S
Shaant
Guest
Avoidant love gives you highs that feel like connection, until the crash hits.
Photo by Min An on Pexels
Being around avoidant people can sometimes feel like you just stepped into a party where the lights are always on high, the music is totally upbeat and engaged, and everybody is laughing just when they are supposed to.
I thought that energy was how freedom felt.
They told the jokes, enacted the stories, and made sure that silence would never linger long enough to become heavy.
What appeared like lightness was at times a type of armor.
I recognized this in those friends who never wanted to actually go deep, who wanted to remain on the surface where everything feels safe. They could pull a crowd in quietly through humor and confidence, and I fell right into their track.
They weren’t demanding and weren’t asking for more than I was ready to contribute. At that moment, it felt like ease, but underneath all of that energy was a silent refusal to let anybody close enough to hurt them.
As it turns out, one of my best friends from college exhibited this same quality. He could ignite a room with quick humour, but when things turned to personal subjects and people began to get awkward, he would shift.
He’d tell a joke, throw in a clever diversion, or straight change the topic. People loved being friends with this guy.
I asked him one night why he never talked about things that mattered to him. He laughed and said, “cause feelings are awful and I don’t like awful.”
That was his shield.
The cost of being the fun one
Spending time with avoidant people taught me that sometimes enjoyment is based on fear.
It’s hard to create deep bonds. If you can’t do that, you either impress people on a surface level or run the risk of being alone.
Some of my avoidant connections were amazingly skilled entertainers. They dazzled everyone until the party was over, then gently closed the door behind them.
The facade was their security.
Many years ago, I dated a person who lived this way. Everything with her was electric. She was an adventurer, she always had plans, and she wouldn’t tolerate boredom in a million years.
But the moment things got serious, she disappeared.
She told me once, “I only like the start of things.”
Ouch. But it made sense.
The start of things is always exciting and doesn’t have the weight of vulnerability. Staying on the surface is way less risky than having your real self be rejected.
Eventually, I realized this way of acting was not just an issue related to relationship styles. It was a way of navigating the world for avoidant people.
They had a kind of independence that was inspiring. No help needed, no expectations for anyone. They often filled their lives with hobbies, quick trips to interesting places, and huge amounts of work.
To an observer, it was amazing, maybe even enviable.
But the hard truth was less glamorous.
The independent self that made them fearless was the same independent self that also kept them alone.
When independence hides old wounds
The more I looked, the more I understood that avoidance often starts in childhood.
There were people who discovered early that closeness was painful and learned to build walls to keep themselves safe.
The friends I met, with family that hurt them when they should have been loved the most, carried a very simple lesson. If love can hurt, distance is safety.
I had a friend who grew up with one parent, if not both, who never allowed him to feel. As a man in my group of friends, he had “the gift of guffaw” to the point that everyone wanted him around.
If the cocktail or dinner parties were fun, laughter, and stories, he was often part of the ambiance.
He told me about the time his girlfriend told him that she felt some distance from him. He shrugged his shoulders and said, “I just don’t feel those things like you do.”
Pause.
What he learned was how to numb. Numbing was the norm for him.
Another friend admitted, in a casual conversation, that the main reason he continued to jump relationships was that it was easier than mourning a loss.
Separating from someone every six months allowed him not to feel loss. When it was over, he didn’t allow himself to go through mourning, which is normal for any loss.
He told me, “You get a lot of practice to practice dealing with hurt until you just don’t hurt anymore.”
I guess on the surface, he was fun and exciting and unpredictable.
Underneath, he was practicing survival.
The irony of being drawn to their lightness
What I find interesting, and occasionally painful, is how magnetic avoidant people are.
The less they seem to care about how others view them, the more confident they appear to be. Their refusal to hold on makes them look free. And freedom is attractive.
It feels strange that they can draw others in so intensely with something built on a fear of intimacy.
I realize now that people like me often uncritically view their seduction as authenticity. The mystery made them enticing.
The space between their words, the redirection of vulnerability, gave off the impression of someone who knew themselves deeply. But in truth, they might not have been willing to know themselves at all.
The reality is that many avoidants turn to fun to distract themselves from inner pain. After trauma, the body is deprived of dopamine. The chemical balance is off, and the thrill becomes a lifeline.
I saw this in someone close to me who struggled with avoidant attachment and addiction. He was always chasing pleasure, constantly seeking the next high or distraction.
The laughter, the energy, the fun, it was all just noise to drown out the self-loathing he hadn’t yet faced.
Being his friend was exhilarating.
But it was also completely draining.
At some point, I began to realize the price of all this.
When someone refuses to let you in, you can’t dance at the party forever. Eventually, you realize the music is too loud and the lights are too bright.
It’s like being high on adrenaline and chaos, waiting for the inevitable crash. And that crash always comes when you’re with someone who is avoidant.
Learning to value depth over performance
I started viewing things differently in my 30s.
I had friends who used to be avoidant but had the courage to go to therapy and build inner security. They all said healing made them quieter. One even joked, “I used to entertain everyone into loving me. Now I can sit in silence and be ok.”
That hit harder than I expected.
Because it made me realize the difference between what we call boring and what is actually peace.
The consistency of a secure bond doesn’t need highs and lows. It doesn’t rely on performance or constant escape routes. It just is.
I won’t pretend I don’t still enjoy the company of avoidant people. They’re full of fun, and I’ve always admired their autonomy.
But I no longer confuse their surface-level excitement with the kind of connection that sustains me.
Now I see the barrier for what it is. I can respect what it protects, while also recognizing that genuine intimacy asks for that barrier to be lowered.
Maybe that’s part of why avoidant people are so fun to be around.
They’ve learned to master the performance of lightness, the act of entertaining, and the art of not needing too much.
But performance isn’t the foundation for connection.
Real connection comes from presence. Even when that presence is messy.
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Are You Addicted to Emotionally Unavailable People? Here’s Why It Feels So Good was originally published in Activated Thinker on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
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