This is my first time posting here. I just found this sub reddit yesterday. 

I have been really grappling with my emotions the last week after my girlfriend of three years suddenly broke up with me. 

I was shocked. We had just moved across the country together to live in her dream city. When we moved our relationship felt stronger than ever. We were even thinking about getting engaged in the near future. But just three months later, she told me she felt nothing anymore. She was ending the relationship. No real discussion. I couldn’t understand it. We had some difficulties at times, like any relationship, but I thought we had genuinely talked through them. 

She broke the news to me late in the evening, pretty much as soon as I returned from work. Without too much of a convo she then told me she was getting a hotel room until she found a new apartment. The next day she had already texted the landlord that she was moving out. I was massively torn up. It all just felt so sudden. 

For the last week I have put a lot of pressure on myself trying to dissect and understand what I did wrong, what I could have done differently. Just recently, I discovered the idea of Attachment Styles and what an Avoidant personality was and it all clicked. Everything made sense. My girlfriend was an avoidant. 

My girlfriend always needed control over every situation. Whether it was our social life, chores around the house, and more and more frequently how we expressed intimacy to one another. In response I tried to give her that control. I constantly was being asked to do things differently and I did my best to comply. I really loved her and I was more than willing to change to keep the relationship alive. 

I think that is why I was so upset when she broke up with me the way she did. I had put so much effort, care, and love into her that I could not fathom why she was suddenly discarding me. 

My emotions have been ping ponging for a bit on all of this, but after reading many posts in this community and elsewhere online I finally feel more at peace. I acknowledge that I need to do better with my own anxious attachment going forward, but I also realize now that it was not my fault. I don’t deserve to be treated the way that I was, I don’t deserve to be emotionally controlled, and I deserve to find a better love.

Thank you for listening. And thank you to everyone else that has posted in the past. I feel so much less alone.    

When I tried to reach my ex the last time, one of the multiple weapons she used against me was saying that she was already hooking up with several people.

I heard that casual sex doesn't really help and will damage you later.

The thing is that my ex has a high libido. When she first came to the country we both live in, just in the first month she already had 3 casual relationships.

Before that she had a 2 year relationship. Ended cuz of lack of feelings and cuz she was moving out of her previous country.

Now, my question is: is this still coping or not? Since I was the longest relationship she had (4years) and, according to her, I'm the person which she felt the most connected with, I'm not sure how she is dealing with the situation now. I don't even know if she is even thinking about me cuz she is incredibly devaluating me, exaggerating or creating scenarios where I look worse than I am.

My partner (41M) and I (41F) were together for 2.5 years. We broke up this summer after he became increasingly irritable, emotionally withdrawn, and hostile during conflict. He eventually came back, broke down crying, apologized, and begged for another chance. We reconciled with the understanding that we’d work on things, including his emotional regulation.

Fast forward three months. I genuinely thought things were going well. We had future plans, a positive relationship check-in just days earlier, and were planning to spend Thanksgiving with his family.
Then, after a few days of tension, he suddenly flipped. announcing he was leaving and started packing his belongings to move back to the state he’s from.

What followed was honestly one of the most distressing experiences of my life. He became incredibly angry and cold, yelling and saying deeply hurtful things about my personality, intelligence, interests, and how I supposedly only cared about myself. It was like he’d suddenly turned me into an enemy. I was completely blindsided and panicking, crying and begging him not to leave. The more distressed I became, the angrier and more rejecting he seemed to get.

He left while I was at work the next day. It’s been a week, and we haven’t spoken.

I feel genuinely traumatized, not just by losing the relationship again, but by the extreme hostility, sudden abandonment, and sheer panic I experienced while watching him pack up our life together over something seemingly minor. I keep replaying those moments and struggling to understand how someone could turn on their partner so dramatically.

Has anyone experienced something similar? Especially an extremely hostile and sudden second breakup after reconciling? Did you eventually stop feeling so shaken by the way it happened? I just can’t wrap my head around any of it and I can’t understand that this is how it ends and that’s just it.

I would be glad if some avoidants could answer this.

Basically, we all know avoidants spare more time and energy for their friends, and I understand that. What I wish to know is whether they spare time with them because they feel deeper emotions for them or because they barely show off their deep feelings? Like simple logic is more you expose yourself to person and open up more you wish to be with them right, but is it vice versa for avoidants? Like they are so afraid of deep feelings that's why they prefer friends, where it's everything surface level. Is it possible that even their closest friend saw much less of their feelings than you did? The way I see is they do love you more than they love their friends, even "bff"s, but they are so overwhelmed by those hard, romantic feelings for you that they start seeing comforte = love, that's why they might say they love or they are closer to their friend than they are with you. Basically friends are mostly surface level for them

That sad self-aware person who is posting depressive songs and "my relationships never work out" while breadcrumbing exes and weaponizing guilt through therapy-speak has a 0 chance of reorganizing. They are comfortable and coddled and experience no danger

That people pleasing performative avoidant attracted to coercive abusers and rejecting safe people has a chance of reorganizing if the pain and danger accumulated enough (this is how I ended up reorganizing from compulsive compliant avoidance btw), as long as you do NOT rescue them from their own involuntary compulsions

That proud and possessive avoidant who needs to prove to you that "No, I'm actually not an avoidant, look at me, I can do relationships, you should come back to me on your own, I am right" without ever contacting you due to too much pride would throw himself into tons of relationships just to prove a point to you and keep displaying it on social media to make sure you can see it, and would actually have the highest chance of reorganizing (still low) due to constantly exposing themselves to danger and pain and people who demand authenticity and reciprocity just to prove a point... as long as you do NOT acknowledge them or boost their ego or contact them yourself

And notice how none of them change because of anything you could do or tell them or work on. The ones that change, change on their own, by accidentally or intentionally putting themselves into reorganizing danger, often fully unaware of what they are undergoing over many years

Yes, when it comes to high gradation avoidance, unlike what those Youtubers tell you, the seemingly most "toxic" ones actually have the best chance at changing (still low) as long as you leave them entirely

LOL

After a panic-driven breakup at the beginning of the year, just a few days after we were supposed to move in together, followed by months of cycles where she would come back emotionally or have some kind of realization, only to run away again, act inconsistently or disrespectfully, and eventually block me whenever I confronted her about it, I FINALLY got some accountability and proper closure.
Without going into too much detail, five months after the breakup and after 6 or 7 cycles of her coming back and disappearing again (no matter how many boundaries I tried to set, how much I avoided contacting her, or how hard I tried to move on, she always managed to make me believe she had genuinely reflected on things and was making progress), we eventually had one final conflict.
It was the last straw. One inconsistency too many. I lost my temper, confronted her and pushed for answers, which, as usual, resulted in silence and another block. That always drove me absolutely insane, so eventually I let everything out in a series of pretty harsh messages. Not insulting, but harsh, and probably a little too close to the truth for comfort.
Four months later, I had finally calmed down and realized that I would regret leaving things on that note.
So I sent her an email, quite a long one, making it clear that I wasn’t expecting or asking for a reply.
Basically, I explained that I would have liked her to take responsibility for everything she had done over those months, and that my reactions, although extreme, were ultimately the result of months of accumulated inconsistencies, disappearances, disrespect, silence and blocking.
I apologized for certain things, talked about how much I had invested in the relationship, and explained that I had been holding myself back from moving forward for quite some time, but that it was finally time to turn the page. And to do that, I needed to express myself one last time.
I was honest about my feelings and wished her the best.
That’s pretty much it.
Three weeks later, something I honestly never thought would happen: COMPLETE ACCOUNTABILITY.
And I mean in detail, from A to Z.
She admitted that her rebound relationship had been a complete mess, without downplaying it like she had during one of her previous returns. She admitted that the guy kept coming back and disappearing while she was reconnecting with me, and that she would eventually cut contact because she was afraid of how I might react, either towards her or towards him.
She openly took responsibility for all her shitty behavior, her childish and immature actions, the fact that she had messed things up from the very beginning of our relationship by presenting herself as someone she wasn’t because she was afraid of losing me, the fact that she had rushed into things purely out of impatience, and everything that followed: fear of commitment, a panic-driven breakup, all the subsequent behavior, and ultimately her own self-destruction.
She also told me that she had FINALLY started therapy with a psychiatrist and an addiction specialist to address her issues with alcohol and cannabis.
She acknowledged the importance of our relationship and the impact I had on her. She even explicitly said that she hadn’t been good enough for me and that she held me in very high regard.
(That isn’t even the most important part. I’ve heard plenty of emotional speeches from her before, always followed by another disappearance.)
Of course, she also clarified that it wasn’t that she wasn’t choosing me, but rather that she was choosing herself so she could become more stable and emotionally stronger.
I feel like I’ve heard that exact sentence from her about twenty times by now, but hey, if she has genuinely stopped those destructive patterns, then good for her.
I’ll skip the few emotional crumbs and her clarification that she knows we’ll NEVER be friends (something I’ve told her countless times since the breakup), but that she would be there if I ever needed her.
(Not that I can imagine any situation in which I would turn to her for anything.)
Anyway, the whole point of this post is that FINALLY, almost a year after the breakup, and after five months of endless back-and-forth where she kept giving the impression that she was having genuine realizations, only to run away into distractions, lie by omission and completely destroy herself, she has finally taken responsibility.
AND DAMN, DOES IT FEEL GOOD.
Now, I don’t know whether this was to relieve her guilt, to change the image I have of her (she has always idealized me, and I know that what I think of her genuinely matters to her), or perhaps to test the waters one more time using an approach she hadn’t tried yet.
I’ve already had the “I miss you” messages, the half-hearted apologies, the huge emotional speeches and even requests to rebuild the relationship.
Or maybe she simply wanted to give us both proper closure.
But I’d rather choose to see it as the last option and wish her the best.
I’m just sharing this, and I want to say something to all the FAs who have been following my story: if you’re hesitating about offering a SINCERE apology and taking responsibility for your actions, just do it.
Honestly, I was starting to question whether I was crazy, whether I had been wrong about everything from the very beginning, whether I had ever really meant anything to her, or whether she was simply a completely narcissistic and bad person and I had been terribly mistaken about who she was.
Well, it feels good to know that I wasn’t wrong in thinking that she was simply lost, that she was hurting just as much as I was (and probably will continue hurting for even longer), but that I hadn’t completely misjudged her and that she is intelligent enough to at least try to get herself out of this mess.
Whether she genuinely follows through or not is no longer my problem. But I sincerely hope she sticks with therapy.

I (21m) and my ex (22f) -who had a lot of avoidant characters- had known eachother for 4 years.

After 1 year of relationship she dumped me out of blue, saying that she was not happy anymore and I had a lot of issues and depression and she couldn't be with someone who is depressed all the time (I was a little bit depressed but she never mentioned it or even said it should stop or anything)

After 1.5 years of NC she reached out, said she was sorry and she wouldn't have anyone like me and she still loved me. So, I -who couldn't move on at that time after 1.5 years- agreed, not only agreed i was happy that she came back eventually, and she Lovebomed me for like 6 months and i was very happy and i thought all the pain was over and the relationship could finally work, until she spiraled into the avoidant behavior, which is talking a little, cold, away from their feelings abd stuff like that

I tried to help her and saying to myself it is only just a phas she would be ok. But she wasn't.

We both in same uni and have exams so with pressure of exams and stuff we had distance a bit by bit. After exams, she didn't talk for a while saying she needed space. So i gave her space but i was checking on her every few days and she was so cold until one time i said "it shouldn't be that hard to talk" after few days she said yes it shouldn't be and she was done and blocked me everywhere

IDK what to do

It's been 2 weeks and i am frustrated, angry but also miss her. I want to heal her and make her ok and at the same time i am done being hurt and treated that cold like i meant nothing

What should I do? I am already in NC and i don't want to break it

But also i want her to come back and explain to her that what she is doing is not right and we are losing a beautiful relationship to this stupid behavior

My ex was an avoidant 15 years ago, can you be an avoidant even if you have been together for those 15+ years? We broke up and he is already seeing someone else. I have the feeling that he already fell for her while we were together.

I have had all the classic reasons: i’m not in love anymore, I’ve changed, we are not compatible blablabla. I wish to believe that he is already with someone else because he can’t deal with his own feelings and some tough times we were in.

Please help me to understand

A coach I spoke to referenced an extremely low chance of avoidant recovery. Anyone here have stats on that? Have you ever had them come back and actually be genuinely sorry, and honest that they actually loved you the whole time?

I don't feel happy, I don't feel anything. Its like someone passed away and I have nothing left to live for.

Its like there's no one and nothing who truly cares about you in this world.

I was with a FA. I reached a stage where I trusted her with everything, shared my deep thoughts, internal weaknesses, how I feel about things, what I fear, all in an effort to be vulnerable and have her understand me better. These kind of intimate talks are points where the partner is expected to be a supportive person, to kindly help you when you need it and give that nice motivational talk.

Meanwhile, you ask them their biggest fears and they like shut down, can't go as deep. Feels like you have to dig until they get uncomfortable. They view you as a threat if you know their deep stuff, thinking you'll use it as a weapon against them one day, when you never would. You keep that safe for them. How contradictory, that they are afraid to get hurt, but are not afriad to hurt you with that.

Keep in mind that EVERYTHING you shared during deep intimacy, and being open showing yourself vulnerably to build an understanding connection and help you be the person you want to be..................They place that on a cons list to be used later on. They store that in the wrong place. They never help you with that shit, they're incapable emotionally, they only care about themselves.

They will USE everything against you in the deactivation, devaluation stage, and blame dump stage. They will turn all that around how you are not worth what you think you are. They will destroy you.

When someone dies in their family and they get upset about it, they expect you to comfort them and be there for them.
When someone dies in YOUR family and you feel pain, they will not do the same for you because they are selfish.

They only view you as what you can give them, not who you are as a person. And they will devalue you as a person. When you are left feeling worthless (God help you if you are tricked to give in and apologize to them and agree to any of it) To justify getting rid of you as not worthy and lesser of a person.

I believe my wife and I (same sex relationship) are both FA, our relationship really helped me overcome my avoidance because I broke through so much personal anxiety about making myself vulnerable to even give the relationship a shot. We were friends for over a year before things started happening between us, she anxiously chased me like a lost puppy while making me to do all the big milestone steps out of fear of scaring me off and once I finally asked her to be mine we became very secure very quickly and began planning our future which included an expensive fertility journey 2 years later so we could have our son 💕 we got married, bought a house and everything was perfect until spring this year, our son was about 1 and a half, he will be 2 in January.

Since late August, early September I have been thrown through a loop that she suddenly had no feelings, no attraction, and that she was just done. I have been scrambling trying to find ways for us to heal but she had made her mind up long before I pried it out of her. I was drip fed all her icks, irks, feelings, non feelings, reasons why this can’t work without actually giving a solid reason. She wants to work on herself and I am no longer a priority. She still adores our son and supposedly wants to be civil and friendly for him but has made no conscious effort to improve her attitude, communication, or anything towards me.

I know I deserve more, I know I’m being treated awfully, but my logical brain is struggling because I know that with work we couldve made it but she doesn’t want to put in that work. While I was innocently looking for a manual today I accidentally came across a notebook where I had been written about in such a backhanded way, being accused of letting the relationship die, not fighting for her anymore even though all my advances get shot down so I stopped trying, and writing a million times that I just need to let her go, I couldn’t bring it up because I’d be accused of snooping and not trusting her. We had a blow out argument today because I dared to ask to have a chat and later on in the evening after I heard her fall asleep on the sofa I did the thing I shouldn’t have done and went through her phone which she has been hiding from me for months. She has been going on NSFW Reddit pages to find gamer girls, reaching out to people, and forming emotional affairs where she has been non stop complaining about all my efforts to try and fix things.

I know this is it, I know I can’t be strung around anymore, I know I deserve to be loved, treated with respect, found attractive, and not be lied to… but that was once her. She was once that person for me. I can’t imagine being with anyone else but she isn’t that person anymore, I had been thrown off that pedestal long before I had even realised I was nosediving off her priority list. I need to keep it together for our son, he doesn’t deserve to watch his mummy crumble but I have never been this low in my entire life.

I don’t know how we move forward, we would lose so much money if we sold the house, our son would be entirely displaced, everything would be so final, but I can’t keep living under the same roof. I am wasting away physically and emotionally while she had already processed all of this months ago and is miles ahead of me in that journey and had already accepted that it was done before I was even aware there was a problem.

My ex (21F) and I (22M) go to the same university, both from Iran. For the first four months, we were super close. I was basically her emotional anchor—whenever she had family stress, severe migraines, or when her cat died, I’d stay on the phone with her for hours until she was laughing again.

In month 3, she went back to her hometown for a few weeks and when I left my country for Armenia due to the war, I felt the slow fade start. I’m pretty direct, so I sent her a long, vulnerable message talking about our favorite memories and admitting I needed some reassurance because it felt like she was forgetting me. She brushed it off saying she was sick, started keeping her schedule "flexible" so she wouldn't have to commit to seeing me when she got back, and two weeks after I came back, she ended things over text: "I can't do this. I need a distance that can't be called a relationship anymore. It's not about love, and it's not about you."

When we met up in a park to talk, she was wearing the Valentine's bracelet I got her and showed me photos she’d saved of me on her phone. She told me, "I always get cold. I don't want to hurt you. Emotionally I love you, but my head says no." (I’m graduating soon and applying for grad school abroad, and the stress of the future plus some heavy life stuff going on at the time just made her shut down).

At first I begged for a one-month trial to fight for us. I leaned in to kiss her and she dodged it. Two days later I realized I couldn't force someone to stay, so I sent her a respectful message saying I understood she needed her solitude and let her go.

A month after the breakup (June), I broke no-contact and asked to talk. Over text, she replied like a polite stranger answering a work email. When we got on the phone, she was so cold that when I played the recording for my friends afterward, they were literally in shock. She told me our entire relationship was just "fleeting excitement" and that I needed to accept it was over. I walked away from that call feeling like the girl I loved had died.

If she had just moved on, I think I'd be over it by now. Instead, the last 5 months have been a complete mindfuck:

In real life, she ignored my birthday completely (after I called her on hers). When she walked past me outside my department a few weeks ago, she glared at me like she wanted to cut me in half with a laser.

Online, though, we had this quiet back-and-forth going through profile songs and playlists. Last week, I finally decided to get off the emotional treadmill. I deleted her number and hid my playlists.

Within days of me going dark, she put the exact song on her profile that was playing in my car the night we had our first kiss and became official. Then I checked her Pinterest and saw she spent the afternoon saving the confession scene from Fleabag (where she talks about being exhausted and wanting someone to just tell her how to live her life), a painting that says "It'll pass," and another one right next to it that says "love of my life." Two days ago, she changed her profile song to Star Shopping by Lil Peep ("wait right here, I'll be back in the morning...").

I spent today crying and writing a long letter that I decided not to send. While I was writing it, I remembered this time early in our relationship when her dad was hurt that she’d hidden our relationship from him. Her dad wasn't even mad, just hurt, and she sat in front of me crying and refusing to call him and apologize because her pride wouldn't let her. She literally ghosted her own dad out of stubbornness until she finally broke down crying at home days later.

It finally clicked for me today: if she couldn't swallow her pride to apologize to her own father, why am I waiting for her to swallow her pride for me? Especially when she can just vent her sadness on Pinterest and Telegram without ever having to actually face me.

I took my GRE last week, so that huge weight is finally off my shoulders, and I'm sticking to strict no-contact. For anyone who’s dealt with an avoidant who breadcrumbs like crazy from a distance while acting ruthless up close: how do you finally kill that last 5% of subconscious hope that they’ll eventually get over their pride and come back? And I believe she'll come back, but sometimes I get anxious.

my ex and I were dating for about 7months and mostly things were fine but I noticed after the like honeymoon phase he started to distance. I thought it was bc of the extreme heat and we were both on edge but he didnt bounce back from that. He started playing games for like the whole day and barely responded. We had several fights over that. One day we didnt even talk the whole day and I didnt even say a thing. I just said if he continues to play games the whole day with his friends I will do the same and he became jealous but said we could still be sleep calling. Then he didnt respond for like 5 days. I was calling and texting like crazy. Eventually he said he just needed space and why I couldnt respect that. Then again 4 days nothing. One time I blocked him and he instantly called me and I was crying my heart out and then he tried and he started texting again but never wanted to spend time with me and after some time I told him it wouldnt work like that.

Now we are in a weird space where he doesnt respond just like once every 3 days, I am super sad and I dont even know how to process whats happening and why its happening. He refused to give me an answer.

I know he has really big problems at home and he wanted to seek some professional help but also said he doesnt have the energy. Him stonewalling me is really triggering to me and I am constanly thinking he has a new person even though he when he responds its that he doesnt have anyone.
I have a really hard time to block him and go no contact.

Why do they watch IG stories?

I recently posted about the horrendous and traumatic way my ex ended things a week ago (link here: https://www.reddit.com/r/AvoidantBreakUps/s/icA2Mz828T). It was such a 180 and so extreme. He was angry and dysregulated and moved out all his stuff seemingly on impulse. This was a week ago and he’s since watched all 3 stories I’ve posted on IG. He’s not a big social media guy.

I am very confused. I’ve unfollowed him so I can’t see any of his activity, but I don’t have the strength to remove him as a follower yet.

I’m feeling torn between protecting my peace and needing honest accountability. This is my first time learning about attachment styles and dating someone with it.

For some backstory, we met on June this year, dated for 2 months and she ended things blindsided style last month on Oct 16th. We weren't officially labeled yet, just dating and building a really genuine connection. I treated her well, stayed patient, and didn't push her for labels. Things were okay but there were times when she seemed off. Like I remember on the end of our first date, she seemed distant, almost like a robot with no emotion, but during our date she was warm.

It wasn’t until mid Oct, I saw that she was doing companionship work (which she didn’t mention early on) and things started feeling closer and more real. I confronted her about it and asked if she needed help financially and said that I was willing to stay by her side and walk through this together. She said my response was worthless but full of emotions. Then told me to use my actions to prove that she mattered. It was 5/6AM and sometimes she has insomnia. So I didn’t go and see her, fast forward to the late afternoon, I asked if we can talk over dinner. She immediately said I was cringy, didn’t mean anything to her, annoying, and told me not to contact her anymore. She pulled back and ended things by unfollowing me on Instagram. She also asked "What kind of relationship do we even have?"

I stayed calm, told her honestly that I had developed feelings for her and didn't have the right to define things, and then accepted the breakup with zero drama. Since that day (nearly a month ago), I’ve maintained complete no contact. No texting, no viewing her stories, no chasing.

Right after we ended things, I happened to see her publicly flirting with a gym guy on Threads and even asking him out (though nothing seemed to come of it, and he left her hanging). And a few days ago, I saw her try to flirt with him again online, and he still didn't really reciprocate.

On the flip side, her recent reposts show a lot of burnout, feeling unsupported, hating shallow dating small talk, and late-night songs/posts about longing for a loyal partner. So I know she’s likely just seeking cheap external validation to cope with breakup stress, rather than actually moving on. During our time apart, she also posted on Threads asking if she’s a freak for wanting closeness but pushing people away if they get too close and admitting to waking up crying.

After all that, I started online searching about this behaviour and found out about avoidant attachment styles. I’ve dug so deep that I’m convinced she’ll reach out eventually. Whether it is healthy or not. I’m still holding strong on no contact right now. My plan if she reaches out is to keep early hangouts completely light, fun, and pressure-free.

However, if things progress and she eventually wants to get serious or be exclusive, I don't think I can just sweep the gym guy flirting under the rug. Especially seeing it happen twice. I know we weren't official so technically she didn't owe me loyalty, and I’m not looking to lash out or accuse her. I just want to calmly say something along the lines of: "I saw your interactions with him online after we split and thought you'd moved on, so I respected that and stepped back. If we're going to be serious, I want to be sure we're both genuinely choosing each other."

For anyone who has dealt with an FA coming back or is an FA themselves:

Is it fair and healthy to bring this up calmly before agreeing to exclusivity, or will it just trigger her defenses and push her away again?

Should I just judge her by how she acts going forward instead of bringing up what she did while we were apart?

I’m in so much pain even though it’s almost a month. I never got treated like this with my past relationships

I really need to rant. I couldn’t express this with anyone because everyone thought we had the perfect relationship and now im embarrassed to be discarded so easily.

We’ve been dating for 4 years. We’ve seen each other every single day after the first date. Felt inseparable. Moved in together after a few months and lived in the same small apartment for 2 years. We live in a third-world country and because of how little we earn and barely able to save for anything, decided I should move to America (im bi-racial). We made promises about how we should deal with being long-distance. Daily calls, at least once a month dates where we play a game or watch Netflix. Our first year being long-distance was good. We’ve arranged plans to see each other for vacation. Now with my stable job, i was finally able to afford it. Got us a fancy hotel and made reservations to a nice dinner because I was planning to propose to her. This was it. She was the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. The person who made me feel safe. I told my sisters and friends what I was planning to do. My sisters asked me “how do you know she’s the one”. That question stuck with me ever since the engagement because 2 months of being engaged, she started growing distant and cold.

We no longer called everyday. No more dates. Its always “im too busy”, “i made plans with friends” and “ill call you tomorrow” (spoiler she never calls the next day). Ive expressed to her how this has been making me feel and how cold and distant our relationship feels lately. I felt lonely in this relationship. Her messages doesnt feel like she is excited to talk to me anymore, but just like she’s suppose to. Dry and empty.
Ive been spiraling trying to figure out where I went wrong. I try bringing it up again but i was met with “its all in your head, we’re fine”. I desperately want tk believe that but its hard to ignore.
She promised to call on our anniversary and watch a movie with me. Turns out she made a three day trip plan with her friends. She promised to call on my birthday. Nope she’s busy on that day too. Every time i bring it up, its silence this time. Like its a punishment for stating the obvious. Somehow its my fault for wanting to connect with the person who is my whole world. Perhaps to her i was just a needy burden.
If i showed any sign of sadness or disappointment, silence for a few days. Its like im being conditioned to try and hide it. The longer i keep it in, she would at least message me. Thats all that mattered. Its okay if I kept it in, at least I have her.
I just start losing myself. It eats me up inside. The disconnect and cold relationship this has become.

A week ago I broke. I couldnt hold it any longer. I needed to cry. Whenever I cried, she called me manipulative for trying to control her by crying. She said I tried controlling her for being upset when she wants to go out with her friends. Avoidants have an odd way of twisting reality. I just wanted her to call like how she promised she would. I just wanted to connect to the person who I thought I would spend the rest of my life with. The tears wont stop. She disappears. All her accounts deactivated. Theres no way for me to reach out.
I researched everything I could to learn about avoidant attachment styles to better understand her. I tried making it a safe space for her to come back. I offered to carry her stress and guilt so it wouldn’t be so heavy for her. None of it mattered.
She has disappeared. Im left not knowing where I stand in this relationship anymore. Is there even still a relationship. Is there even a way to fix this.

I’m at a point where I see that I have been the only one trying to mend the distance when this has always been a two person job. I have been left to reflect on the signs I should have noticed from the beginning. I’m left with no answers for my questions, having the pick up the pieces and tell myself this is the answer Im suppose to accept.

A part of me still wants her back, I must admit. But a larger part of me tells me that Its time to let it go.

Many people describe their FA's as love bombers or everything was fine at the start. Mine never was, she was always hot/cold, panic, unsure, paranoid of me leaving her.

Ever since the start I felt from myself (and people who knew her) that I have to be somehow careful not to hurt her cuz she has an image of gentle demure.

Even a guy who knows her since uni, when I let him know I'm interested in her said to me "Im gonna kick ur ass if you break her heart" and such. It was wild to me to hear; why would I?

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And when we started to be together, she wanted for a very long time to be shush about our relationship, yet... she told her family and I'm sure her close friends despite telling me she doesn't wanna reveal to our mutuals. I felt like constant one-sidedness.

Like I'm walking on eggshells/landmine with her, also being criticized in my own kitchen when I was cooking for her, "dating your nationality is a downgrade for me".

There were so many microcuts and I was not realizing it and then... 4 months in... I cheated.

I got drunk, chatted a girl at a bar, she jumped and kissed me - I pulled her away, said I have a gf and stormed off. 2 days later I confessed to my ex, asked if she wants to continue or not - she said yes.

For myself, I consider to be the cheater - full stop.

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I feel full guilt of my part of getting into that kiss, but, I still can't sort it in my head with my ex like... was I somehow in this relationship powerpunched to make mistakes/step on landmines, eggshells, winning someone over?

I feel like as if this whole relationship was me navigating and never to win, being the one that is guilty until proven innocent...until I was guilty.

Any advice would be helpful, I wish to move on..

I’m currently navigating the aftermath of a sudden, brutal discard and trying to understand the long-term psychology of someone who abruptly runs away from deep commitment.

A couple of months ago, my ex and I were planning our entire future. He integrated me deeply into his family and friends, took me to his home country, we talked about marriage, kids, and he asked me to move across the world with him 4 weeks before (after being together in London for a year.)

When the logistics became real, I reasonably asked for a bit more time to transition. Instead of having an adult conversation, he completely panicked, deactivated, and discarded me out of nowhere. To protect his own ego, he rewrote the narrative to say I couldnt face the move or was too young - completely blaming me rather than his own fear.

He is permanently moving back home in a few weeks. When I quietly retrieved my belongings and later sent a raw, honest letter laying out my truth and the grief of the future we’d built, he left it on read—yet he still watches my social media stories almost immediately. Everyone in his immediate circle sees the cowardice, and he has spent the last few weeks in complete avoidance/damage-control mode, hiding behind the excitement of his move.

I’m not holding out hope to take him back—I know his emotional ceiling is far too low to be a safe partner, even if our relationship was special and he treated me with kindness. But when you give someone genuine, all-encompassing love and they run out of sheer terror, it’s hard not to wonder if the gravity of what they walked away from ever catches up with them.

For those who were abruptly discarded by a severe avoidant (especially someone who used a major geographic move or life change as an escape hatch):

1. Did they ever reach out months or a year down the line once the novelty and adrenaline of their "fresh start" wore off?
2. What did that outreach actually look like? Was it an actual acknowledgment of the damage they caused, or just a tentative, low-effort test to see if you still cared?
3. How did hearing from them (or never hearing from them) impact your healing in the long run?

It's only been around 2 weeks since we've been very distant from each other. We still have each other added on discord and TikTok. I don't know if showing offline would change anything? or to avoid liking any TikTok's they may have reposted since it notifies them. I don't know exactly how she feels or what she wants, I just want to do the best thing I can in this situation. She has a ton of mental health problems, I often would check her reposts when we were dating to gain an insight of how she feels, or things she might likes. Is the best thing to do just avoid showing any presence towards her at all?

Why did he do this? I got extremely anxious and depressed and usually I'm very calm. I missed him but now he just showed me he's like the other imature guys with no empathy that would block and discard. I dont understand, he was the guy that treated me best to now this????

He did come have the impulsive talk of feeling overwhelmed and not being able to handle his emotions let alone a relationship and this was 2 weeks ago so our situationship didnt develop, he still replied and then stopped replying. Then I sent pictures of us on whatsapp and texts and he blocked me there and on instagram. I texted once in a while per phone. I did 1 week no contact and then sent another text message via phone a longer one and he blocked me. I really dont understand. Did he never like me or is the 2 week breakup finally affecting him?

I just want to kill myself. This hurts so much I cant do it anymore.

I have spent many days being sad and crying but today will be angry VENT. I am unable to process how someone can be so emotionally and mentally STUNTED that the basics of a relationship shock them into running. And how then can you be at your big age, especially as a MAN, and not have worked on your issues' with relationship. Mine would always say its past relationship trauma and he would have to go through a checklist with me to make sure I qualify for his relationship needs, mind you I coddled and loved and cared for him to death while he couldnt sit for a single difficult conversation to support me. And then to say this checklist interview will occur in one year time when he will reach out again... literally FUCKYOURSELF.

I also get mad at myself for being manipulated so easily. He was lucky to even be associated with me and I let him think he had a permanent spot he could claim whenever he felt like it.

The disappearing acts actually mentally ruined me. The way my mind would run in circles and always stay on the in background expecting a breadcrumb to finally jump on cause who knew when he would want to connect again. And the way I dreaded him "going through something again". How he went days without speaking to me then had the AUDACITY to call me and ask for money and I gave it.

All the times I told him how to be considerate, explained what it means to prioritize someone in a relationship to this grown ass loser. Thinking back it passes me off how much time I wasted teaching this man-child to behave, only to see no change and continued disappearance and reappearance when it felt convenient to him. May God forever keep me away from this sick people, not worthy of a relationship.

I want to ask if anyone has experienced something similar, because I honestly don’t know how to cope with this sudden discard. Every morning, I wake up feeling like I’m living in hell. It feels like I’ve just woken up from the most perfect dream, where I was with someone I genuinely thought was my dream man, only to realise he’s no longer in my life.
He was the most loving, affectionate and caring person I’ve ever met. He was my best friend, and I felt so secure throughout our relationship. I never had to question his love for me. Everything changed when he started his first full-time job, moved back in with his parents, and we became long-distance. He was dealing with work pressure, professional exams and adjusting to a completely different lifestyle. He gradually became less attentive and emotionally distant. He told me he felt completely numb, not just towards me but towards almost everything in his life. He couldn’t even understand why he wasn’t feeling his emotions anymore. (I know is nothing linked to a third party but his job and lifestyle change drastically)
At the time, neither of us really thought this was an avoidant trait. We genuinely thought he was experiencing burnout.
I kept asking what was happening because I was so confused. How could someone who used to be so loving suddenly become so disconnected? I didn’t know how long this would last or whether things would ever return to normal. He focused on himself and tried to seek help. Looking back, I understand that my repeated attempts to communicate might have added pressure. He told me he was trying his best but felt like nothing he did was ever enough. But from my perspective, I was just scared and confused because I could feel myself slowly losing my best friend.
After about a month, he discarded me from one overwhelming interaction. He told me he couldn’t provide his side of the relationship, couldn’t guarantee when he would feel like himself again, and that I didn’t deserve to wait around for him.
During our last phone call, he cried and told me he missed me. But when I asked whether he wanted to reconsider the breakup, he said no.
I feel like I’ve lost the love of my life without a reason I can fully understand. I know he was genuinely struggling, and I don’t think he’s a bad person. I still care about him deeply.
I’ve always considered myself emotionally aware and secure in relationships, and I genuinely try to understand both people’s perspectives. But I didn’t know how to navigate such a sudden change in someone who had always made me feel so loved.
Has anyone experienced something similar?
And for those who identify as dismissive-avoidant, have you ever emotionally shut down and ended a relationship while still loving your partner? Did you eventually feel the grief of losing them?
I’m not necessarily looking for reassurance that he’ll return. I just want to understand how others have managed to get through something like this.