It’s no secret that getting back with a dismissive avoidant takes so long, sometimes months or even years. How long you should wait for a dismissive avoidant ex to come back or keep trying to get them back is the million-dollar question.
Before you even start tying to get back together with a dismissive avoidant ex you need to ask yourself these two very important question. “Is your dismissive avoidant ex worth investing your time, effort and emotions?”
You need to be sure because dismissive avoidants are the least likely attachment style to want to get back with an ex, this means that your chance of getting back with a dismissive avoidant are inherently low even before you start trying to get them back.
And because dismissive avoidant exes can be okay with a text once a month, a drink or dinner every few months, a social media friendship or friends with benefits for months or even years, you have to be sure that you’ll be okay with what they’re able to offer or capable of at the time because if you struggled with being in a relationship with a dismissive avoidant and felt that the relationship did a number on your sense of self-worth (and even mental health), getting them back is even harder than trying to make a relationship work.
If those two reasons are not enough for you to be absolutely sure if it’s worth investing your time, effort and emotions in trying to get a dismissive avoidant ex back, it takes a dismissive avoidant ex as long as it takes to come back.
As a dismissive avoidant, if the reason for the break-up was me and not an ex “pushing me too far” with their expectations, demands, ultimatums and need for me to be “responsible” for their feelings and actions, it was there in my mind that one day I may want to try things again, but until I was ready to try being in a relationship again, I was perfectly okay with contact with an ex every once in a while and perfectly okay if they decided that they couldn’t wait for me to be ready to want a relationship or needed to move on. I even encouraged them to move on because I didn’t want to feel like I was holding them back (too much responsibility and dependence on me).
Does this mean that all you can do to get a dismissive avoidant ex back is wait?
No. There are many thing you can do to try to attract back a dismissive avoidant. It takes a dismissive avoidant ex as long as it takes to come back means is that you can’t rush a dismissive avoidant. The one thing you learn being in a relationship with a dismissive avoidant is that you can’t push them or manipulate them to do anything that they don’t want to do. If you try, it’ll backfire.
It takes a dismissive avoidant ex as long as it takes to come back also means that worrying or getting upset about how long it’s taking for a dismissive avoidant to come back will not speed up the process and make a dismissive ex avoidant ex come back sooner.
A dismissive avoidant ex can afford to take their time coming back
As adults, individuals with a dismissive avoidant attachment style have low anxiety over separation and high evasion to reuniting with an ex. The high evasion to reuniting with an ex doesn’t mean they don’t still have feelings or won’t come back, the high evasion to reuniting with an ex means that even if they want to get back with an ex, they’ll drag the process until they’re sure they’re ready for a relationship or try things gain.
Because dismissive avoidants have low anxiety over separation, they can afford to take their time coming back. Unlike fearful avoidants who don’t seem to be able to make a decision as to whether they want to get back together or not, most dismissive avoidants will have decided right from the break-up (and even before) depending on how they view an ex or view the relationship if they might at some point want to try things again.
If they think they might come back, they’ll try to keep the lines of communication open or be friends with an ex but not be in a rush to communicate or get back together.
How long should you keep trying to get them back or wait for a dismissive avoidant?
Dismissive avoidants come back for the same reasons other exes come back – they still have feelings for you, they regret the break-up, the problems that caused the break-up no longer exist, you’ve worked on yourself and showing up better than in the old relationship, they feel safe with you, they’ve done their own self-work, the list goes on. What I’m saying is, even with all these things in place, it may still take a dismissive avoidant long to come back.
The one thing that you can count on a dismissive avoidant to do is not to tell you what they think you want to hear. If they say they’re not ready for a relationship, they’re not. If they say, they are okay if you can’t wait for them to be ready, they mean it.
How much longer you want to keep trying to get a dismissive avoidant back depends on you. If you’re doing everything to make a dismissive avoidant feel safe, they say they still have feelings for you, you worked on your issues and they say the see the changes and think the relationship can work but just not ready for a relationship, and you feel that you can’t just keep waiting and putting your life on hold, communicate to your dismissive ex exactly how you feel and what you are going to do.
If they’re ready to talk or see you in person, tell them exactly how you truly feel, and don’t just say what you think they want to hear. One ex sat me down and told me exactly how he felt waiting for me to decide I was ready for a relationship, and I found a new level of respect for him. He wasn’t angry, bitter or mean, he spoke his truth including the fact that being friends was too painful for him because he still had feelings for me. I heard him and respected him for being honest and choosing himself. My ex choosing his happiness over hanging on to a situation that he obviously wasn’t happy with made me respect him. We hugged and went our separate ways.
Don’t feel bad choosing yourself and your happiness and mental well-being
As mentioned in my other articles, given a choice between a relationship and their happiness, dismissive avoidants will almost always choose themselves. They see people who cling to relationships even when they’re not happy as weak and needy and look down on them. So don’t feel bad choosing yourself and your happiness and mental well-being.
If a dismissive avoidant ex asks to be friends and you don’t think you can do it, don’t feel bad that you couldn’t be friends after the break-up or want to move on rather than keep holding on to hope. Your dismissive avoidant ex will accept the reality of the situation and deal with it in their dismissive avoidant way which is: they’re not ready for a relationship and it’s unfair to you to wait any longer, it is what is it.
If a dismissive avoidant ex keeps reaching out randomly and it’s making you uncomfortable or giving you anxiety, directly and respectfully tell them that you need time and space to heal and move on. Don’t feel bad setting or reinforcing your boundary. Dismissive avoidants don’t feel bad setting or reinforcing their boundaries and understand why it’s important for you to do the same. Plus, dismissive avoidants don’t have the same fear of rejection or abandonment as anxiously attached or fearful avoidants, so they’ll be okay. Just don’t set a boundary and break your own boundary because you lose the respect of a dismissive avoidant.
Dismissive avoidants come back after months or even years
It’s not uncommon for a dismissive avoidant ex to decide months or even years later that they’re ready for a relationship and want to give things another chance.
If you haven’t moved and still want to give things another try, don’t think a dismissive avoidant “suddenly” decided they want to get back together because they were losing you. You’re selling yourself short. They’ve been thinking about if for a while and whether or not you told them you were moving on, they’d have come back.
A dismissive avoidant ex deciding that they want to try the relationship again is because you are worth coming back. They’ve likely put a lot of thought into it and weighed what a life with you and without you feels like and made a decision that a life with you in it is much more fulfilling than a life without you. They may even truly love you. If they didn’t think you were worth it, they wouldn’t risk their so valued independence to be with you.
If a dismissive avoidant ex decides months or even years later that they’re ready for a relationship and want to give things another chance, and you’ve move do or don’t want them back, don’t feel bad about that either. It is what it is. You don’t owe them an apology or even a response.
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Does Your Dismissive Avoidant Ex Even Care About You?
