Narcissist or Avoidant?
And why both feel so devastatingly familiar when you were raised by emotionally immature parents
There is a reason so many intelligent, high-achieving women find themselves caught in cycles with difficult men.
It isn’t weakness.
It isn’t desperation.
It isn’t lack of standards.
It’s psychology
And most importantly:
It’s your nervous system recognising a dynamic you were trained to survive.
Women who grew up with emotionally immature, narcissistic, inconsistent or chaotic caregivers develop a radar for:
men who cannot meet them
men they have to work hard to be chosen by
men who punish vulnerability
men who make love feel like an audition
men whose emotional temperature determines the entire relationship
The dating pool is full of two archetypes who replicate this wound perfectly:
The Narcissist
and
The Avoidant
They look almost identical at first. Both leave you equally destabilised.
But their psychologies could not be more different.
This is the guide I wish every woman had before she blamed herself for the behaviour of men who were always running from themselves, not from her.
Why YOU trigger shame (and why ‘shiny’ women trigger fantasy)
Women like you - attuned, deep, emotionally literate, intuitive - are kryptonite to emotionally avoidant and narcissistic men.
Not because you’re “too much.”
But because you see beneath the mask.
These men carry the same core wound:
“If someone sees the real me, they’ll discover I’m not enough.”
Your emotional presence feels like exposure.
So what do avoidants do?
panic
disappear after intimacy
return when the shame settles
repeat forever
Your depth awakens the parts of him he spends his life avoiding.
He doesn’t disappear from you.
He disappears from the version of himself that he becomes in your presence - tender, real, unmasked.
‘Shiny’ women trigger fantasy
Every avoidant chases distraction. This isn’t about looks - it’s about surface-level stimulation:
image
performance
ego validation
novelty
sexual escape
social prestige
They can perform around these women.
They don’t have to feel.
They don’t have to be honest.
They don’t have to grow.
‘Shiny’ women let men stay boys.
YOU require adulthood.
Fantasy is easy.
Reality is terrifying.
You are reality.
How Narcissists & Avoidants choose their women
Narcissists choose:
beauty
youth
status
obedience
emotional labour
convenience
You are an accessory - a trophy to reinforce their image.
When you stop mirroring their ego and start expressing needs, boundaries, or independence?
You’re punished or discarded.
They don’t love you.
They love the reflection of themselves they see in your admiration.
Avoidants don’t objectify you.
They split you.
To them, women fall into two categories:
the women they desire
the women they can be known by
They don’t know how to integrate the two.
If they feel deep eroticism and emotional closeness, they panic.
Most men have never learned that sex and love can live in the same woman.
You become too:
intimate
deep
psychologically equal
emotionally confronting
soul-level
grounded
erotic AND nurturing
They want you.
But they can’t stay with you.
Avoidants will often hide the women they care about.
Not because you’re shameful but because their shame says they don’t deserve you.
A narcissist LEAVES to assert power.
An avoidant LEAVES to escape shame.
That is the difference.
Why avoidants always run from the women they care about
With a ‘shiny’ woman, the avoidant feels:
in control
impressive
ego-inflated
distracted
safe from real intimacy
emotionally numb
With a ‘deep’ woman, he feels:
emotionally exposed
accountable
vulnerable
confronted
deeply attached
afraid of losing her
afraid of being loved
afraid of what love demands
To stay he would have to:
stop numbing
stop performing
stop avoiding
stop fragmenting
stop running
step into emotional adulthood
Most avoidants are not ready for this.
So they flee to the shallows.
It’s not about your worth.
It’s about his avoidance of himself.
Why these men always come back…
Narcissists return because they want supply.
Avoidants return because they want safety.
Neither returns because they’ve changed.
Men don’t choose “better.”
Men choose easier.
The ‘shiny’ woman temporarily inflates his ego but starves his soul.
But you meet him at the level of self he hasn’t yet grown into.
Avoidants ALWAYS circle back to the ‘deep’ woman because she was the one who made him feel like the man he wasn’t ready to be.
How to stop thinking you’re the problem
Your pattern isn’t that you’re unlovable.
Your pattern is that you choose men who cannot love themselves.
A man who hasn’t metabolised…
shame
trauma
fragmentation
identity confusion
compulsive escape
addictive avoidance
emotional immaturity
… cannot love YOU.
And you cannot love the version of him that doesn’t exist.
You are not “unchosen.”
You are simply incompatible with men who haven’t grown into emotional adulthood.
The kind of man your nervous system is actually built for
You need a man who has outgrown:
fantasy
numbing
image addiction
performative masculinity
shame-driven avoidance
shiny women
ego chasing
emotional insolvency
You need:
stable presence
consistency
emotional literacy
duty
reliability
adult responsibility
embodied masculinity
grounded sexuality
no identity fragmentation
This man is rarer. But he exists.
He just isn’t found in the men who are still performing a masculinity they don’t trust.
You belong in the world of emotionally adult men.
Your path is slower, not smaller.
Your love is deeper, not delayed.
And the right man, the grown man, will not be intimidated by being seen by you.
He will be relieved