"For people with avoidant attachment, love feels like a transaction." this one hit too close to home. i always tell myself that a relationship only works if it’s transactional. and while being in a relationship, I ask myself if I should pay back for the love people have given me. it’s so hard to unlearn this belief.
left an avoidant person who i really loved (i still love him so much) a few months back. it was very tough. at first, everything felt like a great disappointment. over time, i’ve started to understand more and more. can’t even hate him because i believe he deserves the biggest, the gentlest love this world has to offer. i can only love him and pray for him from afar. i miss him everyday.
Me too. We were long distance and I ended things months ago when I started to feel her pull away and it hurt too much. But the hardest part is, is that im still hurting 8 months later. I just wish I could hold her and take all the fear around love away from her. 😔
for the longest time, we avoidants are often painted as a villain; the perpetrator of most connection in our current generation. however, what people don't know is how truly difficult it is when your very own hindrance in love is supposedly your own temple - yourself.
avoidants need better representation just as much as other attachment styles are receiving. and your essay shows the caverns of our complexity; that we aren't monsters as most consumed medias like to stereotype us, without ever trying to fit into our own shoes for the slightest bit. because how so avoidants gets an immediate draw of a concluding statement that we're too messed up to engage in love, while the rest gets pages of chances for growth and change?
i used to have the worst attachment style in our block, but with the right environment, i have slowly learned to embrace romance; gently and progressively.
I have a question as an anxious attacher who has dated an avoidant. You said that “We see love as something conditional, something that requires us to be perfect, self-sufficient, and emotionally invulnerable.“ Which , I do believe, I saw this within my previous partner, but also , he also projected that onto me as well , which eventually led to our breakup because he told me that in the beginning I gave off this false confidence of independence and I wasn’t as perfect as I seemed, and it seems he lacked empathy for things that clearly hurt me(action he went through with), but even THE THOUGHT of doing something similar to him was seen as a betrayal to him when I tried to communicating my wants and needs unlike him who just lived life the way he wants to because of self-sufficiency, selfish, etc. whatever you want to call it.
Why do most avoidants not only self sabotage, but also make themselves into the victim, when in reality , (I hate to say it because I try not to lean into this narrative because I understand each attachment style needs to be healed to work towards being secure) they are the self-made villain because of their lack of trust/vulnerability to let their walls down?
That’s such a valid and difficult experience, and you’re not alone in feeling this way. Avoidants often build a sense of safety around control and emotional distance, and when intimacy starts to challenge that, it can feel threatening to them—even if it’s healthy closeness. So when you showed vulnerability or needs, it might have clashed with the image they had of you being “self-sufficient,” which they projected because it’s what they idealize in themselves. Unfortunately, this can lead to them painting themselves as the victim when really, it’s their own fear of vulnerability that’s causing harm. It’s not about villainizing avoidants, but recognizing that without self-awareness or healing, their coping mechanisms can hurt others, especially anxious attachers who crave connection.
I’ve definitely been guilty of expecting the person I was with to be as (what we avoidants like to call) self controlled, self sufficient, or strong as me. Although those are guards, that is what we think helps us survive. I personally am sickened by the thought of being a victim (even if I have been at times), I’d never admit that… because it requires me to relinquish control, independence, and strength… which again, we don’t like to let go of. I’d say, and I may be speaking only for myself, it’s more like we think our partner is supposed to be like we are. Like imagine you’re in a war and someone you love enlists with you… you love and protect them the best you can, but want them to realize that there isn’t much time for being vulnerable. So when the partner decides to talk about their feelings or needs mid fight/flight response, the avoidant immediately feels like they are in a war and this partner is going to get both of us hurt because they aren’t handling it like soldiers do (like avoidants do) by being self sufficient, strong, and self controlled.
So he, wrongly, attacks you for not being like him, and blames your needs and feelings as the reason “us” didn’t survive. So that seems very victim like.
The avoidant learned this behavior from being in situations where their needs and feelings were not only not important and not met, but may have even seemed to make things worse for the people they loved. They were taught to survive by being useful and needing nothing. And the more useful they were and the less needy they were, the more they were “loved”.
I’m by no means justifying this, I just thought I could shed some light on why they sometimes behave the way they do.
I really appreciate this piece. I lean more anxious, but I’ve spent a lot of time trying to understand the world of the avoidant.
The dynamic can feel like a painful game of emotional hide-and-seek…where my desire to connect leads them to retreat. What feels like love to me might feel like pressure to them. And when they pull away, it feels like rejection…like my love isn’t enough. But to them, it might feel like too much.
I think both sides often carry the same root insecurity: “I’m not enough.” It just shows up differently. One reaches. The other retreats. But underneath both is the same fear.
And because we get to write the story of what our partner is feeling…we often write a version that confirms our fears. That’s the heartbreak of it.
I imagine for the avoidant, my love might feel like a responsibility. Even when it’s coming from a genuine desire for closeness, it can land like pressure, like something they need to manage or live up to. And that pressure can feel like a threat to their emotional safety, just as their distance can feel like a threat to mine.
So we end up with two people who deeply care for each other…
both trying, both hurting, both just wanting to feel safe in the connection.
The first step for me has been quieting the fear-based stories I tell myself…the ones that validate my pain by blaming myself, or make me believe I’m being rejected when really, I’m just afraid.
Those stories feel like hope, but they’re actually expectations…in disguise. They give me something to chase, something to fix. But all they really do is compare life to a fantasy and call the difference “failure.”
Whenever I feel that pang of rejection now, I try to pause and soothe the part of me that hurts. I remind myself that my story is just a story. That the pain often isn’t something my partner did…it’s something I’ve told myself about what they did. And realizing that has brought so much relief. It’s helped me become more present.
My new kind of hope is rooted in curiosity instead of expectation. I hope that by easing my own fears, I’m creating a space where love doesn’t feel so heavy to the avoidants in my life.
Because maybe my anxious desire to prove my love…
to earn a love I already had….was unintentionally making them feel like they weren’t enough. Just as their retreat made me feel the same.
Letting go of that insecurity is helping me finally feel the love I receive. It’s helped me shift from comparison to curiosity. And it’s been amazing.
When I stop unconsciously measuring my worth, I can finally focus on others…not to evaluate, but to see. The more I look through that lens, the more I realize,
This is probably one of the best observations/evaluations on an avoidant from an anxious that I’ve ever read. I am an avoidant, and you hit the nail on the head for me, as soon as an anxious attachment style begins to try and prove that I do or don’t love them when I’m showing them I do the best way I know how, I feel like my love isn’t enough either. It confirms to me the fear I have, that I’m not made for it, my love isn’t enough. And it begins to feel like a duty or obligation for me instead of a relationship, one where I must constantly prove that I care, which , in many avoidants minds, is what caused this to begin with… we had to earn love by being useful, and we have to prove it by being useful, and our feelings were never useful for survival. This takes out the very component that separates an unconditional love from a responsibility to us…so we end up trying to survive or help our partner survive us… which often means avoidance since we can’t seem to give them enough to feel secure with us.
You are so thoughtful and it’s amazing that you have dug this deep to see both sides of these styles, and what drives them. so much compassion! I wish you growth and happiness in your relationship!
It’s really nice to read this response, thank you for sharing it… it’s nice to feel less alone in my feelings through expressing my own introspective attempt at empathy and challenging my internal story.
This is so well said. The different perspectives in how both attachment styles may feel. The way you put it into words, genuinely, helped me understand avoidants more and the way my past relationship has made me feel and how I might've came across as. So thank you for this!
i loved this post. i feel like recently on social media, avoidants have such a bad stigma. everyone warns each other not to get involved with an avoidant. like damn didnt know we had the plague?? i do think that avoidants need a lot of soul searching, healing, and an opportunity to talk with someone who has another perspecitve.
i myself have severely struggled with my romantic and family relationships due to this. not trying to be a victim but i heavily sympathize with people who also deal with this attachment. it makes love feel like it needs to be won and once its won you give up/ sabatoge. or once you get too close you become obssessed and find reasons to leave. i've learned it has a lot to do with relearning relationships, building trust with yourself to have those uncomfortable moments, and understanding/ pointing out our reactions.
Yes, I didn’t know many people considered us villains until recently too. It may be because, at least the other attachment styles “seem” more invested on the outside? But, really, although other styles may, outwardly, seem more invested because of the engagement… like the people pleasing, dependence, worry, and need for reassurance, it doesn’t actually mean they are.
If my partner isn’t being themselves to “please me”, if they don’t believe in “us” or what I have told them and need constant reassurance, or depend on my opinion to determine their self worth, they aren’t truly invested in who they are, who we are together, or our future together. But outwardly it looks like they are hyper fixated on “relationship” So maybe that’s why avoidants get the bad guy label, because we are even outwardly avoidant.
People equate the engagement with the investment. The anxious styles are technically “doing a lot of work”… it takes a lot of work to worry. And so it seems they give more energy than us. Even if it’s still not good energy.
If it helps any avoidants at all, the last person i fell in love w/ still love, i loved because he was able to be vulnerable with me. I probably had rose colored glasses on in the beginning, but once I saw the real him under it all, i loved him more. He didn’t want to stay of course so I let him go, but just wanted to encourage you that there are some people out there who will love you in spite of your flaws. The right people will see you and cherish you more.
this is so profound . it’s something i’ve been grappling with recently as well . the walls i put up . love over fear >>>> it’s a hard process to undergo to heal this attachment wounding but it’s worth it
This really hit home for me, the whole thing but the highlights were the internalized beliefs that " love demands something I can't afford to give, demands something I can't afford to lose", and "I push away the one thing that can heal me". I also have this belief that love is transactional and I do the same with everyone, if you give me something I must give you something too, I can never simply accept a gift or gesture, I must return the favor and I think it sometimes comes across as rude. Beautiful explanation of the over avoidant attachment.
Thank you for confronting the vulnerability that we so desperately try to avoid. Each of your writings have deeply resonated with me. I can’t wait for your next one.
"For people with avoidant attachment, love feels like a transaction." this one hit too close to home. i always tell myself that a relationship only works if it’s transactional. and while being in a relationship, I ask myself if I should pay back for the love people have given me. it’s so hard to unlearn this belief.
You know this is AI right?
What? 😬
Wait fr??
The article on avoident attachment?
this was a great read! avoidants are pointed out so often, that people don’t even attempt to understand them. I wish all of them could read this :)
left an avoidant person who i really loved (i still love him so much) a few months back. it was very tough. at first, everything felt like a great disappointment. over time, i’ve started to understand more and more. can’t even hate him because i believe he deserves the biggest, the gentlest love this world has to offer. i can only love him and pray for him from afar. i miss him everyday.
Miss him from afar please. If he hasn't healed let me breathe.
Me too. We were long distance and I ended things months ago when I started to feel her pull away and it hurt too much. But the hardest part is, is that im still hurting 8 months later. I just wish I could hold her and take all the fear around love away from her. 😔
so relatable. While reading this, i’m thinking how hard i am to myself.
for the longest time, we avoidants are often painted as a villain; the perpetrator of most connection in our current generation. however, what people don't know is how truly difficult it is when your very own hindrance in love is supposedly your own temple - yourself.
avoidants need better representation just as much as other attachment styles are receiving. and your essay shows the caverns of our complexity; that we aren't monsters as most consumed medias like to stereotype us, without ever trying to fit into our own shoes for the slightest bit. because how so avoidants gets an immediate draw of a concluding statement that we're too messed up to engage in love, while the rest gets pages of chances for growth and change?
i used to have the worst attachment style in our block, but with the right environment, i have slowly learned to embrace romance; gently and progressively.
honestly, this is such a personal struggle for me my whole life. thankyou for this x
Thank you for saying that :)
I have a question as an anxious attacher who has dated an avoidant. You said that “We see love as something conditional, something that requires us to be perfect, self-sufficient, and emotionally invulnerable.“ Which , I do believe, I saw this within my previous partner, but also , he also projected that onto me as well , which eventually led to our breakup because he told me that in the beginning I gave off this false confidence of independence and I wasn’t as perfect as I seemed, and it seems he lacked empathy for things that clearly hurt me(action he went through with), but even THE THOUGHT of doing something similar to him was seen as a betrayal to him when I tried to communicating my wants and needs unlike him who just lived life the way he wants to because of self-sufficiency, selfish, etc. whatever you want to call it.
Why do most avoidants not only self sabotage, but also make themselves into the victim, when in reality , (I hate to say it because I try not to lean into this narrative because I understand each attachment style needs to be healed to work towards being secure) they are the self-made villain because of their lack of trust/vulnerability to let their walls down?
That’s such a valid and difficult experience, and you’re not alone in feeling this way. Avoidants often build a sense of safety around control and emotional distance, and when intimacy starts to challenge that, it can feel threatening to them—even if it’s healthy closeness. So when you showed vulnerability or needs, it might have clashed with the image they had of you being “self-sufficient,” which they projected because it’s what they idealize in themselves. Unfortunately, this can lead to them painting themselves as the victim when really, it’s their own fear of vulnerability that’s causing harm. It’s not about villainizing avoidants, but recognizing that without self-awareness or healing, their coping mechanisms can hurt others, especially anxious attachers who crave connection.
Thank you for this response, it provides a little bit of clarity and a window into trying to understand the world of avoidants 🙏
I’ve definitely been guilty of expecting the person I was with to be as (what we avoidants like to call) self controlled, self sufficient, or strong as me. Although those are guards, that is what we think helps us survive. I personally am sickened by the thought of being a victim (even if I have been at times), I’d never admit that… because it requires me to relinquish control, independence, and strength… which again, we don’t like to let go of. I’d say, and I may be speaking only for myself, it’s more like we think our partner is supposed to be like we are. Like imagine you’re in a war and someone you love enlists with you… you love and protect them the best you can, but want them to realize that there isn’t much time for being vulnerable. So when the partner decides to talk about their feelings or needs mid fight/flight response, the avoidant immediately feels like they are in a war and this partner is going to get both of us hurt because they aren’t handling it like soldiers do (like avoidants do) by being self sufficient, strong, and self controlled.
So he, wrongly, attacks you for not being like him, and blames your needs and feelings as the reason “us” didn’t survive. So that seems very victim like.
The avoidant learned this behavior from being in situations where their needs and feelings were not only not important and not met, but may have even seemed to make things worse for the people they loved. They were taught to survive by being useful and needing nothing. And the more useful they were and the less needy they were, the more they were “loved”.
I’m by no means justifying this, I just thought I could shed some light on why they sometimes behave the way they do.
I really appreciate this piece. I lean more anxious, but I’ve spent a lot of time trying to understand the world of the avoidant.
The dynamic can feel like a painful game of emotional hide-and-seek…where my desire to connect leads them to retreat. What feels like love to me might feel like pressure to them. And when they pull away, it feels like rejection…like my love isn’t enough. But to them, it might feel like too much.
I think both sides often carry the same root insecurity: “I’m not enough.” It just shows up differently. One reaches. The other retreats. But underneath both is the same fear.
And because we get to write the story of what our partner is feeling…we often write a version that confirms our fears. That’s the heartbreak of it.
I imagine for the avoidant, my love might feel like a responsibility. Even when it’s coming from a genuine desire for closeness, it can land like pressure, like something they need to manage or live up to. And that pressure can feel like a threat to their emotional safety, just as their distance can feel like a threat to mine.
So we end up with two people who deeply care for each other…
both trying, both hurting, both just wanting to feel safe in the connection.
The first step for me has been quieting the fear-based stories I tell myself…the ones that validate my pain by blaming myself, or make me believe I’m being rejected when really, I’m just afraid.
Those stories feel like hope, but they’re actually expectations…in disguise. They give me something to chase, something to fix. But all they really do is compare life to a fantasy and call the difference “failure.”
Whenever I feel that pang of rejection now, I try to pause and soothe the part of me that hurts. I remind myself that my story is just a story. That the pain often isn’t something my partner did…it’s something I’ve told myself about what they did. And realizing that has brought so much relief. It’s helped me become more present.
My new kind of hope is rooted in curiosity instead of expectation. I hope that by easing my own fears, I’m creating a space where love doesn’t feel so heavy to the avoidants in my life.
Because maybe my anxious desire to prove my love…
to earn a love I already had….was unintentionally making them feel like they weren’t enough. Just as their retreat made me feel the same.
Letting go of that insecurity is helping me finally feel the love I receive. It’s helped me shift from comparison to curiosity. And it’s been amazing.
When I stop unconsciously measuring my worth, I can finally focus on others…not to evaluate, but to see. The more I look through that lens, the more I realize,
People are really beautiful.
This is probably one of the best observations/evaluations on an avoidant from an anxious that I’ve ever read. I am an avoidant, and you hit the nail on the head for me, as soon as an anxious attachment style begins to try and prove that I do or don’t love them when I’m showing them I do the best way I know how, I feel like my love isn’t enough either. It confirms to me the fear I have, that I’m not made for it, my love isn’t enough. And it begins to feel like a duty or obligation for me instead of a relationship, one where I must constantly prove that I care, which , in many avoidants minds, is what caused this to begin with… we had to earn love by being useful, and we have to prove it by being useful, and our feelings were never useful for survival. This takes out the very component that separates an unconditional love from a responsibility to us…so we end up trying to survive or help our partner survive us… which often means avoidance since we can’t seem to give them enough to feel secure with us.
You are so thoughtful and it’s amazing that you have dug this deep to see both sides of these styles, and what drives them. so much compassion! I wish you growth and happiness in your relationship!
It’s really nice to read this response, thank you for sharing it… it’s nice to feel less alone in my feelings through expressing my own introspective attempt at empathy and challenging my internal story.
This is so well said. The different perspectives in how both attachment styles may feel. The way you put it into words, genuinely, helped me understand avoidants more and the way my past relationship has made me feel and how I might've came across as. So thank you for this!
Thank you for this comment… ♥️
feeling so incredibly seen it almost brought me to tears.
This is clearly A.I...
But how
i loved this post. i feel like recently on social media, avoidants have such a bad stigma. everyone warns each other not to get involved with an avoidant. like damn didnt know we had the plague?? i do think that avoidants need a lot of soul searching, healing, and an opportunity to talk with someone who has another perspecitve.
i myself have severely struggled with my romantic and family relationships due to this. not trying to be a victim but i heavily sympathize with people who also deal with this attachment. it makes love feel like it needs to be won and once its won you give up/ sabatoge. or once you get too close you become obssessed and find reasons to leave. i've learned it has a lot to do with relearning relationships, building trust with yourself to have those uncomfortable moments, and understanding/ pointing out our reactions.
Yes, I didn’t know many people considered us villains until recently too. It may be because, at least the other attachment styles “seem” more invested on the outside? But, really, although other styles may, outwardly, seem more invested because of the engagement… like the people pleasing, dependence, worry, and need for reassurance, it doesn’t actually mean they are.
If my partner isn’t being themselves to “please me”, if they don’t believe in “us” or what I have told them and need constant reassurance, or depend on my opinion to determine their self worth, they aren’t truly invested in who they are, who we are together, or our future together. But outwardly it looks like they are hyper fixated on “relationship” So maybe that’s why avoidants get the bad guy label, because we are even outwardly avoidant.
People equate the engagement with the investment. The anxious styles are technically “doing a lot of work”… it takes a lot of work to worry. And so it seems they give more energy than us. Even if it’s still not good energy.
If it helps any avoidants at all, the last person i fell in love w/ still love, i loved because he was able to be vulnerable with me. I probably had rose colored glasses on in the beginning, but once I saw the real him under it all, i loved him more. He didn’t want to stay of course so I let him go, but just wanted to encourage you that there are some people out there who will love you in spite of your flaws. The right people will see you and cherish you more.
this is so profound . it’s something i’ve been grappling with recently as well . the walls i put up . love over fear >>>> it’s a hard process to undergo to heal this attachment wounding but it’s worth it
You know this is clearly AI generated?
Why do you believe that, but also, what is your criticism of the content?
This really hit home for me, the whole thing but the highlights were the internalized beliefs that " love demands something I can't afford to give, demands something I can't afford to lose", and "I push away the one thing that can heal me". I also have this belief that love is transactional and I do the same with everyone, if you give me something I must give you something too, I can never simply accept a gift or gesture, I must return the favor and I think it sometimes comes across as rude. Beautiful explanation of the over avoidant attachment.
tears down my cheeks while reading this, damn.
explained so perfectly🫧🩷
Thank you for confronting the vulnerability that we so desperately try to avoid. Each of your writings have deeply resonated with me. I can’t wait for your next one.