Erin: “I shared how I felt and you said nothing. Your silence said everything!”
Taylor: “I didn’t know what to say… so I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to make it worse!”
I hear this kind of exchange often in couples therapy. In this case, Erin and Taylor were a couple trying to reconnect after years of communication strain. Their cycle—one pursuing connection, the other withdrawing—wasn’t about love lost. It was about overwhelm, fear, and not knowing how to repair.
Taylor hesitates or retreats during emotional moments; while Erin pushes forward, hoping to resolve.
This is classic avoidance — one of the most misunderstood dynamics in relationships. It’s a relational pattern rooted in deeper emotional needs, histories, and nervous system responses. Understanding what avoidance really signals is the first step toward interrupting this painful cycle.
In this post, we’ll explore what avoidance looks like, why it shows up, and how to begin reconnecting—especially when one of you pulls away.
Why your partner goes silent during conflict
You may notice that during emotionally charged moments, one partner retreats while the other pushes for resolution. This mismatch often creates more distance instead of clarity.
What’s happening isn’t just a communication style difference—it’s a dynamic rooted in emotional safety and nervous system responses. It’s what we call the pursue–withdraw pattern.
One partner feels a strong pull to connect and repair quickly. The other often needs distance to avoid escalation. And when this goes unnamed, it creates confusion, misinterpretation, and pain.
The pursue-withdraw pattern: What’s really happening
The pursue–withdraw pattern is not a personality flaw. Avoidance is oftentimes misunderstood as apathy or emotional immaturity, and the pursuing partner can turn their complaints about not feeling seen or validated into criticism. In response, the withdrawing partner may shut down further or become defensive before turning away.
Avoidance isn’t enjoyable for either partner, but in therapy we often discover it began as a protective strategy—something that once made sense. Most often, it was a coping mechanism that helped your partner navigate emotional overwhelm in their family of origin or early relationships.
When one partner pursues, the other often withdraws. Over time, each begins assigning meaning to the other’s behavior:
- “You don’t care—you just shut down.”
- “You always blow things out of proportion.”
In most cases, neither of these assumptions is true.
With time and support in therapy, we usually uncover a very different story beneath the surface.
- The pursuing partner is often seeking reassurance. Underneath their urgency may be fears of being alone, invisible, or not mattering.
- The withdrawing partner is often overwhelmed. Their thoughts feel scrambled. Their nervous system is flooded. They might be thinking, “Whatever I say will make it worse,” or “I can’t do this right now.”
Creating distance becomes a strategy for emotional regulation rather act of intentional indifference. This understanding is often a turning point.
While avoidance can feel deeply hurtful to the partner on the receiving end, it rarely comes from a lack of love. More often, it’s about self-protection.
What avoidance really means
When your partner is overwhelmed, avoidance often shows up in subtle, easily misread ways. In therapy, it might not become obvious until one partner share that they feel alone, shut out, or confused.
You might notice your partner going quiet, avoiding eye contact, or physically leaving the room. They may say “I don’t know,” or seem emotionally distant, even when something clearly matters.
But beneath those behaviors, the inner experience is often much more complex. Many withdrawing partners describe feeling:
- Overwhelmed or unable to think clearly
- Terrified of saying the wrong thing
- Afraid that engaging will only make things worse
What looks like emotional shutdown may actually be their nervous system in overdrive. And in many cases, it’s a protective response that made sense in earlier relationships or family dynamics where emotion wasn’t safe to express.
That’s why it’s so important to understand what avoidance is not. Avoidance does not mean your partner is indifferent or is refusing to engage. And it’s not intentional stonewalling—though it can feel that way.
Instead, avoidance is often signaling distress: emotional flooding, cognitive shutdown, or not knowing how to express yourself when things feel tense.
How avoidance can impact your relationship over time
For the pursuing partner, the moment feels urgent. They may be saying or thinking, “I need to know you’re here,” or “I need help making sense of this.” But when their partner pulls away, it often feels like rejection.
The pursuing partner might begin interpreting the silence:
- “They don’t care.”
- “I must be too much.”
- “Why am I always the one trying?”
Over time, the absence of engagement becomes its own story. And in my experience, it’s often the story a partner creates in the silence—not the silence itself—that leaves the deepest mark.
What to do if you avoid conflict
You don’t have to override your nervous system to stay connected. But you can begin to help your partner understand what’s happening for you.
Feeling emotionally flooded?
Feeling emotionally flooded can feel like your body is moving faster than your words—your heart races, your thoughts criss-cross, and everything feels urgent or overwhelming. In those moments, caring for yourself first can actually help your partner feel safer with you. Pre-emptive communication transforms avoidance from disappearance to dialogue.
Taylor described feeling emotionally flooded as if all his thoughts were tangled and his chest was tight. He didn’t even realize he was holding his breath until we talked about it in session. Learning to recognize these cues helped him pause before shutting down—and eventually, to name it to Erin instead of withdrawing and disappearing.
Try a structured timeout
Talk with your partner about what a “timeout” might look like—ideally before conflict arises. A time-out gives one or both of you space to physiologically self-soothe and come back to the conversation with more clarity.
The key to a helpful time-out? Return to the conversation.
Without follow-up, a time-out can easily feel like abandonment.
In one session, Erin shared that Taylor was specific about needing time and space to regroup. Taylor said, “I need 20 minutes, but I promise I’ll come back.” Erin reflected, “It was the first time I felt like he left and still took me with him.” That moment helped rewire what space meant for them—from avoidance to safety.
How to connect if your partner withdraws
When you’re reaching for your partner and they go quiet, your instinct may be to pursue harder—not because you want to push, but because you’re reaching for closeness. The problem is, urgency can feel like pressure, and that can deepen your partner’s shutdown.
One technique is sharing how you feel without accusation or criticism. You can try a softened start up and make a clear bid for connection.
Use a softened start-up and clear bids for connection
For the pursuing partner, this is not about minimizing your needs, but rather changing the approach to give you a better chance to be heard and for your partner to stay emotionally connected.
Try starting from the feeling, not the fix:
“I’m feeling ignored and unimportant, and I’d really like to feel close to you.”
Or:
“I notice I tend to talk quickly and push to resolve things when I feel anxious. What I’m really needing is reassurance—not a solution.”
These are moments where pacing matters more than content. When a pursuing partner slows their approach, it can open the door for a more regulated response in return.
In therapy, I helped Erin tune into her physical cues of urgency—her shoulders would tense and her speech would quicken. We practiced slowing her breathing and leading with how she felt, not what she feared. When she later said to Taylor, “I get scared we’re not okay, and I need to feel close,” he stayed in the conversation. That shift made all the difference.
How to break the pursue-withdraw cycle
I’m a big believer that change is possible—I’ve seen it happen again and again with the couples I work with. Breaking the pursue-withdraw cycle does take time, patience, and a willingness to stay engaged with each other, even when it feels hard.
When couples name the cycle together, they can begin to stand side by side—looking at the dynamic, instead of through it.
This isn’t about “fixing” each other. It’s about understanding how this cycle formed, what it’s protecting, and how it might be keeping you apart.
In therapy, we slow things down. We explore each partner’s experience. And then we help translate those fast, automatic reactions into something slower and more aware and intentional.
Over time, conflict starts to feel less like a threat or a sign that something is fundamentally wrong, and more like a signal that important needs are asking for attention. When couples learn to respond to those moments together, as a team, real connection and change become possible.
With Erin and Taylor, we used the image of a seesaw. When Erin’s urgency pushed down on one end, Taylor instinctively lifted off the other side to create space. Once they could name that rhythm, they began learning how to balance together—neither dominating nor disappearing.
Therapy can help you shift the pattern
Avoidance, shutdown, escalation are learned strategies, not fixed traits. With the right support, they can be unlearned.
If you recognize this pattern and feel stuck, couples therapy can help. Working with a trained couples therapist can help you slow down cycle, understand what’s happening underneath, and learn new ways to respond to each other that foster connection rather than distance.
Avoidance FAQs:
Q: Is avoidance always unhealthy in a relationship?
A: Avoidance can be protective, especially in moments of overwhelm. But if it leads to disconnection or miscommunication, it may signal a deeper pattern that needs care.
Q: What’s the difference between needing space and withdrawing?
A: Needing space includes communication and a plan to return. Withdrawal often happens without clarity, which can feel confusing or hurtful to a partner.
Q: Can this pattern be changed without therapy?
A: Some couples can make progress on their own, but therapy can accelerate understanding and provide a safe space to explore and shift the pattern together.