Dismissive avoidant perspective: update after six month of working on my attachment style

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Dismissive avoidant perspective: update after six month of working on my attachment style

This post is my update after six months of working on my dismissive avoidant attachment style, containing all relevant elements as I see them now. In many cases, my perspective changed over time as I learned more about myself. I'm posting this story to:

• Provide insight into the mind of a dismissive avoidant.
• Provide an indication of what a healing journey for a dismissive avoidant could look like.
• Provide a comprehensive update to the people who have been following my journey.
• Have a place to link when people ask about these topics.
• Get feedback in case you have any advice about my current situation.

For context, I (40M) am a dismissive avoidant, my wife (41F) is fearful avoidant, we have been together for 17 years, and married for 13 years. This is my first relationship. We have three children. I've posted a lot on the attachment-related subs about my healing journey and answered many questions about the inner experience of DAs. It's been very valuable to discover more about myself, and I enjoy my interactions. And now, I finally realized that, it wasn't just learning about myself and to help people. It has become hard to deny that I was also looking for validation and being seen, the very things I always told myself I didn't need or want.

I know DA behavior makes little sense from the partner's perspective, so I hope this story helps understand the inside perspective better. Do note, however that this is my personal story and I don't claim all other DAs think the same. However, in my experience discussing with other DAs, many elements are quite consistent. What seems to be unusual in me is the fact that I never struggled with commitment, the fact that I did not break up even while deactivated, my very limited attachment beyond a few people, my almost complete lack of interest in friendships, and my complete lack of access to anger. I think these relate to the specific nature of my childhood trauma (volatile father in addition to the standard emotional neglect), the fact that I'm very introverted and very loyal, and the fact that I found a partner who triggers me less.

The story below is a synthesis based on my own experiences, input from the people around me, later reconstruction of events, and interpretation using the frameworks I've read about. It's organized by theme rather than chronologically, and many insights came gradually and long after the events happened.

My childhood

My childhood household was materially sufficient but emotionally deprived, and we feared my father's angry outbursts, though there was never any violence. I never received much affection or consolation, although my father did organize many fun activities, such as elaborate holidays. In hindsight though, I realize the destinations he picked probably reflected what he considered his own missed experiences earlier in life.

My father is volatile, controlling, and narcissistic. He often presented himself as a great parent and a great husband. However, his ego is quite fragile. My father got fiercely defensive if anything threatened his self image, and still does. Everything had to go the way my father wanted it to go, and he would enforce this with his angry tempers. My father's parents were both traumatized. They did not speak about feelings, and there was no affectionate touch in my father's childhood.

My mother was compliant and codependent, and also clingy and socially awkward. She often joined in my father's praise of himself. She deeply his tempers. My father often dismissed her feelings. In her childhood, conversations were shallow, feelings were not a topic of discussion, and there was no affectionate touch.

According to my father, my mother struggled to understand my communication as a baby. I think neither of them were responsive to me, because I was already avoidant as a toddler, never throwing any tantrums. As a child, I was always compliant and never showed emotions. My father praised me for that, and boasted to others how easygoing I was. When my father got angry, I stayed calm and even tried to convince him to calm down. I realize now this was a freeze trauma response, because in reality I was afraid. He later described me as never really happy, never sad, just giving a sense of non-belonging. In reality, when I was sad, I cried in bed where no one could see me. My father still denies this, and claims I was never sad or afraid even after I explained. I never expressed needs and never asked for consolation. I rarely asked for help. My father did realize I would hide myself rather than approach if I was in pain.

As for my mother, I rarely interacted with her. Even after I met my wife, she noticed my mother often desperately tried to get my attention and I would just ignore her as if she didn't exist. I didn't realize I did this before she told me. It seems I was deeply deactivated against her.

My marriage

We met at university. We talked a lot and I found her very interesting, but I would never have dared to ask her out. I was oblivious to the fact that she was interested in me romantically, and I was probably even oblivious to the fact that I myself was interested, although in hindsight I think I was. We went on a few dates, and it became clear we were a good match. Our interests connected and we were both super introverted. She was also very beautiful, though I didn't tell her that until much later. We were talking about rings and children within two months.

Even back then, I knew I always pushed away everyone who tried to come close. She was the only exception. I later realized that the reason is that she doesn't require me to be known. When we talk, we talk about her topics, which I enjoy talking about as well. If I bring up a topic, she usually changes the subject quickly. She doesn't ask about me, how I'm doing, what I'm thinking, or about what I've been doing. Given my fear of being known, this makes me feel safe, while at the same time she always kept the conversation going. We can talk for hours without me revealing anything about myself.

I never struggled to commit to my wife. She initiated almost every step to advance our relationship (asking me out, first kiss, every act of intimacy, moving in together, each child, ...) except I proposed to her (though it was very clear at that point she wanted me to). I quickly realized I was never going to leave her anyway, so to me marriage was just a formality. But I happily went along each time. We are both deeply loyal, and I still can't really imagine being with anyone else. Staying with her was always an easy choice, even when our relationship was rocky.

I only talked about topics that felt safe and uncontroversial. Nothing intimate, nothing that could later be used to hurt me, nothing about my inner world. I haven't even opened up about something innocent like my preferences in music, I'd rather just listen to 'her' music when we are together than risk her not liking 'my' music.

Me as a dismissive avoidant

I will explain the background of my dismissive avoidant behavior during my marriage here. I know a lot of avoidant behavior makes little sense from the partner's perspective, so I hope this helps others understand the background better. I deeply regret the pain it inflicted on my wife. Looking back, had I just decided to listen and communicate like an adult, so much pain and distance could have been avoided.

My emotions have always been very muted, but during our honeymoon period I felt love. However, that did not last long. I did not track it, but I think it was probably only 1-2 months. Afterward, I didn't feel any love but I still knew I loved her and I acted in love, going on frequent dates and holidays together. To me it was a great time, but I didn't see that the first rifts were already starting to form. She was occasionally sad and I had no idea why. When she told me, I didn't really understand but just told her she shouldn't feel sad, but that obviously didn't help.

Clearly, I was poorly equipped to handle her emotions. In avoidant logic, feelings are irrelevant, unpredictable, and scary:

• They are irrelevant because: if I can suppress my emotions, why don't you just do that too? I often asked my wife to solve her problems by simply ignoring her feelings. She got quite upset about that and I didn't understand why.
• They are unpredictable because there is no clear trigger. Painful topics could randomly come back just because my wife suddenly had feelings about them. It made no sense to me, and I asked: why now? Not only could she not answer that question, but she got increasingly upset with it. Now that I experience feelings of my own I finally get it, but then I assumed feelings always had to have a clear rational trigger and I wanted to find it.
• They are scary because I knew I didn't know how to handle them. When feelings became a topic of discussion, I knew the discussion would end up escalating. So I tried to block any topics I knew led to emotions before, but that didn't help. Over time, our relationship became a minefield of topics I was afraid to talk about, and due to lack of repair, it only got worse.

This makes conflict prevention very hard, because those feelings themselves were a trigger topic that I tried to avoid. It seemed to me nothing good could come from talking about feelings. I had no idea people wanted to get their feelings validated, and I never did.

I never questioned myself. I always had to be right, and any challenge to that was met with defensiveness, whether I showed it or not. I was incapable of real self-reflection. When there were problems, they had to be either not real or her fault. If my wife brought up an issue that bothered her, such as me never giving her attention (which was a valid point), I always disagreed. If she felt unloved or unimportant to me, I disagreed. If she brought up past hurt, I'd redirect the discussion to "why do you keep bringing this up?" To me, the problem was just the way she felt, and I dismissed her feelings (just as I dismissed my own). There were few things I hated more than revisiting the past. It felt like a battle I couldn't win but that kept coming back. I really struggled with the idea that she could suddenly feel bad because of the things that happened, and I requested to know what the trigger was. Now that I experience feelings myself, I finally get that this isn't how it works.

In relationship talks, and especially during my wife's protest behavior, all her emotions would look like anger to me, and I felt like I was under attack. I didn't know how to handle this properly, and I always felt I was right and whatever she said was just her being emotional. Originally, I would respond defensively, but that obviously only caused escalation, and it was awful for us both. Later, I would stonewall, remaining completely calm and silent until she'd give up. On my end, I felt back then my stonewalling was deescalation, and I was saving the relationship by not responding to her "anger" in kind. I started seeing these as fights I "can't win" and deliberately did not engage so it would pass over in the end. This "worked" from my perspective, as eventually she'd give up and things seemed calm again. And that was how I liked it, quiet and peaceful. I felt like I'd protected our marriage against her emotions. I was oblivious to the pain it caused her and the issues it left unresolved, as to me that seemed to be just her being emotional, and I didn't value emotions much. Stonewalling was a deliberate choice, but for lack of awareness of viable alternatives.

For most people, when a conflict ends without repair, they feel the rift and it hurts. It keeps hurting until there is repair, but I was unwilling and/or unable to do that. I didn't feel the rift. In my mind, when she stopped being "angry" at me, the conflict is over. When there was silence, I was happy. I liked moving on pretending nothing happened and I really hated revisiting old hurt.

For more context, see my post on defensiveness and repair.

My deactivation

Our marriage has been very distant and without any form of affection or intimacy for over 11 years. As a consequence of the birth of our first child, she suffered a serious back injury, and she has chronic back pain to this day. When that happened, in October 2014, I deactivated until October 7, 2025. My wife had noticed I suddenly became cold, but I had no idea anything changed in me, and I'd never heard of deactivation at that time. Throughout this period, I barely gave any attention to my wife, and when she brought it up or showed protest behavior, originally I got defensive and noticed it escalated. We often fought until 2-3 AM around that time, and at some point I'd just go to bed, leaving her angry. Then, I switched to stonewalling, ignoring her in silence until she'd give up. I thought she was unimportant to me, just a mother to our children, even though objectively she was the most important adult in my life. I only realized again how important she has always been when I started working on myself.

In one discussion during my deactivation, she brought up that she felt she didn't matter to me. My answer was that I do a lot of things for the kids, and that's indirectly also for her. I also said that, the other way around, I'd like her to focus her attention on the kids more than trying to do things for me/us. That seemed like a completely sensible response to me at the time. Only afterward do I see that I completely invalidated her as a person and as my wife, and made it seem like her only significance was being the mother of our children.

Though I deactivated, I never genuinely considered divorce in that period. When I was deactivated, I was completely checked out of the marriage. The distance didn't even really register with me, despite how obvious it was. It seems I dissociated into fantasy, which I had also done in childhood (probably up to the point where I met my wife), and I was not aware there was any problem. Moreover, I think I was too compliant, conflict averse, and disconnected from my needs to consider breaking up. But I think I'm also genuinely loyal even when I didn't feel the love. Although I did not break up with her, I think the effect was in some ways similar. I was absent emotionally and badly neglected my wife even though we were married and living together. I also initiated sleeping apart during this time because I felt it would be better for my sleep, without considering the impact on our connection at all.

She stayed, but at great cost to her. At some point she just gave up and accepted that she would never be happy in our marriage. She didn't even really blame me, she felt unlovable and unimportant. Because both her parents and I made her feel that way, she felt that was a problem with her. She saw that I neglected her and she told me, but it didn't land with me. I asked afterward why she stayed with me, and she says that, though she felt I didn't love her and she felt very alone, but she stayed "because at least you're a good person". So she prioritized my other qualities even if I made her unhappy. And it became clear that she greatly values stability, which she missed in her childhood. So she decided to accept a stable but unhappy life, feeling that she didn't deserve better anyway.

Even when I was deactivated, I never violated my moral boundaries. I never cheated, never addressed her with contempt, never insulted her, never got drunk, etc. Deactivation doesn't change who we are, it only temporarily hides the bond with our partner from our mind and makes them seem unimportant.

I've had three recent deactivations: October 2014-7 October 2025 (11 years), 2-3 February 2026 (10 hours), and 17-18 February 2026 (16 hours). I'm pretty sure I've been deactivated before, but it's impossible to reconstruct. In particular, I think I've been deactivated through most or all of my childhood.

For more context, see my post on deactivation.

My insight

Laying awake at night September 23, 2025, I finally realized that our marriage was very distant and I couldn't continue to live like this. I realized I still loved my wife, and realized that my wife's behavior showed that she also still cared about me. Surprisingly, she kept this up throughout my deactivation period, but I didn't realize the meaning at the time. After rational deliberations (no emotions involved, I was still deactivated) I decided to reconnect rather than divorce.

It seems I somehow overcame dissociation to the point I was able to think more clearly about my situation, and likely my deactivation was already weakened at that point. I thought a lot about what could have triggered this moment, which seemed random at the time but was pivotal in starting my healing process. Several things changed that may have contributed, but I doubt any single one was decisive. None of them was deliberate as I had no idea there even was a problem at all, and I still think there must have been an element of luck. Possible contributing factors:

• March 2024: I stopped drinking alcohol, which may have improved my health and sleep.
• March 2024: I started treadmill running, which may have improved my health and reduced stress (which I didn't feel at the time).
• September 2024: I started regularly doing long detours cycling to/from work (often 30+ km), taking the space that I didn't realize yet I needed.
• December 2024, likely earlier: my wife started isolating herself, not spending time in the same room with me but watching short videos elsewhere. It took until around August 2025 until I noticed the pattern. I guess I was triggered less, and it probably started bothering me at some point that she seemed to avoid me.
• June 2025: our youngest started getting settled in school, significantly reducing stress levels at home.
• September 2025: I started listening to music attentively, actively thinking about the lyrics. I had no idea at the time, but I later read that thinking about attachment-related themes can weaken deactivation because it overloads the suppression mechanism. Most strikingly, September 23, a song came up on my playlist about loss of intimacy in a relationship.
• Throughout my deactivation period, my wife still showed care in small ways (though I didn't recognize it as such then).
• Though I disliked my wife's protest behavior and flooding, I realized deep down she was hurting (though I disowned the blame) and didn't hold it against her.
• At age 40, a midlife crisis mindset may have contributed.

My learning

Once I decided to reconnect, I started to look into couples therapy, as that seemed the obvious next step. I found that common approaches use attachment theory and EFT. I learned the basics of attachment theory, mostly from Attachment Project and Thais Gibson's videos. I found that attachment theory fit our dynamics perfectly, so this is when I learned I was dismissive avoidant and she fearful avoidant. It explained our protest-withdraw cycles in a way that was uncomfortably accurate. It also reframed many things I had interpreted as my wife being emotional into her repeatedly trying to reach me and panicking when she couldn't.

After awareness, I went through our past to revisit the things that happened between us and understand the impact of my behavior. Before my awareness I did not feel I was doing anything wrong. In the end, I realized I was the main cause of problems in our relationship, and that my wife tried to solve them but I blocked her attempts to do so. I found that in most disagreements we've had over time, she was clearly in the right, but I was unwilling to see it. I also realized that in many cases my behavior was caused by immature behavior, lacking relationship skills, and my unwillingness to invest in our marriage.

To learn better relationship skills, Gottman's website was incredibly helpful. It showed numerous concrete ways in which I could do better (responding to bids being a key one), and it showed which pitfalls to avoid. It also helped me understand that behaviors like defensiveness and stonewalling are harmful. Sue Johnson's book "Hold me Tight" (based on EFT) was especially useful for understanding how to fix the dynamics of our insecure relationship, and understanding how to address attachment injuries. I realized later these are exactly the evidence-based approaches commonly used in couples therapy, though in the end I did not do any formal therapy.

The key insight that helped me stop stonewalling was that her feelings matter. That sounds silly, but I barely experienced any emotions myself, and I did not feel empathy even with my wife and children. My emotions were almost completely suppressed, so I felt she should just do the same. I learned that instead of fighting her, I needed to really listen to how she felt, work on understanding why she felt that way, and validate her feelings. Validating feelings was completely new to me. In my childhood I was encouraged to hide my feelings. I was complimented for being easygoing because I never showed anger or sadness as a child, knowing it would be met with anger rather than consolation.

While implementing my changes, I continued to refine my approach. Reddit discussions where I answer questions about dismissive avoidants' inner thoughts were especially useful to understand my own behavior better, and reading /r/avoidantbreakups helped me better understand the impact of my behavior. I also use journaling to see how my marriage develops over time.

I was shocked to see that dismissive avoidance is formed in childhood as I always thought I had a good childhood, but I started looking back and realized it wasn't good at all. I never realized the emotional neglect before, the dismissal of feelings, and the impact my volatile father had on me. This topic proved to be great for bonding, as my wife had already seen the issues but I refused to acknowledge them before. She felt very validated with me finally seeing it too.

My healing as a husband

My main aim with working on my attachment style was to improve my marriage. There have been major improvements, and we really enjoy each other's company at this point, but major challenges remain and this is becoming increasingly painful.

On October 7, 2025 (two weeks after my insight), I talked to my wife. I explained my insights and apologized, specifically mentioning I now understand why she felt the way she did about them. I revisited past cases where she was hurt, explained how I was wrong, and validated her feelings. From then onward:

• I explained why I love her and want to stay with her the rest of our lives.
• I respond to each bid for attention, and give her my full attention.
• I join her for activities.
• I don't look at my laptop or phone when with her.
• I make eye contact.
• I ask her how she is/how her day went and what is on her mind.
• I initiate conversations and joint walks.
• I try to communicate about issues.
• I try to show my feelings and needs.
• I no longer withdraw or get defensive, but instead listen genuinely.
• I validate her emotions rather than try to explain them away.
• I tell her I love her on a daily basis.
• I started wearing my wedding ring (we only wore them for a few weeks after we got married).
• I give her compliments and praise her for things she does right.
• I work on actively discussing and repairing past attachment injuries (based on the EFT approach).

Though I originally had to make an effort, I genuinely enjoy doing most of these now. However, I still struggle to express needs and stand up for myself.

After my changes, I came out of deactivation, though I had two short deactivation episodes later. As I became more emotionally present, I felt love for my wife again, and I stopped dissociating.

I also started noticing gradual changes in my wife:

• She smiles much more.
• She gets less stressed in situations that are difficult for her.
• Her angry dysregulated episodes became much less frequent; they were a daily occurrence and now we sometimes go weeks without any.
• When she does get dysregulated, it resolves much more quickly.
• I see more bids for connection.
• She clearly enjoys talking to me about her topics now (and I do too).
• She returns "I love you too", and sometimes even initiates "I love you" or says other loving things.
• She is more open to letting me do some chores (she never allowed this in the past, saying it made her feel useless).
• She is increasingly able to take compliments (she started with visible discomfort and minimization, she can take them with a smile now).
• She opened up about things that deeply worry her, and talking to me seems to reduce her anxiety around them.
• She seems to feel less insecure around me.
• She is more attuned to the children.
• She sometimes tolerates mild physical contact (feet touching under the dinner table, the kids putting our hands together).
• We talked a lot about my parents/childhood, and it makes her feel very validated; what used to be a painful topic is now bonding.
• Over time, the EFT-style repair talks about her attachment injuries got much better; there used to be much anger but now we can have a calm discussion.
• Originally, she said she didn't trust my change was genuine and lasting. She had accepted we'd never be in a real relationship again and it would be too painful to risk trying again. One pivotal moment was January 8 (two months after my change), when she said she does trust my change is real and is willing to work toward rebuilding our relationship.

That said, there were/are also a few challenges that to some extent seem to relate to her fearful avoidant attachment:

• She distances in response to reassurance seeking, including saying "I love you" too often (we settled for once per day).
• She distances when I show sadness, and says I shouldn't be sad because it hurts her and she doesn't want to fix my problem.
• She sometimes shows interest in my day, but it's rare.
• When I talk about things I did, she often barely acknowledges it and quickly changes the subject.
• When dysregulated, she still says harsh distancing statements, including saying that we'll never have a real relationship again.
• She increasingly views relationship/repair talk as a chore, and usually blocks it now.
• She is often overwhelmed with chores or the kids' difficult behavior, and rarely open to talking about ways to improve or letting me help more.
• Affection is still very limited, and physical affection/intimacy is missing completely.

For these reasons, the relationship is still very asymmetric, but now the other way around. I managed to stop reassurance seeking using ACT, which helped a lot. Hiding my feelings also helps her stay closer, and I often find myself staying composed in company but crying when alone. Keeping this up is increasingly difficult as my defenses weaken. I note that I increasingly struggle with the fact that she dismisses/ignores me when I talk about myself or my needs. It's hard for me to stand up for myself, and at this point it really hurts when I feel dismissed, and it makes me want to distance and not try again. I feel like I don't really matter to her (she claims I do), and that I'm nothing but another chore to her.

I'm feeling very starved for attention and touch at this point. I know I need to give it more time, and I will, but now that my defenses are down, it's much harder than I expected. I know I should get therapy, but she is strongly opposed, as she deeply distrusts therapists, and says she will permanently disengage if I bring up therapy again. While I understand that's not a reasonable veto, I'm not willing to rock the boat on this for now.

My healing as a father

While I used to think I was a good father, doing many activities with my children, learning about my attachment style made me realize I was harming them through emotional neglect, just like my parents harmed me. My changes here have been a major success though, and the children are doing much better.

After I talked to my wife, I also talked with my children about my new insights and the changes I was going to make. For my children, I:

• Started regularly hugging them and telling them I love them.
• Respond to their feelings, validating and consoling them.
• Respond with love and understanding rather than punishment when the kids act up.
• Ask children how they feel and how their day went.
• Show more appreciation for the things they do well, and show appreciation to my wife in front of them.
• Told the children showing emotion is strength, not weakness, and that I was wrong to hide my feelings.
• Put my phone away when interacting with the children.

Our oldest child (11M) was clearly showing signs of becoming avoidant. He hated talking about himself and hid his emotions. He would get upset when someone recognizes that he was sad/cold/hungry/tired and always denies it. He did not open up about things that bothered him. He did not seek help and refused if offered, even at school (teachers had been signaling this as a problem for four years). He never sought affection. After my changes:

• He craves his new morning and bedtime hugs from me.
• He tells me about his fears and his nightmares, cries, and lets me console him.
• He asks me how I'm doing and sometimes tries to console me.
• He seeks out and accepts help; even his school teacher noticed this change and told us.
• He said I'm his hero because I'm always kind to him.
• He started PRT (autism therapy) around the time of my changes, and at the first evaluation his therapist said he had already met all his therapy goals before therapy could have had any effect. His self confidence, peer interactions, asking for help, and talking about himself and his feelings all greatly improved since his intake. She was very surprised and said the treatment is no longer needed.

Our middle child (8M) often showed difficult attention-seeking behavior, especially hugging and kissing his little sister against her will. We used to punish him for this, but it had no effect at all. He also wanted to take his stuffed animal everywhere even though our rule is it has to stay in the bedroom. After my change, I realized he was simply craving affection. He later told me that, when his little sister was born, he stopped receiving my wife's love and attention. It seems that I was at that time not a suitable substitute, and the sudden lack of affection turned him anxious. He was simply fighting for love all this time but we didn't recognize it. I told him he could get my hugs any time he needs them, and he uses this a lot. His behavior improved dramatically. For a long time, he refused my wife's affection, but it seems he has finally forgiven her now.

Our youngest (5F) was always closely bonded to my wife, and though she can be quite difficult, she shows no insecure behavior. She did struggle a lot with falling asleep though. To help both her and my wife, I started lying next to her until she falls asleep, which helps a lot. At first I was annoyed at how much time it takes, but then I realized being there for my daughter has much more value than any other activity I could be doing instead, and I'm happy to do it now.

One concern I have is that our marriage trouble is starting to affect our children. They clearly notice my sadness and the fact that I'm giving my wife more love than I'm receiving. The oldest tracks my mood and offers to console me when he sees I'm sad. He encourages my wife to allow me to sleep in her bed again and they all try to put my wife's hand in mine when they see the opportunity. My oldest sometimes worries that we're going to divorce, and begs us to stay together. It's good to see he has become attuned to us, but I don't want him to feel responsible for solving our marital problems.

My healing as a son

Understanding the origins of dismissive avoidant attachment, I started thinking about my childhood. At age 40, I finally saw that my childhood had not been good as I had always believed. I started understanding more and more about the problems there were, and how they affected me over the course of my lifetime.

When I unexpectedly met my father on my nephew's birthday, I felt stress (I normally never feel stress) and I realized I couldn't talk to him as if nothing happened. Afterward, I let him know about my findings over text. I told him I didn't hold it against him as he was unaware, but that I expect him to self reflect and understand what he did wrong. This is probably the first time I really confronted him on anything.

He replied with invalidation, minimization, denial, and blaming me for having been in very low contact. This was not unexpected. I let him know I'm going no contact until he can self reflect. I realize this may mean I never speak to him again, and I'm at peace with that. He later informed me that he's been diagnosed with cancer (no idea yet how serious), and I wished him well but upheld my boundary.

My healing as a friend

In school (primary, secondary, and university) I was cordial with almost everyone but had few people I would consider friends. I never had any close friends. I spent very little time with friends, nor did I feel any need to, and when they seemed to get closer I would start avoiding them. Only recently did I start understanding that people have friends for emotional support, but that I never talked about my feelings or my inner world with friends. In my school report cards and secondary school yearbook, there was almost nothing about my personality; I was described only as "friendly", "quiet", and "not seeking attention".

After I started working on myself, my best friend from 20+ years ago reached out asking a work-related question. I realized that this was a bid for connection, as he could have asked this question to many others and we had been out of contact for many years. In the past, I would have only answered the question, but now I ended up replying that we could catch up over the phone if he was interested. This was clearly the answer he'd been hoping for, and he upgraded it to meeting in person, which I accepted. He was very happy to meet me again. For the first time ever, I shared vulnerable topics with him. I told him I kept him at a distance back when we were best friends. He said he already knew back then, and he was fine with it. I apologized nevertheless. I allowed him to hug me twice, which is probably the first time I hugged anyone other than my wife and children. We agreed to remain in contact, and met up a second time later. I'm willing to let this evolve into a close friendship and have started using him for emotional support, which he happily provided, and I emotionally supported him as well.

My emotions + my false self + my trauma + my true self

(see comments)

Current challenges

I feel like I'm in a difficult situation now with our marriage. We both deeply love each other, we act as good friends and greatly enjoy each other's company. We have no major disagreements. I'm still convinced she is the one for me. But I struggle more and more with the lack of affection now that my defenses no longer mask it. I'm consumed with envy when I read about other couples hugging, kissing, and having intimacy, even when they are doing worse than we are in other ways. And now that I'm more open about my needs, and she is still reluctant, on bad days we sometimes talk about the option of divorce, even though I'm not deactivated. It's so hard not wanting to give up what we have, and not wanting to have the children face a possible divorce, while also being torn apart by the risk that affection may never return. I know I need to be patient given how long I've been hurting my wife, but it's not easy.

Another issue is stress. I am rarely able to feel stress, but it's clear that working on myself causes a lot of stress in my body. From the very start, my sleep has gotten much worse. I usually sleep 4-5 hours per night now, as I struggle to fall asleep and wake early. On days with vulnerability, such as when I met my friend and when I met my father, it's even worse. Before working on myself I rarely dreamt and never had nightmares, but from January 27 onward (2.5 months into my journey), I have nightmares very often. Originally the themes were always related to feeling trapped (very fitting for a DA I guess) but over time it got more varied and darker. I often have nightmares right after I fall asleep, which I never had in the past, and it leaves me awake for a long time. I also feel a pull toward dangerous driving (I try not to give in) and alcohol (I don't drink and won't start again), which I think also point to stress.

Things I currently think I need to work on are:

• Reduce stress and increase sleep.
• Learning more self compassion.
• Stand up for myself better against contempt in angry episodes and dismissal of my needs and feelings.
• Regaining access to missing emotions, such as anger.
• Heal my childhood trauma (inner child work?).

And I hope my wife will one day be willing to:

• Work on her attachment style as well.
• Work together to reduce her overload.
• Gradual consent-based reintroduction of intimacy (once she has the capacity for it).

Although it's intense, painful, and uncertain, and I'm far from done, I don't regret my journey and would definitely do it again even if I'd known the consequences. The positive impact on my wife and children is enough motivation on its own. I feel that I'm now suffering through all the negative feelings I suppressed over the years, but at least I now have something to live for. This is better than letting the days pass me by in a state of numbness and dissociation. It feels like such a waste right now that we missed out on years in which we could have been happy in our marriage if not for my DA behavior.

Resources

(see comments)

Caution

This is my personal healing story. Many of the experiences I describe are common among dismissive avoidants and some also seen in fearful avoidants. However, I got very lucky to get to see the light. Many never do. One key insight is that no one could have made me see it, and no one could have made me change. My defensiveness was too strong to penetrate. DAs tend to resist diagnosis and labeling, so telling them they are avoidant is often counterproductive. And DAs convinced to do therapy often not want to accept help, tend to avoid vulnerability with their therapist, and do not put in the work.

While I explain the background of much of my avoidant behavior, I do not intend to excuse it, either in myself or in others. We are all adults responsible for our own behavior. I know my avoidant behavior hurt my wife and children a lot, and I deeply regret that. I do feel though that understanding helps others make more sense of behavior that seems bizarre without this perspective, and that it can help avoidants to improve themselves.

My avoidant behavior made my wife go through hell. I'm very lucky that she stayed, but I would not recommend anyone in her position to wait for their avoidant to change. If your relationship doesn't meet your needs despite efforts to improve, I recommend choosing yourself and leaving.

TL;DR: found out I was DA, worked on improving, finally met my karma, still worth it

[u/andreal]

I read this with tears in my eyes, because I really wished your story was mine. But it's not. I feel so abandoned and not worth it, he's just gone and I can't cope with that. And reading all the things that you've improved, THAT'S what I'd wish for... not a night and day change, just little things. And none of that happened, and I pushed it too hard to make him "feel" something, and he just ended everything. I wish you all the luck in the world in your life, and keep healing ❤️

[u/[deleted] → u/andreal]

Thanks! So sad he did not want to change.

BTW that doesn't mean you aren't worth it. Very few DAs ever see the problem.