> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://developers.telnyx.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# despawn()

> `protected` **despawn**(`child`): `Promise`\<`void`>

End one child of this agent — both halves, in one call.

A child that is finished has to be emptied *and* removed, and doing only
one leaves a mess of a specific kind. Emptying alone leaves the name alive:
the next call to it activates a blank agent that answers as if it were new.
Removing alone leaves everything the child accumulated — its state, its
pending timers, its history — sitting in storage under a name nothing can
reach again. `despawn()` does both, in the order that works: the child
empties itself first, while it can still be reached, and only then is the
name ended. Afterwards a call to the old address is refused rather than
answered by a ghost.

```ts theme={null}
async close(caseId: string): Promise<void> {
  await this.despawn(`case-${caseId}`);
}
```

Pass the name, or the stub you were handed when the child was created —
either identifies the same child. A stub is read for the child it names,
not for how to reach it: the child is addressed by the type the platform
says it runs as, so a stub minted from the wrong binding still ends the
right child rather than emptying one actor and removing another. A name
that is not one of this agent's
children is not an error: it is already in the state being asked for, so
the call returns having done nothing. That makes a retry after a partial
failure safe.

Only this agent's own children can be ended this way. Naming somebody
else's child, or an instance that was never a child at all, does nothing.

Added with SDK 0.15 — a new inherited member, so a subclass that already
declares `despawn` must rename it (or align it to override this method).

**Parameters**

| Parameter | Type | Description |
| - | - | - |
| `child` | `string` \| [`ActorStub`](/docs/edge-compute/stateful-actors/api-reference/stub) | The child to end: its name, or its stub. |

**Returns**

`Promise`\<`void`>