Dismissive Avoidant ghosted after a good 9 year relationship

[snarly]

I was in a 9-year relationship with someone I believe has a dismissive avoidant attachment style. She left two months ago, very suddenly. There wasn’t a major event or betrayal, just emotional burnout and long-standing issues that had built up over time, including communication struggles and sexual disconnection. She eventually said she “just didn’t want to anymore,” and cut off contact. She blocked me and has avoided any closure conversation, even when I tried calmly and respectfully to open the door. I was blindsided, we were happy and working on things, she left for a trip and came back and blindsided me. She wouldn’t face me, talk to me, but the last time we saw each other she was crying and upset and I said I love you, and she said it back. It’s clear she’s avoiding me because she has feelings, and can’t be accountable and face her own feelings of empathy, shame, guilt and regret for her part in this, things were getting real and she would have had to face all that in therapy. She started therapy a year prior to all this but talked about us (without me and my perspective) and of course was validated and developed her own story and narrative that she lost herself.

Despite that, we had a truly loving and peaceful connection for most of our relationship. We built a stable life together, traveled the world, supported each other through everything, and coexisted as a solid team. We lived together with our two pets, we shared a home and a rhythm. We had rough patches like anyone, but our day-to-day life was good, and we were still saying “I love you” before this happened. We said we appreciated each other and thanked each other for doing things around the house on a daily basis.

I’ve done a lot of reflection and work since. I understand now how our dynamic may have triggered her avoidant side, especially when I leaned in during conflict and she pulled away. I over-communicated initially, and I she had come to pick up a few things, she hugged me and after she left I sent a message saying I love you, and she hearted it. After that she went silent and ai sent too many messages and she sent a cold I’m done, door is closed, let me go message. I’ve grown a lot emotionally, and I just want the chance to rebuild something with more awareness and mutual care. Im friend with her mom and we’ve been talking a lot about it, her and her daughter are the same person almost and she acknowledges that and also has related to a lot of what I said.

I still love her very very much. I believe what we had was real and fixable, and I’d appreciate hearing from anyone who’s been through something similar especially where time and space led to reconnection, even in the most staunch, closed off and “done” avoidants. I’m here to learn and to make this work - and to understand what I can do with no contact. (I know all I can do it be patient and hope she comes around, but surely there has to be something more?).

TIA for reading.

[Kevin-T]

Hi snarly,

I am sorry you are going through this breakup. It does seem like she is really avoiding facing the issues. And kudos to you for doing a lot of work and improving yourself.

We’ve had quite a few cases of avoidant coming back. Unfortunately, I don’t have a good category system on the Ex Back Permanently website to sort out the stories. But you can read quite a few of success stories in the comment section of this article..

In addition, one of my recent readers (actually a customer of our course) said this in his email to me.

"Nancy broke up with me at the end of May because she was having a lot of personal problems and a lot of stress emanating from situations going on with her daughter. Because she’s an avoidant type of person, she wanted to run away from the situation and figured that by breaking up with me that would remove a stress from her life that she felt that she could not handle at the time.

Of course this upset me a lot because all I wanted to do was support her but that was not what she was able to see in her vision at the time. So after texting her only twice during June and then writing her a letter but pretty much finding out that she just wanted to be alone and she did not want a relationship, I let it go and I started looking at how I could improve myself and what I could concentrate on.

So I found your course and I concentrated on completing it during July and a bit of August and I worked on myself and I joined the gym and I did a few other things to really try and figure out how I could be all that I could be - and possibly even grow out of any kind of anxious attachment that I might have an instead build myself into having more of a secure attachment style, which is what I’ve always seemed to have, for the most part, before.

When I felt like I had enough behind me and inside me to write to her again, I felt like I took an enormous Chris when I reached out to her and early September to find out how she was doing and tell her briefly what I had been doing. We had had absolutely no contact in July or August and we were not on each other’s social media either.

When she wrote back to me pretty much immediately that it was good to hear from me and she was happy to hear that I was doing well, she asked me if I wanted to talk. I was happy to see this. Overjoyed tbh.

So we spoke for many hours that night, which was a Monday in early September.
We continued to talk more that week and text each other and slowly she started to tell me that she wanted to see what it was like to give it a shot with me again and she would not really know how things probably felt until we actually physically met… She had some dates planned that weekend, first dates with two different men, but she cancelled those and I cancelled the work plans that I had and rearranged them so that I could meet her on the Sunday. I also had to break things off with a woman that I had had a couple of dates with And who I actually did like, but I knew she did not have the same residence with me that I did with Nancy.

Needless to say, we got together on that same day when I saw her again, that Sunday, and she told me how she never stopped loving me throughout the entire summer but it was her pride that was getting in the way of not reaching out to me herself because she was afraid that if she did, I would reject her and she told me that she didn’t think she could take that. So I’m glad that I had the balls to reach out to her myself, after taking your course and finding my strengths again.

We’ve been together for almost 3 months now and she has told me that if I was to ask her to marry her tomorrow, she would say yes. So we have talked about this a lot and looked at rings and we left it there but she does not know what I’m planning over Christmas. I have ordered a ring, the one she wanted and liked most, and I am going to pop the question. We don’t plan on getting married right away, we plan on a rather long engagement, for at least five or six years until our children who are both of similar ages (16/17) are going to be a little bit more independent and probably out of our respective houses.

So that’s a bit of a success story there man. Our relationship is not without its challenges and we have already had a few situations where we needed to discuss a few things and get past some elements of latent bitterness and things like that - sort of to be expected - but it’s all working and we both want this relationship to work at our core, we have the same values and we share a lot of the same feelings about so much so we both feel that this is something that we want to last forever.

If you use this as a testimonial, please do change our names which I imagine you do anyway.

Hope that works for you, Kevin. Massively indebted to you and your course. "

[Kevin-T]

With that being said, you have to keep your expectations in check. All the situations are different and things may not work out in your case. But know that regardless of what happens, you are going to be okay.

[shelly34]

9 years I am so sorry. I was with my ex for 4 years. I really hope for you but I don’t how long it will take.

[snarly]

Thank you. I’m trying to wait it out. I’m still friends with her family who really care about me, and I’m just trying to maintain presence from afar. We had a lot of good and practicality, no toxicity and genuinely appreciated each other, and I don’t know how someone can walk from what everyone wants in a relationship without making an effort. It’s been two months and two weeks, holding hope and not giving up.

[snarly]

Thank you for this - it’s nice to see that there is hope and happy endings do happen with time.