If you’re trying to win back your avoidant ex, I have good news and bad news for you.
The bad news is that you’re probably doing so many things to push them away, without even knowing it.
Because your natural instincts in this situation are going to lead you astray and cause you to make the kinds of mistakes that will ruin your chances with them forever.
The good news is that all you have to do is adjust your behaviour slightly and there’s a solid chance you can reverse this process and win them back for good.
Don’t Make This Mistake With Your Avoidant Ex
So let’s talk about what you need to do to win your avoidant ex back for good. The first thing you need to know is that you can’t beg, plead, reason, or love bomb your way back into their heart.
Any of that kind of behaviour will only make them cringe and run away from you even faster than they already are.
So here’s what you need to do instead:
1. Understand The Avoidant’s Core Fear
Despite what you may have heard, avoidants really do crave connection just like anybody else. The difference is that they’re hyper sensitive to feeling pressured, trapped or overwhelmed by their romantic relationships.
So they fear commitment and connection just as much as they crave it. That means that when you reach out to them with kind words, compliments and pleas for attention… it only pushes them away.
Sure, they do feel the positive emotions those messages evoke, but they feel the desperation and the danger more acutely and that’s what’s going to guide their actions and make them pull away.
And that sense of danger that they feel is only going to be triggered further by the breakup.
They just had their entire romantic relationship blow up so they’re feeling pretty confused and because you’re now their ex, they don’t know how to talk to you.
But that doesn’t mean that avoidants can’t create proper loving connections or reconnect after a breakup. But they have to experience connection on THEIR terms so that they feel safe…they need to experience that agency.
That typically means that they need a slow pace and the ability to take space when they need it, without feeling like you resent them for it.
2. Be Careful With Your Questions
When you’re trying to reconnect with an ex, questions are going to be a great way to get them to talk and to open up. But you need to be wary which questions you ask, as well as how frequently you ask them.
Frequency is important to recognize because of the way avoidants tend to retreat from conversation.
So here’s a pattern that can cause issues between you and your ex: when you’re trying to reconnect with them, you want to get them talking, so you ask them lots of questions.
They give you one word answers or leave you on read. Since they don’t ask you anything in return, you feel like you have no choice but to follow up with another question.
This can quickly start to feel like an interrogation or a job interview. And ironically— even though you’re the one taking all the chances in this conversation—it can feel like you’re putting all the work of the conversation onto them. I mean it’s easy to ask questions. They have to come up with answers to this barrage while you share no information about yourself.
So to avoid falling into this trap, you need to change tactics. You should offer a little information about what you have going on instead of leaning so hard on the questions.
In fact, it’s best to do it in a way that doesn’t require any input from them at all…at least at first.
You can say something like “I just picked up food from that Tibetan restaurant down the street for the first time. I can’t believe that I’ve lived here for three years and never tried it. So good! Anyway, hope you’re having a good day.”
That’s a basic example but it’s a good way of reminding them of your existence without forcing them into conversation that they might not be ready for.
I know it’s hard when it feels like your ex is giving you the cold shoulder but remember, this is just a product of their attachment style. It’s going to take them a little while to warm up to the idea of you two speaking again.
The other thing you need to be careful of is the kind of questions that you’re asking your ex.
So if you two are speaking regularly, obviously you’re going to have to ask them questions to keep the conversation going, but there are certain topics that are off limits.
Basically, you want to avoid asking any questions that will trigger their avoidance and make them pull away. And their avoidance is triggered by feeling pressured.
So any questions about when you’re going to see them, why they’re being quiet, who they’re dating, if they miss you: these are all going to show your ex that you’re obsessing over them that’s going to put them off in a major way.
The same goes for questions about the breakup and about their feelings. Avoidants don’t like drama or emotional conversations because they feel like they lack the skills to navigate them successfully. So instead of dealing with them, they avoid and pull away.
So it can feel like a bit of an uphill battle, trying to reconnect with your ex while avoiding all these triggers. But you really need to make it a priority because you don’t want to give them a reason to pull away.
3. Give Them Space
Space is what avoidants claim to want most. After dating one, you definitely know this. They made you feel like you were too much for them. You wanted too much closeness, too much conversation, too much intimacy.
And ultimately, if you refused to give them all the space that they felt they needed—because you have needs too—then it probably contributed to your breakup.
Whatever happened, now is the time that you need to be listening to their requests and respecting their boundaries. Because giving your ex space can literally save the relationship and prevent them from moving on and leaving you behind.
RELATED: Can You Get Your Ex Back If You Grew Apart?
Because the truth is that while space is comforting to an avoidant, too much space can actually trigger them to come back to you after just a short time.
The pattern goes like this. You chase your ex and they pull away. Eventually, you get the memo and you give them space. You pull away from them completely and let them be truly alone for the first time since you two met.
At first, they feel relief…relief from the emotional demands that you were putting on them…relief from the confusing feelings that your presence carried.
But that relief will soon sour. Because without your input, your ex is going to be truly alone and they’ll have to face that loneliness head on.
Because here’s the thing…your ex blames a lot of their bad feelings on you. This is the coping strategy of an avoidant: projection. They feel overwhelmed by the relationship and scared of the future.
And you’re right there in their space, making demands on them emotionally. And so it’s pretty easy for them to blame all these bad feelings on you.
But When you disappear completely, they finally realize that all this negativity is coming from within. They see that you weren’t the source of their sadness and feelings of disconnection. In fact, you were the one thing keeping them grounded and showing them unconditional love and affection.
So by giving your ex the maximum amount of space possible, you allow them to process their feelings and come to the conclusion that you weren’t the problem…they were.
And remember when we talked about your ex needing to feel agency? Well this is the perfect example. When you were chasing after them, they became reactive…keeping you at bay and running away.
But now that you’re really gone, they start to make decisions for themselves. And one of these decisions is typically going to be to reach out to you and try to reconnect.
4. Always Take Things Slow
So if your ex does reach out to you after a period of silence, it can feel like a turning point…and it is. But it’s not the one you think. It’s not the moment that you and your ex finally let down your walls, jump back into each other’s arms and ride off into the sunset.
Just because they’ve started to warm to you again, doesn’t mean that their avoidant attachment style is suddenly gone and they’re going to completely change their personality.
No, they’re still the same person they always have been.
And while they’ve started to process the breakup, they’re still feeling very vulnerable about everything that went down.
So whether they hurt you or you hurt them, they feel uneasy about the idea of connecting again.
All this to say, you need to continue to take things slow, move at their pace and let them take the lead as much as possible.
Again, this will give your ex the feeling of agency that will be huge for rebuilding the relationship.
They’ll see that there’s no pressure on them to give up their freedom or their individuality so reconnecting with you can be EASY and feel SAFE in ways that it never was before.
And this safety is what will really make your ex want to give you another chance. I think that people say “oh yeah, I’ll take it slow because I don’t want to spook them.” And that’s a huge part of it.
But it also creates a feeling of safety for both of you. And that safety can completely reshape the relationship that you have this time around.
Because when an avoidant feels truly safe, they’ll feel free to open up to you in ways that they never did before.
When they see that they can come to you rather than running from you, they’ll want to connect with you more and more. This is how you heal your relationship and their avoidant attachment style at the same time.
But again, this isn’t going to happen overnight. You need to give your ex a lot of grace and freedom and become a master of patience if you want to make this work.
Dating an avoidant isn’t for everybody but those who are able to weather the storm, find that they’re able to build a relationship that’s more rewarding than any other.
