Do Dismissive-Avoidants Come Back After a Breakup?

The end of any relationship is often painful, and it can be even more so when an avoidant walks away – especially because they sometimes do it when a relationship is doing well. They don’t always make a clean break either, leaving you with hope, anxiety, and all kinds of questions: do avoidants come back? What are the signs an avoidant ex misses me? Why do avoidants come back, anyway?

In this article, we’ll try to answer all of your questions about whether dismissive-avoidants come back, including their breakup timelines, signs an avoidant ex is coming back, and what to do if they do.

Key Points:

• Every person and every breakup is different, although studies have found general patterns showing that people with high attachment avoidance take longer to recover from a breakup.
• Feeling safe when separated can encourage someone with high attachment avoidance to come back, only to enter a cycle of leaving when the connection is too close and returning when it’s distanced again.
• Going no contact can help you to recover from your breakup, but an avoidant ex who returns just because they feel safe to do so when you’re no contact may leave again later.
• People with attachment avoidance can become more secure, but you can’t make them change – this needs self-motivation, as well as time and effort on their part.

The Dismissive-Avoidant Breakup Timeline: Why Your Avoidant Ex Seems Fine

Everybody has their own breakup timelines, and your attachment style doesn’t dictate how long it takes you to recover from a breakup – you might even experience different breakup timelines after different relationships.

With that said, there are some patterns in how we might process a breakup depending on our attachment styles.

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Separation Elation: The Initial Relief Phase

People with the dismissive-avoidant attachment style might initially feel relieved by a breakup, because close relationships and high emotions can cause them discomfort and anxiety. They can seem fine, perhaps because they do feel fine (for now), or because they’re avoiding the emotions associated with the breakup.

This doesn’t mean that they don’t value you or your time together, or that they don’t miss you. They may just be processing their emotions in their own way, and they sometimes feel the difficult breakup feelings a while after the breakup actually happened.

One study actually found that people with the dismissive-avoidant attachment style had significantly slower rates of decline in feelings of love in the first 4 weeks after a breakup, compared with other attachment styles.¹ Dismissive-avoidant and secure attachment styles were also less likely to feel angry, but people with dismissive-avoidant attachment styles who were angry stayed angrier for longer during the first week.

When Reality Hits

In another study, attachment avoidance was linked with higher self-punishment (e.g. self-blame and self-focused rumination), leading to greater anxiety, 3 months post-breakup.² Avoidance was also linked to less accommodation coping (acceptance, positive reframing, replacement), leading to greater symptoms of depression, both 1 and 3 months after the breakup.

Again, every individual responds differently – the patterns found in these studies might help us to understand our own experiences better, but be careful not to assume how your ex-partner might be feeling.

The Avoidant Relationship Cycle

The dismissive-avoidant tendency to pull away from relationships when they’re good can become a cycle. People with high attachment avoidance do want to love and be loved, but that closeness can be uncomfortable and scary.

If avoidance is the reason they leave, they might feel initially relieved, but they might have greater difficulty coping with the breakup later down the line. This might lead them to seek comfort in a new relationship, leading them back to the beginning of the cycle.

Why Dismissive-Avoidants Come Back

So, why do avoidants come back? If they’ve ended the relationship because closeness and commitment became a point of tension, the breakup removes this obstacle and might, in theory, enable them to feel safe re-entering the relationship. However, this can lead to the cycle repeating.

If you don’t get back together, this could lead to them ruminating on and idealizing your relationship – some people call this a “phantom ex” situation. This term appears to have been first used by psychiatrist Amir Levine and psychologist Rachel S.F. Heller in their 2010 attachment book, Attached, to describe an avoidant deactivating strategy. This works by putting an ex on a pedestal, so that new potential partners can be unfairly compared with an idealized version of you and successfully kept at arm’s length.

Although components of the phantom ex theory have been researched, there’s no research directly investigating this idea – so take it with a pinch of salt.

Signs a Dismissive-Avoidant Ex Misses You

You might not always know it when a dismissive-avoidant ex misses you, especially as they might continue to avoid those feelings by avoiding contact with you. However, some people experience similar patterns of behavior after a breakup with a dismissive-avoidant ex:

• They find excuses to get in contact.
• They breadcrumb you.
• They come back every few weeks or months, only to leave again.
• They test the waters with low-committment texts or messages.
• They may want to resume the relationship with less commitment than before, for example, restarting as a situationship instead of a committed relationship.

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What to Do When a Dismissive-Avoidant Comes Back

All relationships are different – many people find that dismissive-avoidants come back only to leave again, but others find positives in restarting the relationship. What’s right for you is for you to decide, but if someone has repeatedly let you down, it’s important to consider whether they’ve made any real change.

Does No Contact Work on Dismissive-Avoidants?

Going “no contact” should be used as a way to focus on yourself and your own healing journey, rather than as a way to make someone miss you. In this sense, going no contact “works” because it stops you from re-entering the dismissive-avoidant cycle if your ex does try to contact you again.

In theory, since making contact with or chasing a dismissive-avoidant ex could continue to push them away, going no contact could lead to them feeling safer and reaching out sooner. However, this doesn’t mean that this will last when contact is reinstated. If you want to know whether your ex is really ready to resume the relationship, you need to look for genuine change.

Breadcrumbs vs. Genuine Change

Your dismissive-avoidant ex might be saying all the right things, but have they really shown you that they’re making an effort to change? If they’re giving you just enough hope to keep you hooked without actually demonstrating any new commitment, they might just be breadcrumbing.

However, people can work towards more secure attachment styles. There are some positive signs of genuine change you could look out for:

• Consistency in effort and behavior.
• Self-motivated to change, independent of whether you take them back or not.
• Their actions align with their words.
• In time, you feel safe and secure in your relationship with them (not anxious or just relieved).
• They invest time and energy into concrete actions that lead to change, rather than just talking about it.

Can Dismissive-Avoidants Change?

With consistent effort, anyone can learn to be more secure in their attachments. However, this motivation to change has to come from within – you can’t change your partner, and any attempts to do so could lead to avoidant deactivation.

If you or your partner are interested in learning more about your own attachment styles, take our free attachment quiz. This will give you more information about your attachment avoidance and attachment anxiety, which you can use to understand more about the dynamics in your relationship and what you each can do, for yourselves and for each other, to build a stronger attachment bond.

Conclusion

People with attachment avoidance do tend to have a harder time after the breakup, even if this process is a little delayed. They might make an attempt to restart the relationship, only to end it again when their attachment system becomes deactivated.

Dismissive-avoidants can learn to be more secure, but it takes time, effort, and self-motivation. If you’re recovering from a breakup with someone with a dismissive-avoidant attachment style, it’s important to focus on yourself. Your healing does not depend on whether they miss you – in fact, many people find that contact with an avoidant ex makes their healing journey more difficult.

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Instead, spend time with friends and family and enjoy new or existing hobbies. Reflect on how you experienced the relationship and what lessons you’ll take into the next one. If your avoidant ex does come back and you still want to restart the relationship, look for concrete actions and signs of real change before jumping back in.

FAQs

Do dismissive-avoidants come back after a breakup?

People with dismissive-avoidant attachment styles sometimes come back after a breakup. Often, it is part of a cycle of walking away and returning. Look for concrete actions and signs of real change.

How long does it take for a dismissive-avoidant to miss you?

Everyone and every breakup is different. Studies have found that people with dismissive-avoidant attachment styles tend to struggle more from 4 weeks to 3 months after the breakup.

What are signs an avoidant ex misses you?

You might not always know it when an avoidant ex misses you. They may reach out or find excuses to make contact.

Does no contact work on dismissive-avoidants?

Going no contact should be used to focus on your own healing journey, rather than to regain someone’s attention. If someone with avoidant attachment only comes back because no contact made them feel safe enough to, then they may leave again when the connection is restored. Going no contact does tend to help you to move on, however.

Can a dismissive-avoidant ever truly change?

Anyone is capable of becoming more securely attached with time, effort, and self-motivation.

References

1. Sbarra DA, Emery RE. The emotional sequelae of nonmarital relationship dissolution: Analysis of change and intraindividual variability over time. Personal Relationships. 2005 Jun;12(2):213-32.
2. Gehl K, Brassard A, Dugal C, Lefebvre AA, Daigneault I, Francoeur A, Lecomte T. Attachment and breakup distress: The mediating role of coping strategies. Emerging Adulthood. 2024 Feb;12(1):41-54.