Why The Avoidant Discards You When They’re Stressed

Added: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]One of the most painful things people experience is when everything's going well with a dismissive avoidant and then the dismissive avoidant suddenly discards them during a stressful period.

[00:00:08]And I'm going to explain what's actually happening in three major pieces. Number one, when this happens, the [music] person who's suddenly discarded is left feeling so confused and frustrated and honestly, it's usually somebody who takes way too much [music] fault and blame and doesn't speak up for their own needs and standards in relationships quite enough. This is usually the archetype that this happens to in other words. But what's happening from a dismissive avoidant perspective is that they do not know how to coregulate.

[00:00:34][music] What coregulate means is work through problems and challenges with another person in a relationship while they're going through stressful periods. They don't know how to lean on other people, ask for help, [music] resource support from other people. So they literally, in order to regulate, have to retreat [music] and go spend time alone. And so what this ends up causing in a relationship is that when the dismissive avoidant goes through great stress like job stress or family stress, they start retreating more and more. And then number two of three, when their partner says, "Hey, why are you pulling away?

[00:01:04]What's going on?" The dismissive avoidant interprets this as stress, pressure, and things that they are not able to keep up with.

[00:01:10]>> [music] >> And then point number three happens and this is the big reason dismissive avoidants pull away once and for all is they then [music] make this mean that they are not capable of relationships. This is how they interpret this. They're like, "I don't know how everybody else is able to be there for a relationship when they're going through their own stress. I don't know how to do that and so obviously, I'm not good enough or capable of being in a relationship or maybe something's wrong or broken about me." And this is what they are literally feeling deep down [music] causing them in turn to retreat, to run away, to push somebody away, and sometimes to just one up and leave the relationship. [music] If you're on the receiving end of this, you have to understand that if a dismissive avoidant doesn't learn how to coregulate, they will keep doing [music] this. So if you are on the receiving end and you want support, you want understanding, you can dive into for free for a limited time our coregulation workshop. [music] And I'll put if you just comment gift down below, I will personally send you a link to access that for free so you understand this way better.