Ex-avoidant boyfriend goes back to other ex for years!!!

Reading these accounts from two people who seem to have truly gotten through to their avoidant exes is extraordinary. It really gives me hope. I wanted to join the conversation to ask for both of your advice. Here's my story, which I'm crossposting from another forum, with a few edits:

"A few months ago I met someone I believed to be very special. I'm in my mid thirties and I've been divorced for two and a half years. Prior to the marriage ending the relationship was very traumatic for around the same length of time. This new relationship was the first time in years that I have met someone and actually believed we might have a future together. Her life experience is different to mine, but with one key similarity: neither one of us had connected with anyone for a very long time until we met each other.

She's two years older than me, and told me she's unsure if she has ever been in love. I believe her longest prior relationship was two to three years, and she claims to have stayed far longer than she ought have. Other relationships have been short and unsatisfying. Additionally, she is an only child whose father abandoned her and her mother, seemingly leaving them in virtual poverty. She is independent and by all appearances very resilient. She moved to a big city at eighteen and has lived on her own since. Like me, she hadn't formed any meaningful connections in several years, and this was a source of sadness to her. She had essentially given up, to hear her tell it.

Just the same, when we met the connection was instantaneous and beautiful. We were both stunned that such a thing was even possible. It wasn't super intense or anxious... it was just really good, and kind, and incredibly joyful, and we had fun and made each other laugh. Our first date lasted thirteen hours, and we spoke on the phone when I got home. She's intelligent, and can be very insightful, and like that... we fell in love. I know how it sounds... but it felt strangely stable, like two people at a time in their lives who were both ready, and were making a conscious choice to 'go for it'.

For three and a half months we were inseparable, usually at her invitation. I was introduced to her social circle. "I love yous" were eventually exchanged, and felt earned (if early). Plans were made to visit family interstate. Children and a future were discussed and we both seemed amazed and joyful at the prospect. She told her friends she felt she'd finally met 'her person'. It was very 'couply' and domestic. It didn't feel like an affair or a fling. It wasn't intense in a clingy way. It felt like a real, solid, worthwhile relationship. Not only that, but so much of this was by her initiative.

Then, to my astonishment, she sat me down one day and I saw panic in her eyes. She ended it on the spot. It took all of five minutes and seemed incredibly detached and cold. I was given my toothbrush and a shirt I'd left at her apartment, and sent home. ...While I had begun to sense some distancing and irritability from her, this was still a complete shock. She had invited me on a trip that morning. She had booked movie tickets for us for a couple of days later. She had said "I love you" the day before, without being prompted by me.

What had supposedly triggered this sudden change of heart?

Simply this: I had forgotten to make the bed (something she'd asked me not to do).

Obviously it's not that simple, and she didn't pretend otherwise, but the question of whether I was trustworthy or dependable was clearly of deep importance to her, and she had become disconnected and fearful as a result of it. She admitted a loss of connection had been percolating for a while, based on the feeling that I would be unreliable, but she hadn't purposefully revealed it to me. Earlier there had been an incident during which I had (very slightly) pushed back against criticism with a mildly elevated voice. I later learned that while she had gotten irritable at the time, she didn't communicate how much this had truly upset her. She hadn't slept that night worrying about it. The next day she confessed it had made not trust me. It seems it was all downhill from there.

About a week after we broke up we spoke on the phone. She said she still wanted to find the connection between us and that there were moments when it came back, but that she worried it was gone for good and that she just couldn't see things working out. She told me, among other things, that she didn't know if I'd be a dependable father. I assure you I will be a completely devoted and engaged father, and nothing about my life suggests otherwise. I can be a bit scatterbrained, but i'm a good, decent, emotionally attentive man.

I am utterly heartbroken and bereft in light of all this. This is the first time I've been able to invest in a relationship since my divorce. Over a month later I am still in acute distress.

Obviously I recognize the pattern here. I just don't know what to do about it. This is someone I care about deeply. She is in her late thirties and claims to want kids. She doesn't seem to recognize (or at least hasn't acknowledged) that she is repeating patterns in her life and sabotaging something that could be deeply special for both of us.

At first I was very confused and sometimes angry. We met for lunch and while I was far from aggressive, I was clearly hurt and communication was awkward. I told her I felt I'd been really jerked around, given all the indications that had been given to me about this thing being serious and longterm. Due to her sensitivity to anything resembling criticism this only confirmed her sense that she was making the right decision. She told me she had been on a date, and when I registered my hurt feelings she sadly said: "We all cope in different ways."

"What's yours?" I asked.

"Avoidance", she said.

Since then the lines of communication have been open and the correspondence we've had has been affectionate, but she has been adamant that it's over. She said that she really tried very hard (which means she did so alone, because she wasn't communicating the loss of connection to me), but that it was a fantasy and that she was simply overcome by doubts about me as a reliable partner.

On the one hand she has seemed fine about all this, but there have been moments when she says things that indicate it's a big deal to her. She started out believing in it so strongly, and then just changed her mind based on seemingly small triggers and deactivation strategies. I suppose I'm maybe just rationalizing being dumped, but it sure seems like avoidant attachment to me.

While I have suffered over this (in ways of which I thought myself no longer capable), the most acute sadness I have felt has been that of grieving for her. I have attempted to let her know that I am trustworthy and dependable and that my love for her is the real deal, but I don't know what else to do. One can't say these things and simply be believed when one is being shouted over by thirty six years of attachment style. Unlike attraction, trust has to be built over time, and I wasn't really given that chance.

She claims to still care about me and to want to be friends in time. She says the connection was real, but couldn't last. She's much more empathetic in her communication over text than her apparent in person coldness would imply, and admitted that the lunch we had really upset her, which had not been at all clear at the time. She says she's no good at hiding her emotions. I find the opposite is true.

What can I do, to care for myself in my distress and to save the relationship (if that is possible or healthy), but also so as to truly love and support this person?

Thank you if you can help"

And later, this further comment:

"I have great ambivalence about this situation. On the one hand, I recognize that this person clearly has major attachment trauma. On the other hand, I also know this relationship was actually very important to her. This is the first time in a very long time that she has "tried". Her friends were excited. Her Mom was happy about it. Everyone was thrilled, and then deeply disappointed when she ended it. She desperately wanted a normal life and a real relationship. She just didn't have the self awareness to understand what was happening when her attachment style kicked in, because as far as I know she doesn't even know attachment styles exist. Her deactivation strategies all came into play as a consequence of a lack of trust and a sense she was going to be let down, but the irony is she had actually found a man with a largely secure attachment who was likely to be understanding and patient about such matters and could have provided a secure base from which to make progress. Unfortunately it took me a while to realize what was happening, because she's very self reliant and seems strong and assertive, which made it difficult to recognize the enormous vulnerability that was being expressed. The point is that, yes, I'm hurt, but I also feel great sympathy for her, and I genuinely want to help, while also being wise. Of course as I'm still attached there's a large part of me that wants the relationship back, but if she were to ask I would be extremely cautious as I know it would all simply repeat again unless she gets the help she needs.

All of which is to say, my distress isn't merely about my own broken heart, though that's a significant part of it. It's also about not wanting to abandon someone and play a role in her perpetual self fulfilling prophecy of abandonment. How in God's name do you help an avoidant? If someone has an anxious attachment then reassuring them over time seems like more of a prospect as they're more likely to stay engaged, but an avoidant runs for the hills at the first sign of pain, deactivating and rationalizing and talking about how things "just won't work".

It's sad, you guys."

What do you think? Does this person sound fearfully avoidant? Did she just lose interest, or is it attachment trauma? What are the best ways to really be there for her in a stable way so I can provide the kind of benefit you both seem to have been capable of?