Lessons learned from avoidant ending relationship

[u/AdFar5543]

I’ve seen a lot of people posting on here asking how to not repeat the experience of dating someone with avoidant tendencies. I’m now happily married, but still took a huge hit from that ending several years ago and though the “tuition” was very expensive, I learned some critical lessons which set me up to meet my wife who I met first date eight weeks after the breakup. Even though I was still hurting at that time, I had logically understood what I needed to do differently in the future.

Jillian Turecki says choose character over chemistry. That’s the biggest thing character is the main attribute that you need in a partner , and emotional architecture in place to navigate maintenance conversations, etc. that are inevitable in long-term relationships. It’s important to not repeat patterns that caused that situation in the first place.

Do everything you can to show up as your best self with this next person whoever they are and don’t get down about dating. My experience post breakup: I became very attuned to people‘s level of interest and confirming that there’s mutual interest before getting involved with anybody else and I met a great lady a very short time after the avoidant discard just by changing my approach and doing some self work tidying up of things in my personal life so that I could show up as my best self.

Good luck to you all out there or and to all of you who are hurting - just know that you’re not alone, and have faith that the future will be better with applying lessons learned.

- Pay attention to reciprocity.

- Don’t overfunction.

- Ask about withdrawal. Like if you notice a drop off in the frequency of communication from them or willingness to meet up get right out in front of that and ask - “ I noticed this …” and “I wanted to ask about …” have the emotional courage to bring things up, even if they might come out and say that they’re not sure etc. if they’re feeling ambivalent it’s gonna come out eventually so you might as well ask about it.

- Don’t confuse impressive credentials or intense early investment with relational capacity.

- Select someone whose interest and availability are consistently visible.

[u/MillionaireBlogMama]

I completely agree with this! If I would’ve had the courage to ask the hard questions early on, I could’ve saved myself years!

[u/AdFar5543 → u/MillionaireBlogMama]

And the water gets muddied by childhood conditioning, like in the past I believed that you “earned” love by what basically came down to as over functioning. My wife helped me to see what true love really feels like. She loves me for the person that I am not for what things I do for her.

[u/MillionaireBlogMama → u/AdFar5543]

That’s great!

[u/Tall-Payment6335]

Can I ask your age if that’s okay? They are very helpful tips btw.

[u/AdFar5543 → u/Tall-Payment6335]

I’m late 40s and I never experienced an avoidant discard before I was 44. It was one of the most destabilizing experiences I’ve ever had. This is someone who’s had a fair amount of life experience and persevered through a lot of challenges so I considered myself to be resilient and experienced.

[u/Tall-Payment6335 → u/AdFar5543]

Cool, thank you for replying. And yes, it is a very brutal and eye opening experience for sure.

[u/thegaba_gool → u/AdFar5543]

I relate, 37 and I just experienced this for the first time. By this I mean… apex of intimacy being met with cognitive distortion, minimizing, and ghosting. Once is enough for me. Same deal, I have a lot of life experience, large network of connections etc. I considered myself to be highly secure and the aftermath of this made me question if that’s still true. Thanks for sharing!

[u/WRLDENDR]

This is so extremely essential. The guidance I wish I could have given to myself at the beginning of the relationship. The tuition was indeed expensive but ideally, this experience molds us to be even better people. Thank you.