awkward, especially when you realise you have a one-sided friendship on Facebook.
If you have a sinking feeling that someone has ended their online relationship with you, there are ways to find out if you have been blocked.
Friends may disappear because they've deactivated their Facebook account - or they may have blocked you.
Whilst Facebook users will not get notified when they get blocked, there are ways to find out yourself.
One sign you may have been blocked is if the person in question does not show up in search results.
But sometimes glitches do happen, so there are other ways to investigate.
Search for the same profile in your friends' list and if they're not in there, the odds are you have been given the dreaded block.
There's also a third way of finding out if you're not totally convinced.
It involves a bit of hunting on Google, so you need to open up the search engines and get down to work.
While of course you can't see profiles of anyone who have blocked you in Facebook's search results, they will still be there online.
Simply try googling: "Facebook [person's name]" and see if their profile is there. If you see it, click it.
If an error message appears - or you are told that the content is unavailable - then once again, we've got some bad news for you.
If you have been blocked, your can't send the person an event invite or tag them in photos.
There's a fifth and final way of being absolutely certain but you will need some help: asking a mutual friend to see if their profile is still active.
Although, if you can't take the awkwardness, there is the option to cross that digital boundary and create a new profile and look yourself.
