Don’t you just hate it when despite being the ‘wronged’ party you are the one trying to reach out and the other person is just smug unresponsive? It’s like the more you try to move past whatever happened, the more it gets into your ex’s head that they must be so important for you to be trying so hard. Well, stop contacting and pestering your ex.
Sometimes it gets so frustrating that you feel like you are losing your dignity and self-respect trying to “make peace”. If you are the anxious-type, you may find yourself engaging in aggressive and hostile behaviours just to get any response even a cold and distant one.
If it helps, it’s not your fault (or at least it’s not just you with stuff to work on).
Your ex may be a Dismissive-Avoidant type.
I am not talking about the ex who is not responding because you acted too needy and blew their phone, are still too emotional to have a rational conversation or too distraught that you are unsafe to be around. That ex has very good reason not to respond or encourage you to keep reaching out.
I am not also talking about the mind game players with a rejection complex. They don’t respond because withholding what they think is ‘love’ is how they measure their sense of worth. Counterproductive if you ask me. It’s like saying, “you don’t want to be with me, so I’ll act immature, distant, mean, hurtful, abusive etc. and prove to you that you were right to dump me”. Like I said, counter… productive!
I am talking about people who genuinely value independence to the extent that it denies them closeness with anyone. People who withdraw when faced with conflict, shut down not to feel any emotions and push people away to not let themselves get close.
They are not trying to make you miss them and want them back (like you know-who) or trying to get back at you for whatever. It has nothing to do with wanting to space to deal with their emotions (like you know-who). Dismissive-Avoidant type are so good at suppressing their emotions (deactivating the attachment system) to the extent that they don’t feel anything at all.
They see your text trying to reach out and just stare at it, no emotion. You leave voice messages and they just press “delete” and continue like nothing happened. If any emotion is triggered at all, they’re able to quickly crush and suppress it. And they are not just doing it with you, this is their deeply ingrained pattern.
They’ll be the first to tell you, “I don’t keep contact with exes”. Of course, when they are telling you this, it doesn’t hit home that one day you will be the ex they don’t keep contact with.
If your ex is a bonafide Dismissive-Avoidant and you have tried at least 3 times or more to open the lines of communication, only to be met with stone cold silence, it’s time to leave him or her alone.
No amount of ‘pestering” is going to get them to respond. Not crying and begging. Not yelling and insults. Not acting “happy and positive”.
Maybe, just maybe you are ‘special’ (the game changer), or maybe they will want to change their attachment style (on their own) and reach out. But don’t hang your hat on it. Some people are happy being Dismissive-Avoidants.
Bottom line is that you can not make someone who believes in not keeping in contact with exes want to keep contact with you. What you can do is work on becoming securely attached so that when someone does not respond when you reach out, they don’t mess up your day, week – or life.
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