Like me, maybe there's a person (or few) in your contact list that is a TERRIBLE MONSTER WHO SUCKS AND YOU DON'T NEED THEM IN YOUR LIFE ANYMORE.
And so, after a moment of clarity over a glass of rosé, you decide that you will banish this person from your life by deleting their number from your phone.
Cool. Now your life is bliss. You don't have this garbage human's number anymore — OR DO YOU?
In what might go down in history as the worst discovery on the planet, it turns out that even if the number is not in your phonebook anymore, you can still compose a new text, type in the name of the deleted contact, and it will pop up!
That's right. Even though the contact is "deleted," it's still somewhere in the abyss of the cloud. So when you type their name in the "to" field, it will show up.
Now that I've burdened you with this information, WHAT DO WE DO?
A couple of years ago there was a thread attempting to solve this problem. Once person suggested a fix that included actually having a conversation with said deleted contact.
If having a conversation was the only way to solve this, then I thought that I'd be in this purgatory forever, but upon further research it seems there is a fix.
After you type CONTACT X's name, hit the info icon that comes up next to it when they pop up. Then click "Remove From Recents."
So now, you have two options: "remove from recents" and say goodbye. Or pretend that you never read any of this and see where life takes you. It's up to you. GOOD LUCK.
