Matthew Hussey: 

The sweet delight of first dating someone. The butterflies. Oh, hi. The anticipation. The flirting. It’s just like the movies. Until it all goes away. And leaves you wondering how to spot an avoidant before you fall in love with them. A quick word on avoidance before we start. The difference between avoidance and the anxiously attached is how they deal with their fear of closeness.

The anxiously attached hold on tight. Avoidance. Push it away. That’s the general pattern. The issue that creates for dating an avoidant is that it makes an already dangerous dating moment even more dangerous. I have long said that the most dangerous moment in dating is the moment you decide you really like someone, or even love them. The moment you decide you like someone and then you feel they like you back.

The most dangerous moment in dating and the reason it’s the most dangerous moment is because we think it’s so rare. I never meet anyone I like and they like me back. This is it. And then we give everything to this situation. Because that’s the moment you’re liable to throw all of your standards out the window in order to stay close to them.

But with the avoidance is dangerous for another reason. The moment you let your guard down and show your true feelings is the moment that many avoidance begin to feel overwhelmed and start to pull away. So what are some of the early signs of the avoidance so that you can in some way inoculate yourself against these painful situations? Let’s talk about them.

Number one with an avoidant closeness equals distance. The most important sign is not that someone is distant. It’s that they become distant when you get closer. Maybe you have a vulnerable conversation. Spend an amazing weekend together. Finally, feel like things are moving forward and then suddenly they become harder to reach. The slower to text, the more vague, the less affectionate.

They need space in a healthy relationship. Closeness equals closeness in a relationship with an avoidant closeness equals distance.

No, sorry about that. David is not here right now, and this is not a part of the YouTube game that I am good at. I wanted to say something about this point because it’s one of the most important points in the entire video. Closeness equals distance with an avoidance, but not all avoidance are made equal, and I feel like I have to say that almost as a PSA, because there are clearly the avoidance that are toxic, malicious, truly unfeeling in their response.

Ghost you at the end. As soon as you get close to them, they just disappear. And there are other people who are not bad people. They just dragging their feet a little bit. The people who will stretch out the time of a situationship if they can, because they’re getting in their own head and making everything too difficult for themselves.

The reason I say that is because when you have someone like that in your life, they actually are practical things that you can do to help people get out of their own way. I know of what I speak here because when I was dating my wife Audrey, I was dragging my heels a little bit and there was somethings that she did that helped me get out of my own way.

A very specific conversation in fact, that she had with me that changed things and led to a serious commitment and a relationship that really started to take off. If you are in this situation yourself, don’t worry. There is an epidemic of situation ships right now. So you are not alone. But you’re also not helpless.

There’s things you can do that actually help a relationship move forward from situationship into a commitment. I have a video on it if you want to check it out. It’s a little longer than this video, but I promise you it’s worth it. It’s a GetCommitment.com, so go check that out. And now let’s get back to this video.

And the second early sign that someone is an avoidant.

Second, they react disproportionately when you bring up your feelings or a need you have. Let’s say you say I was hurt when you disappeared for three days. Instead of hearing you, they suddenly act as though you’re demanding, controlling, needy, dramatic, or asking for too much. This is a very telling sign because healthy people can tolerate some discomfort and remain in the conversation.

Three, they avoid committing to plans. It’s as though the act of giving a date and a time and a definite yes is something their schedule just can’t allow. Even though there are probably many other things in their life that somehow get scheduled like a dentist’s appointment, if you notice that things tend to become vague, get postponed or canceled right after the two of you have gotten closer, that tells you more than the cancellation itself.

Number four, you are vulnerable with them, but they don’t become vulnerable with you. There is, in other words, an emotional asymmetry. You tell them meaningful things. They may listen. They may even seem warm, but they remain on the outside of the relationship emotionally. You know all about their work, stress, their exes, their travel stories, but not what they’re actually afraid of, not what they’re longing for or feeling.

Many avoidant people can appear emotionally open while still withholding real vulnerability. Number five after a wonderful time, they suddenly create distance and produce a reason. You might be saying to yourself, we just had the best weekend ever. And now suddenly they’re overwhelmed with work, confused, stressed, exhausted, or they have a family emergency. The danger if you are an empath who really likes this person, is that all of a sudden you snap into support mode.

You start scouring UberEats for fresh ginger shots and feel better bagels that you can send them. Look, sometimes the responsibility they’re referring to is real, but the timing is the part that tells you something. You got close. Now all of a sudden, distance is necessary.

Number six, they talk passionately about wanting love, but have a history of relationships ending just as things got serious. And when they explain those endings, the reason, or often the timing wasn’t right. I lost the spark or I just needed space or freedom. Listen for that recognizable language. Most avoidant people don’t consciously say I’m afraid of intimacy, but the stories they tell reveal that truth.

I’ve had lots of great girlfriends, but it’s always around that 18 month period where something just happens and goes wrong. Strange, right?

There is a problem with trying to spot an avoidance behavior before you catch feelings. Feelings happen fast. If closeness equals distance with an avoidant. Then by definition, the moment you realize you have one on your hands is when you’ve already gotten close and started to develop feelings prior to closeness, the avoidant doesn’t always present themselves clearly.

Many can be charming. And by the way, that’s not intentionally malicious. They might genuinely believe that you are the answer. They’ve been looking for that. Yes, I was unsure in all of my previous relationships, but I feel really sure about this one. So they’ll start giving you a lot of energy and they show up to you as a green flag.

And in any case, the problem with spending all of those early dating moments obsessing over spotting the signs of an avoidant actually ends up putting you on the defense. Now you’re looking for every minor sign and signal to suggest that someone is going to hurt you, which is not a fun place to date from. You risk misreading things, or worse, not even giving something a fair chance.

What we can do is move from trying to spot an avoidant to being a person who isn’t afraid of putting themselves in situations where the avoidant patterns reveal themselves in other words, show up ready for real intimacy and engineer moments where it can occur and see how they react. Share something vulnerable and see if they meet you there.

Introduce them to a friend or meet one of theirs. Ask for something small, more consistency, a phone call, a plan for next week. The point is not whether they do it perfectly, it’s whether closeness makes them more connected or more evasive. You could share a need or an unmet need, which is one of the clearest ways to see someone’s attachment style.

For example, you could say, I really like hearing from you between dates or when plans are vague, I start to feel uncertain. A secure or self-aware person may not get it perfect, but they can tolerate hearing that and stay engaged. Whereas someone with strong avoidant tendencies may immediately become defensive, overwhelmed, distant, or make you feel unreasonable for having the need in the first place.

And if you do feel distance, notice what happens when you name that distance. If you say to them, I feel like you’ve been more distant since our weekend together, their reaction to that sentence will tell you a huge amount. Do they lean in and say you’re right? Sometimes I get overwhelmed when I get close to people. There is a huge difference between someone who has avoidant tendencies and can still say, I notice I pull away when I start to care, versus someone who is completely unaware of it, or worse, blames you for noticing.

Self-awareness doesn’t solve everything, don’t get me wrong, but it changes everything. I get it is hard to rock the boat, especially with someone you don’t want to scare away. But if you can’t do this, you’ll never find out how someone handles discomfort or you know you having needs it may be worth considering that you’ll know an avoidant precisely at the moment when you find yourself falling in love with someone who’s not actually showing you the right things.

For many of us, especially those with anxious attachment styles, the push pull dynamic with the avoidant is the very thing that has us fixated in the first place, asking, how do I spot the signs before I catch feelings? Sounds like the right question, but a better question might be what’s really behind these feelings I’m having when they occur?

In many of us, especially the anxiously inclined early avoidant behavior triggers a sense of unworthiness that suddenly makes us feel like we really must have them. And even in the more secure among us, it still gives us whiplash, because it doesn’t feel like a normal response to the situation. But for those of us who feel ourselves falling harder for someone who is pulling away, our falling for them may not be an indication of how perfect they are, but how unsure our footing has become with them.

There’s something intoxicating about anyone who initially shows us interest in Dorothy Tennoff’s work around limerrance, which is an involuntary state of intense romantic desire focused on another person. She says that it is triggered by the possibility of reciprocation, a smile, a lingering conversation, a mixed signal, and moment of unusual warmth. Many avoidance, therefore, are particularly dangerous when it comes to getting us fixated because of the tendency to initially show interest and then change their energy, often being ambiguous and unpredictable in their next move.

This is what I meant when I say that the importance of trying to discover whether someone is avoidant before we get intense feelings can be overstated. The intense feelings we have for an avoidant may, in themselves be the answer we are looking for. It’s not. How do I rapidly find out if they are avoidant before I develop intense feelings for them and get hurt?

But instead, perhaps the fact that I have rapidly developed painfully intense feelings for them is in itself an indicator of their avoidance. This understanding can act as a kind of pressure valve. It doesn’t just switch our feelings off for that person, but it does allow us to view those feelings in a much more skeptical light. It stops us from putting all of our sense of control outside of ourselves, making the other person the focus of all of our attention.

Asking what’s behind these feelings I’m having puts the control back in our hands and brings the power back to us. Now, instead of constantly noting their moves and their behavior and their moods. What you’re doing instead is checking in with yourself and asking, are these feelings coming from me feeling safe and appreciated? Or is it because I’m getting anxious at slow responses and anticipating the next one?

This way of thinking brings the attention back to us. When you notice yourself getting pulled in fast, pause and ask why? Is it because you actually feel good around this person? Relaxed, happy? Like you can breathe? Or is it because you feel like you have to earn their attention? If you find yourself thinking we’re so compatible while also feeling constantly unsure about where you stand.

Pay attention to that contradiction. And if you find yourself drawn to whomever gives you the most intense feelings. There are many things in life that give us very intense feelings. Some of them are good. Some of them are really bad, like drugs. No one’s recommending drugs as a life partner, so we shouldn’t just take intensity as an indication of importance.

Instead of trying to spot every avoidant behavior before you catch feelings, let your feelings themselves be a signpost. The goal is to stop assuming that just because something feels intense, it’s good. You can be deeply emotionally involved in something and still step back and say this isn’t making me happy. And the intensity of my feelings here might actually be the warning sign I’ve been looking for.

Let me know in the comments if this video helped you. I would love to hear how you check in with your self in early dating. Journaling helps some people. Many people in my audience have been using Matthew  AI. There is no wrong answer. It’s just what works for you. I will see you here next week.

*This transcript was whipped up with the help of AI. While it does a pretty impressive job, it may have the occasional typo, mix-up, or moment of creative interpretation. If you spot anything that looks a little . . . adventurous . . . thanks for your patience (and your sense of humor).*