I've been exchanging messages online with someone of the opposite gender for an extended time now. We live in different countries. I think we get along fairly well, and there have been situations where there is a romantic undertone to some of our conversations.
Early this year, I lost my phone and her contact information in it. It was but one incident in a fairly crappy start of the year for me. Thankfully, I was able to recover it recently with the contact data still on it.
Since my contact stopped abruptly due to the incident, I fear that from her perspective it looks like I have ghosted her. I really enjoy our conversations, though, so I want to resume our exchange now that I have my phone back.
I want to know if there are points I should take into consideration before resuming after a long time without contact. The circumstances were out of my control, but it's something they have to take at my word. I want to assuage those worries (if they're even there and I'm not just overthinking this), but I don't know how I should phrase it, or how I should bring it up naturally, if I even should.
I would feel a bit sad if the same happened to me, so I want to know if there is a way to express that it was not my intention to 'ghost' her and that I still enjoy exchanging messages with her.
How can I tell my romantic interest I stopped talking to them because I lost my phone without them thinking I ghosted them?