Today we’re gonna be talking about the major stages that a dismissive avoidant will go through during the No Contact Rule.

1. Avoiding all things about that person
2. Feelings beginning to bubble to the surface
3. Re-suppression
4. Beginning to move on
5. Nostalgia

Let’s just jump right into it.

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Stage One: Avoiding All Things About That Person

Believe it or not but the origin of this article came from a YouTube comment we got on our YouTube channel where someone was literally asking what the experience of a dismissive avoidant was during the no contact rule.

Ultimately, it starts with this first stage, avoiding things about the ex.

Immediately after the breakup occurs, they like to cease all contact with their exes. You’ll find they will completely drop off the map.

In other words, while you are using a no contact rule on them they are using one on you.

In some rare instances they will poke in a time or two to check up on you and that’ll be it. They’re out.

Why?

Well, it’s there in the name if you really think about it. They are an avoidant.

They’ll spend a lot of time rationalizing the breakup and why it didn’t work. Ultimately they just get caught up in their head which is actually why a lot of people say they’re stubborn, constantly trying to rationalize the breakup.

It’s a game of suppression. This is why they’re often seem to act cold towards you after the breakup if you do end up trying to reach out.

And that’s what I find really interesting.

Breaking The No Contact Early Is Dangerous

Often throughout this website you’ll see us say that it’s not a good idea to break the no contact rule early because it sets you back. Well, by understanding an avoidant you can really understand why.

Let’s say you’re using a no contact rule on your ex which is what somebody should do regardless if you’re even trying to you recover a relationship or not.

It’s very imperative that you stick to it because if you break that boundary often your anxiousness now ends up manifesting during the reach out which in turn pushes the dismissive avoidant away every more.

It’s best to look at DA (dismissive avoidants) as a bear in a cave. And they essentially just retract further into that cave of darkness every time they get triggered.

So, by breaking the no contact rule you end up really damaging yourself.

Common Behaviors An Avoidant Will Engage In When They Are Avoiding You

They’re trying to go do other things to distract themselves,

Spending time with friends Family hanging out with them. Hobbies that they’re trying to get interested in Smothering themselves with work, because they’re typically workaholics.

And so that’s what you usually see, on very rare instances, you’ll see them try and date at this point, even if they do it’s just just because they’re just trying to keep themselves entertained.

Stage Two: Feelings Will Begin To Surface

Stage two is all about the feelings they are trying so hard to repress bubbling to the surface. What’s interesting is that stage one can last anywhere from six to eight weeks.

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After that you kind of see them sober up a little bit on their feelings, and they kind of start surfacing thoughts where they are going through the breakup to understand it.

“I now remember my ex again, and I’m thinking about it a little bit more.”

But the interesting part is, is that you would think that they would try to process that and move on in that capacity but they don’t.

And so they actually take higher initiatives to suppress it again. Which causes them to go right back into their shell again to try and do everything they can to keep a lid on those emotions.

So essentially, stage one is all about avoiding. Stage two is where those feelings start to bubble to the surface which leas us seamlessly to stage three, re-suppression.

Stage Three: Re-Suppression

Personally I feel stages one and two are in this constant stage of flux with each other a lot.

It’s a constant back and forth.

Avoid Feelings bubble up Avoid again Feelings bubble up again

That back and forth continues throughout stages two and three.

Feelings bubble up Suppress them Feelings bubble up again Suppress them again

This leads us to our fourth stage.

Stage Four: The Dismissive Avoidant Begins To Move On

When you see those first few stages intertwining you know, the things fluxing back and forth, eventually that avoidant side will win, and they will suppress their feelings further and begin the process of moving on.

That, or they will attempt move on to someone new and engage in what I like to call the anxious/avoidant self fulfilling cycle,

The interesting part is, is when they try and move on, they typically try to get in another relationship but it’s not immediately after a breakup.

It’s not quite as aggressive as a fearful avoidant, but they usually seek out and this is actually kind of hilarious, they seek out someone similar to you.

Because remember, they don’t really learn from their old patterns.

They do go after similar people in that regard. So they’re going to seek out people that look a lot like their ex and the process now repeats again, which is why they’re in and out of relationships throughout their dating history.

Stage Five: Nostalgia Begins To Kick In

One thing I want to make clear. This stage happens A LONG time after the breakup.

It’s often why we see exes coming back so far after the fact.

So with nostalgia I think that this is a scenario that happens across all avoidants.

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I think after the avoidant has cycled through a few people, and they have had unsuccessful relationships they can feel comfortable reverting back to you, because they have, in a way forgotten about all the bad memories that you’ve had, because they’ve been so far suppressed.

In this video,

I talk a lot about the concept of nostalgic reverie and how only when a dismissive avoidant ex feels like they’ve moved on or you’ve moved on will nostalgia begins to kick in.

Once they’ve had so many other distractions and they’ve actually processed through all the bad memories. That’s when selective memory comes in and they only remember the good. And so they try and reconcile and it usually can be pretty aggressive. Believe it or not.

What does that look like?

The Aggressive Re-Approach

Let’s say you’re blocked on any kind of social media, they can just completely unblock you immediately and directly message you in are very forward about what they want.

Something like this,

They they function on anxiety at that moment and most of the time they are in some kind of state where they feeling alone.

During that time. It might have been after a recent breakup with someone new and there’s been some time where they’ve allowed that nostalgia to kick in and they’re like I’m, you know, ready to revisit another relationship. And so they end up being quite aggressive with their intentions.

Remember, that dismissive avoidants are the most stubborn of the attachment styles so everything here is going to take a long time and everything needs to feel like it’s their idea.

So, when you try to impose your own ideas on them, it just pushes them away more.

That’s why we often tell people to give an avoidant what they want, which is the break up and the space and they end up coming to terms with what they want in the future.

Expect A Longer Wait Time With Dismissive Avoidants

Naturally with DA’s It’s just gonna probably take longer before you start to see results.

Oftentimes, when you start to see those results, you’re not really in a place where you want them back anymore.

And that’s kind of the interesting irony of dating dismissive avoidance.

In the recent video Tyler and I partnered on he makes a really great point about Dismissive Avoidants,

Yeah, that’s exactly what I tell people most of the time by dismissive avoidant coming around, eventually, you’re to the point where you don’t care anymore, and you just you’ve moved on, or you, you know, want to move on. So it’s just a long grueling process to recover. A dismissive avoidant takes a lot of emotional control, and a lot of what I call the model of ungettable illness. So because you know, you’d have to act as a very independent person, because that’s the only way that they feel like they’ll be safe with you again.

A Recap Of The Five Stages

To recap, the five stages are,

The avoidant, or the dismissive avoidant will avoid all things about their ex after a breakup (this usually happens during the no contact rule.) After enough of this avoidant behavior feelings slowly begin to bubble to the surface.

This makes them want to suppress those feelings. Back and forth and back and forth they jump between stages two and three until finally they enter the fourth stage where they begin to move on from you.

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Of course, the final stage five way, way, way, way, way after they moved on, and probably dated multiple people, they’ll start to have nostalgia, you’re the one that got away, and they’ll reach out to you.