u/Far_Detective_2316

I have noticed that I visited a profile of one particular person. They have a public profile but their stories were hidden from me (I noticed it using my rat profile lol). After I visited, some time passed and I noticed that this person blocked me completely! I obviously didn't interact with their stories and didn't like any of their posts, however they somehow figured out I visited and blocked me?

Hey, guys!

I am trying to figure out if my ex was a DA or an FA. But honestly I don't really understand the difference, what are the simple ways to tell these types apart?

Hi all!

I am recovering from a breakup with a DA (or maybe FA, honestly, I am not completely sure) guy, it happened 1.5 months ago, we dated for 10 months and were friends before that for 2 years. We are in NC for around 1 month. I am trying hard to recover, started therapy and want to get closer to being secure.

Asking this to see what the timeline here could be and what to expect from them. Just wanted to read about your experiences to see what I should be ready for so that he won't destroy my healing progress.

Hi everyone!

I’m just trying to understand if his behavior sounds avoidant, or if I’m using attachment theory to make sense of a normal breakup. I'd be greatful if you look through my post and share your thoughts, thanks!

I’m 25 and he’s 31. We are both guys.

**How it started**
We were friends for almost two years before we started dating. After about a year and a half of friendship, I realized I had feelings for him. Around six months later, I met with him and told him how I felt. He said the feelings were mutual. However, later that same evening, he messaged me saying that he didn’t think he was ready for a relationship and that relationships might simply not be for him. I replied that we didn’t have to make huge promises and suggested that we could just try dating and see how it went. He agreed, and we ended up being together for almost a year. Back then I just thought he texted it because his ex was cheating on him and broke up with him that's why I thought he had some fears to start a new relationship.

**Why I think he is an avoidant**
I often felt that I was the one initiating contact, suggesting meetings and trying to create more closeness. When I once told him very gently that I would like us to spend more time together, he reacted quite defensively, as if I were criticizing him. (though I used those 'I-messages' to communicate it and I even showed my message to some of my friends and they confirmed it didn't look offensive).

Another important detail is that, while we were already in a relationship, he later admitted that he had met his ex specifically to check whether he still had feelings for him. He said that he felt nothing and chose our relationship, but he only told me about this several months later. Looking back, this feels like a serious breach of trust to me, especially because he didn’t discuss his doubts with me beforehand.

Simply after time together he ofter did shoutdown for a while which made me really anxious thinking I did something wrong.
He could also take a lot of time to respond even to something simple like "hey, what's up". Even though it literally takes 10 seconds to respond. At the same time he could post stories while my message was still unread.

**Why I think he is not an avoidant**
He openly talked about wanting to spend more time with me, wanted to start going to the gym with me, talked about future trips together, and even two weeks before the breakup he was still making plans with me.

He also admitted that he had feelings for me before we started dating, even though he initially said he wasn't ready for a relationship.

When we were meeting in person, he was always trying to keep physical contact with me and pull me closer to him.

He always told me that he doesn't think giving gifts for holidays is necessary whereas I told him that I wish we did it. So, after that he actually started bringing me some gifts for holidays.

Because of all that, I'm struggling to understand whether this really sounds like avoidant attachment, or simply someone who genuinely cared about me but later realized the relationship wasn't right for him.

**How we broke up**
Then one morning at around 5 AM, just about month ago, he sent me a breakup message. He said he had been thinking about it for a long time and had realized that he could no longer love me as a partner, only as a friend. He also said he hoped we could remain friends. I hate to say it, but I agreed to it but since then we didn't talk much. I responded something to some of his stories and once asked how is he, he did pretty much the same from his side. Though he was watching and liking most of my stories within like 15 minutes since I posted them. Also he once mentioned that he misses the time when we were friends but while I still have feelings for him, we can't be friends (that's his words). This made my think of that classic avoidant thing that they want to keep you but don't want closeness and vulnerability.

**How I feel now**
I really hate myself for how I allowed him to do to me all those things that I mentioned in "Why I think he is an avoidant" section and also because I allowed him to make me feel so anxious and that I'm "too much" or "not good enough" and that I didn't really do anything about it. I'm generally a very anxious person (not only when it comes to relationships) but now I don't feel anxious when I think about him anymore. Obviously, it's only 1 month since the breakup and I still miss him and still think a lot about him, and still would want him back. I miss our time together, we really had a lot of good time together. But still I decided to never reach out to him first again.

So, avoidant or not? What do you think?