Why I Didn’t Take Your Call…

Why does an avoidant attachment person take long to text back? 

From Quora:

The clue is in the title, my friend…

We avoid.

I’ve yet to be officially diagnosed (evidently they aren’t a big fan of labels this side of the pond) but hopefully my avoidant tendencies qualify me to help you out here.

I have major anxiety around my phone.

And I mean, major.

I cannot remember the last time I had the thing unmuted. Whenever it rings, my thought processes go something like this:

Who?

Oh, right it’s you… ok then.

Dammit, why are you calling when you know I’m better at texts?

Should I answer?

What if you want to chat for ages?

What if you’ve got a huge problem you want me to listen to and empathise about? If I do it today then I’m responsible for checking in & making sure you’re OK and following up on it and all kinds of scary commitmenty type stuff I just can’t cope with right now.

Oh man, what if you want me to go somewhere?

Ugh is this some kind of horrible surprise being sprung on me?

I’m not sure I can deal today.

Meh, I’ll call you back after *insert self-deceptive excuse here*

Call rings out.

Then comes the fretting:

What is wrong with me?

I do not deserve friends/family/people who give a shit.

Oh god, what if something awful happened?

What if you called to tell me something life-destroying?

Well, then I did the right thing not answering – ignorance is bliss.

The loop of fear is then normally disrupted by a text.

Texts I can kinda handle because you have no idea if I’ve read it or not. You don’t know if I’m ignoring you, if my battery died or if I’m out of signal. This gives me time to read, digest and plan a plausible reply.

DO NOT GET MY STARTED ON THE DAMN WHATSAPP TICK. THAT THING EXISTS PURELY TO TORMENT WEIRDOS LIKE ME!

Collapsed Reply:

Avoidants need to decide to either grow up and change no matter how painful it is – or to just self isolate and never interact with anyone. They seem to feel entitled to having their cake while also eating it – and also eating your cake – and lack the empathy to be trusted to roam free and destroy others

My Response:

If I lacked the empathy to be trusted with others, surely my thought process would’ve been: ‘X is calling, there is nothing I need from them right now so I won’t waste my time answering.’

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