The struggle of trying to get an avoidant partner to open up to you is real. They can take months, or even years, to open up, especially about their feelings. Why is this the case?
Avoidants, or those with the avoidant attachment style, learned very early that emotional closeness brings discomfort.1Mosannenzadeh, F., Luijten, M., MacIejewski, D. F., Wiewel, G. V., & Karremans, J. C. (2024). Adult attachment and emotion regulation flexibility in romantic relationships. Behavioral Sciences, 14(9), 758. They have more negative than positive associations with emotional intimacy. As a result, they tend to avoid emotional connection and closeness and instead seek independence. This doesn’t mean they don’t want connection or that they’re incapable of love. It also doesn’t mean they’re incapable of expressing their feelings. What it means is that they have fears around these.
If you address these fears, you have a solid chance of making avoidant open up to you about where they stand with you.
The friction point
You’ve enjoyed spending time with an avoidant. You feel like you have a connection with them. Things were getting better and closer. Eventually, as any normal person would, you asked them if they have feelings for you and they pulled back, as if having seen a ghost. This pattern is common with avoidants. They move in relationships at a slower pace than other attachment styles. They need time to process their emotions, and that includes how they feel about you.
By asking about their feelings, you may be genuinely trying to move the relationship forward. However, to them, that can come across as pressure to invest more in the relationship and a threat to their independence. So their pulling away is basically a flight response to a threat. If they don’t pull away, they may get defensive and say something hurtful. Sometimes they do both.
If you're aggressively trying to move the relationship forward, you might be anxiously attached.
Stress makes it worse
If they’re already stressed by non-relational things like work, then getting them to talk about their feelings is going to be even harder. When stress overwhelms an avoidant, they have no mental/emotional bandwidth to deal with relational issues. The following relational pressures stress them out if they’re not already stressed or add to the stress they’re already under:
- Asked to give or receive support
- To become more emotionally intimate
- To share deep personal emotions2Simpson, J. A., & Rholes, W. S. (2017). Adult attachment, stress, and romantic relationships. Current opinion in psychology, 13, 19-24.
Unlike other attachment styles that may seek their loved ones to co-regulate, avoidants typically do self-regulation. They’d rather sit with their emotions for a week and regulate themselves than do an hour-long phone call to emotionally stabilize themselves after a stressful event.
How to get them to open up
Avoidants don’t like vagueness. You have to be clear about what you want from them. Say you feel less cared for and want to ask them to show more care. It’s normal, in this position, to say something like:
“I want you to be more caring towards me.”
Those with other attachment styles will likely understand what you mean and want, but to an avoidant, that statement is a huge cloud of obscurity. So they might say something like:
“What do you mean ‘caring’? Don’t I already do X, Y, Z…”
They’re dismissive of your feelings and the terms you use to express them because they’re often not in touch with their own and hence lack the language to express or acknowledge them. This doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t want to be caring. It means you have to phrase your ask in a more specific way, like:
“I want you to call me during lunch at work like you used to.”
This is one example of a ‘script’ to use to communicate better with avoidants. I’ll go over more in a while.
The PCD framework
When you’re communicating with an avoidant, you have to think about how what you say is likely to affect them given their attachment style. You have to frame your asks in a way that bypasses their attachment-related fears and takes care of their independence and other needs. Here, the key variables that you need to keep at a low level are:
1. Pressure (P)
Avoidants dislike and are overwhelmed by both cognitive and emotional pressure. The former means overloading them with information, and the latter means overloading them with emotions.
2. Criticism (C)
They get defensive when criticized and are likely to interpret neutral feedback as criticism. Avoid anything that implies they’re at fault.
3. Directness (D)
Vague, overwhelming direct statements that back an avoidant into a corner and force them to answer are a no-no. Sometimes directness may work, but research suggests that it generally doesn’t.3Schrage, K. (2017). Attachment and Communication: Softening the Demands for Intimacy with Avoidantly Attached Individuals. University of Toronto (Canada).
Next time you’re trying to get an avoidant to open up about their feelings for you, keep this PCD framework in mind.
Script examples
I have bolded the phrases that make all the difference.
“I’ve really enjoyed getting closer to you, and I’d love to know how you’re feeling about us, whenever you’re ready to share.” ✅
You asked them an emotionally loaded question, but you also respected their autonomy. It’s their choice when to answer. (PꜜCꜜDꜛ)
“Do you see us becoming more serious?” ❌
Too direct and vague for an avoidant. They might dismissively ask you what you really mean. (PꜛCꜜDꜛ)
“I’d love to know what’s going on in your mind about us lately, but no pressure to figure it all out right now.” ✅
Again, the load of directness is counterbalanced by removing pressure. (PꜜCꜜDꜛ)
“When you don’t initiate, I feel unloved.” ❌
A good example of how focusing on your own feelings and needs by using an “I feel…” statement can backfire. They feel criticized, and it’s likely to trigger them. (PꜛCꜛDꜛ)
“There’s something I’d like to share with you sometime, whenever you feel up to it.” ✅
You’re not being direct and confrontational. You’re also not overloading them with information. You’re gently letting them know an issue has popped up. (PꜜCꜜDꜜ)
“Why are you shutting me out?” ❌
This will seem more like an attack than the previous “I feel…” statement. (PꜛCꜛDꜛ)
“I really enjoy our connection and would love to hear how you’ve been feeling about us, whenever you feel comfortable sharing.” ✅
Leading with valuing the connection makes the ask more natural and expected as it triggers reciprocity. (PꜜCꜜDꜛ)
“Do you even have feelings for me?” ❌
Even if you remove the word “even”, which does the most damage here, it still is a very direct and high-pressure ask. (PꜛCꜛDꜛ)
Interpreting responses
Hopefully, by using the right statements, they’d be more willing to open up about their feelings. If they still pull away, it probably wasn’t a good time. If they do respond, they may use one of the following responses:
“I don’t know.”
Avoidants may be genuinely out of touch with their emotions in a relationship. So when they say that, they’re not necessarily being evasive.4Blackwood, K. F. Loving Someone with Avoidant Attachment: How to Build Trust and Connection When Your Partner Pulls Away. Blossom. They’re communicating the reality of their subjective experience and may need more time to process your question.
The tone of how they say it matters. If they say it quickly and in a dismissive way, they’re trying to avoid the question. If they say it in a slow and thoughtful manner, they’re likely telling the truth.
It's also possible that they're being both dismissive and genuine at the same time.
What to do?
Give them more time and space. Ask again when you think enough time has passed.
“I need time.”
Again, they may genuinely need more time, or they may just be avoiding responding. If they genuinely need time, they’ll return to the conversation. If they want to avoid the question, they’ll keep saying “I need time” over and over.
No avoidant stays emotionally overwhelmed all the time. When they’re in a regulated state and still avoiding answering, that may indicate an unwillingness to invest in the relationship.
What to do?
Give enough time. Reasonable time. Not more than that. Ask them for a deadline so that they don’t keep “I need more time”ing you indefinitely.
“Why do you need to know?”
Since they undervalue their own connection needs, they think you do too. Projection. They think that because they’re uninterested in moving the relationship forward, so are you.
What to do?
You have to put your relational intent, goals, and needs on the table in the kindest and politest way possible (Low PCD). That’s all you can do. It’s up to them whether or not they consider your perspective. That you can’t really control. If they get better at understanding your perspective, that’s a good sign. If not, bad sign.
“I really like you, but I’m scared.”
This is good because they’re being honest about their fears. They have expressed their interest in you, and all you have to do here is help them overcome their fears.
What to do?
Help them understand themselves by pointing to resources or suggesting therapy.
No response
Classic avoidant shutting down. You asked too personal a question and probably invoked something in them they don’t want to face. The thought of closeness likely induced a sense of suffocation, entrapment, and shame. They’re running away from those painful feelings.
What to do?
You have the right to state your needs clearly and wanting clarity about the relationship from them. Giving space doesn’t mean waiting indefinitely. Sometimes avoidants will indefinitely pull back, hoping you get tired and end the relationship. But they won’t end the relationship directly because they’re conflict-avoidant. If a reasonable time has passed and they haven’t returned to the conversation, it’s time to reconsider the relationship.
There is hope
Lots of myths about avoidants are afloat on the internet, such as:
- They are incapable of love
- They don’t want relationships5Marquess, S. (2025). Loving an Avoidant Partner: Comprehend Dismissive Attachment Style for Closing Emotional Gap & Build a Safe Partnership. Hans Gustav Renman.
- If they withdraw, it automatically means they’re interested
- If they withdraw, it automatically means they don’t care
- They can’t change
Ultimately, they are humans and have strong connection needs like others. It’s just that their fears overpower their desire for connection. If you create a warm and positive environment for them, they can show fewer avoidant tendencies within just a month.6Stanton, S. C., Campbell, L., & Pink, J. C. (2017). Benefits of positive relationship experiences for avoidantly attached individuals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 113(4), 568.
But you can’t be the only one doing all the work. They have to be interested in you and be willing to work on themselves and the relationship. They have to see you as someone worth investing their limited relational bandwidth in. If they are not, no script will work. There’s no impeccable magic sentence that will make them open up their heart to you and wear it on their sleeve.
