Why You Keep Falling for Emotionally Unavailable People

Have you ever fallen for someone charming, mysterious, and addictively inconsistent? They gave you just enough to hold your interest… but no real security.

Your relationship was a roller coaster. One moment, they made you feel like you meant everything to them. And the next moment, it was as though you were invisible.

Instead of moving on, you told yourself that they just needed time. You even convinced yourself that if you loved them enough, they would come around eventually.

But they never did.

If this isn’t your first rodeo and it’s become a pattern, you might be asking yourself: Why do I keep falling for emotionally unavailable people?

There are five reasons… and none of them are easy to process.

1. Your Nervous System Confuses Chaos and Love

It’s scary, but the truth is that most of us find emotional unavailability to be exciting. We just don’t realize it.

Someone who is demonstrating a hot-and-cold pattern is creating a cycle of hope. This leads to the brain’s dopamine system turning on — the same system that’s activated by addiction.

When you feel the uncertainty and unpredictability that comes with an emotionally unavailable partner, your nervous system is mistaking chaos and anxiety for love and chemistry. In reality, you’re addicted.

For some of us, it stems back to our childhoods. If you were raised in an environment where you experienced inconsistent love, then what an emotionally unavailable person has to offer may feel familiar. Familiarity can create a false sense of safety.

2. You Want What You Can’t Have

When we perceive something as rare or difficult to obtain, we place it on a pedestal. We think it’s more valuable than it actually is, which can lead to us obsessively wanting what we can’t have. As a result, we make it a pursuit to win their love, since we as humans have an innate desire to overcome obstacles.

3. You Have Low Self-Worth

This pill can be hard to swallow, but we have to talk about it.

People who have low self-worth are willing to accept emotionally unavailable people due to the way they secretly feel about themselves.

If you’ve ever felt like you’re not enough, too much, or hard to love, then you will subconsciously choose partners and situations that confirm those beliefs. And on the off-chance that you’re able to win their love, then it confirms that you’re worth it — because you were worth it to someone who doesn’t give away their love easily.

4. You Don’t Have to Be Emotionally Available, Either

This may be a twist that you didn’t see coming.

When you’re involved with an emotionally unavailable person, they act as a safety net because they don’t require you to be emotionally available, either. You don’t have to be vulnerable. In many cases, you don’t even have to be committed.

A lot of people who are involved with emotionally unavailable people are actually subconsciously self-sabotaging because they’re not ready to face their own emotional needs.

5. You’re in Love With a Fantasy

Falling for an emotionally unavailable person means falling in love with a fantasy. You fall in love with their potential. You believe that with more time, space, or love from you, they’ll become the person you want them to be. The perfect partner.

But you’re living your life stuck in a fantasy. The reality is that the relationship you’ve built exists only in your mind… not in real life. And this might be the hardest truth of all.

Now What?

If you’ve fallen for an emotionally unavailable person, you might feel like you’re broken or destined for this path. But that isn’t the case.

You’re just looking for this person to heal you, to validate you. You think that if they choose you, it will offer you validation. It will be evidence that you’re worth it.

But when you start choosing stability over chaos, security over butterflies, and reality over fantasy, everything will change.

You need to accept that you don’t need to win someone’s love. You need to realize that someone who doesn’t show up for you isn’t “the one.” It’s not love. It’s trauma bonding.

You need to realize that you deserve better. Because once you do, a love that you’re truly deserving of will find you.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.