Avoidant love letter

Hi dear members

I have been in a relationship with an avoidant for about 5 years. We have lived together and even though there are communiction issues at times, the both of us value our bond.

I'm not pressuring and I know he cares. But you see, all of you have an advantage: you have put a name to the problem. You probably knew that there was something off, wondered why it was all that easy for others to open up. My significant other admitted that not even close friends and family know what is really going on inside and you know how lonely it gets when you don't even know what's going on with you...We are talking about a light verson of avoidant who does appreciate support and needs to be understood.

What would you like to read in order to feel understood and supported?

Thank you for giving me some perspective, I really appreciate it

Has he been officially diagnosed with AVPD?

Hi Skyflyz,

thank you for your reply, I appreciate it. Your question is completely reasonable. I acknowledge the time you must have taken for many people looking for help.

No and I see why people would jump to assumptions. I have been with this person for 5 years and have experienced what is described in countless avoidant articles. Not parts of it, but the full picture.

Of course he is aware,just without the ability to put a name to it. "I don't want to function like this", "No one really knows me and if they did, they'd run", "I want to pack my bags sometimes and disappear for a while"

My significant other feels inadequate and lonely,but I don't know how to bring this to him without sounding patronizing.

Thank you for taking the time.

The words " love letter" might give a false impression of what I'm aiming at. What kind of written lines would take away the pressure of upholding the mask towards friends and family? Would make you feel understood ?

I'm thankful for any little answer

It's great that you want to help, but from what I've seen and read, this is something that you really can't help with, it's something that he has to get help for himself. An analogy as far as I see it is if somebody had a broken leg. If you are a doctor, you can fix it. If you aren't you really can't, and you can't force the person to go to a doctor to get it fixed.

In some ways, he's broken and you can't fix him. Only he can fix himself by going to a therapist. So I guess the idea of writing letters, etc. is akin to asking what sort of lotion you can put on the leg of somebody who has broken it to make it better. Nobody can really answer that because the answer is that putting lotion on doesn't fix his leg.

I wish you both nothing but the best, and I hope for his sake and yours that he eventually seeks help.

You might also benefit from reading the pinned post up top directed at nons who are in a relationship with avoidants, the one that says for nons to please read this first.

Good luck to you both.

Thank you for your reply. I have read a lot, about the broken popcorn machine but also that people agreed they sometimes imagined perfect conversations in their head with people and feel understood.
Everyone yearns to be understood. No hopes and expectations attached. But informing yourself can partly mitigate fear and confusion.

A broken leg might get you some sympathy and compassion from others but this is invisible, people assume you are fine if you manage to put on your mask. This is your place and I don't want to step on anyones toes,thank you for being patient with me.

People are fantasising about interactions, imagine a letter you'd either hand out yourself or received yourself. What would it say?

Every person is an individual. What helps one person may not be helpful to someone else- it may just outright trigger them.

I think the best thing you can do is ask him yourself, "what can I do to help you" and maybe "what can I do to avoid triggering/upsetting you" and go from there with it.

I'd also point you to this thread that skyflyz mentioned before- avoidant-personality/topic196373.html