Break the Cycle: Why Your Avoidant Ex Needs to Stay That Way
The real reason I never write reconciliation strategies for avoidant relationships
Scroll through social media or YouTube, and you’ll find an abundance of advice on how to get your avoidant ex back.
It’s everywhere — Instagram, TikTok, Medium, Substack, you name it.
Honestly, even when I was once in the post-breakup stage, still living with my avoidant ex-fiance, I searched for answers by typing “how to get my ex back” into Google.
And after reading through various posts and videos, all I could feel was anxiety — like I was doomed. I knew I was totally fucked.
That relationship was done for.
I was desperate for any kind of solution because I couldn’t imagine living without her.
But here’s the thing, as much as it might generate clicks, dollars in my bank account, or views, I don’t write about ‘how to get your avoidant ex back’ for a few reasons.
None of the typical advice actually works:
Go no contact so they’ll come crawling back after a while
Work on yourself so they regret losing you
Send a thoughtful but casual text
Just wait around until they’re ready
Focus on being friends with him or her
(Or some other convoluted scheme)
I could sell out, but that would only be disingenuous to you, as the reader. And I wouldn’t feel good about doing that.
Plus, we have to be real here — your ex is unlikely to come back. The relationship ended for a reason and it needs to stay that way.
Why bring someone back into your life who discarded you out of the blue?
If you’ve ever felt that strong, emotional pull — a craving that’s impossible to satisfy for someone you loved, I totally get it.
I’ve been there.
You loved this person, and the attachment is real.
But we need to come back to reality, if an avoidant person didn’t have enough respect for you to offer a clean, dignifying breakup, that tells you everything you need to know.
And I mean everything. That night when my ex flippantly left, I finally saw her for who she really was. She was pretending to be someone that she wasn’t, and for years I wasted time with someone who could never be who I wanted her to be.
So, I ask from my own experience, why would you want to go back to that?
Because now that they’ve shown you who they are, how could you trust them not to dump you all over again?
This is actually what some avoidants do.
They’ll ‘yo-yo’ out of your life in cycles of leaving and then coming back. Each time it will be more chaotic and emotionally taxing.
So instead of resisting or trying to win them back, the best thing you can do is just accept their decision and walk away.
It will feel more painful at first, trust me. But in the long run, you’ll be better off for it.
None of this is about manipulating them, because let’s remember, why fight for someone who doesn’t want to be with you?
This is what I’ve heard from some of the prominent experts on the topic of attachment:
Give the avoidant exactly what they want — the breakup.
Avoidants, especially the dismissive ones, subconsciously expect their ex to chase, plead, or try to ‘fix’ things. The avoidant doesn’t want to feel like the bad guy or to feel guilty.
By chasing after them, it not only fucks you up, but it prevents the avoidant from feeling the weight of their actions.
When you genuinely let them go it forces them to sit with the consequences of their decision.
By doing this, you might (but it’s not guaranteed) see them come back — eventually — but usually by then you should have already outgrown and healed from that relationship.
You can’t fix or change an avoidant partner
Avoidants, especially in the middle of a meltdown or an implosion, are unreachable.
You can try convincing them to take you back. But it’s futile. I tried it, and the problem I didn’t know at the time was my avoidant ex had an RAS (Reticular Activating System) flip.
The RAS is a bundle of neurons in the brain stem.
It’s also known as the ‘selective focus,’ because it’s impossible for our brains to take in ALL the information that we’re bombarded with.
So if we’re primed to see the bad things in people, that’s what we’ll see.
Anyway, when she suddenly discarded the relationship, this negative view that she had of me and the relationship had been slowly building until one day after therapy.
There was nothing I could do because she was now focused on all the bad things.
Nothing you say will fix them, the relationship, or their opinion of you.
Plus their behavior (shutting down) won’t change until their ‘shut down period’ has run its course and they’re ready to change.
Unfortunately, avoidants usually have to hit rock-bottom to change.
And even rock-bottom might not to be enough for them to un-fuck whatever it is that’s going on with them.
It’s painful, I know.
You might hold onto the hope that if you just give it enough time, they’ll come back to their senses.
And sometimes, yes, an avoidant will come back, but it’s often when you least expect it — like a random text in the middle of the night (experienced this one before) or unexpected calls that throw you off balance.
As far as the unexpected text, she was only looking for validation. It had been nearly a year since she left me, and I actually held out a little hope that she wanted to come back.
Though, I quickly realized she was just playing games.
So is that the kind of back-and-forth you want in your life? Do you really want to keep dancing around someone’s emotional unavailability?
Mel Robbins said something that really stuck with me.
She talked about the importance of seeing letting go as a way of acknowledging that some people or experiences served a purpose at one point, but they’re no longer useful.
During her podcast, she compared it to the leaves on a tree falling during autumn in preparation for winter.
They’ve done their job, and now it’s time for a new chapter.
Avoidants are like that.
They serve a purpose in your life, but that purpose is simply for you to learn. Nothing more, nothing less. It might be a hard lesson, but it’s still a lesson.
Instead of focusing on getting them back, celebrate the fact that you loved that person and that they loved you (in their own way). Acknowledge the connection you shared, but recognize that it’s time for you to move on.
The season has changed, and it’s time to let go.
Disclaimer: Letting go isn’t about forgetting or pretending it’s ‘okay;’ it’s about releasing what no longer serves you.
Hopefully, you learned something valuable by being with that person, and now you can take that lesson with you into the future that serves you in a way that makes your next relationship possible.
Create a life that has love, respect, and understanding . Those are things that an avoidant person may not have been able to provide.
You need to trust that by letting go, you’re making room for the right people.
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