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Don't Put up With THIS From an Avoidant (And What To Do)

Channel: ManTalks
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcMfJIlS--E

Connor Beaton describes "the flip," a tactic he says avoidant partners use to dodge responsibility by making a partner's normal need for closeness look like a problem, and offers steps for responding.

Key points

  • Avoidant people experience pressed-for closeness and intimacy as a threat to their individuality and independence, so they push it away.
  • Two situations trigger this: (1) asking for more closeness (regular texting, date nights, more frequent contact), and (2) trying to reconnect after conflict with mutual accountability.
  • The flip: you express normal, healthy desire for connection and the avoidant acts like you are crazy, needy, or the problem, shifting responsibility and creating distance. Beaton notes this does not apply if you are genuinely hyper-anxious and text-bombing.
  • Staying avoidant is also a power position: it gives control, security, and a superiority stance ("you want too much"). This can leave the partner feeling gaslit.
  • In secure-avoidant or anxious-avoidant pairings, the secure/anxious partner does most of the relational lifting and may take on too much responsibility while the avoidant avoids looking at their part.
  • What to do:
  • Recognizing they are avoidant helps; like an addict admitting a problem, they must reach that realization themselves. Do not try to convince or corner them; offer resources and invite conversation.
  • Stand your ground and reinforce that the closeness you want is normal and reasonable, while being honest with yourself that you are not operating from a needy, anxious place.
  • If you do sometimes act needy or insecure, own it without blaming them, and still ask them to look at their part.
  • Ask what their resistance to the specific request is, and what threat it represents to their independence or freedom.
  • Share your vision for the relationship and ask whether they are willing to work toward it. Give them choice rather than demands, threats, or attempts to fix or coerce them, which builds trust over time.