ABSTRACT
This chapter draws on clinical work with individuals and couples to consider how people with avoidant/dismissing strategies cope with long-term relationships. When an avoidant person is paired with a more preoccupied partner then a pursuer/withdrawer pattern tends to emerge; when avoidant individuals form a couple they collaborate together to minimise vulnerability and avoid intimacy. The chapter considers sub-groups of this type of minimising attachment style along with their antecedents in childhood. Research shows that people with this attachment style derive little satisfaction from relationships, their lack of connection to their own internal world makes attunement to a partner difficult and their care-seeking and care-giving skills are underdeveloped. Meanwhile, sexuality may become overdeveloped in order to de-activate attachment needs. When Bowlby identified the universality of attachment needs, he indicated how attachment longings are equally strong in an avoidant person. These people may only come to therapy if desperate or if dragged along by a partner; once there, the therapist hopes to provide a containing experience that enables them to stay long enough to commit fully to the work.
