How long should no-contact last based on my ex's attachment style?
Short answer: No-contact length depends on your ex's attachment style. A dismissive- avoidant ex typically needs three to six months since they repress emotion and keep people at arm's length. A fearful-avoidant ex usually needs one to three months, sometimes longer after repeated trust breaks. An anxious- preoccupied ex needs the least time, since they tend to resolve things and reach back out quickly.
Not every breakup calls for the same length of no-contact, and in this video Benny Lichtenwalner lays out why: your ex’s attachment style determines how long they need before they’re capable of coming back around.
A dismissive-avoidant ex, shaped by childhood neglect, keeps people at a distance by default and gets defensive under pressure, so this archetype needs the longest window, often three to six months. A fearful-avoidant ex, shaped by trauma or a serious trust break, reacts to conflict rather than repressing it, which generally shortens the timeline to one or three months, though repeated betrayals like cheating can push that well past three months. An anxious-preoccupied ex, shaped by inconsistent care or early abandonment, needs the shortest window of the three, since the same fear of abandonment that made them roll over in conflict also tends to pull them back toward resolving things quickly.
Benny’s larger point is that no-contact length isn’t a fixed rule of thumb, it’s a read on your specific ex’s wiring. Misjudging the archetype, treating a fearful-avoidant like a dismissive-avoidant, or rushing an anxious ex the way you’d wait out a dismissive one, is one of the more common ways people sabotage a no-contact period that was otherwise working.
Full transcript
Here are the four archetypes of exes and how long it takes in no-contact for each one, depending on their attachment style. I'm Benny, I help people get their exes back, and before I did this I was a dating coach for five years, watching how attraction forms between people. I use that experience to help you get your ex back now. It's important to know the archetype of your ex so you can figure out how to handle things, and if you have to go into no-contact, roughly how long it's going to last. There are four: secure, and three insecure styles. We're not going to talk about secure here. The first insecure style is dismissive-avoidant. This is someone who was emotionally neglected in childhood and keeps people at arm's length in a relationship. They often have low self-esteem, can run depressed or anxious underneath, feel like they're not good enough, and don't open up about their feelings. They get defensive easily because they already feel broken, and a lot of them are people-pleasers on the surface. Depending on the length of the relationship, you could be in no-contact anywhere from three to six months with this archetype, depending on the full circumstances. The next archetype is fearful-avoidant. This is someone who's been through some kind of trauma, emotional, mental, verbal, physical, or from being cheated on, and a big trust break in particular. They trauma-respond in the relationship, overreacting to certain stimulus because it registers as danger, then they want to run and put their walls up to protect themselves. These are the people who fight in conflict and won't drop an issue, who go through your phone wanting to know where you were. Because they don't repress emotion the way a dismissive-avoidant does, they generally take a little less time in no-contact, often a month up to about three months. But in outlier cases, especially with repeated cheating or betrayal, it can take upwards of six months. The last archetype is anxious-preoccupied: someone who was either abandoned in their youth or had a parent who was hot and cold with them, which created anxiety around when they'll get love. These are the people who don't stand their ground in conflict, they roll over and give in because they're afraid of abandonment. If an anxious person breaks up with you, it's often because they've temporarily shifted into avoidant behavior after feeling walked over, and if that's the case, treat them like the fearful-avoidant archetype above. But if they're truly anxious- preoccupied, you don't want to leave them alone too long, since they tend to rebound toward resolving things quickly rather than sit in silence.
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