Why do friends act like you "ghosted" them when all you did was stop texting first?

For the past four years, I was the undisputed planner of our four-person girl group. I organized the birthday dinners, made the brunch reservations, booked the Airbnb for our annual girls trip, and sent weekly check-in texts whenever someone was having a rough week at work.

around last November, I went through a really exhausting burnout at my marketing job. I was emotionally drained, so I decided to see what would happen if I took a step back and let someone else initiate a hangout for once. I did not announce anything dramatic. I just stopped sending the weekly group chat messages.

The chat went COMPLETELY dead for almost five months. Not a single text. Nobody asked how my job was going, nobody asked to grab coffee, nothing.

Then yesterday, one of the girls posts a selfie on her Instagram story and replies to my view with: "Hey stranger! Why did you disappear on us? You totally ghosted the group, we miss you!"

I just stared at my phone. I did not move away, I did not change my number, and my DMs were open the entire time. They live twenty minutes from my apartment.

I should of realized our friendship was one-sided years ago, but how do you even respond to someone accusing you of vanishing when they never once reached out?