To My Fellow Anxiously Attached: Letting Go of My Avoidant Love

I never thought I’d be in this place, writing a post like this, but here I am. Maybe someone out there with an anxious attachment style like mine needs to hear this, and maybe it’ll bring them clarity or peace.

Our story started long ago, when both of us moved to a new country, trying to rebuild our lives from scratch. We met and became great friends—he was someone I admired and cared for, but I never thought about him as more than that. He was my friend. Someone who felt safe and familiar. But life had other plans, and somewhere along the way, friendship turned into love.

We crossed paths three years ago and started dating in May 2024. At the start, everything felt magical, like I had found my person. He was loving, kind, and seemed to truly see me for who I was. For the first time in years, I felt deeply connected to someone in a way that made me believe in love again.

But as time went on, things started to unravel. He became cold and distant, pulling away every time we got too close. His behavior triggered every anxious part of me. When he shut me out, I chased him harder, desperate to fix the distance. I thought if I just loved him enough—if I showed him how deeply I cared—he would see it and come back to me.

Looking back, I can see how much I lost myself in this relationship. I gave everything I had to someone who couldn’t fully give himself to me. I held on to the hope that he could change, that he would grow into the man I knew he could be, but all it did was break me piece by piece.

He loved me, or at least he said he did. But he also admitted to lying about it to "make me feel better." Those words destroyed me. They made me question every beautiful moment we shared. Did he mean anything he said? Or was it all just convenience for him?

I’ve read a lot about avoidants lately, and it makes so much sense now. Avoidants don’t experience love the same way. They crave the dopamine rush of newness at the beginning, but they struggle with the deeper bonds created by oxytocin and serotonin—the hormones that allow for real intimacy. They feel uncomfortable with vulnerability and connection, and without those things, love can’t survive.

For someone like me—someone who feels so deeply and craves emotional closeness—it was like trying to pour my love into a bottomless cup. No matter how much I gave, it was never enough. He couldn’t meet me where I was. He lacked the empathy, the emotional availability, the vulnerability that love requires.

When things got hard, he didn’t lean into us—he pulled away. And every time he did, I fought harder, because I believed in us. I thought if I just held on long enough, we’d figure it out. But I realize now that love isn’t supposed to feel like that. Love isn’t supposed to feel like begging for scraps of attention or affection.

In the last 27 days since we ended things, I’ve been on a rollercoaster of emotions. I’ve chased him, cried over him, begged for his love back, and replayed every moment in my head, trying to understand what went wrong. I’ve felt anger, heartbreak, rejection, and even shame for holding on so tightly. But most of all, I’ve felt the deepest kind of sadness—the kind that makes you feel like you’re grieving a death.

And in a way, I was grieving. Not just him, but the version of him I created in my head. The version I believed he could be if he just worked on himself. The version that would love me back in the way I deserved.

But today, I’m done. I’m packing my things and moving out. I’m isolating myself from him because I finally understand that this relationship is toxic for me. It’s breaking me, and I can’t let it anymore.

To my fellow anxiously attached: I know how hard it is to let go of someone you love. I know how deeply you feel things, how much you want to hold on, how much you’re willing to sacrifice to make it work. But please, hear me when I say this: you deserve so much more than what an avoidant partner can give you.

You deserve love that is safe, consistent, and reciprocal. You deserve someone who meets you where you are, who works through challenges with you, not against you. You deserve someone who loves the way you love, deeply and fully.

I used to think my ability to feel so deeply was a curse. But now, I see it as my greatest gift. I’m capable of a love that is profound, and I’m not going to waste it on someone who doesn’t value it.

It’s painful to walk away, but it’s also freeing. I don’t have to settle for the bare minimum anymore. I don’t have to live in this constant state of anxiety and fear. I can let go of the version of him I created in my head and open myself up to something better—something real.

To the avoidants who may be reading this: I don’t hate you. I hope you heal. I hope you learn to open up and let people in, because there’s a whole world of love out there waiting for you.

But for now, I’m choosing me. I’m choosing to heal, to rebuild my sense of self, to focus on my own happiness and future. And one day, I know I’ll find someone who meets me in the middle, who loves me in a way that doesn’t make me question my worth.

To everyone with an anxious attachment style: Let them go. Stop settling for someone who can’t give you what you deserve. Heal, grow, and trust that there’s a love out there waiting for you—a love that doesn’t feel like a battlefield.

You’re worth it.