Facts are how you build up everything else. It pretty hard to reason about complex math if you don't understand how to count to 100. It's pretty hard to reason about how societies move in waves and cycles if you don't memorize something about history.
I think people don't understand that you don't just start doing abstract work. You build it a bunch of facts that you memorize and then you can start building higher level things like patterns and abstractions.
I know this from trying to teach my child basic concepts like what money is. What exactly is a day. How magnet work. The entire concept of estimation. These are trivial to adults, but these are hard won concepts that were build from concrete ideas for my child.
We know this is necessary because of cultures that are missing whole concepts like particular colors. The idea of right and left. So on.
I hope you got the therapy you clearly need. People drop off the internet for all sorts of reasons. I remember bleeding friends because a platform died. It's just how it is. This can be their lesson learned that you actually need multiple ways to contact your digital friends.
If it were me, I would have been oh well too with my kid. Taking gambles like lying about your age sometimes doesn't pay off. Sometimes your parents just up and move. Somehow I survived losing digital and IRL friends because of things I had no control over. Learning to cope with that is an adult skill that you everyone eventually needs.